Welcome to Sober Sunrise, a podcast bringing you AA speaker meetings with stories of experience, strength, and hope from around the world. We bring you several new speakers weekly, so be sure to subscribe. If you'd like to help us remain self-supporting, please visit our website at sober-rise.com.

Whether you join us in the morning or at night, there's nothing better than a sober sunrise. We hope that you enjoy today's speaker. >> Hello everybody.

My name is Ed Mutum and I'm an alcoholic. >> By the grace of God, the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous and sponsorship. I haven't found it necessary to take a drink or a mood altering chemical since January 5th of 1971.

And I'm really pleased about that. Yeah, I know. I'm too young and too pretty to have that much time, but uh I'm delighted to be here.

I want to thank Joanne for asking me. And I love to do retreats. And I'll tell you why I love to do retreats.

Because lives change at these. If you've been coming, you already know that. If you're new, you're about to experience it.

It may be your life. This is a place where God lives intensely. And I'm really grateful about that.

And uh I'm really grateful anytime I have I actually don't have a retreat business. I'm a pastor, which is kind of a retreat business, I guess. But don't hold that against me.

You heard my talk first. You know, it's kind of you got to apologize for being a pastor anymore. You never hear any good jokes either.

No, you don't. It's like I'll be talking, I'll be at a convention or something, and I always like to go by Ed. You know, Ed's the way I got sober, and that's the way I like it.

But a lot of people call me Reverend and pastor, and I always say, "Whatever's comfortable to you. I, you know, I want you to be comfortable." And it's funny, I'll be in some place talking and somebody will come up and say,"Reverend Ed, how are you?" And I'll turn back to that person. All of a sudden, the conversation totally changed.

Well, you know, I go to church every Sunday or I've been thinking about it. I said, you know, don't get guilty on me. That's not, you know, that's your deal.

That ain't my deal. But it's really funny. It's really funny.

I l I would have never believed that I'd be a pastor. Gee, I'm telling you. Well, you'll know pretty quickly.

And I thought what I'd do tonight is tell you my story because one of the things that's important to me is when somebody's talking to me about their steps, about the steps, and I am not an expert. You know, I am blessed to be doing this over 35 years, and that's that's wonderful. But all I am is a guy who's got some experience, strength, and hope that I want to share with you.

Uh if your sponsor tells you something different, excellent. They're probably right. You know, I'm not here to cause what what a good friend of mine says, Ed, your job is to comfort comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

And uh I guess that's what I do. You know why? Because uh we're losing more people out of AA than we've ever lost before.

For the first time in our history, AA's membership flatlined last year. Flatlined. There was no growth.

Now, that's never happened before. And one of the reasons it's happening is we're losing people from both ends. Uh I believe we lose people when they come in uh to a treatment center and they're told a lot of things are AA that aren't AA and they get into the psychology of sobriety, which is a wonderful thing.

It's just not alcoholic synonymous. Uh and they get that honestly confused. So one of the things I hope to do this weekend uh is is bring some clarity in into how I understand that.

Not that it's right, not that it's wrong. And it's certainly right for me. It's certainly right for me because uh my best thinking is what got me here.

The finest ideas I could come up with got me to Alcoholics Anonymous. I was taken to my first a meeting when I was 10 years old. I've got a brother in Newberry, South Carolina, sober 44 years.

He's so dry we don't let people smoke around him anymore. You know, like he'll go up in flames. And he took me to ANA.

God. And I remember going to ANA and there was some old guy up here about 20 25. My name's Fred and I'm an alcoholic and I thought, "Good for you, Fred." You know, and I just didn't particularly care for it.

Plus, they lied to me. They lied to me right off. Yeah.

Everybody says, "Oh, I've never been lied to an A." Well, I have. Still hear the lie. Still hear the lie.

They said to me, "If you keep drinking and using, you're going to die." And you know what I thought? Excellent. Where do I sign up?

because I was tired of living already. I wanted a way out. Dying didn't scare me then, but for a whole set of different reasons.

It doesn't scare me today. I promise you. Just doesn't at all.

Because if I've ever had a chance to go into that other place or into the other room, it's no. So, uh, I remember a few years ago, I had a heart problem. I was up in the North Woods in northern Wisconsin chopping trees, which I did every year.

And for the first time, I went down and with bad chest pains. Being a good alcoholic, I waited to the end of my vacation to to go to the doctor. We don't want to rush into anything.

And uh went down there and he took me through all these tests and he was he was doing uh all the nuclear stuff and all that. He called me into his office on it was on a Monday night cuz I had to go in Tuesday. And he called me in.

He said, "Ed," he said, "You know, your heart is not in good shape." He said, "You've had a massive heart attack before." And he said, "The upper part of your heart isn't doing too well either." And he said, "We need you in here at 5:00 in the morning." He said, "Go home and get your affairs in order." And I said, "Well, okay. Okay." And he said, "Ed, do do you get the gravity of what I'm talking?" He said, "Yeah, I get it." Yeah. So, Ed, I don't think you understand.

He said, "I need you to go home, make sure all your affairs." I said, "Yeah, I get I get." And he said, "No, no, I don't think I do." I said, "Doc, you don't get it. You're threatening me with heaven." And he looked at me said, "Well, I never heard of it that quite that way before." I said, "That's the way it is, baby. I'm clean.

Whatever I got to do, I'll do." You know, but isn't that a wonderful way to be? It just doesn't scare me anymore. Now, oddly enough, you can make of this what you wanted.

Prayers went out for me all over the world. And they asked what I wanted prayed for, and I said, "The people who love me, because this is awfully quick, and if something should happen, their hearts will be broken." I said, "I want you to pray for them cuz they really loved me well." And they didn't listen to me. They prayed for a healing and I went into the hospital that next day and they all of a sudden put me up on the angoplasty.

And if you've ever had one of those fun things, they they run a a camera and all that up your groin and the vein and you can watch yourself on TV, which I wanted to see. And the doctor's pumping away on this heart thing. And he said, "Eddie said, I don't get it." And I said, "What don't you get?" He said, "Your heart's perfect.

you got the heart of an 11year-old. He said, "We must have made a mistake." I said, "Well, you call it what you want and I'll call it what I want. Have a good day, Don." And to this day, whenever I see Dr.

Cory, he goes, but anyway, that's the way the weekend's going to be. I don't use notes. Uh, not that I think I'm brilliant.

I just want the spirit to lead me wherever we need to go. And I want to be in tune with what the room needs. And I believe everybody puts off an energy.

It's a good energy or a bad energy. I don't hang around much with bad energy cuz I just don't want to play. I used to love bad energy.

I used to be a creator of bad energy. Uh but I started drinking at a very early age. I don't know when I started drinking.

Dad used to think it was funny to give me a drink and get me drunk when I was a kid. I was the youngest of seven and I come from a very elite group of people called white trash. And um you know there were certain things that were expected of us and by gosh we came through with all of them you know and and we were just a a group that the cops were at the house every week and I hated life going in.

I hated life going I don't know about you but I had this sense that there's something wrong with me that I'm somehow different. There's something wrong with me now. Oddly enough 35 years later I think of it.

Is there something right about me? There's something different. Ain't that amazing?

See, my biggest problem going is I started to conform to what you thought I should be. And you know what they thought I should be? They thought I should be dead by the time I'm 20.

They thought I should go to prison the same way my brother was in prison. They thought all those things. And I thought, okay, guess they're right.

I started doing something then that I carried into my sobriety. And I have to be very careful today not to do it. And I call it my 299 to1 theory.

I could walk into a room of 300 people. 299 could turn around to me and say, "Ed, you're the best. We love you." One could go, "Jerk." Guess who I remembered?

I'd set up in bed three nights later going, "Why would they say that? Why would they think that? Even sober.

What? Somebody doesn't like me. Now, I'd beat you to death when I was out there on the street, but god forbid you didn't like me, you know, and and and I would collect those ones in my life.

It got to the point of where in my life and in every area of my life, the 299 didn't even exist anymore. It was just the ones that I remembered. That teacher, that teacher in kindergarten, the first day I went to school, smacked me right across the face.

Miss Kasich, not that I remember. And um I remember Miss Kasich, but you know some years ago I was thinking about that and I remember Miss Kasich well but I can't remember all the other wonderful teachers that tried their best to help me. They never worked their way into my story was the one.

Miss Kasich, my kindergarten teacher and I hated school but my own choice all the while I went there. Thank God they booted me out in seventh grade and I was pleased they did because I hadn't been paying attention for a couple years anyway. But I just I I was just tired.

I got sober at 20 years old and a lot of people think, "Oh, that's young." Well, you know, how old do you have to be to die? What is the age limit on that? We were talking at supper.

And one of the things I get a kick out of is people go, "Oh, it's so good to see you get this so young." And I think, you know, if we were cancer survivors, would we go into the hospital of a 16-year-old go, you know, we're so glad you got cancer so young? You won't have to hurt like we did. Your chemo will be much easier.

What are people? Well, I know what they're thinking. But isn't that crazy?

I uh I had to drink to balance the ones in my life cuz the ones were killing me. I'd wake up with the ones and I'd blot out the ones and I'd blot them out. But you know what had happened that next morning when I'd wake and the terror of the ones I had a faith long before I got to AA.

Now I had a lot of ones about church and about God. I mean to be offensive to no one please believe me. But my my feeling about God at a very early age is bring him down.

I'll beat the sheet off the punk. If he's a god, why is there starving children? If he's a god, why isn't there any food in our refrigerator?

Yeah, you good. God is good. Really?

Come to my house. You could say I had a little issue with God. And uh I I collected a lot of ones.

And you can collect a lot of ones where God's concerned. I remember when I was 10 years old, I had a cousin, Linda. If there was anybody close to God, it was Linda.

She was amazing. She was beautiful. She was talented.

She was at the top of her class. I couldn't stand her. She just did everything right.

And in my heart, she was up here and I was down here. Like my older sister, I used to call her Miss Titsy Pritzell. And I remember making my amends.

It's one of the tougher ones I made. I said, "I am so sorry that I gave you so much help cuz you were so kind and so good, but I felt I never could compete, so I'd attack you." And she cried. And she said, "I couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong." And I said, "No, sis.

It's you were doing everything right." And I didn't never see me being able to do that, you know. And uh the ones in church, my cousin Linda was walking across the streets one day and a truck hit and killed her, knocked her 200 ft. And I went to the funeral and people were saying, "God must have wanted an angel." And I thought, "So he hits you with a truck.

I'll pass. You know, you know what? I still do.

That's how he makes angels. I just assumed not be one. You know, and I started collecting ones.

God rips people out of your life. People that you really care about cuz he thinks they're more needed there. So, that was a one in my bag about church.

I remember going to church. My mother, God bless her, I used to think she's crazy. She's just start ravening crazy.

I'm the youngest of seven children. She had an alcoholic husband and she'd be sitting there in the house. She'd be coming down.

She'd be reading scripture and I think she's nuts. And I've realized no, she was the only sane one there. But she had been, "Thank God to Alanon." And I'm not one of these people that take any shots at Alanon.

I thank God for Alanon because uh you gave my mother, you helped give my mother her sanity and peace back. She had a terribly strong faith but was losing it because of alcoholism and because of the steps and the work she did in Alanon. She regained her faith and came back stronger than it had ever been.

And in fact, you gave me back my mother. You know, it's funny how when we talk in AA and in Alanon, I don't know about you, but I bash I was a parent abuser. We never mention that, but I was a I'd tell you what they didn't do for me, >> but I was a horrible kid.

I was a challenger. My mother told me no, I'd stay on her till she broke down in tears and would say, "For crying out loud, Ed, just go do it. You're going to do it anyway." And I'd laugh.

And I got the nerve to come in here and tell you I didn't have good parents. No, my parents had a big problem. They had a real rotten kid.

And it wasn't about me being alcoholic. It was about me being an having a bad attitude by choice and mixed alcohol in with it. You know, I don't want to blame all my defects of character on my ism.

It was on my personality and a lot of choices I made as well. That's why when I get sober, that's why a lot of people in my experience have a lot of trouble cuz they do a pretty good job of handling the booze problem, but these other monsters come creeping up on them and get them by the throat and then they're saying, "What's this all about?" Well, there's a lot of areas of our life. In my understanding, we got to work these steps in every area of our life.

That's what we're going to be talking about this week. Because I promise you this, whatever area of your life you're not working this program, it's the one that owns you. It's the one that owns you or will own you.

It's just that simple. And uh I remember I'd go to church and there was some guy said up front, all spiritual people have thin blue lips. Talk like this.

ministers, rabbis, priests, you name all talk like this. And there was this guy sitting in the front row. He had thin blue lips, too.

And I looked at him and I thought, you know, he looked a lot happier in the bar last night. He really honest, he really looked a lot happier. And I don't know who that grumpy broad is he's sitting with, but the gal he was with last night seemed to be a lot more fun, too.

And he'd sit there and go, "And you know what I thought? Hypocrite. Now, I know you're not this sick, but I was.

I didn't only judge that guy and his wife in that row. I judged entire organized religion by my little narrow mind and my little narrow point of view for years. Absolutely.

For years. You see, I had my ones. And if I had my ones, reality didn't count.

I'd look at my ones, and the ones were what was killing me. And uh so when I imagine my disappointment when I got to he and in the old days they did I always love people that say I love the that spiritual part there is no spiritual part the steps are spiritual in essence there's an intellectual part but it is a spiritual program spiritual and it's its entire its entire message is to help you find a relationship with God that you can live with. That's what it's about.

It isn't about improving self. It isn't about processing and working through and it isn't about it's about surrender. Just the opposite.

When I first come into a we used to spend a lot of time about humility and smashing the ego at depth. You don't hear that much anymore. Now they call it self-esteem when it's dressed up as ego and self-righteousness and I deserve this and I deserve that.

I don't know about you. That's what got me here. That's nothing new.

That's nothing new. Oh, you want me to think about me for a while? Gee, I'll try.

You know, don't know how I'll fit that into my busy schedule, but And not that it can't be helpful. Not that all that can't be wonderfully helpful, but if it's become your god, you got another problem. The answer is still out here or here rather than here.

Man, I uh I didn't like my life at all. At the ripe old age of 13, I was arrested by the Iowa Highway Patrol for possession of a sawoff shotgun. I had a double barrel 12 gauge and was 14 in long.

And when I pulled that out my size, I seemed to get a lot of attention. and I seem to be in charge and I really like that a lot. And I remember when the police pulled me over and they arrested me for that.

Uh the cops were going to teach me a lesson cuz I had a brother in prison. They said, "Let's throw him in a hole for a few days. Show them what it's like.

Let's teach him a lesson." They did. I was a cop fighter from then on. >> Absolutely.

If I saw a badge I swung, I don't care if you were crossing guard, I'd take you out, you know, just I would. You can't hurt me as much as you've already have was my head. Kill me, I'd be a hero.

I'd finally be something in my neighborhood. Cop took me out. Okay.

Isn't that amazing? And I believed it. I believed it.

So, January 5th of 1971 when I found myself waking up in the middle of the street after a car accident pretending like I was knocked out. I'm not sure why I was doing that, but it seemed like the thing to do at the time. All of a sudden, for the first time in my life, I didn't have any answers.

I didn't have any cute comebacks. Oh, I found those again later in AA. We'll talk about sarcasm this weekend.

Uh because I became an expert at it. I was running away the very people that love me the most with this charming little mouth. And uh but I was laying there that night and I remember the cops coming up and they said, "That's mute him.

Don't touch him. He's the scum of the earth. Don't even cover him.

And it was 18 below zero that night. Jawfully cold. And the most amazing thing happened.

I didn't have any argument left. I agreed. It was no longer the way I was raised, what I did or didn't have, what my family did or didn't give me, what how this person or that person treated me, whether I was molested or not.

And I'm one of those that was molested, enjoyed it quite a bit. I'm sorry. You know, it's just not popular to say, but I'm one of those that never had a problem with that.

Is it wrong? Sure, but I'm not going to proclaim guilt. I no longer want to find a victim at any given spot or be a victim at any given spot.

I realized none of that was valid for me anymore. And uh they rolled me into the hospital and some nurse was standing there and she said, "Ed, do you want me to call AA?" And I said, "Might as well." Now, us people who've been around for a while want to know why you knew people can't be sincere like we were in the old days. Might as well.

That was my entry back into AA or into AA cuz I'd been sent to AA, but I didn't pay it much money. Those were nice, kind people, but they were a little too old for me, you know, and they weren't quite hip. Excuse me while I take a little You want to know the difference between an Alanon and an AA speaker?

I can show you real quick. An Alenon speaker uh goes like this. When she's talking, she go, "Excuse me." And then an a speaker goes, so let me finish.

But uh but I was laying in there and they took me into the hospital and uh any wine drink wine connoisseurs in here? I like the good stuff. You know, the stuff with the twist off caps.

I I tried to stay with the higher line and Aribba Mad Dog 2020. Thunderbird. Oh god, that stuff has never seen a grape ever.

You know, just it was so bad. It was so bad I had to hold my nose to drink it. Otherwise, I had another problem.

You know, trouble with that. And I'm one of those I believe in singleness of purpose. But I also need to tell you that uh there was nothing I wouldn't take.

One word that never one sentence that never came out of my mouth or question that ever came out of my mouth is oh what'll this do to you? Mine was more. Yeah, that's pretty good.

Dmore. At one point in uh two years before I got sober, I was down to 138bs. And when you're at that time 6'11, believe me, it's not a pretty sight.

especially when you're on crutches and got a back brace. But I uh I'm in this hospital and I had been drinking that wine. And if you drink enough of that wine, it has a wonderful thing you get in the morning.

It's a little gift from the winery and it's called the dry heaves. Oh, AND THAT you get a little slobber. Just come on.

And you do that about three times and then you get the toenails. The good news about that is you're just about done, you know. And then I wandered back and I was sweating like I'm sweating now from doing my dry eaves.

And I got back in the bed and this guy came in. His name's Hap, short for happy, and he's from AA. And he said, "Hi, my name's Hap.

I'm from Alcoholics." synonymous. I thought, "Get out of my room, Jesus." And I He said, "We don't drink and we don't use one day at a time." And I don't know why I got honest that day. I don't know why.

Maybe it was just my time. I said, "I can't make it a whole day without something. Cuz when this starts, when this starts, got to go." And he said, "Ed, all we have to do is try.

All you have to do is try." That's the only thing I've done consistently from that day to this is try try to be a better person today than I was yesterday and don't drink one day at a time and for me not take anything of a mood altering nature and that hasn't changed even with the wonderful recent discoveries that they come up with about 10 years every 10 years where we lose a whole hunk of our membership because the experts found out another way. I simply say this, if you're chemically addicted, you're chemically addicted and chemicals won't help you. That's been my experience.

I remember he uh he said that and that's my sobriety date. And from that date uh to this uh I haven't had any vacations. Uh haven't had any, you know, uh I've been in Alcoholics Anonymous and I've been sober.

Now, that's impossible because I don't do anything consistently except get in trouble. I did that quite consistently or cause pain to the people I love. I was very effective at that.

But to actually not drink one day at a time. And God blessed me because I knew instinctively I had to keep busy. And I did.

I just I would not uh God gave me some great inspiration going in. He said, "Ed, if you think it's a good idea, don't do it. If you're new, believe me, those are words to live by.

If you think it's a real If you've been here a little while, those are good ideas. if you think it's a good idea, run it past your sponsor. Just a suggestion.

>> Uh but I knew if I thought it was a good idea to absolutely not do it. And I knew to keep busy. And thank you, God, I kept busy.

And I started going to ANA meetings and uh man, I'd walk in there and and they were they were just kind of uh wonderful to me. I remember uh when I got sober, I had shoulderlength hair and I always wore dark glasses and uh I had a tie-dyed shirt on and jeans and a chain around my waist, a motorcycle chain and a swastika around my neck. I'm not sure why that annoyed people, but it really seemed to annoy him.

So, I had that baby cuz that' be a fight and that'd be fun. And uh I had my look. I can't do my look anymore.

I used to have such a great I had a look that would make you back out of the room. And it was this little sneer. I remember I was about 2 3 months sober and I walked into the meeting one day and Logan he buried him with 56 years of sobriety.

Logan said, "How are you, Ed?" And I said, "Fine, Logan." He said, "Ed, while you tell your face, it doesn't know." And I didn't know, you know, so I changed that. I changed that. Over the weekend, you're going to hear me say this a lot.

You want a spiritual awakening, change your mind about a few things. It's that simple. It's that simple.

And when he said that, I changed my mind about my look. And I've never had people tell me anymore, "God, you okay? What's wrong?" You know, in fact, they smile when they see me.

And God, you know, in my worst days of drinking, all I ever wanted to do was feel like I belong somewhere, feel like we had some sort of connection. And if you're a drunk like me, when you feel so odd, you'll start behaving odd and say it's by choice. That way, you got some control.

And I I started going to more and more meetings and they they it was just a matter of time. I knew they were going to bring up that three-letter word. You know which one I'm talking about.

I knew it was going to come up. I was about a month and a half sober and sure enough, somebody turned to me and said, "Ed, don't you think it's about time you started thinking about a job? I didn't like that idea at all, you know, cuz I was a pretty good thief and I thought, well, I'm still doing enough to make ends meet.

We don't have to get crazy about this, you know. I had to get out of the burglary business cuz I was pretty easy to identify him officer. That's what's I really felt cheated at the time.

I really did. Like, geez, I can't do anything right. But, uh, but then they threw a curve to me.

They said, "Ed, we're not only talking about cash register honesty. We're talking about emotional honesty." I made a point of not knowing how I felt for a long, long time. And these guys said, you know, you're going to start having to tell us how you're really feeling.

And when I sponsor people, one of the requirements I have, and I'm one of those that have requirements simply because I know it how it works for me and how it doesn't. And that's all I know. And that's how we got to do it or I don't know how to do it.

But I tell them, you got to call me and you got to be honest with me. And if it's a crappy day, just don't try to fool your spine. Oh, it's okay.

Everything. No. No.

I want to hear where you're at. So if you learn how to get out of there, you don't ever have to go back there again because I would lie. I would lie when the truth would serve me better.

Anybody else here? >> I would just lie. I've got a a 26-year-old son in Southern California who's uh majoring in methamphetamines right now, studying for a scholarship in Narcotics Anonymous.

And he uh his mother called me when he was 19 and uh she said, "You need to talk to your son." Any divorced people, you'll know what that's all about. Your son when it's trouble. And I said, "Why?

What's going on?" She said, "He came home loaded last night. He was wearing shades in the middle of the night and he was pulling things out of the sky and talking to people that weren't there. I said, "Really?" He said, "Yeah." I said, "Well, let me talk to him." So, he got on the phone.

I said, "Uh, his name's Vichi." I said, "Vichi, how you doing?" He said, "Oh, cool, Dad. Everything's good, man. How are you?" I said, "Good." I said, "Do you want to tell me about last night?" You know what?

He said, "What?" I said, "About the police and about you coming home?" He said, "Dad, you aren't going to believe this." And I thought, "Oh, I'll bet I won't." And he said, "I went to Taco Bell and I got a bad taco." And I said, "Do you have any idea who you're trying to lay this on?" And then he won my heart cuz you know what he said? "No, Dad. It's the truth." To this day, if I called him up and said, "You know that you a few years ago that taco, you know it's the truth, Dad.

It's the kind of liar I was. I would be caught dead and still lie to you." So when they talked to me, oh, Richard Prior was a a guy that uh I always loved his comedy and that when he when uh he first came out and he used to say a line that I I think any person with an addictive personality can uh identify with. He said he was with this other woman and his wife wife walked in on him.

This is true story by the way. And his wife walked in on him and she got really upset and he said to her, "Are you going to believe me or your lying eyes? See, I understand that.

I understand that. You're going to believe me or those lying eyes of yours. You know how they've been wrong before.

So, I had to start being honest. I had to start talking. And then they brought up God.

And that was a tremendous disappointment to me. Uh I had faith long before I got here. I lived it every day, every moment.

My faith was life sucks. Uh Murphy's law. If something bad could happen, it's going to.

It's just a matter of time before something bad happens. That was my faith. I believed it.

I professed it. And guess what? It came to be one day at a time.

So faith wasn't anything new to me. I just had faith in all the wrong things. And what they said when I come to AA is they said, uh, I said, "Well, I'm not going to believe in that guy." And they said, "Well, you don't have to believe in that guy." Said, "You can come up with a god of your very own." I said, "Really?

And they said, "Yeah." I said, 'I can make up my own.' They said, 'Yeah.' I said, ' Okay. So, I thought for a couple days, very dep. And I come to a meeting and I said, "My God's going to be kind and loving and forgiving.

How do you like them apples? They didn't seem to mind. They kind of giggled like you did." And I thought, "See there, they just can't stand an original idea." That's what it is.

But why I share that with you is that is 180 degrees from anything I ever put about God in this head. I had a lot of ones about God. And none of them was being about being kind and loving and forgiving.

None of it. So that was just 180 degrees from what I'd ever thought about that. And that worked wonderfully for me.

But then I made a mistake sober and I see a lot of people make it. I didn't know it was a mistake at the time. I started professing a faith that I didn't have.

I had people uh uh around me that really talked about God. And the eyes are the mirror of the soul. Period.

Period. And I'd look into their eyes and they'd talk about God. And I knew they were telling the truth.

I couldn't figure out their angle, you know, but I knew they were telling the truth. So what I did, the mistake I made is I started paring what they'd say. God's in his heaven all right with the world.

Have you prayed today? That's what you want to hear. Some newcomer coming into a meeting and you're ready to kill your boss at work and a newcomer comes up.

Have you prayed today? Thank God I'm as big as I am. They would have took me out, I'm sure.

Uh and and I didn't see anything wrong with that because uh after all those old-timers said it. Well, I'm one of those that believe and have indeed experienced that if you bless you. If you uh the only defense you're going to have against a first drink or anything else in your life eventually is a relationship with a higher power.

That's going to be your only defense. Well, guess what? If you don't really have one.

I was a little over a year sober and uh I uh Dad invited me over for dinner. Now, I don't know how it is in your house, but our house was chaos. It had been better.

Dad had gone to treatment. He was really trying to stay sober. He was cut down immensely.

and mom was seemed to be somewhat happy and dad asked me over for dinner. Well, when I got asked for over for dinner, it was usually cuz I was in trouble and I really didn't want to go. And I went to the rooms and you guys told me that if anything's going to change in my home, it had to begin with me.

I couldn't wait for them to shape up before I'd come back. If I wanted to change things, it had to start right here. They said, "Get a new attitude and go to your parents house for dinner.

And if you got something to atone for, atone for it." Well, I'd never thought of that before. And I did. I went there and I about halfway through dinner, dad said, 'Boy.

And I thought, uhoh, here it comes. I said, 'Yeah, pop. I said, 'J just want to tell you I'm proud of you.

Now, I got to tell you something. If you're new or if you're used, they uh they tell you in AA that miracles happen, and I'm here to tell you that indeed they do. That has embed my experience countless times.

But my old man telling me he's pro, that didn't even make my list of miracles. That was far beyond anybody's comprehension. And he looked at me that night the way I'd always dreamed my father would look at his son.

And it was one of the best nights of my life ever. And you know where I had to go then? I had to go to a meeting.

Man, that's good stuff. And I went to that meeting. And after the meeting, I got went to my sister-in-law's house.

And I'm going to move this up just a bit now. Went to my sister-in-law's house and my mother called. She was crying and hysterical and said, "Ed, come home quick." And I said, "Mom, what's wrong?" She said, "Dad went across the street to get him a beer and me a quart a bottle of pop.

Now they're carrying bodies out. There's police everywhere. Please come home." And I jumped in my car that night and I thought, "Well, God's in his heaven.

All's right with the world. Now that I found God, nothing bad can really happen." And I pulled up in front of that bar where I drank from time I was 11 years old. I'd never, in fact, I've still never had a legal drink in my life.

But uh I I I was in there every night till the year before when I got sober. And I went up there and there were more policemen than I'd ever seen ever. And all of them knew me.

But it's funny how those cops shaped up that year. I was sober. Yeah.

I found out some amazing things. If I don't talk about their heritage, they don't talk about my heritage. If I don't talk about their sexual habits, they usually don't talk about my sexual habits.

You know, amazing discoveries. Once you get sober, you don't swing at them. They usually keep their clubs in their holders.

you know, man, what information. I could have used this a long time ago. And I'd also been working in the courts.

We used to have a wonderful relationship with the court system where if a member of AA came in and you had any problem with drugs or alcohol, they would simply say, "Ed, uh, take Arie, bring him back in 30 days, tell us what you think." And people were staying sober in droves. It was just amazing. Then, thank God the professionals came in and helped us.

Anyway, at that time it was just amazing. And the only the reason I mention that is those cops saw me in court and they knew I was sober. Nobody believed I could stay sober, especially me.

I remember the night of my first year birthday. I prayed and I said, "Oh, this is too important. Am I sure?

Am I sure?" And I tried to think the best I could. Was there any place where I, you know, cheated here, cheated there? And I was just amazed and in tears that there wasn't.

I couldn't believe it. And these cops couldn't believe it either, but they saw me often and in court. So when I walked in, I walked up to an officer that was standing there and he said, "Ed, what are you doing here?" And I said, "My dad was in here." He said, "Oh my god, Ed." And I said, "Why?

What's wrong?" And he said, "Ed, all we know at this point is somebody came in and just opened fired and shot everybody." And uh I looked down the bar and I saw a pool of blood with my father's glasses all smashed up and mangled and laying in the blood. And I got so sad and I didn't want to know. If you've ever been through anything like that, you know exactly what I mean.

I just don't want that information. September 11th, you don't want that information yet. You turn the TV back on.

And it was just horrifying to me. And the most amazing thing happened. I turned to my old archeneemy, the cops, and said, "What do I do?

I don't know what to do." Cuz the old me said, "Get crazy and start taking people out and even the score." Eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, baby. and I'd been around you for a year and you taught me to say, "I don't know what to do. I know if I do what I think is good, it's not good.

What do I do?" And he was so kind. He said, "Ed, go up to the hospital." He said, "Some of the people are alive, some are dead, but they're all up at the hospital." And I went up there and I saw an officer up there that hadn't forgotten my past. and he wasn't kind and he was very rude and uh told me to leave and no uncertain terms called me a few names and said if I didn't leave he'd have me arrested for obstruction of justice that he had identified everybody in there and my old man wasn't one of them.

So I went home and I called the one guy I would have never believed I'd call ever and that was the cop that the last 5 years of my drinking and using tried to put me away. He used to put me in the back of his squad car and say, "Ed, if I see you leaving the scene of the crime or think I see you leaving the scene of the crime, I'm going to shoot to kill and not stop." And I say, "Everything's fair and love and war, Ch." And he used to say to me, "I'm going to bust you and I'm going to bust you straight up when I get you. You're going away for a long time." And I'd laugh and say, "Yeah, you come after me, big fella." You know why I called him?

He was an honest cop. He could have had me 50 ways from loose if he wanted to. But he was a man of integrity.

He told me, "I'm going to catch you straight up." That's the guy I called. Hadn't talked to him the year I was sober. Hadn't talked to him before I got sober really, except those little conversations we used to have in the back of his squad car from time to time.

And that's the guy I called and he said, "Ed, what's going on?" And I said, "Bob, my my dad was in that shamrock." And he he said, "Oh my god, Ed, hold on." And he fed me information as he come in. Later, Bob said to me, and Bob, I love Bob. He's a good man.

He said to me, Ed, he said, "I was so afraid for you that night." He said, "I know you'd been sober." And he said, "With this hitting you and my brother was out of prison, and he was a violent guy, like I was a violent guy." He said, "I just prayed that you'd be okay. If you could make it through that, you can make it through anything." He told me one time, he said, "You know, I'd get so tired out of being on the police force." He was in the narco division. And he'd say, "Some mornings I'd get up and I'd just throw my gun and my my my badge back in the door and say, I can't take it anymore.

I just don't even want to go out there." And then he would say to me, "Ed, you came to mind and you've done so well." And I thought, "Well, if Eden can do it, maybe others can do it. Maybe I'll go to work one more day. We never know the effect we're having on people with our sobriety." But he came up with Ed uh uh the only thing we can come up with is he was taken hostage or he wandered outside and he's outside somewhere and it was one of those freezing rainy nights and just terrible cold.

I'm sure you get him over up here with a quarter inch ice over everything, you know. And we searched the streets all night at uh 10:00 or 8:00 the next morning, that officer from the hospital called me up and said, "Well, Ed, anybody could have made a mistake. You want to come up and identify your old man?" And I said, "Okay." And I went up there and I walked into that morg and I saw my daddy laying there with that bullet hole on his face.

And I reached for that faith I'd been professioning and I came up with absolutely nothing cuz it was everybody else's experience and none of my work, none of my surreners, none of my reaching out. And I got to tell you, that was the most terrifying and lonely time I've ever had in my life. But God did for me what I could not do for myself.

if I opened the door that Morgan, I'd walk out and there were members of Alamon and AA already there. And just the look in their eye, I had to sense that I was going to be okay and that I'm not alone. And uh I was so grateful for that.

You know, a lot of times people say, "I don't know what to say. Just look him right in the eye. It tells them everything.

Just go give them a call. Go wash your dish. Go pick up a kid.

Go do a little laundry cuz they got company coming. Just do whatever your heart tells you to. Nothing is too silly.

In fact, the more silly it sounds, probably the more meaningful it's going to be to that individual because that's something God gave my opinion gave you uniquely to do. And so I was uh so grateful that they were there and immediately the love of AA and Alanon enveloped me and carried me because I I was 20 years of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth and one year a live and let live and live and let live was winning. But that that anger and that rage had just come up after me and uh it was just terrible.

Uh eventually they came to me and said uh you got to testify in court cuz you identified the body and the billfold and all that. And I thought boy and then people in AA said you know Ed you might be the only example of AA anybody ever sees. So you got to behave yourself in court.

I thought what an order I can't go through with it. Court was fun time. That's when you stir up the bail see how many of them it takes you to get you out of there you know.

But I did because already you had meant to me more than my own self-image. I had been begun to lose myself into something much bigger. And so I went and I I I did the impossible.

I remember walking into that courtroom. There was a guy sitting there with his little do and his little uh attitude. And I thought, you know, you give me five minutes with him.

We don't need a trial. In fact, bring all five of the gang bangers in. I'll take care of them in short order.

That's what I thought. What I did is I behaved. It's the first time I ever realized if my feelings were not facts before then I would have been over the rail and I would have had that punk and no court in the world would have ever convicted me.

It's still Iowa's most heinous murder. And please God, it always stays that way. That's one record I'd like to keep.

But that be the worst that ever happened. But I was amazed because I sat there and I answered the questions and I left. And as God would have it, uh they all got sentenced and this guy got uh three life sentences in 135 years.

So I knew he was going to be gone for a while. And shortly after that, God talked to me. Now, you got to be careful when God talks to you.

Those sponsors are great God filters, by the way. And if you don't have a sponsor, I I really strongly suggest you get one. I remember one time I told my sponsor, I said, "You know, I got a message from God." He said, "Oh, really?" And I said, "Yeah." He said, "Well, why don't you share it with me, Ed?" So I shared my message with go from God with him and he said, "You know, Ed, this message from God looks strangely like your handwriting." Okay?

And indeed it was. But I also got to tell you, and we'll talk about it later in the weekend, 86,87, and 88 of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous gives you specific instructions how to live every second of every moment of every minute of every day, and how to have a conscious consistent contact with God. It's right there in the book.

All you got to do is read it and do it. Most importantly, do it. And uh shortly, well, when God talked to me that time, he said, "Ed, go out to California.

Go into show business." I thought, "Well, my resume fits pretty good." So, I loaded up the car and I went to where all stars get their start, Anaheim, California. Got a job at Disneyland. I was goofy.

Little did they know how well I fit the role at that point. You know, two and a half years sober, no sponsor, not many meetings. I was goofy, you know, and by accident I went up to this meeting in West LA and the meeting was so enthusiastic and they were they were living Alcoholics Anonymous.

They were a living example. I mean, they were taking people to meetings and they knew that 12step calls was more than verification of insurance or if you could get them into treatment. It's about bringing them into your home.

I I love an AA sometimes. Well, you know, we're not a housing agency and we're not an employment agency and we're not a bank. God forbid.

Don't read uh working with others cuz it says just the opposite if the situation is required. But those are just two pe people who are too damn tight to look past their own nose in my opinion. And uh I lost my place.

I got to start all over now. My name's Ed and I'm an alcoholic. But I walked into this room and these people were there and the excitement and the love of life was just in there.

It was you could taste it. It was wonderful. And I went up again the next week to see if it were still there.

And it was still there. They were hugging and laughing and joking and they were having a ball sober. And man, I just that was so attractive.

And this guy came up to me and I said, "Excuse me. Would you be my sponsor?" He said, "No, no." I thought, "Why not?" He said, "Anybody I sponsor has to look up to me." Haha. Thought, "Oh, good.

Tall jokes. That's what I need. Haven't heard those before." It's always the same two questions by the same size person.

First question. Oh, how tall are you? 610.

Next question. Oh, do you play basketball? And I say, "No, how tall are you?" And they say, "54." I say, "Do you play miniature golf?" It's their rules.

I'm not, you know, I'm just trying to get along. But I thought tall jokes. Yeah, that's what I really need to hear.

Especially those, "How's the weather up there?" Oh, that's original. Yeah. But u I thought, "Oh, boy." and he came up to me a few minutes later and he shook my hand and he said, "Uh, if you agree to do a few things, I'll be glad to be your sponsor.

My name's Clancy, and I'm forever grateful I didn't hear some of the things that are said about that guy. Really am." You know why? I would have believed you and you would have killed me.

I was ready to blow my brains out sober. Sobriety sucked big time. I'm doing the best I can and my guts are all over the floor every day.

And I'm looking at Bridge abutments as I'm driving home thinking, man, I can't take this sobriety stuff. And if I'd heard some of the things that were said about Clancy, he would have been the last guy on earth I would ever talk to. Thank God I didn't hear him, you know.

And that's that's for gossip. I'm not a big gossip guy. And I hope you if you have been, you stop.

And I'll share two things with you. If you're hanging around with gossip, you need to know gossips. You need to know when you leave the room, you're the next topic.

The other thing, you know, is never confided because they are not trustworthy. Now, I know that offends some people. That's what the truth does sometimes.

But if you're telling other people's secrets, you're going to tell everybody's secret sooner or later. I was so grateful cuz he just looked me right in the eye and I knew. He knew.

And I didn't ever have to feel this way again. That there was an answer. He knew exactly where I was at.

And I would do anything in my power to stay sober and to stay sane one day at a time. And he insisted that I started all over on the steps that if I was that crazy, I missed something along the way. And I suggested to him that I was 2 and a half years sober and at that time was an addictions counselor and pretty much the expert on addiction.

He pointed out to me if that if I was that good, I probably wouldn't be living in his garage. Well, he had a point there. So, okay, I'll listen.

and he insisted that sponsors are wonderful because they help you do things I would have never asked. I remember when you get a sponsor, you can ask him those questions that just you wouldn't ask anybody else. At least I would.

I remember one time I walked up to him, I said, "Clansancy, how do you be a gentleman? How how do you do that?" And he said, "Ed, you act like one." I would have never thought of that. You mean you just act?

Yeah. Act the way you think a gentle man would act. And I've been doing it ever since.

There was no big process that I went through, no inventories I had to write. You want to be a better spouse, be one. Act like it.

Want to be a better wife, better employee, better husband? Act like it. Want to be a better father?

Act like it. Talk's cheap. People around me don't say, "Oh, I'm trying to do this or I'm working on this." Because I just cut them off.

Say, "All that tells me is you're not ready to make a commitment to do anything. Call me back when you're ready. Call me back when you're ready." Ain't that true?

Just means I'm just If I'm working on means I'm just not ready enough to say, "Oops, I stopped." You know, I quit. No more from here. And I'll do whatever it takes not to do that.

It's called surrender. And Clancy was amazing to me. He he helped me a great deal and uh he uh uh insisted I do things that made no sense to me.

He made me shake everybody's hand. And at that time the group was small. It was only 400 people and uh I had to stand at the door and shake everybody's hand.

I said, "I don't want to shake their hand. I don't like them people." He said, "They don't like you either, Ed. Go shake their hand.

Hi, I'm Ed. Hi, I'm Ed. I'm Ed." you know, and uh oddly enough, I've had jobs after that going all over the world into places I don't know anybody and I have to go in and say, "Hi, I'm Ed.

You're teaching me how to fit in. You know how to break that click. Hi." You know how to fit in?

Hi, I'm Ed. I was now cast by choice and got a big ego about it. And uh that was very important for me.

I remember I was going to talk in Pasadena, California. And Pasadena is a wealthy area. And uh I thought, "Oo, wealthy area.

I may hook up with a job." And I caught myself doing that hustle. And I stopped because after my father's murder, I did something that was very important for me. I started all over with God.

I stopped. And I my first prayer, first honest prayer I ever said is, "God, I don't know if you're there or not. I sure hope so.

That's right where I was at. And I started all over right where I was at because that's the only place you could grow from. All the rest is nonsense.

And uh I got down on my knees and I asked God to uh just let me go to that meeting. I said the same prayer I said before I came down here and for this before this retreat. Said, "Let me share the miracle you've performed in my life through Alcoholics Anonymous.

Save me from my own nonsense. And I don't want anything from these people. I've already been vastly overpaid.

I don't want anything. And I went and talked. After I got done talking, guy come up to me after meeting and said, "This makes no sense to me.

We won't offer you a job." I said, "It makes perfect sense to me." Said, "Have you ever been in Taiwan?" I said, "No." He said, "Have you ever been in show business management?" I said, "No." He said, "Be in my office Monday morning." That was Saturday. Thursday, I was lifting out of Los Angeles International Airport going to Taipei, Taiwan. I was new, soon to be vice president of America on Ice.

I had a cast of 62 casting crew. was going over to Taipei, Taiwan to negotiate contracts with the Taiwanese government while flying back and forth to Hong Kong with designer Bill Campbell out of Las Vegas designing costumes. How was your week?

Now, you know why I share that story with you? You talked me into dropping my bag of ones. There would have been a time when I wouldn't even gone for the interview because I had ones in my head that said, "People like you don't do things like that.

You're going to end up dead." No, you're white trash. you're worthless and you made me drop them off. And I showed up for the interview and it was wonderful.

I remember getting off the plane and everybody's just told and they're looking at me and I'm looking at them, you know. I know it's just a matter of time before they tie me down. And I had a great time over there.

I loved I loved I loved everything about I loved everything about Taiwan. The people, the culture, God, it fed me like I'd never been fed before. And I uh I was down in Kawong and I was ending my tour there and a guy walked by me one night and he said, "You know, you'd be an excellent manager for the Harlem Globe Trotters." And I said, "Yeah." Went home to Los Angeles and I got a call from the president of the Harlem Globe Trotters said, "Is this Ed Mutum?" And I said, "Yes." and they said, "We've heard wonderful things about you.

Would you come up to our office?" I said, "I'd be honored to." Next thing you know, I'm manager of the Harlem Globe Trotters. At this point, I'm 8 years sober. I got less than seventh grade education.

I have no business background. I have no business by everything I know, even having that job. Yet, they picked me over 50 people.

I don't know how powerful your God is, but mine's dazzling. Mine's amazing. He does stuff like that.

And I get to go along. And all of a sudden, I traveled all over the world and met kings and queens and presidents. And all of a sudden, uh, the most amazing thing happened.

I'd be in limos and in in in suites and finest hotels in the world. And the most amazing thing was I fit there. Now, let me explain what I mean by that.

I belong there. You know why? Cuz God gave it to me.

I don't argue with gifts anymore. I just say thank you. Oh, I don't deserve I people make me crazy and a when I say how are you?

Oh, much better than I deserve. I say, oh, God's still wrong, huh? You know, how about just saying thank you?

Would that you know, how would that work? And that's what I say to God in my life. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. And I met the daughter of the Turkish ambassador to London.

She was Muslim. She was beautiful. Still the most beautiful woman I've ever known.

And uh she was wealthy. And I thought, well, our backgrounds are a lot alike. So we got married.

I didn't say all judgment had returned, but and uh we were married for 10 years. And she's an amazing woman who absolutely hates my guts. Every breath I take.

And uh there's absolutely nothing I can do about that. And I don't say that to be a smart alec because my kids have paid a a heavy price. I have three children that uh hardly have talked to me in the last 20 years because of the hatred and the anger.

And I made a major mistake. I realized this last year. I always took the high road.

I would never say anything discouraging about their mother or anything else. But I realized in not responding to the charges, they automatically assumed they were true. So I that was a tough one to learn.

I cried all day when I figured out that one because I thought I'm trying to do the right thing. Why does this keep happening? And then I realized they got no choice then but to believe her cuz I would never answer this answer the charges, so to speak.

Not put down her mother, just give them my side. Two months ago, my 20-year-old daughter called me and said, "Dad, I need some money. Can you help me?" And I cried cuz she'd never asked me for anything.

And I said, "Oh, sweetie, it's tight, but I guarantee you you're going to get something." And something was on its way in a very, very short while after that. But I was so honored that she was trusted me enough after all that she's been through to ask me for help. I mean, that was one of the best best nights of my sobriety.

And my uh 20-year-old just failed the psychological test for the sheriff's department in Los Angeles. They said he has some anger issues and he called me and he said, "Dad, do you know anything about that?" And I said, "Oh, yeah. Yeah." And he's going to come out and spend the summer with me.

And I share that with you because we went for years and I didn't have any contact and there was bitterness and there was uh just a mess. It was just not not a nice thing. And people would say to me, "I didn't know you had children." And I said, "Well, that's cuz when I talk about them, I get really sad and I've given them to God and I got to leave them there.

My way of leaving them there is just to leave them there. And that if God wants them to talk to me, they'll be calling me. And if he wants it restored, then he'll restore.

My job is to be ready and present when it occurs. That's my job." And there was a tremendous freedom from that. And u uh in ' 88, I went back out to Iowa.

I'd lost everything I owned. I made some business decisions that were just bad. They were out of greed.

They were all they were all money based. They all materially based and within 6 months I lost everything. I mean they even took the Mercedes.

They really got personal. And u I thought well I got to start all over. Why not go home?

So I went back home to Iowa from after living in Los Angeles 16 years. And I ended up with a house a boarded up house on East Sixth Street eight blocks from where I was in the middle of the street 18 years before that. And I opened the big book and I read the promises and I said that you know these promises are true.

I have had to have done something wrong. This book is not wrong. My application may be and I started from there and my life has just been great.

Not without problems. Thing I love about sobriety is I can get have a lot of problems in life but it doesn't have to upset me. It doesn't have to rule my day.

Uh do does my heart get broken? Sure. How can you see some of the things that go on in the world and not shed a tear?

but I don't carry it with me all day and I don't worry about it all day. And I've learned that in Alcoholics Anonymous. Uh some years back I was at a Christian retreat and I had a spiritual awakening at 23 years sober and God talked to me and my heart's been changed from that moment to this.

Those of you who know what that means know what that means. Those of you who don't, there's no way to explain it except I have been a different person from that night to this. And I have remained a faithful member of Alcoholics Anonymous because this is where I found God.

This is where I found the basic instruction and direction. And uh I love uh my God with all my heart, my mind, and my soul today to the best of my ab ability. Uh and uh I wouldn't change that.

I make no apologies for my faith. You know, it's funny in a we always say, "Oh, any higher power is welcome here. You can have a rock, you can have a chair, you can have a tree, you can have a sponsor or a group.

Just don't bring up Jesus, okay? Anybody else is okay, but we're not hypocrites. Isn't that amazing?

And uh so I talk about my faith freely, not to convert anybody, but just that's the right you gave me coming in these doors. I can have a god of my very own. And if it's a chair, if it's a marble, if it's Christ, I'm allowed to say it.

or if it's Buddha, if it's Allah, or if it's a crystal. Good for you. I hope you're getting as much out of your faith as I am.

And if you're getting more, I'd like to share that with you. Maybe you can teach me because it's the oneness and the inclusiveness of Alcoholics Anonymous and the welcoming of any and all faiths that I thrive in because there's so much to learn. I was with a guy a little while back.

I haven't. Anybody got a pen? Yeah.

Here's a guy was on a plane and you know I I'm looking for gifts everywhere and and he gave me a gift. We were walking on the plane and he is at the political spectrum the exact opposite I am. And it was so wonderful to have a great conversation with somebody.

I don't know how it is up here but politically in the states everybody uh just spews every character defect they got when they're talking about it. And it's it was just sad. It's just sick.

It's just sick. And this guy was the toilet. And we had a wonderful conversation.

There were some honest differences. We talked about maybe ways. And he pulled the pen out of his pocket.

And this guy is a really powerful guy. Pulled his pen out of his pocket. He said, "You know, Ed, you see this pen?" And I'm sitting next to him there.

And he said, "At the best you're going to see is half that pen. And the best I'm going to see is half that pen." And that's our perspective. What we always must remember is at least half the pen is unknown.

Isn't that powerful? I just love that cuz so many times we think we know it all and it ain't working. No, no.

At your best, you're just looking at half the pen. There's more to learn. And I really love that.

And I get more pens like this. It's really going to wrap it up here. I know we started a little late, but I don't want to keep you late.

Uh I They told me I had to go to seminary, and I thought, boy, I only got a seventh grade education. And so I went over to the university and I said, "I'd like to go to school." And they said, "How many credits do you have?" And I said, "I have bad credits. Why?

What's that got to do with anything?" And they laughed like you laughed and I shared with them a gift you gave me. I said, "You you don't understand. I got kicked out of school in seventh grade.

I've always lived by my wits and God gave me a very good mind, but I don't know if I'm smart enough to pass a class, but I'd like you to help me find out. Would you do that?" And they were most gracious. And within 3 weeks, because I taken a a GED test as a joke in California, uh I was able to go to school.

And within 3 weeks, I was full-time student and I went and I got the uh uh bachelor's degree. And then I went on to get my masters of divinity, that little 96-hour master's degree. Took me about five, six years.

I don't I didn't keep track. No need in keeping track when the end is what you're after. And uh I became ordained and I did all that.

Now I'm I'm signing up. if I'm going for my doctorate. And uh I don't say that to impress you.

I I just say that because I had told you for years in my head that education wasn't worth much. Well, to tell you the truth, I still pretty much feel that way, but it's required. Uh they don't teach you a lot of new news there, but uh uh especially if you're working a program of recovery, especially spiritually, we have wonderful avenues.

I'm uh I'm going to end on this. I was doing a a sermon on forgiveness. About halfway through the sermon, I stopped and I said, "I can't talk on forgiveness.

You know, I've never told the guys who killed my father that I forgave them." And I stopped right there. And my congregation was,200 members at that time. And they kind of looked at me funny.

As God would have it, two and a half weeks later, one of the guys sentences was overturned. And I'm well loved and well respected my community because of how you taught me to behave and how I want to reflect God in my life, not just a passing mood. Uh and uh when he got his sentence got overturned, they said, "Release him or retry him." And the press came to me and all the cameras were around and said, "Reverend mut." And I said, "It's time to let him come home.

Let him let let's heal. Let's see if something good can come out of this after 30 years, 27 years." And a reporter friend of mine said, "Ed," he said, "he's been in there since he was 17. He hasn't learned a career.

He doesn't where's he going to live? How is he going to support himself?" I said, "He can come live with me if he'd like." And people were taken back by that. And I'm not sure why you welcomed me in here.

What is the difference between him and I or you and him? You know how many times did you almost kill somebody in a 3,500 lb bullet? How many times would it would have been seconds and inches and you would have been behind bars for the rest of your life?

I got a call from a guy. I was up in Wisconsin last week and um this guy said, "I want you to talk to a guy sponsor. His girlfriend was killed last year and the guy's coming up for sentencing on Tuesday.

Can he call you and talk to you?" And I said, "Oh, absolutely." Well, I didn't realize the whole story till the guy told me he was sponsoring the guy that killed his wife. So, he had the guilt of was it did I do something wrong as a sponsor? And should I have been there to protect my girlfriend?

and the whole thing about questioning God. And he said, "I need to know what to do." And I said, "Here's what I'm going to suggest you do. I'm going to suggest you go to that hearing and you go in the spirit of forgiveness.

This baby's going to own you forever." And I said, "Oh, your therapist will love that. But if you want to be happy, joyous, and free, you can't let it own you." And he went. And the young man, 21 years old, was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole and his sponsor cried cuz he felt bad for the kid.

You know, who are we to judge anybody after some of the stuff we've done? Who are we to hate anybody? I mean, really.

You know, I don't know about you, but I've got two or three things in my inventory if I want to judge or be angry at somebody. I compare them to those three things. And I have said if it's ever worse than those three things, I have the right to be annoyed.

I never get past one. Ever. Well, that story went all over the world.

I got a call from Oprah, her producers, 48 hours, Dline, NBC. They all called, "How can you do this? How can I say you?

It's working step eight and nine." See, if you're really working step eight and nine, you know, they didn't get that at all. But, uh, that's what it is. You know, I've come to believe, and I'll talk about this more over the week, 8 and 9 has nothing to do with me.

It has to do with repairing the damage I've done. It isn't all about me. It's about repairing the damage I've done.

And that's exactly what I was doing there. 2 and 1/2 weeks later, I found myself walking down a cell into a prison I swore I'd never go in. And uh because my brother, all my youth, I was spent there visiting my brother.

And I'm uh hearing the my feet shuffle on the cement and I'm praying say God let me be the best example and reflection of you I can be. And I walk into a cell and I see a guy I hadn't seen in 27 and 1/2 years. Last time I saw him we were in a courtroom and I said you give me 5 minutes with him.

We don't need a trial. And I found myself sticking out my hand telling him Sherman I just come here to tell you that I love you and I forgive you and I believe that God loves you and forgives you too. And I said I only have one request for you.

And he said, "What? What's that?" Cuz I'm kind of a big imposing guy and he didn't quite know what to do. And I said, "If there's any ever anything I can do to help you improve your life, allow me to do that." And he said, "I don't understand.

I should have been looking you up to a ask you for your forgiveness." I said, "Sherman, I'm not here about your accountability. I'm here about mine. and I just needed to tell you that I had forgiven you a long time ago and I'd never told you.

And that's only half an amend if you don't tell the people. And the most amazing thing, I spent 2 and 1/2 hours there. And uh we ended up friends.

We ended up saying the Lord's Prayer and the jailer and the state's county states attorney general was there, everybody. We were all in tears. We all held hands and said the Lord's Prayer.

And oddly enough, Sherman and I became friends. And I kept my promise. I went up and when he was released from prison, the county attorney asked me what I thought and I said, "You need to reduce charges and let him come home." He said, "Ed, all the other families are against it." And I said, "I know that.

I'm just telling you where my heart says. Let him come home." And that's uh God bless Bill. Bill Davis, the county attorney in Davenport, Iowa.

He let Sherman come home and they called me up and I was allowed to go and pick him up and I was allowed to bring him home and I he didn't do well the first time he was out. 30 years of maximum security prison. You kind of get moody and uh he had a bad attitude and if anybody said anything critical, he was right in their face and he had to go back to prison.

And then the next time he called me up and he said, "Do you know any place I could stay?" And I said, "I made you a deal. You can come live with me." And I picked him up and I brought him home. And uh uh I was able to get him a little apartment.

I had a little apartment house at the time. We went out together and we found him jobs. And when they'd say why he was in prison, I'd stay there and explain to him, "Well, yeah, but you got to understand this is the other side of that.

There's a healing going on there." And he got a lot of jobs. He just didn't have a real good work ethic. But you know, the time I remember the most is when my friend Sherman was walking along the side of the road coming home from work.

And when you spent 30 years in maximum security, you don't hear anything, not even birds. Nothing except clangs. And I I went and picked him up.

He was walking along the side of the road cuz I didn't I was running a little late to pick him up for work. And he got in my car and he was crying and he said, "I just got to go back to prison. I can't take all this noise.

I can't take all this stuff coming up behind me. I just can't take it." And you taught me what to do. Then I pulled over to the side of the road and I hugged him and I said, "Sherman, it's going to be okay." He said, "You're a miracle.

I'm a miracle." And I don't use the word lightly. I said, "If God can bring me where he brought me, he can bring you through this. And if you can't use your belief right now, believe my belief and I believe in you and I will stand behind you." That's what I remember most about that whole thing.

And I wouldn't change that for a minute because that's what you've done to me. That's what the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous has done to me. Turned me into a person I always dreamed of being and didn't think I could.

this weekend. That's what we're going to talk about. We're going to talk about uh we've decided to call it searching for spiritual sobriety.

And uh that's what we're going to talk about. And hopefully we'll have time to share. Uh I want to do some private times with anybody that wants to.

And uh we're going to talk about the steps. We're going to talk and share about one another. And a lot of healing is going to go on if you're willing.

Thank you very much. >> Good morning. For >> those of you who weren't here last night, my name's Ed Mutum and I'm an alcoholic.

>> I still have an honorary streak in me. What I was going to do for those of you who came late because of the hockey game. I was going to and I did by I'm losing by evil streak.

It's just by honory streak. But what I was going to do is program everybody to say, "And you remember when I talked Friday night and gave you the secret to sobriety?" And you go, "Oh, the ones that weren't here. But I don't do that anymore.

I'm far beyond that. But uh I want to thank Don for being here. I you know people tape all over the country.

And so you know speakers don't have a real relationship with tapers. They just tape our talk and and uh a lot of people oh they're making money off AA. Well if you saw their expenses believe me you wouldn't have another idea about that.

There was a time I mean I've been taped so long I remember when it was real to real and every once in a while you every once in a while tape would break right and you hear you stop. My favorite one though is when they went to cassettes and they didn't have auto reverse. The taper would stand right in front of you and go and you'd stop and they turn over the tape, hit it and go.

And my honorary streak was that too, I'd say. And that, my friends, is the secret to life and sobriety. And I could see him in the car go, "What the heck?

we just, you know, but but I really appreciate and there was a while I got really annoyed because every there used to be they'd ask permission because legally they're supposed to have my permission to do that and here they do ask by the way and um but they just it seemed to me that we were being taken for granted and people were just taping us at their will. I was getting a little annoyed by it to be quite honest with you. And in 1988 I moved back to Iowa after a series of of bad breaks and misunderstandings financially.

And uh I got back to Iowa and I just gone through a terrible divorce. Just a nasty divorce. And at uh 2:00 in the morning, I started getting calls, five right in a row, and I'd get on and nobody'd say anything.

Well, my keen alcoholic mind told me who it was. And about the fifth time, I grabbed that phone. I said, "Who is this?" And a little voice said, "Is this Ed M that talks in AA?" And I said, "Yeah, yeah.

Who's this?" And she told me her name. And she said, "I'm 5 years sober. I was sitting here with a gun in my lap and I just heard you talk.

Can you talk to me?" And I said, "Of course, honey. I'll talk to you. However long we need to talk, I'll talk to you." And uh from that moment to this, I celebrate what they do.

you know, tape it, do it, give it away, whatever. You know, whatever. Uh, I'm just pleased.

And, you know, I tell that story from time to time and last year in Melbourne, Florida. I was telling that story and like I say, I tell it rarely. And in the reception line afterwards, uh, a lady came up to me and said, "Uh, Ed, I want to thank you for that night.

I'm that moment." And >> you know, all that time later, 88 to 2005. So, so I support what they do and they have a ministry in my opinion that literally saves lives. When I was here at Toronto at the international, some of you may not know it, uh, but those name cards looked an awful lot like tape labels and CD labels.

They had them right here. And people would come by and they'd talk to my badge. They'd go, "You're at M.

You're from I've heard your tape." And they'd be talking right here and I'd be looking Butch Butch from Barry would sit right here cracking up. They'd be talking away to my badge. Boy, you really helped me.

I really It's really nice meeting you. So, so it does it does do wonderful things. And it does uh does do and not that I'm a wonderful thing, but the spirit of Alcoholics Anonymous and Allen and my opinion, the spirit of God carries through the help that's needed in those tapes.

I know what I was before I came here and I was absolutely nothing because I didn't know how to be anything but that. This morning we're going to talk about uh and and throughout the day we're going to talk about spiritual maturity and emotional maturity through the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous or the 12 steps, however you want to look at it. I'm going to make a suggestion to you though.

How many here are brand new to recovery within the first year? Raise your hand. Okay, very good.

How many are uh over uh five years? Okay, very good. Uh those of you newly sober within the first five years, you really need to concentrate on on alcohol and whatever else you were doing.

Uh and and I kind of direct I direct it to everybody because I believe it's important information because I never got the information that step one is about every area of my life. It says alcohol, but the longer you're sober, if you're like me, it really needs to be any area of your life. I said it last night and I will say it again that whatever area of your life you're not applying this program, it's going to kill you sooner or later.

I cannot tell you the number of funerals I've gone to of good AA members, good Alanon members that didn't get it's a life thing, not a situation thing. And I buried him gambling, sex, pornography, stealing, you know, I promise you this that the disease is alive and well unless you're addressing every area of your life. And if you have a disease like I have a disease and I believe what the book calls it a spiritual disease.

You know that's the only time disease is mentioned in the big book. It's referred to as a spiritual disease. They also say something in the big books is just fascinating.

There's a little uh sentence in there. I'll let you find it. Uh it says when the mental when the spiritual malady is addressed the mental and physical take care of themselves.

Now wait a minute. This is saying if I address the spiritual first, everything else will work out. You know, I did it just the opposite.

I thought, well, when I get to feeling a little better and when I my head clears up, I'll talk about that God stuff. And it says in there just the opposite. And a lot of us uh don't even want to look at the God situation because we've been our own little god and we don't know if we want to give it up yet.

Now, what do I mean by that? Oh, I know better. How do we say that?

We say it in so many different ways. Oh, you don't understand. My case is different.

>> That's right. Clancy says it best. He said, "If there's ever a flag for Alcoholics Anonymous, it should be simply be a flag that says, "But you don't understand.

My case is different." All of us, isn't it funny? All of us think we're so terminally unique. And the truth is, we are.

But the problem is we all look at it in the wrong way. That somehow this can apply. Step one can apply.

After all, what is powerless? That doesn't mean I'll be able to control it. It means you're powerless.

You ever been in a power outage? Powerless. You can wish light on all day long.

You can be mad and indignant about it and it's you're still going to be powerless. Isn't it the same with our lives and our addiction? I uh I use a Bible that I enjoy and believe me, I'm not trying to convert anybody, but this book, the Life Recovery Bible, is one of the best 12step.

It's got the steps and meditations all through it. and the serenity prayer step 10 meditation. All the notes at the bottom are footnotes to recovery and it's generic recovery.

Uh their first step in which I'm going to use this morning is we're powerless over our life situations and our lives have become unmanageable. Now what does that mean? It means everything.

You know that person you just can't stand at work? >> You're powerless. And if you're spending a lot of time hating them, your life is unmanageable.

It means on the freeway when you're telling that person they're number one or they're telling you you're number one. Powerless. How about breathing?

How much power you got over that? We think we're so powerful and so mighty. Who keeps your heart beating?

Who starts you breathing? Started you breathing. Going to keep you breathing till you stop.

We're powerless over that too, aren't we? To a good degree. Powerless means have no effective response, out of our control.

How many of us said, "Oh, yeah. I want to get sober, but geez, meeting every day sounds like a little extreme to me." You know, is that admitting powerless? No.

That's admitting there might be a little problem. Might be a little problem, but I can take care of it. Trust me, I can take care of it.

You know, uh going to get help. Don't need to. Don't need to.

No. No. A lot of people just don't understand the way I operate.

I operate a little differently than others, you know. And here's my favorite one. You know, I've been blessed with a brilliant mind.

People can't appreciate my creativeness. No, they they call it insanity. That's what they call it.

And once I get sober, guess what? I found my brilliance and my genius just as you will. But what I found before was insanity.

And the insanity was I could control everything and I'll do it as I see fit. Step one for me is the finest ideas I could come up with made me a miserable failure every single time. Especially where drinking was concerned.

Other areas there was mild success. But even that mild success had to be affected by the failure. My best thinking got me drunk time and time again.

Got me crazy sober time and time again. Got me hating time and time again and my life was unmanageable. What do I mean unmanageable?

Means simply that means simply that there are simple things we can do like we can set an alarm to get up but what do you do if there's power outage again? You're probably going to oversleep unless like me I wake up with or without alarm clock. Thank you God.

But I still set my alarm clock just in case. Just in case. Unmanageable.

Uh how long have we spent trying to manage? How long have we meant spent trying to control? How long have we said, you know, my life would be okay if it wasn't for them?

Talk about unmanageability on them. How about my emotions? How about my emotions?

I used to think when I was new, wouldn't it be something if we had a PA system hooked directly to our mind? Your every thought is just right out there. There was a time when that idea would have terrified me.

I wouldn't mind it now because I've changed my mind because I've changed my mind. The mindset is the biggest problem I believe we have coming in here. Uh we I don't know of anybody that woke up one morning said, "God, it's a beautiful morning sunshine and think I'll join it." Haven't met him.

Or you know, home life's just wonderful. Everybody's doing so well. I think I'll take in one of those Alamon meetings.

That ain't the way we get here. We get here beaten but not surrendered. Sometimes surrendered, but for the most part, Clancy has a great line.

He says, "You know, we come to this program and we throw in the towel." And a day or two later, we reach in and pull the towel right back. Then we spend the rest of our sobriety tearing off little pieces and throwing that in to see if that was that. A good analogy.

What I'm asking you to do this weekend is forget the little pieces, throw in the towel. What have you got to lose by surrendering to the fact that you're powerless and your life is unmanageable? Tell you a few things you got to lose.

Anxiety, depression, and anger, loneliness, sadness, irritability, discontent. To the extent I understand and live and apply step one is to the extent of those other things. The more I do it, the less of those I have to the point of not having them at all for a long long time.

And then when they come, they're just like birds flying by. My friend Sandy B has a he's a great great member of Alcoholics Anonymous and I love his his sharings because he's an inspiration to me. And he says, you know, we go through life and thoughts go by.

He said, we'll grab a thought. Got one. And it's a bad thought.

Now, that's where he stopped. Here's where I take over. And I said, "Oh my god, look what I was thinking.

How could I think that? God, I'm sober. I'm Oh, look, look.

Then what else do I do? I go to M say look look go oh for three days look oh god how can I do that? And what Sandy says is if you got a bad idea put it back and grab a good one.

How often on step one are we go? We grab a good one. I'm here to tell you that's the basis of spirituality.

It's no big mystery to me anymore. If I'm having a bad thought, replace it with a good one. Put it back and grab a good one.

That's all I have to do. And that's what I got to do with step one. Not only step one, but every step.

And I don't know about you, but the longer I'm sober, the more those steps expose themselves. I when the first time I read the big book, God wasn't mentioned once. And over the years, the big book fairy has come in and put him in about every sentence and paragraph.

First time I read it, it wasn't mentioned. You know why? Wasn't going to look.

Wasn't going to look. I always get chuckles when I hear a new person talking about reality really u because nine out of ten times they have no idea of what reality is. They have a great idea of what their perceptions are.

And step one to me says, "Stop. Surrender it all. Let's start again." And if I might be so bold, die of self.

Begin again. Or bolder yet, be reborn. Let's start fresh.

No matter where you've been, no matter how far you've been, no matter how far down, up or what, start fresh. So if we look at step one and we really say, even at my best, I probably could do better and surrender it all. I always get tickled when somebody says to me, "Well, you know, I've had some old behaviors come up." And I say, you know, if you're still doing them, it's not old behavior.

It's called current behavior. So what you know what that is? It's just a little rationalization to pass it off and keep doing it.

Pass it off and keep doing it. Oh, step one. Well, I don't know about that.

Well, you know what? If you don't, you're in real trouble. you're in real trouble if you've been one of them fortunate enough to come and just glide through and go into meetings and the little activity and the fellowship is wonderful, but the steps in God are what's going to keep you sober.

The steps in God are what's going to give you a life that you wouldn't trade with anybody. See, I was fortunate because when I got here, I pretty much felt that I I would rather be anybody else any any other place and live any other time than right now. And through the process of these steps and living it as a way of life that's gone 180 degrees.

I don't know of anybody I trade lives with. And I know some wonderful people. But I also know what I've been given.

You know, and it starts with step one, powerless. My life is unmanageable. And you know something?

I've been through all our literature several times and it never says at any given point, okay, you can manage it now. >> I assume that you can. Because after all, I did step one.

I assume that I can manage it again. But the minute I do, guess what? I'm going backwards.

I'm not going forwards. And all of these steps, I believe, are spiritual exercises. People come to me a lot and they say, you know, Ed, uh, something bad happened and I was just surprised at how weak I was spiritually.

And I would say to them,"Well, what spiritual exercises are you doing every day?" They went, "Well, well, I pray from time to time." I said, 'Well, why is you why are you surprised you're weak when you're not doing any spiritual exercises? You don't do any physical exercises. Guess what?

You get weak. Don't expect to run a marathon. So, it's very important that we take these spiritual exercises, including step one, and in my opinion, every day they're applicable.

I'm always fascinated when somebody comes to talk to me and I say, "Well, what step are you on?" And inevit inevitably if they're in deep trouble, I'll be going, "Well, I'm u I'm kind of doing um um let's see, maybe 10 and a little three." I said, "Otherwise, you're on no step." He said, "Well, I've been through the steps." And I said, "Where does it say that? Where does it say that? You, you know, you take this for 10 days and your disease will be gone.

take this for 12 steps, your disease will be gone. What it says to me is it's a way of life that has to be practiced daily. So what I tell those people said, you got to get a program.

You got to start walking one rather than thinking one, you know, cuz your thinking isn't doing well. And what step are you on? If you've been around a while, got a great idea, 12 months, 12 steps.

H what if you took a step a month and just applied that in your life consciously and not take it for granted. Well, I did that. Oh, I've done that.

Really, it's not about doing that. It's about living that. And until we make that distinction, I can tell you what happens from my own experience.

The same emotions, depressions, and anxieties that came to you in your drinking days will come to you in your sober days. You know the psychic change has not taken place if I'm not doing the steps. If I do the steps, it guarantees me a psychic change.

What does that mean? Change my mind. Change my mind.

That through the steps, these steps, I can find the freedom that I've never known. And they have to be pertinent. All everybody, well, this is my favorite step.

This is my favorite step. They're all my favorite steps because to my mind and to my way of life, they are all imperative to my recovery. None is less important than the other.

In fact, I will say this to you, the one you think is less important is probably the one you should be working. At least in my experience. Then, you know, right after that, we surrender and we start talking about being powerless.

God, don't we love that? And we got to surrender and we got to start fresh. Oh, there's a good thought.

You know, let's just throw away everything I've ever done in life. Well, for for some of us is a refreshing idea. But um now what are they going they're going to talk about you being crazy?

You know, it says came to believe. Now notice it said came to believe. I'm going to challenge you this weekend on your on your belief.

I'm as some of you know I told you I'm a pastor last night and it's so funny when people come up to me and say you know Ed I've been a good Christian all my life and I just believe in Jesus and you know my son I'm just worried sick about him how does that work say what do you mean so you're a good Christian and you believe in Jesus that means you have faith have you prayed about why are you worrying if you pray why worry if you worry why pray because we need to keep control. That's why people of faith can turn it over and go on about their business. So, I'm asking you when it says in step two, came to believe, where are you coming from?

Where are you going to? Where are you at in your journey really? So easy to say, oh yeah, I kind of believe there's a God.

And then there's others that profess faith to no end, and you see him breaking every rule they can break. Of course, my answer to that is, "Thank God they're going to church. At least they got a fighting chance.

They're not sitting in some other room gossiping about them, you know." But it's true. Often times I'll have people come into the church and when I was at a a regular church and people would come in and they say, "You know, I thought the wall, excuse me, the walls were going to come tumbling down when I walked in." I said, "Oh, no, no, they got much stronger when you walked in." It's just the way we look at things. just the way we look at things.

Came to believe in a power greater than ourselves. I am so pleased that it didn't say God at this point because I would have had to leave. Thank you very much.

I told you last night about my ones, my evidence that God was nothing but a jerk out to get me. And when you told me to pray, I said, "Please, that's radar, baby." And he'll pick me up and zap me. I know it.

I ain't praying. Those are all the images I had. So I'm so grateful they said power greater than yourself because I had to start where I was at.

God, I would have loved to been where you were, but I had to start where I was at. My talk last night, I told you how I made a mistake. I started out right.

I said, "A God that I could come to believe in is a a God that's kind and loving and forgiving." Oh man, that's good stuff. I like that because that's 180 degrees from anything I'd ever believed about God. But then the mistake I made, I went beyond my own belief and experience and started using your words and your terms and forgetting my journey.

As it says so eloquently in the book, this is a book and a program designed to help you develop a personal relationship with God that will solve your problems or problem. It says problems to me. So, at step two, when we came to believe in a power greater than yourself, make sure that's what it is.

And if you're new and if you think it's the group, okay. If you think it's if you think it's your sponsor, okay. I hear people say, "But they think they think their sponsor is a rock." I say, "You know what?

They're probably being more honest about their God than you are cuz you're pretending like you got one. You ain't got squat. So it's important that what I come to believe what is the power greater than myself because this is the cornerstone of all other things that I'm building.

This is the cornerstone. If I misplace it and if I get it in crooked, there's problems later in the structure. I promise you.

The nice thing is we can always go back. The wonderful thing about the 12step program is we can always start at step one again. And by the way, you don't have to drink to do it.

You don't have to get divorced to do it. You don't have to choke somebody to do it. You can just say, you know what, I am not comfortable at all and 12 steps tell me I'm supposed to be happy, joyous, and free.

I'm starting fresh and getting it right. I would suggest you do that with the sponsor's direction. Here's why.

Especially if you're on step three. Step four may look a little a little too weary to get into maybe I need to go back to step one. No, you probably need to go on to step four.

But that's why sponsorship is so important. But when we talk about a power greater than yourself, what is it? I mean, what do you really believe?

If I had a gun to your head and a lie detector hooked to you, and I said, "Your life depends on what you believe." What would you say? That's the truth. Whatever that is, celebrate it.

Even if it's, "I got no damned idea." Excellent. Good. Now, we got a starting spot.

Now, we can move ahead, but I until I acknowledge where I'm at, I can't grow anywhere else. You know, they used to say years ago in the what was 70s and ' 80s, grow where you're planted. It was really profound because that's the only way your relationship with God or a power greater than yourself.

And for me, for a long time, it was a power greater than yourself because to say God would put a knot in my gut. And you know, for a long time, it was higher power. Now it's Huelet Packard, you know, but back then it was I always get a kick when I see their commercials.

But eventually I was comfortable enough to take the to take the abbreviation away and just call God God. But I'm grateful for every step of that journey I took. You know why?

It's mine now. You can't tell me what I think. You can't tell me what I feel as far as my God's concerned.

You can share with me some things you've been through and maybe improve my relationship, but you can't destroy my relationship because it's my relationship. And if we don't take time to build that relationship going in, our sobriety is going to be a skew at best. And you're going to have that sense of I'm missing something here.

I'm missing something here. Usually what it is is the relationship with God. Now, it's very easy to do because in this day and age, I have gone to meetings where God isn't even mentioned, issues and boundaries and all that other stuff's mentioned.

None of which is in our 12 steps. It's in the other 12 steps, not in our 12 steps. Has nothing to do with alcoholic synonymous.

In fact, I almost believe that a lot of people's higher power is their therapist anymore. I sit in meetings and hear people say, you know, I couldn't live without my therapist. To me, that's just as bad as saying, I couldn't live without my pastor.

Really? Then you got another sick dependency going on. You better look at it.

You know, you better look at it. We got to be when in thinking about who is my higher power. Is it helpful?

Is it not helpful? There again, I'm not saying anything derogatory about therapists. therapy has helped a lot of people and continues to help a lot of people in a uh the problem is when those individuals put more on the therapist than they even want and they become their reason for breathing and they're they're going to be their third step next Thursday at 2:00.

That's when it gets to be a problem. And it doesn't get to be a problem with them because if you blow your brains out, they probably don't even do a follow-up. They're too busy.

Doctors and therapists have lines of people saying, "What about me? What about me? What about me?" I have yet to meet a doctor in our or therapist who does any follow-up, especially on alcoholics, they put on medication.

Once you quit calling for appointments, you don't exist anymore because so they have no idea of the reality of what's going on. So, I'm going to say to you that when you talk about a power greater than yourself, make sure it's something that's healthy, something that's freeing, something that doesn't make you dependent. My first higher power was Big John.

Big John used to pick me up and take me to meetings. And not that I was afraid of Big John cuz he wasn't that big. He was only like 6'3, 6'4.

I love these guys. These six guys, 200 lb wearing big dog t-shirts. I say, "You're a pup.

You ain't even a dog. Take that shirt off." But Big John, why was he a power greater than myself? He'd magically appear at my door and take me to meetings.

And when he'd drive home, we'd said, "John, I told you his size. You see my size." We would sit in his 1962 for a twodoor Corva Monza and talk. Yeah.

John, what do you think? But he was wonderful to me because he was showing me how to do things I had no idea how to do. I remember one time we walked out of a meeting, somebody said something bad to John, so I kicked in their window and I jerked him out of the window.

I threw him up against the tree. I was going to take him out. John said, "No, no, no, Ed." And I said, "Well, he insulted you." He said, "We don't do that." And they asked, "Oh, okay.

Made my amends and paid for the window. I don't know." You know, but he was a power. He would tell me and show me how to do things I had no comprehension on how to do.

I had a comprehension on how to do it, but they were all wrong for the most part. Especially for me emotionally and spiritually. I had gathered all this negative information on how to live life and how to relate to people and how to believe in a god or not believe in a god and that was ever most of my mind.

or Big John. I came to believe in Big John. You know why?

If he said 6:30, I'll pick you up at 6:30. He's out there. No question.

After my father was murdered, every morning at 7:00 when I left for work, you know where Big John was? Happened to be right outside my house reading his paper. And I'd come out and he'd go, "He made a believer out of me.

what we say and what we do counts a great deal. I remember one time my sponsor after Clancy became my sponsor, he said, "Well, Ed, do you want to go with me to talk someplace?" And because he talks literally every night of the week, sometimes two and three times a day. And I said, "Sure." He said, "Be at my house at 6:30 p.m." I said, "Okay." I got there about 6:31 and I smelled exhaust fumes.

And I called in the next day. I said, "Hi, class." Said, "You know, I was there. Uh, you were gone." He said, "Uh, you weren't there at 6:30." I said, 'Well, I was there 6:31, 6:32.

He said, ' That's what I said. I said, 6:30, didn't I? And I went, oh, come on.

He said, don't know. Come on, me. If I was a newcomer waiting for you to take me to a meeting, that would have been enough to say, see, they don't even tell the truth.

It's important what we say and do. When we say we're going to be someplace, do it. We are responsible, you know, we're responsible for the the the reflection we send of this program.

And if you're one of those who think that this is a social deal, God, I hope you get over that pretty quick. Otherwise, you won't be around long anyway. You know, what this is is a way of life.

What this is is something that we commit to to our innermost selves to be the best people we can ever beyond what I ever dreamed of being. Beyond So John was my first power greater than my show. Then the group because there was times when John couldn't be there.

He was an undertaker. So we had business from time to time. He kept me sober for a long time.

You say, "How taller are you, Ed?" And at that time I was 6'11. I said, "11? Why?" He said, "You know the standard coffin's only 6'3"?

I said, "What do you mean by that?" I said, "Oh, chop chop." It's that aa love in the early days. It kept me here. He said, "We either chop them off or we break them and fold them in." I thought, "Oh, God." I don't want to be walking around heaven like that if I get there.

Oh, hell for that matter. A little closer to the flame, you know. But John, I came to believe in John and then I came to believe in uh the group because when John wasn't there, you know what?

Holiday, no holiday, rain, snow, somebody was always there. Always there. In the last 10 years, I started hearing about people that don't have meetings because of bad weather.

Really, how long would that keep you from drinking, you know, or on a holiday because of family? You're like me. If it wasn't for AA, you wouldn't have a family.

Is it really that bad to go give an hour back, you know, and eventually I worked on a power greater than myself because the next step demands that I know cuz you know what it's asking you to do? made the decision to turn our will and our life. Just take a minute and think about that.

Will and our life. What more is there? How many of you have done it?

How many of you have said you've done it? You bet. Will in life.

That's everything that we are about, everything that we live. The job, the co-workers. You know, a lot of people say to me, you know, the toughest place to work this program is at home.

That's a load of crap. It's the last place you ever attempt it. That's the problem.

You know, we're too busy trying to impress the people in meetings. Oh, we let that day time. Everything's good.

Yeah. We go home and kick the dog and cuss out the wife or the husband and be the same jerk we've always been. No, no, no.

It's not the toughest place. It's just the last place, unfortunately. Have you turned that over to God?

Your home life, your situations? You know, it's asking you to turn everything over, even your emotions, your will, and what you think. Everything.

I'm going to read you something that fascinated me a while back. U my home group's a big book study group. We meet every night uh every Tuesday night in Davenport, Iowa at 6:00 to 7:00 p.m.

And I would invite you there, but I like the group small. So, but if you're ever there, come on by. It'd be good to see you.

And we go through the first 164 pages, but we also include the forwards in the doctor's opinion. And um it only took us four years and four months to get through it the first time. You know why?

There's far too much information here. This isn't Bill Wilson's brilliance that's in this book. It's God hadn't feeding us everything we'd ever need.

In my opinion to this day when I read it, it tells me something new. I'm not a big time big book quoter simply because by the time I got to quote it, it's old news. If I think I need to quote that, I'll get your number, go back and read it, see if it says the same thing.

Promise you it won't, then I'll share that with you. But I'm always sharing yesterday's recovery. You know, it's like you can't stay sober on who you helped yesterday.

You can't stay sober on the prayers you said yesterday. Just can't. But on page 62 of the big book is just profound to me.

It says, "Selfishness, self-centeredness, that we think is the root of our problems. Driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-d delusion, self-seeking, we step on our toes of our fellows and they retaliate. Sometimes they hurt us seemingly without provocation.

But invariably we find at some point in the past we have made decisions based on self that have later put us in the position to be hurt. So our troubles we think are basically of our own making. I'll read that again.

So our troubles we think are basically of our own making. They arise out of ourselves. The alcoholic is an extreme example of self-willrun rhyme.

I'm sure many of you have read this. Later it says this is the how and why of it. First of all we had to quit playing God.

It didn't work. Next we decided that hereafter in this drama of life God is to be our director. He is the principle.

We are his agents. He is the father. We are his children.

Most ideas are simple. And this concept was the keystone from which a new and triumphant arc through which we passed to freedom. I love this one.

When we sincerely underline sincerely took such a position, all sorts of remarkable things followed. We had a new employer being all powerful. Doesn't say having a little power.

Being all powerful, he provided what we needed. But there's an if. If we kept close to him and performed his work well.

Established on such footing, we became less and less interested in our lives, ourselves, our little plans and designs. More and more we became interested in seeing what we could contribute to life. As we felt new power flow in, as we enjoyed peace of mind, as we discovered we could face life successfully.

As we became conscious of his presence, we began to lose our fear of today, tomorrow, or the hereafter. We were reborn. That's the big book.

Now, I read all that to read you the next sentence. We were now at step three. That's all work to be done in two.

the understanding, the selfishness, self-centerness. That's the only way you can be ready for three is if you get rid of that selfish self centerness. And if you understand that we're the root of the problems, how can you turn your will in your life over to the care of God if you don't understand these basics?

What you're doing is what a lot of us did. Give him enough to satisfy him for a little while. Are you praying?

Yeah. Yeah, I'm praying. I'm praying.

What are you praying? And I pray he gets exactly what he deserves. That's what I'm praying.

You know when we talk about step three, they are dead serious. And I will ask you. I will ask you, how have you done on step two?

How have you done on preparation of step three? Now the saving grace is most of us have a good excuse. We were new and when I was new, they used to have a great line that I love.

They said, "You know what? Wait for 90 days to get your brains out of hawk, you know, for the fog to lift." God, what great information. Now they ship you out of treatment centers and say stupid things like, you know, now that you've been through treatment, you got the equivalent of two to three years in ANA.

Oh, they tell them that. They tell them that. What a lie.

You know how you get two to three equivalent years of AA? About two to three years in AA. That's how you get that.

So in 30 days they're thinking I've done one through five and we can't hold them accountable. But what we can do is when they come into these rooms we can rem we can take them through the book and take them through the steps and show them what's really there. See people can't charge for AA.

That's why all the other therapies had to be brought in. I don't know about up here, but down in Iowa in treatment, they are not allowed anymore to mention AA or God. Oh, it's coming if it isn't here.

In fact, I know it's here, but it's coming because we're no longer helpful to the experts. And last night, I said something about the professionals. And a lady come up to me who is a professional, and I'm glad she did.

She does a lot of good work. Please understand that I I paint that with a broad broad brush because simply because it's been my experience that that's what's applicable. But there are individuals in every profession that understand alcoholism and addiction and this disease that we're dealing with, this spiritual disease that we're dealing with.

Uh but most of them don't. Uh now in the medical universities, they're backed down to giving the same education they gave 40 years ago on alcoholism. 1 to two hours, that's it.

And what they're taught to do is dual diagnose so the insurance companies will pay them. That's the truth. Uh that's just the truth.

Change happened about 15 years ago. I watched it happen. I watched a hospital that was totally chemically free.

Uh when insurance company, major insurance company said, "We'll no longer pay just for a uh addiction. There has to be another diagnosible condition." At that time they had an AIM meeting every Saturday night where over 300 people attended. They have no meeting anymore.

There isn't enough for a meeting anymore because they started dual diagnosing and saying, "No, this won't hurt you." Yeah, we know last month we told you it would. This month we're telling you, "No, it won't." And it does. What do I mean by that?

I mean that in order for me to grow spiritually, I have to be in touch with what's going on. If I'm going to work step two and be restored to sanity, I need to be restored to sanity, not mask over and I'll deal with it later. You know, in certain cases, uh, mood alters are are needed.

There's just no question about that. And please understand, I'm not talking about your heart medication. I'm not talking about your blood pressure medication.

I'm not talking about your epilepsy, unless your epilepsy was diagnosed before you got sober. You might be surprised now if you go to the doctor and get re-evaluated and get off that. Maybe you don't need it anymore.

Chances are you don't. But that's between you and your doctor. You go and you talk to your doctor about that.

And any form of medication that you might be on, don't make the brilliant move of I'm just going to quit it. That's crazy. Especially if you've been on it for a while.

What you might do is go to your doctor and you're saying, you know, I really want to try to get more depth in this. I want to would like you to wean me off this. You know, you can always go back on and just see.

Now, some people say to me, "Well, what if they get suicidal?" In 35 years I've been around, I've met a high estimate of seven people who've committed suicide while they're trying to stay sober. I cannot count the number of people I've been buried that took the other way. Can't count them.

Can't count them. And as a pastor, when you're sitting there doing the service, you just want to scream one more time because they convinced them, "Oh, this won't hurt you." They don't know what they're talking about. We're the experts.

We do know what we're talking about. They aren't the experts. This is the program that started changing the world of addiction and it's the program that continues to if that program's applied there.

Again, when we're into step three, I it doesn't say turn my will and my life over to the care of God and Prozac. It says over to the the care of God. The care of God.

Some people, well, it's just the care. It means I still got to do it. I don't think so.

I think when I turn my will in my life, I surrender it all. One day at a time, thank God. One day at a time, thank God.

Just for today, surrender it all. See what happens. First time you try that, you know what's going to happen?

You're going to be a nervous wreck all day. Well, what if he isn't paying attention? You know what if I love the people who say, you know, I went to a meeting today and God's testing me.

That's right. He stops the entire world just to screw around with your day. That's right.

You're just that important. Yeah, you really are. No.

Life tests me. Life tests me all the time. My old ideas test me all the time.

But my God never tests me. But he watches I'm being tested and he's given me a way out. I can either do it or not.

The choice is mine. The choice is mine. Now, when you talk about step three and you talk about God, man, sour.

When you talk about God, what I want you to do is take a minute and throw away any old ideas that you have. A lot of you have pads and those of you who don't, I want you just to take a minute and I want you to create a god that you can believe in. There again, gun held to your head, lie detector.

Do you believe this? Your life depends on it. Write down on your pad some of the characteristics of a god that you could really believe in this moment.

Or make a mental list. Take a minute, close your eyes, and do that. It's important work.

And there's no right or wrong wrong size of list. There isn't any correct number or incorrect number. This is your list.

Could just be one word. And it's not a test. There's no pass or fail.

It's your word. It's your concept. Okay.

Anybody want to share something they wrote down? Just a little piece of it. Oh, don't all jump forward.

>> I will. I put kind, gentle, forgiving, loving, and compassionate. >> Okay, very good.

Anybody else? >> Loving, caring, forgiving, accepting, all knowing, and understanding. >> Good.

Anybody else? >> Merciful, forgiving. >> Okay.

>> Plugs in. Very good. I like that.

Yeah. Any Not I like them all, but anybody else? Come on.

>> Benevolent. >> Benevolent. Good.

>> My god loves the Saskatchewan roofers. >> Thank God it says you understand him. >> No, but if that's your god, hope it's a winning season.

But anybody else? >> Sober. >> Sober.

Okay. >> Funny. >> Funny.

Very important, >> man. And if we can't learn to laugh at ourselves, forget it. If you take your program so seriously, you can't laugh, then you've got a new God.

And it has nothing to do with anybody outside of you. Have you noticed we got a room of people here that probably at one time didn't believe much at all. And all that was said was positive comments.

I'm going to share something with you that I absolutely believe with every fiber of my being. There was a wonderful man around years ago named Chuck C. And Chuck was my mentor.

He used to sit and Chuck taught me about God by the way he lived. Oh, he taught me wonderful things by what he said. But I watched him.

And one of the things he used to say to me is, Eddie, what you came here looking for, you're looking with. What you came here looking for, you're looking with. What does that mean?

What it means is everything I ever wanted to be, I already am. And these steps are a way to bring it out. The way I lived life brought out the worst in me.

The way I've learned to live life brings out the best in me. And you know, we always hear, "Well, when you point a finger at somebody else, there's three pointing back at you." Have you heard that one? Do you know that's about the good stuff, too?

We always take it in a negative connotation. It's about the good stuff. If you see something that really moves you and lifts you and just touches your soul and you say, "Oh, I wish I could be that way." You are or you couldn't have identified it.

What you came here looking for, you're looking with everything you ever wanted to be, you are. The difference is the actions we take and the way we think about faith, about God, about life, about everything. Those of you who wrote down your God, next time you pray, I challenge you to bring that image to mind.

Connect with that God that you understand. And don't put any boundaries on it. Let it grow.

Let it lift. See where it goes. But for some of you, I'm sure for the first time in your life, you're on solid ground with the power greater than yourself.

And you know, the nice thing about step three, too, is you can take it anytime you want to take it. I don't know that you can take it enough. And each time you take it, you're going to grow.

And each time you take it, you're going to learn a new sense of healing and a sense of being. At least that's been my experience. Step three in the break, I challenge some of you to go for a walk and do two things.

Stop hating yourself. It hasn't worked even before you got sober and even start to consider the possibility of taking your own hate and self-loathing and giving that to God, too. That's my challenge for break.

Are we at break time? We got uh four more minutes, but I'm going to give you four extra. Thank you very much.

>> I meant to tell you earlier that at any time we're going to have a question and answer period at the end of all this in the closing sessions. But if you come up with a question before then that's really burning like I love somebody came up. happens to me at halftime at at break and u said uh you know I agreed with some of what you said and I strongly disagreed with other parts of you said I love that because it's not about me being right it's about just putting it out there and stirring it up and seeing where you stand.

So, if there's any time that something that that really bothers you, instead of going into a corner and taking my inventory, which you're more than welcome to do, uh, because God knows my sponsor does, uh, so, uh, maybe talk about it here. So, if you have a question that comes up, don't hesitate if you're not embarrassed to talk about it because it is being taped. Uh, and we will hold you up for blackmail, but if you have a question, ask it, but we'd be happy to answer.

Also, tonight, uh, we're going to have our service, our little get together. We'll call it a service of joy right down there in the chapel. And there will be a normal uh mass being given across the way at 5:00.

Okay. So, uh for those of you who wanted to go to mass, that'll be across the way. And at the same time, we're going to be down here and we're going to have a little service that I just kind of do and put together and it's fun and it's loving and anybody's welcome.

You don't even have to believe. How's that? >> Yeah.

Yeah. Ain't that great? So, step three, you know, a powerful step.

And it's funny because when we said when we said the third step prayer, I heard a couple people say amen in the It doesn't say amen in the book. In fact, amen is until after the seventh step prayer. I've heard it said that you could consider from 63 all the way to 76.

One solid prayer with the end. Amen. And that's pretty good stuff.

That's pretty good stuff. And I'll tell you why. It says some powerful things.

I'm just going to I hate being read to. That's why I'll read you. But no, I just want to read this one part that that uh it's when we're talking about an inventory, it's so important to me.

Um it says next we launched out on a course of vigorous action not thought vigorous action you know and and the first step was a personal house cleaning of which we're going to be talking about four of which many of us had never attempted. We're not talking about the same thing as confession in the Catholic church. We're not talking about the same thing.

If that had worked for you, then >> you'd be in better shape. We're talking about a house cleaning at death. And uh when it talks about resentment is the number one offender.

It destroys more alcoholics than anything else. From from it stems all forms of and I told you it was in here before, spiritual disease. For we have not only mentally and physically been mentally and physically ill, we have been spiritually sick.

When the spiritual malady is overcome, we will straighten out mentally and physically. How important is step four? I would say to you, absolutely critical in this person's recovery.

Now, what was tough was they said, you know, made a fearless searching moral inventory. You know what my first question was? Whose morals?

Yours or mine? >> Because if they were by my morals, I really didn't need to take one. Thank you very much.

But if they were by your morals or the moral standing that was set, the difference between right and wrong, which everybody knows, uh, except a few people who are incapable of knowing. Uh, of course it was by the morals that were set out there. And I didn't like that information at all because I was not a nice person.

And there's a a a a a set of columns that you do in the big book and it's laid out wonderfully and it's very good. I've taken the fourth step that way. I'm a guy that takes a good fourth and fifth step about every 5 years.

Now, I know some people you were perfect and did it all back then. My hair's off to you. I'm I'm one of those guys I'm one of those guys that I can't do a perfect step 10 and things slip between the cracks.

And it's funny how it seems to be the same things will slip through those cracks and you get a little pile at the end of three or four or five years. So I go and I clean up the pile. So whether you do or you don't, my recommendation is especially if you've got some time sober and if you've been a long time and you're still critical and grouchy and taking everybody's inventory, my suggestion is you've never taken a good one to begin with.

I always run into a I've been sober 20 years. I haven't taken an inventory. Yeah, I could tell.

And if you want what they have, good. Okay, go for it. I'm not here to judge them.

I just don't want that kind of action in 20 years sober. Just don't want that. Uh, so I had to take an inventory.

And I don't know about you, in my inventory, it wasn't the big things that you probably should have thought were in there. >> It was the little nickel and dime compromises in my life before I got sober and after I got sober that were killing me. And we all have that deep dark secret that nobody's going to and never going to tell this one.

I'm going to share mine with you. And you're probably going to think that's nothing. Doesn't matter what you think.

It matters what it was doing to my heart and soul. When I was, I don't know, 13, 14, somewhere in there, uh there was a record out Little Eva in Mottown. Little Eva in the locomotion.

Come on, baby. Do the locomotion. Remember that?

>> Some of you do. Some of you are going, "Huh? What?" But it was a great song and my buddy Ron and I would play that record over and over on that 45 RPM.

We just started just played all day long. And one day I stole the record. I didn't even have a record player.

I stole I bless you. I stole the record. The next day I went over to Ron's and he said, "I can't find the record." And I went, "Huh?

I wonder where it's at. Now, that may sound silly to you, but that bothered me worse than beating people half to death sober. That bothered me worse than the broken heart I put on my mother's face.

For whatever reason, I was never going to tell that to anybody ever. See, in that case, it doesn't I don't care what you think should bother me or not bother me. It's what bothers me.

It's a fearless moral inventory of the exact nature of my wrongs. Now, I'm aware in Alanon, they shifted a few years ago and now they put good things in the inventory. That's fine.

I don't believe in that. I believe it defeats every purpose of the four step because the four step is to level our ego. Other people put themselves on their inventory.

I don't recommend that. In step 10, it talks about putting assets. Step four, it doesn't talk about that.

And people who are self-involved go, "Oh, but I think so badly of myself, not nearly of what you should think." Let's get down to the real nitty-gritty of what kind of rotten persons we really become. Because until we do that, we're never going to get better. I don't know about you, but I'd love to justify my actions.

Oh, I did this, this, and this, but I did this, this, and this. And I'd never look at what I did. I never look at the kind of damage and hell I put people through.

So in my inventory, it was my inventory. It wasn't their inventory. And it's very that's very important to me.

I've done the four step in many different ways. Uh my sponsor gave me seven questions 30 years ago that are just very effective and that's what I use for the people I sponsor because it gets right down to the quick first question is what memories in your life caused you pain guilt and sadness. Hello there's and when you're done you know what those are supposed to be gone if they're not then you've missed something in the process.

If you have done this inventory and if you've done five, six, seven, and eight and still carry it, you've missed something in the process. There is something you're unwilling to let go of. Part of what is was in my inventory is I loved pain and discomfort.

It was familiar. I knew how to be at disease. I had no idea how to be at peace.

If you brought peace along, I'd bring disease into it. disease into it so I'd feel comfortable. How many of us did that once we got sober?

You know, things are going well. So, we start thinking of things to stir it up. Yeah.

Well, what if Clancy always used to say we had a sheriff in Los Angeles, Sheriff Peter Pitches. And he said, "Uh, somebody told me to turn my checks, my bad checks over to God. Turn them over to God.

God turned them over to Sheriff Peter Pitches." and he came and arrested me, you know. So, again, we got to do action. It can't just be a thought process.

And I've got to put the things in there uh uh that I've done wrong. And I'm not trying to be the worst because there isn't any worst and there isn't any best. But I couldn't think of anybody I hadn't offended in some way just by my presence because I was sarcastic.

I was arrogant. I was self-involved. I was all that stuff.

So my inventory uh the first time I I wrote that inventory, it was kind of all what you had done to me. Next time I took that inventory is what was about what I had done to others. And that was very powerful and very healing for me because I had always blamed you for all of my troubles.

If it wasn't for you, then I wouldn't have done this. If it wasn't if it wasn't for those cops harassing me, I wouldn't have fought them. Well, you know what?

If I hadn't been in trouble, they wouldn't had any reason to harass me. Those kind of things and and that inventory, especially anger and resentment, my god, uh those were part of my being. I think that's why a lot of us have trouble letting that go because I used to think if I let that go, what's going to happen?

There's going to be a giant void. No, it's called peace. It's called lack of conflict.

It isn't a void. But I always looked at it negatively. I've been that way all my life and I've heard it this week.

Well, I've done this all my life. Well, change it. Quit justifying that you done it all your life.

Here, I've done this all my life. What do you think? Want to change it?

No. Rather not. Thank you.

I swelled from time to time. Other than that, I'm okay. And the nice thing about You're more than welcome to keep doing it.

Yeah. But if you want to get better, then you decide to do whatever it takes to change that. And I think part of the healing process of this fourth step is to look at it to be able to change it.

50% of the problem is acknowledging what it is. You know, really getting down to the nitty-gritty of what it is. The other uh part of this that's so important is uh who you take it with, but I'll get into that.

I want to talk about anger for a minute. Uh God, there's so much stuff about anger and that today. The book is very explicit about it.

It says we can't afford it. It says it's the dubious luxury of normal men and women. For us, it's poison.

It's kind of like reading the warning on the pack of cigarettes. Huh? Yeah.

For them, maybe. That's our insanity. That's our insanity.

And for years, I hung on to that anger. I really did. And I'd process it.

I'd work through it when it came. I'd breathe and I'd work through my anger and I' at times I'd vent my anger because that's what was needed. God forbid you were the one I was vetting it on.

There wasn't. And I heard all this stuff in meetings. None of it's found in there, however.

None of it. But I heard it in meeting and I want to share a couple instances when I was working on my anger and resentment. I was in Bowling Green uh Kentucky about 3 years ago.

Guy come up to me and said, "Ed, how you doing?" I said, "Oh, fine. How are you?" Said, "Good." He said, "You know, I used to go to meetings with you out in Los Angeles." I said, "Really?" And I said, "Yeah." Said, "I remember the last time I was at a meeting with you." And I said, "Really? Why is that?" He said, "You knocked the guy out with one punch.

I'm a spiritual guru. Sh 15 years sober. I remember I had forgotten about it because when you do these steps, you heal.

And I'm glad he brought it up because I remember at that time I was working on my anger. Yeah. Yeah.

No one was going to upset me. I was going to breathe in, breathe out. I was going to control my anger.

And there was a guy that was sitting in front of me talking during the meeting. And our group culture is no talking during the meeting. Have respect for who's ever out there.

Don't go and get coffee. Do go at breaka d all that. That's this guy.

And I tapped him on the shoulder. I said, "Excuse me, you're talking so I can't hear." And he said, "Oh, oh, okay." And at coffee break out in California, all the meetings are an hour and a half, which I prefer. Uh, and you had a half hour and then 10-minute coffee break and then you finished up with an hour.

It was great. And at the coffee break, he stood up and he turned around and said, "Don't you ever touch me again. And I said, "Sir, you don't understand.

I was just trying to help you. You see, in this meeting, we don't talk during the break." And little Alice, God bless her, knew me a lot better than I did. Come over and put both hands in my chest, said, "Big Ed, sit down.

Big head, sit down." I said, "Oh, honey, don't worry about me. We're just talking. It's just fine." And Alice went, "Okay." Went sat down and we're talking again.

Here's Alice again. Come back five minutes later. big head sat down.

And I said, "Oh, no. Don't worry. I'm in control here.

This is that, you know." And I turned around, the guy said, "Don't you ever." And before I know it, pop. >> And he's going over four rows of chairs. And my first thought is, "How am I going to explain this to my sponsor?" That was my first thought.

And I know what to do when you've been bad. I ran right around and woke him up and made amends immediately, you know. and I sponsored him for the next five years.

He said he'd been around a for some time, but nobody had ever gotten his attention before. Seems I did. Now, the reason I tell you that and funny, but you know what?

There's no reason to ever touch anybody physically in an AA meeting and that had always been my safe place here and I'm the one that violated it with the exception of that guy. The first few months I was sober and there have been some people I had to physically take care of that were going to hurt themselves or somebody else in the meeting. That's the only exception when there's a lot of illness and things need to be taken care of.

But it just broke my heart that I did that. Shortly after that, I'm uh going out to the valley. I was living in California.

I was going out to the valley to talk and this guy in this Audi cuts me off and he tells me I'm number one. And uh then he slams on the brakes a couple times and then he tells me I'm number one again. And then he does this.

Pull over. I thought excellent. There is a god.

Excellent. And my rule is if he gets out of the car, his butt's mine cuz he's coming at me. That's the rules in California.

He got out of the car and I thought, "Oh, good." I unrealled out of that car. His eyes got this peak. I grabbed him by his collar and his crotch and I threw him over his car and I thought, "Ed, you're on your way to give a spiritual talk.

This probably is." So, I went around and I picked him up and I brushed him off, put him back in his car and started to make amends immediately. You know, I'm a member of a 12step group and what we do his eyes got this big And I'm sitting there in the middle of the freeway going, "I'm 15 years sober. What's wrong with this picture?" Shortly after that, I was at work.

I had just gotten this new job. And I was running this agency and a guy came in. He'd uh his girlfriend had left a deposit on a piece of merchandise she wanted to purchase.

And I guess the previous management there, they had some difficulties with them. and she called me up and said, "But I want my deposit back." And I looked at what she ordered and I thought, "Man, that's an excellent piece of merchandise. I'd love to have it back in inventory." So I said, "Sure, come on.

I I'll give you I'm sorry about whatever happened before. We'll give you a check." And she came in. She came in with her boyfriend who was muscle bound.

And I found out later he was a stunt man in a lion tamer. Hadn't run into this lion before. And um he started getting real smart with me.

And he had nothing to do with the deal. She seemed to be pleasant. I had her sign that she had gotten the check and I said, "Thank you very much.

I'm sorry it didn't work out." And he said to me, "Uh uh, what are you some kind of?" And called me about every foul name he could. And I had a coffee cup in my hand and I crushed it. >> And I went for him.

And I'm running down Burbank Boulevard full steam. And this kid could run, man. He could This guy could run cuz I couldn't catch him.

And here comes my boss driving by this way. Oops. And I stopped and I caught my breath and I went back to work and I went in.

And those people where I'd been for 3 months that loved and respected me and trusted me could not even look me in the eye. They had saw a rage in me that just terrified. And that's the day I decided the book is correct.

I cannot afford anger and resentment. Justified or unjustified. I can't.

Now, those are the obvious ones. The other ones I got to ask is how to come out with my loved ones, with my children, how to come out with my co-workers, how to come out with the people I sponsor. Cuz it was coming out some way.

Cuz until it's surrendered, it doesn't go away. And I found out for me that surrendering it, it indeed goes away. That I don't have to control it.

I don't have to work on it. I don't have to process it. I have to do what it says in the book.

God saved me from being angry and leave it there and leave it there. How well does that work? It got to the point in my life where you aren't going to believe this cuz I find it hard to believe.

I could not remember the names of the guys who killed my father. Could not remember their names. Now, that's a lifetime of guaranteed resentment and anger.

Nobody be mad at me for that. Trouble is it was killing me and I really got to the point where I could not remember. Somebody asked me and I couldn't recall one name.

That's the kind of healing that's available here. Not there, not in the future, not tomorrow, but right now if you're willing to put it down and here they say put it on paper. Look for it really is.

And what I missed in my inventories, I think, was the depth of my anger. The depth of my anger. I really didn't know.

If you'd asked me, I thought I was doing fine. I thought, oh, I' I'd uh do a little gossip every now and then, barbed with hostility. It's called character assassination.

I was just helping you so you wouldn't get involved. So, I had to put that stuff in my inventory. And uh I had to put that down and I really had to be willing to admit to God, to myself, and to another human being the exact nature of my wrongs.

Now, it's funny because fifth steps are taken all over this country. And there's directions on how to listen to a fifth step right in the 12 and 12. And most people don't get it.

When I was going into seminary, I was there and I was trying to behave myself. I I was not trying to even though I live alcoholic synonymous and everything I do. I was just trying to be one of the group and we're sitting there and they brought in a priest to talk to us about a fifth step.

And I'm being I'm being a good little pastor. I'm just sitting there and he says, "You know, when you listen to a fourth step, you never say anything. You just let them, you know, leave their burden with you, but you never interfere." And I went, he said, "Yes." I said, "Where'd you get that information?" He said, "Oh, I've been sober 18 years." I said, "Yeah, I've been sober 25." "Where'd you get that information?" "Well, I learned that in AA." And I said, "Oh, no you didn't.

No, you didn't." And he said, "Well, I think I did." And I said, "Well, you might run want to read the 12 and 12 because in the 12 and 12, it says that we counsel, direct, and advise counsel, direct, and advise. When we listen to a four step, you know why that was so personal to me? First four step I ever did was with Father Dan.

He's a wonderful guy and takes fifth steps with thousands of hundreds of guys. Hundreds of guys, maybe thousands cuz he's been doing it 30 years I've known him, 35 years I've known him. But I sat there and I took that fifth step and Father Dan would pat his Bible and he'd listen and I'd left there and the next day I was creating a new fourth step and I thought, "What's that about?

God, I just did that. Here I am doing the same crap. I didn't get any counsel, direction, or advice." When I got my sponsor, he said, "You're going to take your inventory with me." He said, ' And if you don't trust me enough to do your inventory, then you need to get another sponsor because we're talking about your life.

And come on. And he said, uh, you're going to do it with me. Well, I thought, well, what if you get drunk?

And he said, well, what if a priest gets drunk? Oh, okay. And, uh, so I took my inventory with him.

And I'll tell you what I found that when the the old habits would start appearing, he could bring them up to me. Ed, uh, how many hours did you work last week? 40.

How many did you put on your time cart? Well, 43. Didn't we talk about that in your inventory yet?

The minute you start stealing a little bit, doesn't go into every area of your life. And Oh, yeah. Thanks.

See, that's what I needed. I needed to be counseledled, direct, and advised and be with somebody who could hold me accountable. Now, I know that's not fashionable for a lot of people.

They just don't want to be held accountable. I needed to be because I was my own worst enemy. Even when I thought I was doing great, I needed someone to hold me accountable and give me a new perspective.

And in sponsorship, what I did is supplement my judgment, their judgment for mine because my best judgment kept me sick for years. Even in AA, if you remember, I was two and a half years sober before I got a sponsor. And I'd been through hell with my father being murdered and all that.

And I was stark raving sober. I mean, I was stark raving sober. And that's the time when I really had those suicidal depressions where I just wanted it to end.

I couldn't take the pain of living anymore. So, when I share with you about these steps and call them life and death, that's what they were to me. you know, uh, uh, drinking never occurred to me, but hitting a bridge abutman, turning on the gas, just going to sleep, no dramatics.

Oh, that sounded attractive. And through doing a fourth and fifth, I got to take that option off the table, too. You know, but if I'd never told anybody about it, it' still be on the table.

Four and five are cleansing. That's where we get in there and we scrub our insides out. I call it scraping of the soul.

And man, you want it good. And if there's any secrets you kept, go back and tell them cuz we are indeed as sick as our secrets. And I always get, it's always funny to me when when people say, "Oh, I don't want to do a fourth and fifth.

I've been so bad." I said, "Yeah, you're probably one of the worst." You know, and at first I go, "Yeah, probably." I said, "No, that's a joke. That's a joke. We all There are no original sins.

They've all been done before. probably a lot better than we did them, you know, and a lot more times. And uh part of what I had to put on my inventory is my hate for me.

I hated every breath I took. I felt dirty where soap don't get. And I didn't like me at all.

And those of you who liked me, I thought were just mis misunderstanding who I really was. What I learned through that inventory is I am a collector of ones. And I knew every negative thing there was about me.

And that was upfront in my mind. And step four, step five, six, and seven is where I started eliminating the ones in my life. For those of you who weren't here last night, the ones are simply I the analogy I come up with is I could walk into a room of 300 people, 299 could turn around to me and say, "Ed, you're the greatest." And one could go, "Jerk." And I'd remember the one.

Forget all the wonderfulness that was in that room. I'd remember the loser and that' be my life. Well, the inventory is to is the time where I started losing that bag of ones and it helped me breathe.

unhindered. You ever noticed alcoholics and uh people who love alcoholics are very shallow breathers? Seriously, do you ever notice that?

We had a wonderful meditation this morning where we were doing some breathing exercises and I stumbled that onto that uh God showed me that through a friend of mine, Clint H. He was talking and he was telling his story one day and he just said it this quick, kind of like a throwaway line. He said, "And when my mother died when I was 9 years old, I stopped breathing deeply." I went, "Wow, wonder when I stopped breathing deeply.

I don't ever remember breathing deeply." It was very shallow. You know, I was real easy to upset and I was I could explode. Snap like that.

And I started breathing deeply. Well, when you got a bag full of ones, you breathe shallow because it's a heavy load. And the less the load, the more you can breathe.

It's like kind of like being congested. You got a bad cold. You can't take a deep breath.

And the more it heals, the better you can breathe in. So I would highly recommend to you, whether you've been here a day or you've been here 40 years, if you're not practicing deep breathing, number one, it is the fuel that makes your body operate. It what what keeps you on Earth.

Breathe deeply every chance you get. Now, if you're anxietyprone, do it slowly, please, or you'll have an anxiety attack. Okay?

But breathing deeply, slowly and deeply fuels our bodies, our hearts, our minds, and yes indeed, our emotions. I realize my ones created my chemical imbalances. My ones, the key word is chemical imbalance.

Well, you know what? I can create a chemical imbalance with you at any given moment. You ever been startled?

Somebody run up behind you or just come up and you're startled. What happens to your body? Chemical imbalance.

I can give you a visual image and I I do it a lot of times and I just have you close your eyes and I have you envision a giant green 7 foot dill pickle. The sourest dill pickle you could ever imagine. And I have you walk up and I have you take a great big bite out of that sour green dill pickle and the juice is just running down your face.

And those who are not on medication. I'm not trying to be smart. It's true.

Because that's what medication's for is to mask uh start salivating and tasting it. They're li licking their lips. And I say by my input I just created a chemical imbalance in you just by telling you a little story.

Imagine the stories we tell us day and night. Imagine if it's all a negative input. Imagine if it's all negative energy.

Imagine if it's all self-hate and it's self-doubt. Of course we're going to be chemically imbalanced. Now imagine if you start putting empty this out with four and five, make some adjustments in six and seven and start putting good in the imbalance changes.

I promise you I haven't had a depression in 25 years. And they told me when I got sober I could never live without some sort of medication. And for the way I was at that particular time and they were absolutely right because of all I knew to learn I created it.

Selfishness, self-centerness is the root of all of my troubles. And I through four and five I learned a way to get out of that negative imaging because I didn't need it anymore. And you taught me a way to put in some positive things like helping other people and watching their life change.

and wonderful things happen. So, four and five are are powerful. And I I uh uh when I do four and five, I really take a minute before I'm done and I ask, is that it?

Is that all there is? Am I stealing anything at work? Paper clips, stuff I've just rationalized away, time, packing the time cart.

Am I being emotionally dishonest with my loved one? Oh, let's not bring up porno on the internet. My god, that's an outside issue.

No, it's a compulsive issue. And that's what we're talking about. Whatever area of your life you're not working this program, it's going to cost you everything you ever loved eventually.

You know, where am I being wrong? What am I doing wrong? Am I thinking ill of people way too often?

And for me, anytime is way too often. I challenge you the minute you think. I remember Chuck, I might have shared this with you last night.

I'm not sure. But Chuck C, when they talked when I when I talked, I didn't know how to pray at all. And Chuck was just amazing.

And I went up to Chuck one time and I said, "Chuck, how do you pray?" And he said, "Ed, your every thought's a prayer." And I did a little inventory about what I was thinking. Went, uh-oh. I it was not good news that every thought was a prayer to me.

It was just not good news at all. And then I asked myself a simple question. Well, if it's crap, why am I thinking it?

Why don't I replace it with a good thought? And really try to make my every thought a prayer. That's been my goal from that day to this.

I'm better at it than I've ever been in my life. I'm certainly nowhere close to having it mastered. But I'm telling you what, most of my life, I would say 85% to 90% of my day is praying unceasingly because my every thought is a prayer.

I want God to approve of everything that goes through this little mind. And if he doesn't, I'm trashing it. There's a brother Lawrence was a monk number of years ago.

And brother Lawrence was just an amazing guy. Well, let me tell you the story. I love this story.

I love the how God talks to me in life. I travel a lot. I travel about every weekend and I got a terrible habit.

I take the book that I'm reading that's really feeding me spiritually and I take it with me on the plane and I put it in the back of the seat in front of me and I forget it every time. So when I leave the plane and realize I got to catch the other one, I can't go back. I say a little prayer that that book be a blessing to whoever finds it, they get the same blessing or more than what I've been getting out of it.

Last January, New Year's, New Year's, it was January 1st, I was flying back from Shreport and I thought, man, I got nothing to read. I said, God, I need a little book. So I looked in the back and I pulled out a book and it was called Living in the Presence of God.

And it was saying of a guy named Brother Lawrence. It's this monk I'm talking to you about. And you know, for the last 15 years, I've really tried to look at ways to pray, effective ways to pray.

And man, we can get wordy and we can do all this. And brother Lawrence in that little book says, uh, you know, uh, I do the formal prayers they ask a monk, but I have no other formal prayers. He said, I guess my prayer would be each day I say, God, let me do nothing that offends you.

I thought, God, how simple. How simple. And that's my prayer today.

And I went home and I had just moved into this house. And on the kitchen table was a tape of Chuck C. I thought, "That's odd.

I haven't had that tape out for years. I've got every talk he's ever given. I haven't had that tape out for years." So on my kitchen table, I went out in the car and I put the tape in and he's talking about brother Lawrence.

I'd never heard him talk about brother Lawrence before. That's the way my God works in my life. And it's simply I pray that I do nothing that offends you today.

Boy, that pretty much sums it up, doesn't it? I pray that I do nothing that offends you and I add it today because it is a day at a time. But with four and five in that inventory, I had to put my sense of anger at God.

Why would you rip people out of my life? Why would you give people cancer? Why would you do all this crap?

Why do you let children starve in Africa? And I learned that God isn't letting people starve in Africa. We are.

He's given us more than enough. We're too busy upping our cell phone minutes and getting that flat screen TV. Thank you very much.

Don't blame God anymore. He weeps at our selfishness and I blamed him for years. You know, I found that out at my father's funeral.

Uh I had a terrible struggle with what was God's will and what wasn't. And the priest said, "You know, a lot of people would say Clifford's death is God's will." He said, "I don't believe that for a minute." He said, "I believe God created human beings and gave us all a free will. Some of those human beings chose to do this act.

Bless you. And now it's God's will. It was like the weight of the world fell off my shoulders.

I came to believe from that day to this, if it isn't good, it isn't God. Period. And I can back it up in that other book.

But isn't that amazing? You know, if it isn't good, it isn't God. I had to put all that stuff in that inventory so I could find out if I don't get rid of the old information.

and there's no room for new information. And God, I wanted to be whole. I could see people being functioning parts of this world.

And I just looked at them in awe. And I thought, God, that's what I want. But I had to put down that I called God a lot of names.

That I uh hunted his people down and harmed them in every way I knew how to do. But I also come to believe and come to read that uh he forgives ignorance and unbelief. Boy, I thank you.

And he also says, "What better than to say one of the worst sinners of them all? What better example to those around me?" So I didn't have to hate me anymore. I didn't have to think I was the worst thing that ever walked on this earth, that I was morally corrupt.

You know, years ago, I shared this story with Doug the other day. Years ago, I used to have a lot of judgments about a lot of people like we still do. I'm sure still there's still some there.

I'm trying to get rid of them the best I can when they come up. But there was a uh I had permission to tell this story, but there was a wide receiver for the Los Angeles Rams named Lance Wel. Lance was a wide receiver making big money, married to Joey Heatherton, who was a gorgeous blonde.

She's just beautiful, an actress. And Lance got arrested for uh exposing himself to little girls on the street corner. And man, there was big trouble.

Bad press. Almost lost everything. He said, "I'm going into treatment.

I'm going to do this. I'm going to do that." Well, 6 months later, guess what? He did it again.

And he lost his career. He lost his wife. He lost everything.

And part of his sentence was to do community service. So I went down to Clancy's office one day and there's Lance in there doing command community service and I walk in and Clancy said this is a guy sponsor Ed he's a recovering alcoholic and Lance said oh hi how are you said fine good for you and Clancy stepped out of the office for a minute and Lance turned to me and said you know I have a problem exposing myself to children and I said I don't really know a lot about that. He said oh I thought you said you were alcoholic.

I said yeah. He said, 'Y yeah, you know nothing about having a compulsion that if you do it, it'll cost you everything you've ever loved and you do it anyway. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you?

And I made amends right there. How many thought of our addiction and compulsive being weakwilled? Why don't you get a life?

Why don't you get some help? What's wrong with you? Same thing that's wrong with me.

the exact same thing that's wrong with me. And what a healing moment. I have friends who were sexual offenders for a long time and they don't offend one day at a time and haven't for some time because their recovery is one day at a time.

And it's powerful. All the hate I had for other people, I had to put in that inventory. had to put it in there because if I didn't, bad things were going to happen.

And I probably Thank you. And I I if I didn't put them in the inventory, bad things were going to happen. And I uh the worst thing is that I would have kept living the way I was living.

See, dying didn't scare me. It was a wish. Living terrified me sober because I'd been around and I'd been marching in the footsteps.

I thought of everybody else. Yet there was a madness that was in me. And I also need to tell you that doing four, five, six, seven, and six and seven and eight, the way we're the madness is gone for me anymore.

And it hasn't returned. I know it can return if I stop doing the very things I'm sharing with you today. Putting it for first and foremost in my life, you know.

So getting somebody who knows how to do a fifth step is very important. Uh, I've had people fly in around the country, just do a fifth step and go back home. And that's cool, too, because in their area, they don't do it with sponsors.

And I I'm not saying that's the only way to do it. I'm saying that was the most effective way for me. And I tell them when we sat down, I said, "About halfway through this, you're going to be mad as hell at me cuz I'm going to step right on your toes.

I've got to change the way you think about some things or you're going to die." They say, "Oh, I would never get mad." At the end, there's a tremendous feeling that takes place. Because one of the things that happened in my fourth and fifth is things that I was absolutely convinced of were killing me and I had to look at them differently. Number one, you were all against me.

No, you were against my actions. Big difference. There was a lot of people that were for me just couldn't put up with my behavior.

Big difference. I needed to hear that truth. And I heard that in inventory.

A lot of people didn't like me because I was very unlikable. Needed to hear that, too. It wasn't unfortunate.

It wasn't I was misunderstood. It's that I was really understood. They knew what kind of jerk they were dealing with and didn't like it.

Through that inventory, I have given the world complete permission not to like me at all. And it doesn't chase my boat anymore. I mean it.

If you didn't like me, it' kill me. It' kill me. Why?

Why? Why? Doesn't matter what.

I give you the right not to like me cuz you know what? There's some people that just rub me the wrong way. And I I demand that right.

So I got to give you that right. And since I've given you that right, it no longer bothers me anymore. My sponsor said to me one time said, "Ed, if you look good to jerks, that should tell you something." I'd never heard that before.

I like that. And I still do. There are a lot of people I don't want them to like what I have to say because in order for them to like it, I'd have to be of like mind.

And I've watched him die for years. And I watched me die for years until I found out the answer is still the answer. It's the application that was missing.

The answer is still the answer. Just the application that was missing. How we doing on time?

>> Five minutes. >> Five minutes. I still got to do step six.

Well, then I did step six. Thank you very much. Step six is powerful.

I always get them mixed up. I'm going to read it here. We're entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

This little paragraph, this little first paragraph says, uh, this is the step that separates the men from the boys or the women from the girls or the adults from the children, however you want to look at it. And boy, it's true. It's absolutely true in my case because they're talking about the things that caused my chemical imbalance.

They talk about uh false pride or pride. I still hear that in meetings. I hear people in meetings say, "My meeting's the best meeting in the world." Really?

How long did it take you to get to all those meetings to make that decision? It's just ego and pride. It's just ego and pride.

Oh, my group's the best group. I'm the one that knows the only way to Sorry. That's step six.

Doesn't need to be here. This isn't a competition. This is an inclusive ride.

Come along, you know. And uh greed. My god.

Greed. What do you do with that? You stop being greedy.

How do you do that? You stop. You start giving and stop keeping track of what you're given.

When I gave you anything, I would usually remind you of it from time to time. >> And when I was in need, wonder just where the hell you were at not helping me. And I started giving and I don't keep track.

And I haven't had that thought in ages. You owe me nothing. I am in need of nothing except what I create in my own mind through my own energy.

I am in need of nothing unless I want to be. Procrastination. Let's talk about that next hour.

No. But isn't it true? Isn't it true?

Procrastination. Let's put off talking about that till later. What is it in your life that you know if you did would make you feel better that you haven't done for me?

And this is going to sound corny being a macho man, but if my home gets out of order now, I need to tell you I'm a reformed pig. Uh, well, no, I'm not saying that in a mean way. I'm saying that in a life experience way.

Mom had seven kids. She was gone all day. Our house was a pigsty.

And I thought that's the way you lived. And then I learned, no, you don't have to live that way. And I I'm not a perfectionist where I have to have everything in order.

Like when I came in, my water was lined up in a perfect triangle, Joanne. But I I don't judge. I just barely report.

And uh but now if my house I was given a new house. I'll tell you this story. In December, well, we need two stories with that.

About four years ago, I was with the Methodist church and I absolutely loved it. It was a time in my life when things were everything was just going absolutely exquisite. And uh two things happened.

I'll just tell you about one of them. The church came to me and at that time I spoke in AA once a month. When I went into the ministry at 23 years sober, I said I would be happy to do your ministry and I'll go get that 230 hours of college credit and that graduate.

I'll do all that, but I need to be able to go talk in AA at least once a month out of gratitude for what they give me cuz it wasn't for them. You wouldn't have me the other three to four Sundays a month. And that was fine for eight years.

Then we got in a new bishop and the new bishop said, "Why should you have a Sunday a month off? None of my other pastors do. Make a choice.

You can either be a pastor at the United Methodist Church or you can go talk to your AA friends." And it was no-brainer in one. But there was a problem. I realized that the 299s are a lot of wonderful people.

My church out of the,200, there were three groups of 299. And I absolutely loved them. And my heart was broken.

But I'm here, so it's obvious the choice I made. And um as a result of that, I started my own church. And it's been a struggle.

I realize why people get involved with denomination. It's called a a a vein of money that runs through and keeps you going when you're struggling to thank God for it. I just don't have that.

And I spent everything I had trying to keep this little church going. I had to file bankruptcy. And I'm not complaining about that.

It was my choice whether it be right or wrong. Let God be the judge. It was what I felt I needed to do at the time.

And then last December, I'm sitting there and u I'd been holding on to this house I bought in '92. And uh I don't know about the utility bills up here, but this is an old house. Old house built in the 1800s.

And my utility bills for November and December were $900. >> And the payment was $800 a month. So when you're not working, puts a little or you're working every day, but you're just not getting a check in.

Makes it tough. Uh so I decided I said, "God, I I I maybe I made a mistake. You're holding on to this house.

I'm sure sorry." And I said, "I'll give it to you and you do whatever you want." I met with the realator, and I owed exactly what was worth on it, so they just cashed me out. And I I didn't know where I was going, but I knew it was going to be all right. I'd started a job at Tyson's as part-time chaplain where I'm at today.

I've been there just about a year. And this nurse walked by me one day named Mary. And Mary said, "Ed, are you looking for a house?" And I said, "Oh, yeah.

Yeah." She said, "Well, we have one for sale out in the country." Said, "It's just wonderful." And I said, "How much is it?" And she told me. And I went and I said, you know, I had to file bankruptcy a couple years back and cashwise I'm just not making it. And uh uh thank God I got this job now.

I can at least eat. That's good. And uh but I can't do that.

And she said, "Oh, okay." About 2 weeks later, she called me up and said, "Ed, um why don't you come look at the house? Cuz it's winter. Real estate doesn't move down there in the winter months.

Really, it's March. Picks up." says, "We'll rent it to you for, you know, enough for you to get by and that way the house isn't abandoned and you'll be I felt good." And I went and looked at it and you may have had this, but I had never had a sense of home before. And the minute I walked in the door, I was like, "I'm home." And I just backed up and said, "Whoa, whoa.

Can't go there. Temporary situation, one day at a time, and I'm real grateful for it." About a week later, Mary comes to me and her husband Ray and said, 'You know, Ed, we'd help you if we could, but we really feel God wants you to have this house, so we're going to pray for a financial blessing. And when someone else initiates it, I feel comfortable joining them in prayer.

It's not my will, it's theirs. So, I started saying some prayers for that. About two weeks later, I'm doing a retreat that I do three, four times a year down in my home area, and there's a gal there that's been there for 12 years.

Uh, coming for 12 years. And she said, "Ed, uh, where are you living?" And I told her about the little place. She said, "Why don't you buy it?" And I said, "Well, I just don't have the wherewithal to do that." And she said, "Well, you know, I'm in real estate and I speculate.

You mind if I come and look at it?" I said, "No, cuz they were nice people and they needed to move this house because they had taken a loan out against, you know, put it on this one. They got to sell this one and that." I really wanted them to to be happy and stay in their new home. And so, uh, she came over, walked through the house.

That was Sunday. On Tuesday night, she called me and she said, "Ed, I just wanted you to know I bought the house." And I said, "Well, good. Congratulations.

It's a great little house and I know you'll like it." She said, "No, no, no. It's for you." And I said, "Well, no, I can't afford that." She said, "Ed, what kind of payment can you afford?" And I said, "Nowhere near what you need. I I just can't." She said, "Ed, that isn't what I ask you.

What kind of payment can you afford?" And I said, and I told her, and she said, "Okay, it's your house. We'll do a land contract, and that's your payment." And I've been living there ever since. Now, there would have been a time before a good four, five, and six where I would have never believed a story like that.

Now I'm living them. Is it because I'm special? It's because I'm special.

It's because what we've been given here is the answer to everything we've been looking for. What you came here looking for, you're looking with. See you in a little while.

>> 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.