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We hope that you enjoy today's speaker. >> The view up here is fantastic. Alcoholics Anonymous is alive and well in Winnipeg.

Thanks for having me. Thanks for inviting me here. I love the spirit of Canadians.

I was walking down the hallway the other day mentioning the the temperature to somebody and um the the gentleman said, "Well, at least there's no mosquitoes out today." So, it's a nice positive attitude. You have smart water in Canada? I haven't seen any.

I haven't been to a grocery store, but I brought this bottle with me from California. It's called Smart Water. I always bring one with me because it I'm hoping it helps my talk a little bit.

Um the first time I ran across this, I couldn't get the lid open. It had some kind of really difficult lid. It's like I guess you have to drink it first to get smart.

I'm not sure, but um I had one of my sponses open it for me. Anybody have sponsies? Just show hands.

People have sponsies. Excellent. How about uh people have sponsies that are with have sponsies that are here with them?

Excellent. Excellent. I I try not to never never leave home without a sponsy, but uh I didn't bring one on this trip, but I always try to bring one with me.

They're just awesome. Love sponses. They're fabulous.

Um, a couple months ago I was traveling to a conference and I got I missed a missed one of my connections and I was concerned that I wasn't going to be able to get to my destination in time and I texted my host to ask him for some counsel of what I should do. I I was I don't know what to do because I was not going to get there when I was supposed to get there. And I knew I was going to a good AA group when the guy texted me back.

He says, "Read page read page 449 and go to a meeting." So that's two secrets of AA. I've only been talking for a couple minutes. You want to stay sober intensively work with another alcoholic.

And if you have a problem, the solution is always spiritual. So if you doze off, at least you got something to take with you there. If you get done listening before I get done talking, that happens sometimes.

Um, I got thinking about this Smart Water a little while ago and I was I was looking back at my drinking. I thought, boy, it sure would be nice if uh if whiskey had different kind of labels on it. So, when you went to the liquor store, you knew what kind of whiskey you were going to get instead of now you go, you don't know what you're going to get when you drink this stuff.

I mean, you might get uh Dr. Jackekal and Mr. Hyde whiskey.

You might get puking and going to jail whiskey. Um, I used to get some of this dialin whiskey where you call people up in the middle of the night. Don't want to they don't want to hear you.

Sometime I get this stuff called traveling whiskey where you wake up at some strange place with some strange people. And you ever done that where you wake up and you kind of want to chew your arm off because you want to get away from where you are. It's like I thought it was a girl.

I'm jumping ahead a little bit. That's fifth step stuff. But I did not have sex with that girl.

I think the stuff that I really like or you get sometimes once in a while you get a bottle of Smart Whiskey where you you go home and you you start analyzing some problem you have and start taking some notes and you solve all the problems in the world and you wake up the next day and you can't read any of it. The stuff I really like is called I call it plucking whiskey where there's a story in the back of the book where uh this this guy's standing at a bar and all of a sudden he's magically plucked from the bar and uh thrust into some position of power and prestige. I drink a lot of that stuff.

I love that stuff. I lived in this fantasy world all the time. So that describes my drinking.

I'm a puking, going to jail, traveling, dialing Dr. Jackekal and Mr. hide uh guy that thought whiskey made him smart.

So that that covers it. The other thing I like doing besides drinking is I like thinking and I like I actually I like doing them together, thinking and drinking. Drinking and thinking and thinking and drinking and drinking and thinking and Einstein has a saying I like.

He says, "None of your current problems can be solved by the thinking that created them. I can't solve my problems by thinking about them." I was in a meeting last week, I think it was, and somebody was the topic. It might have been our our thinking, and someone said they had this like hamster cage in their head.

I'm thinking that would be really good. I got a slanging monkey in my head. I may not walk my talk, but I'm glad I don't walk my think.

Uh, have you seen these 20 questions for whether you're alcoholic or not? Most people have run across them. You can take those same 20 questions and use them for your thinking.

Is thinking causing you problems at home? Do you have trouble sleeping because of your thinking? Would your life be better off if you stop thinking?

Yeah. Yeah. You can see why a guy like me needs a sponsor.

I got a sponsor. His name is Jack. And Jack uh Jack uh teaches at an air traffic control school.

And until recently, I worked at a place called the Department of Corrections. I worked in a prison as a teacher. So control and corrections.

Jack and I have issues. But uh there's a saying also in a is be nice to the newcomer. He may be your sponsor someday.

And I was nice to Jack when he got sober and he's my sponsor now. He's my second sponsor. My first sponsor.

I didn't know this was going to cause a controversy, but I had a woman sponsor the first time and uh she was my sponsor for 18 years and uh she was a heavy smoker and she died of lung cancer. And one of the last things she said to me before she died is sobriety is no fun when you can't breathe. And so after Donna died, I got Jack as a sponsor.

Um, so a lot of people in AA they brag about how much time their sponsor has. My sponsor, he he sponsored Moses. Uh, and uh, but what I like to brag about Jack is what a great program he works.

He's a fabulous example of Alcoholics Anonymous. Uh, his life's not perfect, but he he applies these principles in his life. And uh, the best sermon is a good example.

And Jack is an awesome example for me. And Abe Lincoln has a quote that I like. He says, "It doesn't matter how tall your grandpa was, you have to do your own growing." So, uh, one of the best examples I heard of why it's a good idea to have a sponsor, some newcomer was at the meeting outside and somebody asked him how long he'd been sober, what his sobriety date was, and and the guy says, "Which one?" And, uh, he says, "I haven't had meth for about three years." So, I got three years off meth and I haven't smoked a joint since I was in Mexico about 6 months ago.

So, I got six months off pot and I haven't had a drink for 90 days. But I had a I had a beer last night. So, I guess I have 89 days today.

It's called newcomer math. So, I only have one sobriety date. It's the only one I've ever had.

It's December the 6th, 1982. And uh thanks Clapping for an alcoholic who quits drinking is like clapping for a cowboy with hemorrhoids who stops riding his horse. Um, and my sobriety day is the last time I smoked marijuana.

We got any marijuana smokers here? >> I mean, we got any ex marijuana smokers. Okay, if you're new here, we don't smoke marijuana in Alcoholics Anonymous.

We don't do that. And the people that do do that aren't sober. I was smoking marijuana because I had a problem with alcohol.

I could I got to a point in my life where I could clearly see that alcohol was causing me some problems and I didn't like the problems and I wanted to quit drinking. Maybe what I really wanted to do is I wanted to quit having the consequences of drinking. I'm not so sure I wanted to quit drinking, but I didn't want the consequences of drinking anymore.

And I hadn't found you yet. So, the best idea I could come up with is I'm going to smoke marijuana because my problem is alcohol. So, I started doing that.

And I'd quit a lot of times before, but this one particular time I I was able to stop drinking. I had a I I was a gardener and I had a a really nice patch of marijuana growing and uh I had shopping bags full of this stuff and I quit drinking and I thought I was okay cuz I thought my problem was alcohol. So I went on my I stayed stoned all the time before I got out of bed in the morning.

I was smoking marijuana, non-addictively, but and during this time that I was not drinking, my sister came to AA cuz we have we have a family disease called alcoholism and she she has it and she came to AA and um and I was not drinking and I kept bragging her that I was not drinking. I'd take a bunch of advising in my eyes and and you know I'd go see her and and tell her how good I was doing and she just kept saying why don't you come come to AA why don't you come check it out and uh this is what she told me about AA she says you like the people and the people will like you wow she nailed it for me she didn't talk to me about God or steps or principles or sponsorship or any of that kind of stuff she told me about you she told me that I would you I would like you and more importantly that you would like me. I had no idea how lonely I was when I got here.

I was so empty. And it took a long time for me to realize that until I started to get filled up by being with you. So I arrived at AA um quite a quite a while after my last drink, over a year after my last drink.

And uh I came to the meetings. I introduced myself as an existentialist. We got any of those?

Yeah. Um, I was an alcoholic. I wasn't even drinking.

And I kept coming to the meetings. I I I it didn't occur to me to ask myself why is someone who's not an alcoholic coming to the meetings. But I but I kept coming to the meetings and I'm so I'm so happy and grateful that there was no sign in any of the clubs that I went to where said you had to be an alcoholic to be there.

I had a desire not to drink. I did have that and I knew marijuana counted. So, I was clean and sober, but I didn't want to be alcoholic.

Oh, that's like I couldn't even say the word. Two words I couldn't say. Alcoholic or God.

Those those words would not come through my throat. But there was something going on at the meetings that I had no defense against. And it was the love that I felt.

It was like a magnet. I kept wanting to be with you because I felt I felt love. Maybe for the first time in my life, I felt love.

So I kept coming back and kept coming back and I was listening. I wasn't agreeing with a lot of things but I was listening and what happened for me is I end up catching alcoholism from you. It's like this is a contagious disease.

Does anybody here not alcoholic today? Don't sit next to me cuz I'll try to give you a case of it cuz that's where I caught it. I remember when I finally raised my hand and said I was alcoholic and said well it's finally unanimous.

Everybody else already knew about it but You know, I've heard someone say that you can't change something you can't name. I knew there was something wrong with me. I was broken somehow.

I didn't I there was something not right in in the way I was living my life. I used to like to get a bottle of scotch, a carton of Marbor, and a self-help book. And I was and I was trying to trying to figure out what was wrong with me.

Well, I come to AA and there's a name for what's wrong with me. It's called alcoholism. I have alcoholism.

I didn't want it. I didn't ask for it, but I have it. And this is like uh the what Dave read.

This is that's the prescription for the treatment of alcoholism. That's what I have. So, I need to be with you so I can treat my alcoholism.

Uh I'm so glad that I was able to listen when I got here. I I met a guy in our area who came in and out of a just could not hear what was going on. And one time he he's out drinking and he comes out of a blackout.

He's in the back of this bar on the on in the alley and he he wakes up and there's a wino pissing in his ear and uh he could hear just fine after that. So it takes what it takes. So, so I get to AA and I think who I got a I got a guy that I sponsor.

I said I I the last the last thing I did I have alcoholism but the last drug I took was marijuana. I I sponsor a guy whose sobriety day it's the last time he did nutmeg. Now, when you do something like that, you get a name in a his name is Nutmeg Steve.

And I started meeting all these characters like uh there was a guy named uh Machine Gun Tony and Box Car Bill and SWAT team Ron and Dumpster Don and Booger John and uh I think Ped Ed said >> these people are going to help me. I like, hello, I don't think so. And then I started hearing all the things that people did to to try to control and enjoy their drinking.

Um, people get married to help them with their drinking or they get divorced or they join the army or I did something called uh rebirththing one time or people go to EST or Dionetics or Oprah or Chopra or uh it's made I sponsored another guy. You can't make this stuff up. He joined Amway to help him with his drinking.

He somehow thought that was going to help, you know. So, so I'm going I'm going to AA. Somebody says to me, uh, you have an allergy.

You have to go to meetings the rest of your life. I think, really? Um, I'm thinking my dad had an allergy to bananas.

I never saw him eat a banana his whole life. He didn't go to BA. There's there's no such thing called bananas anonymous.

The reason is bananas didn't talk to him. He just quit eating bananas. Alcohol talks to me.

Maybe it talks to you or used to talk to you. Oh, come on, sweetheart. Have us have a drink.

It's going to be so wonderful. Oh, your team lost. Your team won.

It's Sunday. I mean, the it's like it's all of this chattering with me. I loved alcohol when I started drinking.

I'd still be a virgin if it wasn't for alcohol. Although, anybody else relate to that? And it starts off that way, but it ended up in the end it says alcohol said to me, "Get in the car, bitch." And and I and I got in the car.

I did what alcohol told me to do. And bananas don't do that to people. So, So, I'm going to meetings and this old-timer comes up to me, you know, old-timers are, "Hey, kid." And kind of pokes you in the chest.

I was a 39year-old bachelor. I wasn't a kid. And they, you know, he pokes me in the chest and says, "Uh, you got a god in your life, kid?" No, I don't I don't I don't really believe in God.

You reading a book? I don't really like that book. I don't even know Mr.

Brown. Uh, you you're working the steps. I don't want your 12 commandments.

Thank you very much. You You got a sponsor? Nah.

Nah. I I I got it. I'll I'll take care of it from here.

You meditating? Nah. No.

My head's too busy for that. Then he asked me the kicker. He says, "Well, how you doing?" Well, I wasn't doing too good.

I I' I'd had a period of not drinking and not doing drugs, but I hadn't worked the program yet. There's only a window of opportunity that I can see if you don't do something, not drinking is not going to be fun anymore, and you're going to either drink or do something else that's blow your brains out or something like that. And I got to thinking, I to myself, I wonder if I can do this.

I wonder if I'm capable of doing this program. And uh I I looked uh I looked back at my drinking and I thought, I can follow a path. I know how to do that.

I had a rut back and forth to the liquor store. Um I know how to completely give myself to something. I completely gave myself to alcohol.

I had a higher power. It was alcohol. I never went into the liquor store, read the labels, walked out, and say alcohol doesn't work.

I drank it. You have to drink alcohol for it to work. And just like that in AA, you have to do this for it to work.

If you're here now and you haven't worked this program and you go back and go to the bartender and say you you today doesn't work, please don't do that because you don't know if it works or not because you haven't worked it. I also understood that I can't get drunk on yesterday's alcohol. I have to drink today to get drunk today.

And so is the same thing. I've got to do something today to stay sober today. So, I thought, you know, I I can do this.

I can I can And I also had a feeling that you weren't all lying to me at the same time. Your life was way better as a result of the work that you did here. And I thought, I want that in my life.

I We say if you want, what we have. And when I first got here, it was like, well, I told you some of the names of the people. I said, "Well, what do you have?" You know, and uh I realized pretty quickly, well, you don't drink.

That's pretty special for for an alcoholic. And then I was here a little longer and I realized not only you don't drink, but you like not drinking. You're happy not drinking.

That's a big step from just not drinking. And then I was here a little bit longer and I realized what you really have is relieved me of the bondage of self. That's the magic of AA.

And I wanted that cuz I was all wrapped up in my stuff. So I'm here about I don't know remember the timeline, maybe 6 months or so. My sister suggested I go see this man named Howard who was a counselor in Sacramento where I was living.

I go to see Howard. He's a member of AA and he's a family practitioner. And for an hour I told Howard the truth.

I'd never done that before in my life to anybody. I'd been to psychiatrist. I'd been to shrinks on occasion.

I'd lied to them, paid them the money, left. Nothing changed. Somebody told me once that uh alcoholics really should go to vetinarians.

They're used to guessing what's wrong with their patients. So, so I snot cried in Howard's office for an hour telling him the truth about myself. My drinking was I described my drinking as very sleazy.

I had a lot of shame, a lot of guilt, a lot of secrets. I I had a double life. if I had a wor tie in the daytime and I and I drank in in places where your feet stick to the floor at night and uh I didn't want people to know who I was or what I was and I I moved around a lot and so I told Howard the truth about myself and at the end of the hour he got out a piece of paper and he wrote prescription get on your knees and pray and he gave me that and I gave him $50.

It was like a $50 fifth step with no four step and I started to do that. didn't even believe in God. But I said, "God, what do you want me to do and give me the power to do it?" And I'd say, "Thank you." And Howard gave me a number of a woman who gave me another a number of another woman who was Donna.

And I called Donna on the phone and asked her to be my sponsor and never had met her before. And I agreed to work the steps uh journal in a book and read my journal to her once a week and go to at least four meetings a week. And I agreed to do that.

And about the same time, I bought a new car. My life was starting to get a little bit better. I had an alcoholic truck prior to that.

I saw one yesterday um here in in Winnipeg. A crack windshield, door panels a different color, bumps all over, tires are bald, springs popping through the seat, tag somebody else's tags on the back, just a a piece of junk truck. And uh one of the reasons I believe that I was so lonely is because I would not have wanted to go out with a woman who would have gotten in that truck.

I'm like I think Groucho Marks somebody said I would not want to belong to a club that would have me as a member. It was kind of the same thing. So I have this new car and then I called it my sobriety car because it was it was a gift of me being sober and I started to go to a lot of meetings.

I was trolling. I I wanted to have a date and because I was so lonely and I don't know if anybody's planning on using a as a dating service. Uh I'll say the the the odds are very good but the goods are very odd.

So, I started meeting with my sponsor and uh there's little there's little numbers on the steps for people that went to college, I guess. So, I I went back and uh I started going over my life and I looked at my drinking and it was real clear to me when I took a drink, I couldn't stop. And when I when I wasn't drinking, I forgot that or didn't understand that.

And uh one one experiment that I had that really resonated with me is one time I didn't want to be alcoholic. So I'd have these experiments once in a while to prove to myself that I wasn't alcoholic. So one of my better ones was I decided to quit drinking for 30 days.

An alcoholic couldn't do that. I thought I don't know what an alcoholic was, but I thought they couldn't do that. So I quit drinking for 30 days.

And at the end of 30 days, I had a glass of wine uh to celebrate not drinking for 30 days at noon. And I was in jail at midnight that night. That's powerless over alcohol.

I don't have the power over alcohol. But there's a second part to step one. I call it step one part B.

That my life is unmanageable. And I think a lot of the reason my life is unmanageable because I couldn't accept that I was powerless over alcohol. I made I'm not a good manager of my own life.

I need some I need some power in my life to manage my life because I screwed it up. And um I found that power in AA and my life looks manageable today because I'm not managing it. But one of the things that I do that helps me to remind myself of that is I don't ask the question why.

Why is a management question? Why for me is asking for an argument with God. I don't want to argue with God.

So what I do rather than ask myself why, I ask myself what am I going to do about it? Not why am I alcoholic? That's a bad question.

question is what am I going to do about it? That's a good question because I can get into the solution that way because when I'm fighting real if I have a problem nowadays, which I rarely do, I mean a like a real problem. Um, it's almost always step one part B where I think I'm the manager.

Something's going on in my life that I don't like and I want it to be different than it is. That means I'm fighting reality. If I fight reality, I lose, but only a 100% of the time.

So, I I try to stop doing that. Uh, step two, we we all have stories, crazy stories of stuff we've done when we were drinking. And I've got a few.

I'm sure you've got a few. But what I realized about step two was the craziest thing I ever did. I did sober.

I picked up another drink. For a guy like me to pick up a drink, I'd have to be crazy to do that. So that that for me is step two.

Um I've been restored to sanity. This the I worked in a prison for 15 years as a teacher and it was a men's prison. There was 6,000 men in this prison.

It's like a city. It was a huge place. And I asked my students over the 15 years that I worked there if they'd ever been in AA.

And guess what? Probably 80% of them had been in AA, maybe more. Most people in prison have been to AA.

They certainly know about AA. Then I asked him another question after that. I said, "Have you were you ever in AA and had a sponsor in AA and work the steps in AA and were had service commitments in AA?" And during that time that I was in the prison, I had probably had 20 25 guys that said yes to those questions.

Every one of them, every single one of them told me it was the best time of their life. It was the best years of their life. Well, then I asked him, "Well, what are you doing in prison?" What was the answer?

They stop going to meetings. So, for me, I go to meetings so I won't go crazy because people that stop going to the meetings go crazy and then they drink again. And also, when I go to meetings, I get to find out what happens.

People don't go to the meetings, they go crazy. So, I stay in the meetings so I don't go crazy. I get to step three and I'm thinking I go to my sponsor and say, 'Well, this as far as I can go.

I I don't believe in God. I was saying a prayer, but I still didn't believe in God. And I said to my sponsor, "This AA is just full of contradictions.

This doesn't make any sense at all." And she says, "What are you talking about?" I said, "Well, you know, in the in the literature, I read something about the problem of the alcoholic is in his mind. I go to a meeting and there's a sign on the wall says think think. Somebody else says one of also in the literature one of the indispensables of recovery is honesty.

Someone else says fake it till you make it. Someone says you have to give it away to keep it. That doesn't make any sense.

Tell it to your bank manager. I got some friends in the military say you know you got to surrender to win. What people say if you haven't had your if you don't remember your last drink, you haven't had it.

The book says you can't remember the degragation suffering from a couple of weeks ago. Taking a trip, not taking a trip. Recovered recovering.

Uh we're not uh bad people trying to get good. We're sick people trying to get well. Why do we have to do a moral inventory?

People with cancer don't have to do a moral inventory. Um, don't make any major decisions the first year. But turn your will and your life over to the care of God.

As you understand, that's a major decision. Don't get in a relationship the first year, but get a sponsor and tell them all your God could and would if he were sought on the page prior to this issue you find him now. Do you have to find him or can you just look for him?

Alcohol. Cunning, baffling, powerful. There is one who has all power.

That one is God. Well, if God has all the power, how could alcohol have the power? That's the kind of stuff I think about.

It's like I'd rather argue about something than do anything. And there's a line in the literature about resigning from the debating society. I had to do that.

I had to resign from the debating society. My favorite one is half measures of L is nothing. You'll be amazed before you're halfway through.

So my sponsor says to me, well um maybe there's some are there any contradictions in your life? She asked me. And I get to thinking about that and I just I just graduated from UCLA and I was on a trip in to Europe and I saved a little bit of money, sold my motorcycle, went to Europe and and ran out of money pretty quickly and I wired a friend had wired me $200.

I was just outside of Munich someplace. I got the money at noon. I woke up the next morning and the money was gone.

And I was going to say I don't know what happened, but I know what happened. I got drunk and uh I guess I played the big shot all the that could have lasted a couple months on that money. And I got to thinking, you know, there's a line in the literature about in a lot of ways were normal except when it comes to drinking.

And I'm thinking, yeah, I've never gone into a grocery store and say, "Hey, can I buy everybody a loaf of bread?" So what I decided to do and this is this is this is key for me. This is critical for me. I just I decided to let AA change me rather than me try to change AA.

I had always wanted to change outside circumstances. I never never dawned on me to change myself or to work to change myself or to ask for help to change myself. And that's for step three for me was was a decision.

I I the word decision was key for me. I decided to work the AA program. Still didn't really have this clear understanding of this higher power, but I plugged into the power.

It's like in my kitchen, I've got a toaster and a microwave and a stove and a refrigerator and coffee maker and all those kind of things. And none of that stuff works without the power. You have to plug it into the power.

You don't have to understand electricity to use electricity. You just plug into it and it works. And AA is the same way.

We have a power here that you plug into and it works. So I made a decision to do that. And then I launched on this launch is really too strong of a word.

I I started fiddle fatting around and and and working the steps. And I I did got to four. I didn't have a lot of resentments that I knew of, but I had a lot of hate in my heart for my father.

I hated my father. He was a he was a drunk. He was a mean drunk.

And there was a period of maybe six or seven years where I wouldn't even talk to him if I saw him. And I put his name at the top of a piece of paper and I started to write about the pain that I felt as a child. And I started to cry and sob and I I called my sister and talked to her about some things that had happened.

And I called in the sick to work that day. And I just spent the whole day just kind of sobbing and writing and talking and crying. And something happened that day.

I some something inside of melted away about my animosity towards him and I could see him as a as a spiritually he was a sick man and something healed for me that day and I did a fears list. Uh it was longer than I thought it was. I didn't realize I had fears.

I had women on that list. I was afraid of women. Maybe that's why I was a bachelor at 39.

I was certainly afraid of being intimate with anybody. And I had God on that list. And those relationships are difficult when they're based on fear.

And I had uh I did my sexual inventory. It was, as I mentioned, it was pretty sleazy. But uh I I didn't uh I didn't leave anything off.

I was as honest as I could be. And that to me is the key to the to the fourth step is I didn't purposely leave anything off of it. I go to do my fifth step.

It's kind of a rainy day in November. My sponsor notices a lot of trash on the street where we're going out to where I used to grow a pot. thought we were going to do my fifth step.

And uh I do the fifth step and it was like my life had been a garbage can and I just kind of tipped this garbage can out and on the way back we saw a rainbow and it just it touched me deeply that that that I thought I had thrown my life away and and I shared it with another human being and I see a rainbow and there's some wonderful promises in the book. I think they're on page 75 of the fifth step. Those things happened to me.

I felt uh I was excited about my sobriety that day. I felt like I was starting to have a relationship with the creator and I was doing what you did. I was I became a member by by being willing to do some stuff that was very scary and difficult for me to do.

But I wanted what you had. Six and seven. Uh very deceptive.

A couple little paragraphs there. Oh, this is easy. Well, about that same time that that uh all that trolling I was doing was successful and I met a woman named Betty and we got married and we had a little aa marriage and uh as I when we were dating uh we our my idea of a date was to go to a meeting someplace and uh it's about the best I could do and I'd be walking I'd be walking her to her door holding her hand after going out with her and I didn't know whether to kiss her or say the Lord's Prayer.

Betty had a couple of children. Uh, Angela, seven, Shawn 13. I married Betty, and I got to be a husband and a father on the same day, stepfather, and she had a sister and a couple kids, and I got to be an uncle.

I didn't know how to do any of those things. And I work I was working this program and I'm I'm taking inventories and I'm getting in relationships with people and I find out what I believe is my uh my main character defect. I call it faultf finding.

I'm a faultfinder. You're going to do things that I don't think are right. I'm going to point them out to you and I'm going to push you out of my life.

I've done that my whole life. My best thinking just prior to getting sober was in this place where I was growing pot. I wanted to put a big barbwire fence around it to keep the teen teenagers away from my pot and just have some brewers yeast and some vitamin C and bunch of cheap wine and all these bags of marijuana and just uh kind of, you know, give myself to my addiction.

And I realized that in America, the worst punishment we have is called solitary confinement. I did that to myself in my disease. That's where I put myself because I'd pushed everybody away.

So now I'm married and I'm a stepdad and I don't want to be that person anymore. I want to I want to learn how to do this, but I find fault in everything. I have this I don't know if it's a gift or a curse or but I think I know how to do everything.

I have the I know the internationally accepted standard way to do everything. And I'm going to tell you nobody can do it right. I'm not much fun to be around because I find fault with everything.

So I'm I'm I'm learning to to be in relationships. So, one of the things that I decided to do in the interest of harmony is I decided to do the dishes myself because nobody was doing the dishes, right? So, you know, and I like to garden, so my hands are dirty.

So, it was it was a good good thing for me to do to get my hands clean and and and have some peace in the family. But I wanted to do the I wanted to just do the dishes. I didn't want to do them with anger or resentment.

Sometimes I just have to stand at the sink for several minutes sometimes just to get calm enough to just do the dishes. Just doing the dishes is actually very spiritual. There's a lot of things to be grateful for when you're doing the dishes.

I read someplace a little while ago, there's over 60 ways to do the dishes. I thought there was only one. It was my way.

And I started I started learning from you the way you treated me when I came to you. And I started treating my family that way. I started treating them like newcomers.

I started treating my children like newcomers. I stopped I stopped criticizing them. I made an effort to stop criticizing them and to finding fault with everything they're doing.

If their room was messy, I closed the door. Uh my daughter had this dalmatation was like a dog from hell. And if it it was like sometimes I'd come home and as the closer I got to home, the matter I would get and I'd be so mad by the time I got in my driveway, I'd have to turn around, go to my sponsor's house.

I couldn't even walk in the house. I was so mad and she said, "Step over it." And and I started writing notes to Angela about how wonderful uh a wonderful daughter she was and how happy that that I got to be her dad and just what a neat kid she was. And I just started loving her.

Many, many years later, she came to me and asked me to walk her down the aisle. You gave me that. I don't know how to do that.

I'm a faultfinder. I push people away from me. her dad, her biological father came up to me at the wedding and thanked me for raising his daughter.

I got to write the checks for that wedding, too. I was happy to do that. I was grateful to do that.

I had a good job. You taught me how to have a good job. Show up to work every day.

Give eight hours of pay. Eight hours of work for eight hours of pay. I was happy to do that.

Sean didn't know it at the time, but he was 13 and he was just starting off in his disease and uh we had a little AA house and he'd sneak in out of the window and he he was he was he was getting going with his disease and around just before I had 5 years sober, he borrowed my sobriety car um which he he he had my wife's permission and uh he got drunk and smashed it and almost killed his passenger. this pastor was in a coma for a week and I was not very spiritual about that. He's like, "How dare he ruin my sobriety car and I was mad." And we had some Allenons that made a house call where where we live and swim from Allenon said, "Well, maybe it's Sean's sobriety car." Wow.

That was his last drink. He got sober when he was 17. Just celebrated 25 years of sobriety.

Yeah, he lives in he's a civil engineer, lives in North Carolina and he was uh on his way he called me on his sobriety birthday to thank thank him for his sobriety car cuz it's his car, not mine. And uh he was he was going feeasant hunting in North North Dakota. I mean, what a good life.

You know, this this disease is progressive, but recovery is progressive, too. Betty and I believe that we were better parents than our we were better we parented better than our parents did. And I can see that Shawn is a better parent than we are.

And my daughter Angela is also a better parent. I have five grandchildren. And uh Shawn met a girl who got sober when she was 16.

And uh they they are both they both have master's degrees and they're both they're both sober over 20 years. And uh so recovery is progressive as well. Uh step eight was pretty easy.

I just made a list. I'd moved around a lot. There's a lot of people.

I don't know who they are, where they are, but I'm certainly willing to set the record straight if I can. I think the people that I hurt the most were my mom and my dad. I have a couple sisters, but I don't I don't think that I did a lot of damage in my relationship with them.

My my mother particularly. I mean, I was a neat kid. I could have been a contender.

Uh I was as a little kid, I had a just a lot of life in me and it just uh alcohol just cut me off of the knees like it gave me wings and then it took the sky away. And uh I got to be a good son to my mom. And my mom died the same at when I had five years of sobriety.

My mother died that year. Sean smashed uh my sobriety car and almost killed somebody. And my uh Betty's sister was killed in a car accident.

One of her children was paralyzed. All that happened within a six-month period when I had 5 years of sobriety. And but I was in the middle of AA then.

I was right in the middle. And you just surrounded yourself with me and loved me and got me through that. And I'm so thankful for that.

Um my my dad uh he was in a period of his life where he wasn't doing too well and I invited him to come and live with me. He moved into my house. I would let him stay forever.

He was welcome to stay forever. He was there for maybe three weeks. He got mad at something somebody said and he says, "I'm out of here." And uh he died a very lonely man.

He was a faultfinder. He just died a very lonely man. But the amends that touched me the most are I think there were a couple of financial amends.

One was really kind of silly. One was for $10, one was for $5. The $10 amendment, I'd gotten too much change in a restaurant one day where I went to after the after a sec I was secretary of a step study meeting and we used to go to this restaurant for lunch and I got $10 too much one time and I just put it in my pocket and you can't count.

It's not my problem. U couple weeks later, the woman said she was selling the place and I think I I got to give the money back. I'm trying to live this uh more spiritual life with principles and I need to give the money back.

And I asked if I could talk to her, took her aside and said, "Uh, I got too much money the other day. I want to pay it back." And and uh she said, "Are you sure?" I started to cry. I was macho guy in a restaurant and oh man, it was the best $10 high I ever had.

Uh really helped me pay the IRS back. Took a little longer for that. The $5 amend.

Sean moved away to school. He went to San Diego State and he calls me up about 2 years after this uh car accident and uh told me he'd been stealing money from me and he wanted to pay it back and uh I had been a waiter then and I had a jar of coins. He throw my money the coins in this jar and I looked in the jar and it was like all nickels and pennies.

cuz he taken all the quarters and dimes out of it and buying pot or whatever and he wanted to pay me back and I got so excited about that cuz you know we say we look at the steps and say how it works and we look at the durations and say why it works and we look back at the steps again and say when it works it works when step we do step nine that's when the power of this program really comes to life for us and Sean was doing that and I was so excited for him uh in fact I decided to send him a hundred bucks because I was so excited so I wanted him sense the spiritual power of what he was doing. And uh I sent him 100 and a couple weeks go by, he sent me another five and then I sent him another hundred and all of a sudden the five started coming really fast. Step 10, I think, is the step that I like the most because it really allows me to know where the problem is.

I always thought you were the problem. If you're the problem, there's no solution for me. You're not the problem.

The Lutheran aren't the problem. The Republicans aren't the problem. The Arabians aren't the problem.

I'm the problem. It's me and my attitudes. That's what the problem is.

Couple lines in the literature I really like is when I'm disturbed, no matter what the cause, there's something wrong with me. And another one is in the story is I need to concentrate not what's wrong with the world, what's wrong with me and my attitudes. And uh I have the tools now to be able to do that.

Uh I think the misquote the most misqued line that I hear in meetings is uh what it was like, what happened, what it's like now. That's not what it says. It says what we were like, what happened, what we're like now.

It's like you go out to the corner here, there's a there's a traffic signal. It goes green, yellow, red, green, yellow, red. Does it all day long, all night long when you're sleeping.

Green, yellow, red. I I pull up to the to the light and it's red and I got a story about it. I don't want it to be red.

So, the light has nothing to do with it. This is what it is. It's it's a story I bring to the light.

It's like we bring our own weather to the picnic. Uh and uh when we change our mind about it's like change your mind, change your life. That's a lot more than just a bumper sticker.

Um, I know a guy that when he pulls up to a red light, he thanks God for his sobriety. Every red light is a thank is a chance to thank God for their sobriety. I know another guy that he closes his eyes for a second and tries to get in touch with his higher power.

He says, "They'll always let you know when the light's green. When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. The whole world has changed cuz I've changed.

It's an inside job. I'm looking at the world differently. And step 10 is the is the step that really allows me to do that.

The literature says something about looking for uh fear, resentment, selfishness, and dishonesty. And those are all I mean fear is not getting my way in the future. Uh resentment is not getting my way in the past and dishonesty is not getting my way now.

So it's it's again it's a relieving be a bondage of self thing. Uh 11. I read something that I really liked.

It says sought we say in the literature sought through prayer and meditation. And this uh article I read said sought by paying attention. When I pay attention I'm where the power is because the power is right here right now.

It's not uh any place else. I love it at meetings. I go to a lot of topic meetings and and every meeting I go to about halfway through someone will be called on they'll say what's the topic and I say it's paying attention.

That's always the topic. I don't know if you've heard this announcement like now hear this, now hear this. I thought that's not an announcement of something to come.

That is the announcement. Now hear this. Now hear my heart, my heart, my head, and my feet are all in the same place.

So now hear this. That's my new mantra. That's where the power is.

That's the now. The weight doesn't power the boat. And the future doesn't even exist.

It's now. And that's where God is. So if I can be now, if I can be present, I'm where the power is.

And I and I and I, as a result of doing this work, I have this relationship with this power now. Uh that that we call God. So uh step 12, uh I I I make a real effort to carry the message.

I I cram the message for a while. I had the opportunity last night to go out to Rockwood and carry the message locally to the guys there and that was a real honor and I love passing out CDs and I thanks for the work that Roger does and uh there's a it's a great way to carry the message to allow newcomers to to hear our stories and you know when they're driving around. Um I think I'm a better driver on the freeway as a result of practicing these principles.

I haven't missed my exit and chased somebody down for years. Um, wanting to teach them how to drive. I heard a story about Chuck Chamberlain that uh he as he was getting older, somebody wanted to pick him up and take him to a meeting.

He wanted to drive himself and the the person that was picking him up says, "Oh, it's a jungle out there, Chuck. You know, uh, I need to take you there." And he said, Chuck says, "I only have to drive the one car. I don't have to drive your car as well.

Let you do that." Um, but the main thing about 12 for me is that that I've woke up. Uh, we have a a saying that that a lot of us use when we're we're getting loaded is we're stoned. I was a stone.

I was like a walking dead person, hollow dead person. I don't want to be that way anymore. I've woken up as a result of doing this work.

And uh I I believe my my awakening uh is exemplified by a story I heard and I'll back up a little bit. When I mentioned uh step 10, I didn't talk about the other part about it is when we're wrong promptly admitted it. And I think my awakening a lot of it has been how wrong I was about things.

And this little this little story kind of exemplifies it. It's about a woman who goes to the airport and she's sitting waiting for her plane and she's got a a bag of cookies. She's sitting right by her side.

She's reading a novel and eating cookies. And there's a man sitting in the seat on the other side and she looks over and he takes one of her cookies and eats it. And she's kind of shy so she doesn't say anything and she keeps reading and she eats a cookie and then he eats another cookie and she thinks, "Man, this guy's rude." And uh gets down to one cookie.

He takes it and breaks it in half and gives her half. And then her plane is called and she jumps up, never saying anything to the guy, and and gets on her plane, gets settled in, gets out her knapsack, gets out her novel, and there's her bag of cookies. She was eating his cookies.

Like, it's like, oh, I was wrong. I was wrong about that book. That's a fabulous book.

I don't think anybody understands alcoholism, both the disease and the recovery as well as Bill Wilson did. It's amazing book. I was wrong about God.

I thought God about somehow I would lose myself. I ended up finding myself. Dependence upon his power allows me to be independent.

I was wrong about those steps. I thought they were punishment somehow. There are the tools that I've used to change.

I've changed. You've ch we change as a result of doing this work. It's not by thinking about it.

It's about taking action. I was wrong about gratitude. I thought u well I I got a pile here.

I like this. But I don't like that. But I put I don't like it.

I put alcoholism. I don't like pile. Well, really that's the price I paid to be with you.

It should be in the good pile. Alcoholism brought me to you. So, I don't know which p pile to put stuff in.

So, I have one pile. It's thank you, God. Whatever's in my life, it's thank you, God.

I was wrong about forgiveness. I thought if I forgave you, somehow I was condoning your behavior. No, forgiveness is for me.

It's what sets me free of the past. I don't have to live in the past anymore. And and when I when I can forgive you, that allows you to forgive me.

I realize that anything I want, I have to give away. I give away my sobriety, I have more. If I give away my money, I have more.

Give away my time, I have more. Give away my love, I have more. I thought I couldn't trust you.

No, it was me I couldn't trust. I thought I wasn't getting enough love. No, I wasn't giving enough love.

I was taking and taking and taking. Everything was gone and now I give and give and give and my life is so rich and so full. I had everything backwards.

It's like there's a little thing called the set aside prayer in the fourth step. It's like let me set aside everything I think I know about the book, about the steps, about God, about you. Let me have a new experience.

I don't know what I don't know, but I know there's things still that I don't know, and I don't know what I'm wrong about still. So, I need to really keep an open mind. And that's my that's my awakening.

That's uh that I said, "Oh, but I was I had everything backwards." During the years that I've been sober, I spent at least 15 years teaching a DUI class and at least 15 years working in the prison system. And for a short period of time when I was going to college, I worked in a mortuary. So I know where alcoholics end up.

and is a we call it the passing parade in AA and I see sobriety like it's like an escalator and it's the escalator is going down but I want to go up and I'm on the escalator but I've got to keep walking up or I go backwards and there's no going backwards in a there's no coasting in aa you're either going towards a drink or away from a drink so I thought you know some people it looks it appears to me like they work the steps backwards I just want to show you what I think that looks like real quick. 12. Uh, I have principles.

It's doggy dog world. If I don't get mine before you get it, it's not enough to go around. 11.

I have a prayer. It's me, me, me. More, more, more.

Now, now, now. Amen. Uh, I take inventory yours.

Uh, nine. I'm not going to I'm not going to pay the money back. I'm going to skip nine.

Uh, eight. I got a list. It's a list and your name's on it.

Uh, seven. All right. Uh, humility is not one of my faults, but if I had one, that's the one I'd choose.

Uh, six, uh, I'm I'm willing I'm willing to do it my way. I love that Frank SN song. I did it my way.

Uh, five, I'm not copying anything, even if you have pictures. Four, I can never get a break. It's like, it's like I live in this town called Pityville, population one.

It's like a fairy that follows me around. I was always dumping on my head. I'm so unlucky.

If I fell in a barrel of tits, I'd come out sucking my thumb. Three, turn my will over to God. What if he screws my life up?

Two, I have all these uh I understand the inner workings of my mind so clearly now. It would be impossible for me to have a drink. I have all this self-nowledge.

One, I wonder if I quit too soon. Uh I think I'll have a drink. When I have a drink, click click.

Handcuffs. When they put handcuffs on you, they're saying you can't even be trusted with your own hands. go to jail.

Empty your pocket, sir. Here's my sobriety coin. Uh, I keep it with my money because when I don't have any sobriety, I don't have any money.

And there's a little saying on the top of this is to thy known self be true. I won't need that. I'll be lying to myself so fast that don't have any need for that.

Car keys. Have a little um emblem of a camel. Camel starts to stay on its knees.

goes 24 hours without a drink. House key. I was in a bucket when I got sober.

I didn't even have a house. I won't need that. Here's a coin I have that a friend gave me.

I seek strength not to be greater than my brother, but to fight my greatest enemy, myself. We'll need that wedding ring. That'll come off.

I'm a little chubby since I quit smoking 25 years ago, but uh price of gold. I'd probably be at least one good drunk when I get that off. Picture of my granddaughter.

I won't be able to see her. She's a pistol, too. Driver's license.

That's gone. Credit cards. I didn't have any of those.

I could put my teeth out here, too, but that's not a good idea. Everything in my life that's good, everything in my life that's good is a direct result of me being an alcoholic synonymous. You think I'd give that up for one drink?

There's no way in the world I would give that up. These steps are so powerful. One, two, three, give up.

456 clean up. 7 8 9 makeup. 10 11 12 wake up.

1 2 3 gets me right with God. 456 gets me right with me. 789 gets me right with you.

10 gets me right with me again. 11 gets me right with God. 12 gets me right with you.

It's a set of set of principles spiritual in our nature when used when practices a way of life allows the useful allows me to be useful and happily whole. What a wonderful deal for a guy like me. You know, many times I've asked myself, and it's it's what David reads, like, what's the point?

I've asked myself that when I'm drinking, and I've asked myself that in sobriety sometime. What's the point? We have an answer in the literature.

The point is to be willing to grow along spiritual lines. I ask myself, what does that look like? Where to put your hands?

you know, where do you um and I've been doing some reading about it and I keep I keep running across the same thing is the single best thing that we can do to grow spiritually is to be kind to each other. If you can't be kind to us, I hope you can be kind to yourself. Because if you can be kind to yourself, you can't help but be kind to us.

That's how the world works. Thanks for letting me share. >> Thank you for listening to Sober Sunrise.

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