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We hope that you enjoy today's speaker. Hi, I'm Carrie Alcoholic and my sobriety date is September 6th, 1994. My home group is a Way Out group in Tannersville, Pennsylvania.

And my sponsor's name is Melissa. And I start every talk by by qualifying in that way because the bottom line is the program of Alcoholics Anonymous has allowed me to get a relationship with a power greater than myself which has enabled me to remain absent from alcohol for an extended period of time. But it was those three things putting down the drink, seeking a solution and asking somebody for help that en that allowed me to start on this this wonderful journey.

I mean, where where else in the world do you get to I mean, I've I I've when I go to when I do a conference, when I'm asked to speak, one of the things that I really like to do is sit in the back of the room and talk to people. I like to find out what kind of recovery what what do you guys do here? Like, what is AA like here?

What are your experiences? And what would you change? What do you love about it?

And I have to tell you, I I do this enough, you know, and I haven't felt as at home and as welcomed as I have here. I feel like I have friends. I've met I've met people from Ohio that I, you know, and I'm like, I love these people.

I've cried more this weekend than I've probably cried in a really long time. Every time somebody's speaking, I'm like, damn it, I'm going to cry. Please, just you I this morning I'm like, please don't cry cuz you'll run your makeup.

And I cried, you know? But this is the beauty. I'm not crying because I'm sad.

I'm crying because I'm overwhelmed by the awe, by the beauty, by the miracles that I've seen in Alcoholics Anonymous. The things that sustain me through my life when things are difficult it or when I I don't know what to do or when I'm faced with the things that normal people can do and face and like seem to be okay with it, but I seem to have a learning curve that, you know, I just I don't get it. Um I remember the things that I've seen here.

I remember the miracles that I've witnessed. I remember the person that I was when I walked in these doors. And the person that I was when I walked into these doors was somebody who stole, who lied, who treated the people who loved her terribly.

Um, you know, I got sober at 18. So, my drinking isn't all that interesting really because, you know, I only spent some, you know, a couple years doing it. But my experience with alcohol taught me that I can't control how much I drink once I start.

I my experience with alcohol showed me that I think abnormally when it comes to alcohol. You know, I have normal I've you know I' I've met normal people in my life who who drink and say things like you know I I'm going to have a night cap. They drink a half a glass of wine and go to sleep.

That's not my experience with alcohol. That's not what happens to me when I put it in my body. You know, I I can remember sitting in health class.

We had like health class and like, you know, it's like sex ed and drug ed and whatever. You know, this is marijuana. It's like, uh-huh, you know, don't do cocaine, don't drink.

And I'm like, I just did all that in the parking lot before I even got here. No, I'm kidding. Kidding.

But, um, but I remember sitting in this in the class and they're like, alcohol is a central nerv nervous system depressant. I'm like, no, it's not. I'm not at all depressed when I drink.

Um, but so the thing is is my body is different than the average person. And I didn't know that when I until I came here and somebody explained to me the nature of alcoholism and what it meant to be an alcoholic. Um I didn't know that I thought differently than other people.

I didn't know, you know, we all hear those sayings, you know, like don't take the first drink and blah blah blah. And and I and and you know, and I've heard that. I mean, Alcoholics Anonymous, I mean, I'm a product, you know, I'm 34 years old.

I remember I can I can remember watching 90210 and Dylan went to AA and I remember being like hm that's interesting Dylan's in AA you know you know so I mean like Alcoholics Anonymous has been something that's just been a part of you know my collective consciousness my entire life I I've never not known about rehabs I mean I can remember like watching MTV at 3:00 in the morning and seeing well you know do you have a problem with alcohol you know are you lonely and depressed why don't you call my rehab, you know. So, I mean, the recovery message has been something that I've known about my entire life. I've had family members, cousins, people who have been in and out and around.

I have a I have a my, you know, my cousin brought me to my first real AA meeting. When I mean real AA meeting is a meeting when I went in there and I went there because I wanted to be different on some level. And I didn't know what I wanted to be different.

I just know I didn't want to be where I was. And my cousin brought me and he's sober to this day. And thank God he did, you know, because I don't know if I could have gone through that door alone and because he was kind enough to see that I was crazy and take pity on my poor parents and family and say, you know, I share this meeting on a Wednesday night and it was happened to be at my parents' church.

You know, my parents are very, very religious and they're wonderful, beautiful people and, you know, they're very involved in their church. Like my mother's a eucharistic minister, my dad's an usher. I mean, we're I was raised Catholic and uh you know, good old Irish family.

You I'm half Irish, half Polish. So, I'm really c I was raised really Catholic. Um you know, so you know, he's sharing this meeting at my parents' church and I'm like, you this is where I went to CCD.

This is where I get drunk. I mean, like where I would be like, you know, be out on a Saturday night hi, you know, doing what I was doing. My mom, you know, I'd crawl home and my mom would be like, "You're need to go to church." And I'm like, "No." And she dragged me kicking and screaming to this to this church.

And you know, I sit there so be like, "I'm not praying." You know, and by the end by the end of the mass, I was like, "Okay, that wasn't so bad. No, you know, whatever." But I mean, so he dragged he dragged me to this meeting in my parish church and I was like slinking down the back door, but I'm like, "Well, I'm with my cousin, so it like I can like, you know, I I I think I can sneak in. he's goes here and you know like and he's part of the family and they attended you know so I I think I can go there you know and I sat in the meeting and and I didn't get sober that day you know I didn't get sober for a couple years actually two um but I found out that alcoholics anonymous wasn't a scary place and I found out that there were really really beautiful people here and I saw that there was something different about what you guys did I saw that there was something different about how you looked than how I felt.

Um, I've always felt like there was something less than about me. I've always felt like I mean I'm sure you you've how many times have you said raise your hand if you said I felt different and I don't know why. I mean that's the just the alcoholic mission statement.

I'm weird. I don't work and play well with others. Communication is an issue for me.

Um, relationships, huh? You know, I mean, these are things that we don't do well and I I don't do well when I have to interact with anybody other than what's in my head, you know, when I have to actually talk to you guys and interact and like, you know, have a conversation and listen, follow the train of the conversation and think about like what's the appropriate response. Those are things that I have to actually take a second and go, I'm supposed to say something now.

What? Okay. Okay.

Wait, wait, wait. Okay. That's that's terrible, right?

you know, I mean, this is this is this is the way that I live my life. I I didn't have any of those skills. I just didn't, you know, and I can remember being in like kindergarten or first grade and like just being afraid of everything.

I I was one of those people long before I picked up a drink, long before I alcoholism was even a a word in my vocabulary, I had a Cabbage Patch doll. Do you guys remember Cabbage Patch Dolls? Her name was Cindy Lou.

She was my prized possession and I loved her more than I loved anything else on the face of the earth and I must have been in like I was in third grade and I grew up in New Jersey which is really just a toxic waste dump and it's very polluted and I remember that there was a house around like a couple blocks from where we lived. There was like a watch factory and they had like mercury and uh like they make make sure they used to put it in uh paint in order to like make your watch illuminate. And apparently they had dumped a bunch of this stuff and some toxic waste, you know, on this land, built some houses and people were getting cancer and stuff.

And I'm like in third grade and I hear about this and I'm like, there's toxic waste three blocks from my house. I play in that park. The world is a scary place.

And I can remember like sitting in my bed at night with my Cindy Lou and thinking, what if toxic waste like blows into my backyard and I die? What if the house is on fire? How do I get out of the house and make sure I have my Cindy Lou, my cabbage patch doll?

How, you know, and I thought this the world was just a scary place for me. And I was full of fear. I mean, I'm 8 years old and I'm planning escape routes from my parents three-bedroom house, you know, like I had really far to go, you know, but I was planning an escape route for my Cabbage Patch dollar myself, you know, because I was afraid of everything.

And I I've heard arguments and discussions of whether or not we're born an alcoholic or we cross a line. I think it's both actually. I think that there are some people who were born with that thing missing that god-shaped hole.

I was and that's me. And then I've met people who are like really really normal and I don't know the hole developed. It just something ripped apart in their soul and they're alcoholics.

I don't know. But I've heard people who like were pretty normal and then weren't. And I've sponsored them.

Those are we those are the sponsies that I kind of like I kind of shake my head and was like I I really don't get you but I'll help you, you know, cuz they're like the type of people who drink functionally, have jobs and marriages and are successful, get degrees, and then become an alcoholic and lose it all and everything like that. But I'm like, you got that stuff? You functioned.

You were able to like, you know, be remotely successful. I'm somebody I've been I was asked to leave a school for special kids. at a certain point, you know, like my poor parents, they just kept like putting me in, you know, in the hospital, keep going, bringing me to the doctors and and I had been in I I went to high school and uh my brothers and sisters are a bit older than me.

And I had this I had and my sisters are listening, so she's going to love this one. My my older sister, I had this this principal and he he had been my sister's home room teacher uh when I was born. My sister was in high school and she the day that I was born um she came to school and said I have a baby sister and her name is Carrie.

This is the family legend, right? And you know so you know years later I wander into this high school, set some fires, get into some fights, do some bad things. I end up in this principal's office like often and he'd sit down with me and say, "Miss Cosgrove, you know, I remember the day you were born.

Your beautiful, wonderful, smart sister who never did anything bad, was in my whole room. Why can't you be more like her?" And I'm like, I said, "You on fire." Like, these are the things I think of my life. Screw you.

you know, you want, you know, and and I can remember that cuz I had set a fire in home room. I didn't understand why that was a big deal. I took a, you know, I took a spray can and lit a match and said, you know, and I got suspended.

I'm like, what? What do I do? And nothing burned, you know, cuz I didn't have that common sense that normal people have.

That's why I said I think I was born with that God-shaped hole. Like, I didn't really understand limits. I didn't understand the consequences of my actions.

I couldn't think beyond like the, you know, right in front of my face. And half the time I didn't even recognize what that was. So I was full of this fear and I went through my life with this fear.

And you know when I put alcohol in my body I felt it less. And my mind told me that anything that I was anything I would lose would be worth losing so I didn't have to feel that fear, you know, and that's really what that's about. We tell ourselves all kinds of reasons for why we drink.

But ultimately what it's about is that I have that irritable restlessness and discontent inside of me. And whatever it is, whatever it costs me, it's worth it. Now mind you, because I I have such a wonderful family with such a wonderful life, it ultimately didn't cost me very much.

It cost me an education, you know, some brain cells, the trust of my family for a really long time, things like that. But ultimately, all of those things have been earned back in recovery, you know. So, you know, I have this body, I have this mind, and I have that god-shaped hole that we call the spiritual malady.

You know, we call it irritable restless and discontent. You know, on page 52 of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, it talks about the bedments. You know, you know, can't, you know, can't have personal relationships, you know, can't seem to be a real help to other people, pray in misery and depression, can't make a living, and that means not have a good life, not money, um, you know, full of fear, you know, all of these things.

That's that's what the God-shaped hole looks like in action. What it feels like is a terrible sense of unworthiness and a feeling that somehow, you know, I could forgive you for doing something and then when I do it, I'm a horrible human being, you know, and I hear this like I I'll sit and listen to, you know, I've listened to a lot of fists in in my uh in my time in Alcoholics Anonymous. I've been graced with that.

And I my and I'll hear stuff and I'll be like whoa. And I'm like, but you're a child of God and we love you and we'll find a way to fix this. Let's hit some amends and blah blah blah love.

And I get a speeding ticket and I'm like, I'm a horrible terrible person, you know? And that's because of that that sense of unworthiness. And I carried that for so long.

And what I like to talk about is not so much about how I drank or how I got here because I think that's somewhat irrelevant. The three parts of the disease are that that diagnostic tool. Physical, mental, spiritual is what's important.

How that physical, mental, and spiritual look like for you is your own story. How it looked like for me is my own story. But what I like to talk about is what Alcoholics Anonymous has given me.

Because what I feel like these conferences, what I got from this conference this weekend was how much AA works and let's be a cheerleader for the program of recovery because there's the fellowship which is what we do when we're smoking outside and the program of recovery which is what we do when we're sitting across our kitchen table or the d you know dining with our sponsor. And I think where I live people don't understand that. So they say things like, "I'm, you know, I'm in a recovery program." I said, "No, you work a recovery program and you're a recovery fellowship.

Let's get our terms correct." You know, one of the things that my sponsor and my sponsor was a college professor, so she was real big and she she was a journalist and stuff, so like she really was about language. She was like, "Get a dictionary. Get a dictionary.

Look it up. Let's call things what they are. you know, because I had this vocabulary that was full of failure and f-words and all kinds of stuff that didn't accurately describe my experience or what I wanted to convey to people.

What I wanted to convey to people, what what was in my head couldn't seem to come out my mouth appropriately or in any way that you could understand it without being really offended, you know, because I was full of that fear and I was so blocked. I didn't understand about being blocked from God because it was a state that I was constantly in. I didn't know any other state than being blocked from God.

It was normal. And having had a spiritual awakening as a result of the 12 steps of alcoholics anonymous, the state of being connected to God is so normal. It's hard for me to conceive of not.

I had a friend who had visited me from Iceland. He was staying at my house. He had gone out he'd gone down to San Antonio, which I was kind of jealous of because I didn't get to go.

um when he was staying with my husband and my and my four children and uh he you know he had come and we were talking and he's you know he's sober I don't know like 10 years something like that we've been friends for we've been friends for a really really long time and we were talking about like what we do in our spiritual life what that looks like and what you know we're actually talking about the 10th step you know that pause ask turn thing you know pause when I'm agitated for doubtful ask God to remove it turn my thoughts to someone else speak with another person and make amends if I did something I shouldn't do and if I did some if I didn't do something I shouldn't do be of service to someone else and if I did something I shouldn't do make be a apologize and be of service to someone else. So basically you know pause ask and turn my thoughts away from me and then my actions. So we were discussing this and we were talking about the 10 step and I'm like I don't consciously pause most of the time.

It's an automatic thing for me. It's what I do. Something happens and I stop and say, "Okay, I'm being selfish.

What's going on? God, remove it." And then if it's a matter of picking up the phone and turning to somebody next to me, I'm being selfish. You know, what can I do to be of service to you today?

Boom. Done. It's not even something that I think about anymore.

It's something that's become a habitual thing. My relationship with God has become something. It's not habitual.

is such an intrinsic part of me that it's difficult for me to describe. I would have an easier time talking to you about what I do in my bedroom with my husband than I would about what my relationship with God looks like because it's such a personal thing. And the idea here is this is I had this hole I had this fear.

I had this crushing sense of insecurity and unworthiness and it came to Alcoholics Anonymous and I was taught a way out of that. I was taught a way to live my life the design for living that really works. Um that allows me to be in a state of clarity.

I love it. I love it. You know what I know when people work the steps?

They say things like I'm current. I I swear to God, I almost jumped up and down and clapped my hands when I heard that the first time this weekend because those are things I don't really hear where I live. Um, where I live, there's a lot of fellowship recovery, not a lot of program recovery, if you get my drift.

And a lot of people say things like, "Just don't drink." And then somebody says, "How?" And I said, "Well, you just don't do it." I'm like, "Uh-huh." They say things like, "Let go and let God." Well, how? Well, just let it go. You know, like letting like like the third step is a fishing expedition.

I love this. I took my will back. I'm like, no, no, no.

See, here's the thing. We align our will with God by practicing spiritual principles. God doesn't take your will.

The program funnels it, channels it, and directs it in an appropriate manner. That's what it does. You don't give it up.

I don't say, "Gee, I'm going to give up my will, so I'm just going to sit here and do nothing. You know, it's not a fishing expedition. It's about becoming in tune and one with and be becoming a part of one's community.

I love that word community because what fear does is it separates me from you. It's that isolation and that feeling of separateness that keeps me from truly being willing to understand or experience what you experience. And I can't truly be of service to God and to others unless I'm willing to put aside my preconceived notions or experiences to try the world on from your perspective for just a few minutes.

Because when ultimately when I sat down and I wrote inventory, what I found out that I was so stuck in looking at things in my perspective, I was unwilling to consider that maybe some of the things that happened to me in my life had nothing to do with me. that whoever was doing whatever they were doing were having their own experience with their God, their world, their fear in themselves. And yes, it affected me, but it wasn't personal.

I don't go out in my day and say, you know, I want to hurt people's feelings. I want to make them feel inadequate, less than, and uh yeah, I really want to piss them off. That's not like my that's not my action plan for the day.

My action plan is I want to be a good girl and I want to do good things and be happy. And somewhere along the line I make a decision based on self that puts me in a position to be hurt. Then I do something really bad because you hurt me and all of a sudden I'm pissed off and I don't know why and I'm all set and nobody likes me, you know.

You know, and but the idea here is that, you know, if that's my experience and I'm not personally out to get people, is it possible that nobody's personally out to get me? Hm. And that's what I'm talking about that community being willing to be open to another person's experience and being willing to give people the benefit of the doubt to be willing to allow them to be human and realize that we're all all just fallible children of God.

And there's a a friend of my a friend of mine says this and I love this and I I I try really hard not to not to curse because I have a foul mouth. I am still a 14year-old trapped in a 34 year old's body. Um, but there's this statement and I love it.

It's called I'm an ass, you're an ass. And whenever whenever something happens and I'm like, gee, that stung, I have to remind myself I'm an ass, you're an ass. You didn't do anything to me that I haven't done to someone else on some level in some degree.

Wasn't personal. So, it's this community, this thing, this this this being human and and being fallible and having that that thing that we come together and we can be stronger together. I'm never better than when I'm sitting with another alcoholic helping them have an experience with God.

I am never better. And so, I do this thing. I live this life and I have these experiences because I want that community.

I want to feel whole. And the only place I've ever felt whole in my life is here. This is my home.

I got a text before I I spoke and it was I almost cried and I try I'm I'm one of those I'm such a tomboy it's ridiculous. Putting me in a dress and high heels is like arduous. My husband laughs when I have to pack for conferences because I was taught that we show up and we suit up and we look like we're responsible, respectable members of society when we stand before Alcoholics Anonymous, which means that ripped jeans and a t-shirt and tattoos everywhere and my hair like whatever which way and a pair of flip-flops doesn't cut it for being up here.

So, I'm packing for conferences and I'm like, which dress makes me look a little bit more responsible, you know, what high heels can I actually stand in because I never wear them except for when I'm up here, you know? So, and he laughs. He just laughs his, you know, he just laughs cuz he knows how crazy I am.

But here's the thing is that I get to do this. I get to share this. So, I I had this text.

you know, before I I was I was coming up here and this uh a sponsy of mine text me and she's like, "How's it going?" I'm like, "It's going pretty good. I'm having a good time." I said, "How are you?" And she said, "I'm grateful to be sober today. I'm so grateful God put me put you in my life." No one has ever said that to me until I walk through these doors.

No, no one who interacted with me when I was in my sickness ever was truly grateful for having known me. They loved me cuz I had to. They tolerated me because it was what they were supposed to do.

But being grateful to have to be in someone or having somebody being grateful because you exist purely because you are you is one of the most beautiful experiences that anybody can have. And we have that here. And it was because alcoholics anonymous tolerated me when I was encouraable.

I came in these doors. I had like my hair was 9 million different colors. Blue hair, green hair, my head was shaved.

I didn't wear underwear for like the first year. I mean, my home group, this is God's honest truth. My home group in Jersey, where where I originally got sober, had had a group conscience meeting as to whether or not they should allow me in their meeting anymore because I didn't wear underwear.

And someone pulled me and I wear like this hippie skirt and Doc Martens and, you know, my hair sticking up everywhere. And I'd come in the meeting and I'd be like, you know, and lie. That was something else I did a lot is like I like watch like days of our lives and then come into open disc I call them open disgusting meetings cuz I'm an intolerant little stink.

Um but open discussion meetings and I would like make stuff up to see if you guys would believe me. And I knew they knew I was a liar. And they didn't kick me out.

They didn't say, you know, you're a sick little ticket. Get the hell out of here. What they said is, "Keep coming." And I was like, "Keep coming.

I'm not coming back here." And I did. And I did. And I did.

And I did until until I was about two years sober. And I hadn't worked the steps until I was 2 years over because the big book and the 12 steps were not something that people did as a matter of recovery. um you know people read the stories in the big book and they they had sponsors and they went to retreats and they did things like that but they didn't you know writing an inventory wasn't something they they would say things like you know you'll get drunk if you write that four step in fact my poor husband he wrote a fourep when he was about I don't know like 90 days queen and he did it himself like he found the big book and he got pictures and he's like you know I'm going to write an inventory cuz I'm going to die he couldn't get sober and uh and uh his sponsor kept Hey, well, you know, you might drink.

Don't Don't you maybe you should stop writing that four step. You might drink. And then he went up to the Russen house, you know, had an experience with God, 12 steps, came back and said, "Wa, I can't believe, you know, so, you know, like I I'm on fire with this big book stuff." And and my husband's like, "Yeah, you told me last year I was going to drink if I didn't." you know, but I mean where where I got started with, it really wasn't about having a relationship with a higher power or or learning how to live despite fear.

It was about a lot about hiding in alcoholics anonymous, going to a 100 meetings a week and talking about your problems. And after a while, I don't give a I don't give a dudoo about your divorce. I don't care about your cat.

I know your cat's I know you loved it, but dude, it's been 6 months. It's dead. Okay, get a new cat.

Let's get on with the thing here, you know. And that's the way it was. No, not to be like callous or anything, but you know, people we I was taught to go to my meetings and dump my problems.

And the fact was was that nobody talked to me. Nobody liked me. And I was a mess.

I didn't have any damn problems because I didn't interact with people. I hid. So, I had nothing to talk about.

I had to make stuff up, you know? So, you and and then people would be like, "Good share. You know, you you really got to the heart of And I'm like, I write all that up.

Why write that in a book somewhere? You know, so the idea here is that, you know, this is what I taught. I was taught recovery was.

And I ended up being at a meeting and in Staten Island. I ended up moving to Staten Island, New York. You know, by accident, you know, God brought me there.

I, you know, I didn't never wanted to live on that Dor Island. It's a gar they literally put it's a garbage dump. They put all the garbage from the tri-state area in Staten Island.

The middle of the island is a garbage dump. Yeah, I didn't ever expect to be there, but I I I you know, I I moved to this island. I sat in this meeting and this guy from California was speaking.

He was like he was he was doing his last retreat before he went to go study with the Dollaly Lama. And he looked like if if David Crosby and Captain Kangaroo had sex. He would be the love child.

Thank god he's dead because if he if you ever heard me say explain him that way, you probably would be really mad. Um now he'd think it's funny. Um, so anyway, so he was talking and he was giving this talk on the ninth step and he was talking about amends and freedom and how free do you want to be and I'm like you're full of crap, dude.

And I'm, you know, I'm 20 years old May. Yeah. 20 years old and I'm an angry, scared little girl.

I have a baby. I had gotten pregnant when I was about 60 days clean, you know, and I had had this daughter that I didn't know how to be a mom to, but I tried really, really hard. Um, and I was miserable and I was afraid to drink because I knew that I would I would hurt her and I and I loved her more than I loved like she was my Cindy Lou, you know, like the escape plans for my house.

I loved her more than I loved anything else in the face of the earth. And what I I knew that if I drank, I would hurt her and I didn't want to do that. But I couldn't live like I was living because I was afraid of everything.

I can remember I went to um an open and disgusting meeting in the San Ireland and I was I had to get up and get a cup of coffee and I can remember having a panic attack because people might see me. Mind you, I sat in the back of the meeting. The coffee was over there.

No one was seeing me. They were all looking forward. But I thought you guys had the, you know, eyes in the back of your head.

You knew where I was all the time cuz I was so damn important that everybody was paying attention to every little thing that I was doing. And you thought at me, you telegraphed horrible things to me in your head and you thought at me and thought, "Wow, who's that girl? I really hope she doesn't come back here anymore and her butt's fat and oh, she's not very pretty and she's kind of dumb and who the hell is she?" And I thought these things.

I heard these things from your brains when I went through my life. So, I'm sitting in this meeting hearing you think at me while you're facing away. And I get to get this cup of coffee.

My hands shake and I'm spilling all over myself. And I sit back down and I'm broken out in the sweat. I'm overwhelmed with fear and I want to die.

I want to die. I just like I cannot live anymore feeling the way that I feel and I don't know any way out of it. God answered my prayers.

A couple weeks later I stumble into this meeting. There's Captain Kangaroo talking about freedom. And I go up to him and I'm like, "You're full of crap and I'm not making amends to those people.

They hurt me." And he goes and he starts asking me these questions about like, you know, what happens when I drink? How do I think about it? And what I found out now that I've been through the steps is that he qualified me as to whether or not I was an alcoholic.

And he asked me all these questions, what happens when you start drinking and yada yada yada. And then all of a sudden he pulls somebody over and says, you know, you help her. And this guy said, you know, he's this old guy and he's bald and fat and I'm like, you know, what are you going to do?

You know, you little he's going to, you know, I'm like, you're going to hit on me or something. You know, you know, cuz that's the way I looked at everybody. It was what can I get from you and what are you going to do to me?

It was always a costbenefit analysis and I always always expected to be screwed over at some point. So I was out for me and to protect me and to make sure that I got what I wanted. So you know people helping me, wanting to help me, that wasn't something that I believed was possible that you would want to help me just for the pure joy of helping me.

No, you wanted something for me. So, I was pretty sure this guy wanted to sleep with me, you know, cuz I was so attractive, you know, in my flannel shirts and my baggy baggy pants and my hair in my face and the foul mouth and the anger that wafted off of me and the fact that, you know, you know, I was the most antisocial, angry, disgusting human beings you would probably ever want to meet. And I lied all the time, you know, but he wanted to sleep at that, of course, you know.

Um, but he he ended up bringing me to a big book meeting at his house that he and his wife had and they we I started to go through the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous and I began to have an experience with God. I found out what it meant to be an alcoholic. That three-fold disease.

I found out what it meant to be a hopeless alcoholic, meaning that that I'm I am hopeless apart from divine help means that I am hopeless, not helpless, meaning that there is something that I can do in order to live. But here's the thing, and this is the beautiful thing of alcoholics anonymous, is that it doesn't tell me I have a choice as to whether or not I pick up a drink. It says that I can die an alcoholic death or live on a spiritual basis.

So the choice that I make is not whether or not I I don't choose not to drink today. I choose to live today. I choose to live on a spiritual basis.

And that's something that today has become not even a choice anymore. That's the beauty of that choice. I made that choice.

I didn't know I was choosing to live on a spiritual basis. I I just wanted to be not in pain anymore. And I followed this person around and I begin to began to have an experience.

Today, the choice to live on a spiritual basis isn't even a choice that I consciously make anymore. I mean, there are times when there's difficulties and I have to make it call my sponsor. All right, what's the what's the right thing to do here?

But what I'm saying is that my life has evolved into something that living on a spiritual basis is the inevitable conclusion. My husband's sober and alcoholics. He has the same clean date as I do.

My children know about alcoholics. We have a house meeting in our house. We practice these principles in all our affairs.

I have sponsies out the wazoo, commitments out of the wazu. If I wanted to run screaming from here, I really couldn't. I have enough tethers to hold me to alcoholics anonymous.

that I'm held here against my will sometimes. But that's the beauty of living on a spiritual basis is that spiritual basis takes you over. It talks about it.

It talks about in the big book it says that that the that the relationship that we have with our creator that spiritual experience will become the center of our lives. And my life is such that that experience that that connection to God is the hub of the wheel that all the things that I have and all the things that I do come from. And I love those things.

So that experience, that relationship with God is absolutely necessary to be in and have what I have. I'm a hedenistic person. I like to feel good doing this, being here, sharing this, having this as experience, living my life the way that I do, experiencing God the way that I do, feels wonderful, better than I've ever felt in my life.

Now, I'm making a comparison, and I explain this to my sponsies all the time. Let's face it, sex is a great equalizer. Most of us have had it.

Gay, straight, whatever it is, we've had it. We've had an experience with it. We kind of understand it.

It's a human nature sort of thing. And I explain a spiritual awakening as being something like an orgasm. You don't know, you know, it's like it's like, you know, the idea is you don't know.

You don't know what you're missing until you've had it. It changes you. You're never the same.

That's what a spiritual awakening is. And that's what I want. That's what I chase, you know?

And so I'm I talked about being being struck and paralyzed by fear and coming up here and talking to you guys up here is not my favorite thing to do. My favorite thing is going to be in the back and do my thing and rub a shoulder shoulder yada yada yada. You know, I don't necessarily like speaking.

It's not something that I enjoy. Not because I don't like doing like you all, but because I'm a self-centered self, you know, alcoholic insecure and I'm like, you know, my butt's too big and what if I say they're the wrong thing? what if the fbomb flies out of my mouth, you know, things like that.

Um, but I have been given tools in this program to be able to do the things that I know that I need to do, even if it's something that I'm afraid to do. And then I begin to have that experience with that thing that I'm so much afraid of, that it becomes such a joy and privilege. And I was talking to somebody at my home group a couple couple days ago and um she was talking about how she resents that, you know, after being sober for 19 years that she still has to go to meetings.

And I'm like, I get to go to meetings. I get to have a relationship with a higher power. I get to sponsor.

This is a privilege. I am somebody who nobody wanted to be around. They tried to kick me out of alcoholics and thank God you failed.

But dude, AA was kind of like, you're a little too much for me, man. You know, you're a little annoying. Um, I, you know, I was somebody that was a spiritual drain to the people in my life.

I was a deficit and not an asset. And Alcoholics Anonymous has allowed me to become an asset to my community, to my family, to my friends, to the world in general. And I get to be those things.

I get to have that. And I'm grateful for the people who have said the things to me that have made me so angry that I wanted to kick them in the shins because there were things that challenged me and challenged my point of view, my perspective that allowed me to be flexible with the things that I thought that I knew. When I was about 10 years sober, I uh I was in a bit of a spiritual bind.

My ego had written a check that my spirit couldn't cash. I was, you know, speaking all over, you know, I'm in flinting from, you know, going to different countries and different things and sponsoring workshops and this that and the other thing. And I had like 15 sponsies.

I didn't even know half their names at the time. I'm like sponsory one, sponsy 2, sponsory 3 you call this, they call. I knew by the time the day when they called that who it was, you know.

Um, and I was I have I have four kids at the time. I had two and I was married and in school and you know and I had all this stuff going on and I there was all this payout and nothing coming into my spirit that I had put it talks about putting service uh putting it on a service plane you know I was so attached to being important and alcoholics anonymous I forgot that being an alcoholics anonymous is what's important you know and my the way that my sponsor put it says that he says that I was a big shot I was a big shot in a program full of nobodies. Meaning that I thought I was important and that I was, you know, because again where where I grew up in Alcoholics Anonymous, there were not a lot of big book thumpers.

There were not a lot of people who worked this. We call ourselves big book thumpers. Not a lot of people who work the steps and there were not women who did this.

I had to go to the men and say, "Please help me because there were not women who did this. Now there are but because the handful of women who begged and you know in the parking lot saying what what were those inventory sheets that you have where was that tape? Who was that?

That guy and this guy. Okay, just give me that information. I'll take it home.

It was like a drug transaction in the parking lot because you know because the women weren't working the steps. They weren't. And the men were getting it and I was jealous.

I was pissed. I was like that's not fair. I want a penis so I can go into that, you know, I that guy can be my sponsor cuz I'm dying.

I'm dying in Aqua Anonymous cuz women are too busy getting their nails done rather than putting their hand out to the newcomer and telling me how to get sober. So, I was dying. So, I had to go up to my h Thank god my husband was sober cuz I had to go up to his sponsors and say, "Help me please.

I'm dying." You know? So, I got this experience and all these other women came up to me said, "Help me please. I'm dying." So I had proteges and groupies and I was important and people everyone knew me you know I'd walk into a meeting I'm like hey Carrie and people would be like that's your sponsor oh my god does she you know what she do what's she like you know and so at 10 years so over my ego had written a check that my spirit couldn't cash and I went through this process with the steps where I stopped sharing and I I stopped speaking I stopped doing all of those things that fed the ego got quiet and went back to God.

I went back to the basics and cleared the decks. And I spent a year where I didn't take on any new sponses. I finished the ones that I was with.

I stopped sharing in meetings. I started listening and getting quiet again. And it was a true rebirth.

It was a true rebirth for me. But it took a friend of mine saying to me, you your ego read a wrote a check. Your spirit couldn't cash and you're spiritually sick and you're dying.

I know you want to help all these women, but what do you have to offer if you have nothing to offer? look at you. You're dying.

I see it inside of you." And I burst down in tears. I was just amazed that somebody cared enough about me to tell me what they saw going on. Cuz here's the thing, and and I'm I I'm guilty of this myself.

We're scared of old-timers. Not that I was an old-timer at the time, but I was important in the big book community of Alcoholics Anonymous in New Jersey. So people were forget, you know, didn't want to tell me, you know, hey, your slip's showing, you know, by the way, you might want to write an inventory on that.

You know, people were in such awe that they forgot that I had clay feet and I was dying and he cared enough to do that. And it pissed me. I didn't talk to him for a couple months.

And then I said, "All right, come on. Let's go. Let's do this work.

I want to be free." So fear has this way of creeping up inside of us. It has a way of changing. First, I talked about fear as being, you know, you're looking at me, you know, that kind of Carrie moment where they're all going to laugh at you.

They're all going to laugh at you, right? Um, Stephen King, Carrie. Okay.

Anyway, lost. Gone. It's over.

It's done. Um, you know, I talked about that and then we talked about when you when you start getting somewhere, getting somewhere. Listen, like getting somewhere like there's ambition when it comes to God.

God tells me where to go and I do it. But when you start getting things and and and getting attached to those things in recovery because they're things that we love, things that we have, things that we like, and those very things are the noose around our neck because we're so I was so attached to them, I made them more important than the spiritual experience that I was having. So I made the external more important.

And that's a trap that many of us fall into once we get okay and we stop being afraid of dying and drinking and all that stuff. And then all that petty little thing, all those petty things that used to roll off your back when you were new and just didn't just didn't want to drink that day, just didn't want to die that day. And please God, don't let me drink and die.

You know, when you're 10 years sober, you're like, I can't believe that woman looked at me that way. And how dare they ding my car in the parking lot. I, you know, I got sober, I walked, I didn't have a car until I was 24 years old.

I didn't get a license till I was 23. I couldn't afford car insurance until I was 23 years old. I was sober 5 years before I had any kind of vehicle.

People picked my butt up and I walked. And now I'm mad cuz somebody dinged my car. It's my car.

Mine. Mine is the worst word in the vocabulary for human beings. Mine.

It's mine. It's my sobriety. No, it's God's sobriety.

He gifted it to me. He lent my life to me. He lent my children to me.

He lent my husband to me. They are his. I get to benefit from my association with those things.

But ultimately, they have nothing to do with me. The fact that I'm standing here today has nothing to do with me. It has to do with the grace of God coming into my life and changing me.

I did nothing but accept that. All I had to do was sit still and do what I was told. But then now then when I'm 10 years over or 15 years over, I'm going to take ownership of something that was lent to me by a power greater than myself.

No. And so that fear has a way of coming in and changing and ego and pride and attachment. And what I like to do and what I love about Alcoholics Anonymous is that it doesn't allow me to stay in that state.

It allows me to transcend all of those things to be free. One of the things that I love and one of the things that changed me was when I sat down with my sponsor, that same person who told me all about, you know, my ego and calling me a big shot. In fact, when I would pick up the phone and say, "Hey, Big Shot, how's it going?" I hate you.

You know, um, and uh, one of the things that I was told on the on the fourth step in the seven areas of self, we have something called the pocketbook, right? It says pocketbook and everybody thinks about it in terms of money. But isn't time money?

You know, we say time is money all the time, don't we? How much time and energy do I spend worrying about what other people think of me? How much time and energy do I spend being blocked off by God by some stupid thing that didn't matter in the first place just because I decide that I'm going to be attached to it and I need to be right.

That costs me. The question that I need to ask myself on a daily basis is what am I willing to let go of to be free? What am I willing to pay?

Today I'm willing to pay just about anything. There's very I mean I love my family. I love my children.

I have four beautiful children. I have a husband who's wonderful. My life is fantastic.

It's completely insane, but absolutely fantastic. And I wouldn't change not one thing about it. I am who I've always wanted to be.

I want to somebody talked about it and I remember hearing it and that somebody was I heard I heard somebody say saying that um you have to want what you have. That's the gift of alcoholics anonymous is not to get all this stuff but to want what you have. When I first got sober I wanted what you guys had.

I wanted to be I wanted bigger boobs. I really wanted bigger boobs. I wanted to be a little bit taller, too.

But I kind of like I had those those plow girl legs. They're really muscular. I wanted nice thin little stick legs.

I wanted to be pretty. I wanted to be smart. And I wanted everybody to lag me.

I wanted money. I wanted prestige. I wanted all that stuff.

And you guys had all that stuff, you know, cuz I compared my insides to your outsides. And you guys were all great and I sucked. Um and and I went through and I wanted what you had.

And then I I went through the steps and I had a spiritual experience and I wrote that fourth step and I did that fifth step. And I've been gifted with teachers and sponsors that have have loved me enough to piss me off, who have held my hand while I cried, have made me stand on my own two feet and be relying on God and not on them to tell me when to, you know, scratch my butt or wind my watch. So, I've had these been gifted with these things, these people, the these experiences in my life.

And so, I've become a person that I like being. I mean, I still want bigger boobs, but I'm okay where I'm at, you know, and maybe if I get like 10 grand, I can probably change that, but, you know, I'll probably, you know, college fund for the kids. Nah, tits, you know.

But that's where that selfishness, that's where that stuff, that self-centerness, that fear, that thing that shuts me down and blocks me off and tells me that I'm just not good enough. Where God has reduced that and and and made it, it doesn't mean that I don't feel it. It doesn't mean that I don't think it.

It means that I can live my life the way that I want to despite it. And then what happens is those that fear, that stuff is recognized to be a lie because it truly is. A fear says always and never, right?

They they always don't like me. They're never going to love me. I'm always going to be alone.

And I'm always going to be rejected. No. Always and never are lies.

Cuz nothing ever happens statistically. Always and never, right? It's a lie.

And it's a lie that my disease, my ego tells me so that I can be alone and separated from you. And what I love is there's a a a statement from uh the Oxford group. And I I almost I can't walk through the hallway and somebody said the word Oxford group and I turned around.

I'm like, what? Oh, tell me what you know. Because I love the history of Alcoholics Anonymous.

But there's a statement from the Oxford group which is the predecessor of alcoholics and you guys probably all know this because you're good step working a literature reading pass nod reading sort of people. Um but there's this fellowship and they said this thing and they said that the light of God shines brighter through two windows than one. And so I come here and I come to AA meetings and I sit with my sponses and I do these things and I carry this message and I'm willing to give up my personal time and I look I don't have I don't get manicures.

I don't get my legs waxed. I rarely get a haircut. Uh I rarely shop.

I don't do those things. I don't really watch TV. I mean, I t a couple shows, but I watch them like in 15-minute increments because my life is dedicated to beyond being a mother and being a wife to carrying the message of Alcoholics Anonymous to those who still suffer whether they have 3 days or 15 years.

And I get to be a mother and a wife because I carry that message. that carrying that message, that process, that spiritual experience that I have enables me to go back to my family, to my husband, to my children, to the people and friends in my life and be a whole human being and be present for them. Be here right now, not last week, not next week, here, now.

Cuz it's the only true thing that exists. This moment is the only thing that truly exists. Everything else is a fantasy and a delusion.

because I cannot control nor predict next week. And last week was gone, done, and over with. The only thing I have is exactly where I'm standing right here, right now, here with you.

And I have to thank you all. I want to thank, you know, you know, Jerry and Kevin and people. And Tim, who's not here, he's off doing a ser service, running people to the airport for showing me a beautiful weekend and meeting beautiful people like like Grace.

In fact, I've had a wonderful time and I felt truly a part of and it and in the womb with you, you know, ultimately the womb with the little I call her the goddess. I don't like God. We say him.

I just easier to do it cuz I really like the whole mom god thing. It's just me. I'm a little pagan.

I'm Irish. What do you want? You know, you know, but here's the thing is that I've got to be in the in the womb in the safety with you and feel that connection, that wholeness, that beauty that I can carry back into my life and be more effective to those around me cuz my job is to be of service.

My problem is me. My solution is you. So, I want to thank you so much for sharing you with me and for giving me the gift that I've gotten this weekend.

Thank you. 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.