Sober Sunrise – Chuck C. – Amarillo, TX – 1978
AA speaker Chuck C. from Amarillo, TX shares his story of hitting bottom, losing everything to alcohol, and discovering that surrender—not fighting—is how recovery works.
Chuck C. from Amarillo, TX got sober in 1946 after a catastrophic 28-day blackout over Christmas and New Year’s that burned away every excuse and defense he had. In this classic AA speaker tape, he walks through his journey from a man who couldn’t admit defeat to someone who discovered that the battle is won by giving up the fight—and what that surrender meant for the next 36 years of his life.
Chuck C., an AA speaker from Amarillo, TX with 36 years sober, describes his bottom as a 28-day blackout where he lost all conscious memory but gained a clear head and the ability to admit defeat for the first time. He explains that his sobriety is built on three foundational discoveries: the power of living one day at a time, the critical importance of rigorous self-honesty, and finding a personally acceptable partnership with God. Chuck demonstrates how surrender—ceasing to fight anything or anybody—allows recovery to work, and contrasts this with his 11 years of white-knuckle sobriety before the program.
Episode Summary
Chuck C. opens with his most striking claim: he hasn’t had a conscious desire for a drink in 36 years. What makes this credible isn’t bluster—it’s the clarity with which he traces how he got there. He begins by describing his drinking years as a blur of excuses. For 43 years, he never admitted a mistake. It was always someone else’s fault: his wife, her mother, circumstances, society. He became a periodic drinker at 32, cycling between dry periods and destructive binges. He couldn’t admit defeat even after his older brother beat him for 20 straight years—the competitive wound was too deep.
The turning point came during a 28-day blackout starting December 21, 1945. He lost all memory of those 28 days—couldn’t recall the first drink, the middle, or the last. But when he came to in mid-January 1946, something fundamental had burned away. His excuses were gone. His pride was gone. For the first time in his life, he saw himself clearly and admitted defeat. He didn’t surrender consciously; he simply had nothing left to fight with.
At that moment of clarity, he remembered reading Jack Alexander’s Saturday Evening Post article about Alcoholics Anonymous years earlier. He made a decision: if he ever got out of that bed, he would find AA. From that moment forward, he never drank again.
Chuck’s sponsor or first contact in the program told him two things that shaped everything: “It’s the first drink that’s killing you” and “Today is the day we don’t drink.” The second message saved his life. If anyone had told him to stay sober for 36 years, he would have died. But 24 hours at a time? That was possible. He also learned that the past is guilt and the future is fear—only the present moment is real, and living in the now is how you escape both.
What emerges from Chuck’s talk is a clear-eyed view of what sobriety actually is. It’s not the absence of drinking. It’s the ability to live comfortably, peacefully, and joyously with yourself. Alcoholism, he argues, is not caused by alcohol—it’s a living problem. You need a living answer, which is why he emphasizes that the disease is inside, not out there. He didn’t have trouble living with other people or even in penitentiaries; the problem was always his relationship with himself.
He illustrates this with the story of a compulsive gambler who called him on a Friday night with a gun in his hand. Chuck told him to call back Monday. When the man arrived, they worked through the steps into the early morning hours. At Step 8, Chuck told him he’d have to admit the debt and tell the people he’d defrauded that he’d pay them back as soon as he could—even though the man said they’d kill him. Chuck’s response was blunt: “So what? You won’t have suicide on your mind.” The man laughed—really laughed—for the first time in years. He paid off all his debts. Nobody killed him. The point: rigorous self-honesty is the golden key.
Chuck’s major discoveries unfolded over the first six years of sobriety. Six months sober, he realized he hadn’t wanted a drink. After a year, his family was thriving. After two years, his business was good and his state of being was better than anything he’d known. But the great discovery came at six years: he had a God of his very own. He’d spent 30 years trying to find that, given up on it five years before getting sober, and then found it without trying once he stopped running his own life.
This realization led him to the answer that guides everything: tend the sheep. Drawing on the biblical story of Peter, where Jesus asks three times “Do you love me?” and each time Peter answers “Yes, Lord” and Jesus says “Tend my sheep,” Chuck decided this was his task. For 36 years, he’s never tried to get anything for himself. He doesn’t run his own life, his wife’s, or his kids’. Everything good has come as a result of stopping that struggle. He bought back the business he’d been thrown out of and sold it for wealth. His business dealings were conducted entirely on trust and handshakes—no written contracts, no one ever cheated him, and his associates made him wealthy because they wanted him to be.
Chuck closes with a sermon about God’s design. A salmon is born at the headwaters, swims all the way to Japan and back, then returns to spawn where it was born—all without a map. Swallows winter in Venezuela and return to Capistrano on the same day. If God provides that completeness for salmon and swallows, doesn’t He provide it for His children? The answer, Chuck suggests, comes when people get simple enough to live the AA principles—sharing experience, strength, and hope in love, asking for nothing—and discover they’re standing on the Everlasting Arms.
He notes that the program is not a self-improvement program; it’s a self-discovery program. The 12 Steps, he explains, came directly from spiritual principle. Bill W. had nothing to write when tasked with creating Chapter 5, but in 30 minutes produced the 12 Steps—which have never changed in essence. Chuck’s final image is powerful: he sat in the same chair for 10 and a half years in hell, then 36 more years in heaven in that same chair. Nothing changed except him.
Notable Quotes
We cease to fight anything or anybody. This is a battle we win by giving up the fight.
I never had a conscious desire for a drink since my first appearance with you guys.
Alcoholism is not caused by drinking alcohol. Alcoholism is a living problem, and you and I have to have a living answer lest we drink again.
Rigorous self-honesty is a golden key to this life.
I’ve lived one day at a time for 36 years. This is the second greatest thing I ever learned in my life. The first is that if we are going to live without drinking, we have to have some sort of personally acceptable conscious partnership with the Living God.
I’ve never tried to get anything for me in 36 years. Everything’s happened since I quit trying to run my life and hers and the kids’ business.
Step 3 – Surrender
Hitting Bottom
Acceptance
Rigorous Honesty
Spiritual Awakening
One Day at a Time
Topics Covered in This Transcript
- Step 1 – Powerlessness
- Step 3 – Surrender
- Hitting Bottom
- Acceptance
- Rigorous Honesty
- Spiritual Awakening
- One Day at a Time
People Also Search For
AA speaker on step 3 – surrender
AA speaker on hitting bottom
AA speaker on acceptance
AA speaker on rigorous honesty
▶
Full AA Speaker Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated and may contain minor errors. For the best experience, listen to the audio above.
welcome to sober Sunrise a podcast bringing you AA speaker meetings with stories of experience strength and Hope from around the world we bring you several new speakers weekly so be sure to subscribe whether you join us in the morning or at night there’s nothing better than a sober Sunrise we hope that you enjoy today’s speaker thank you thank you thank you I don’t think we lost anybody I figured we’d lose half of them you know the pretty part of the family has already got been up here my name is Tex and I’m an alcoholic hi I’m glad to be here and I’m glad you’re here I in my 37th year without a drink or a pill of any kind due to the fact that uh there’s a program called Alcoholics Anonymous and there are people like you who share their experience strength and hope with people like me it’s been no chore for me to be around here for 36 and 1/2 years this is the only easy life I have ever known the only good life that’s ever been mine and I hope I have another 36 years and I think it will you don’t think so huh he looked like he was mad at me he’s not mad at I think he uh delivers MERS light beer and he don’t want to spoil his Sals I feel like a clown you’re in the right place I’ve had a little trouble breathing the last few years I don’t think it had anything at all to do with the fact that I smoked four packs of camels for many years every day they told me about 20 years ago that I could either smoke or breee and I chose breathing but this thing didn’t catch up with me until about four or five years ago and uh their prognosis is G they tell me that there’s no reversing lung damage so that was not acceptable so I uh took a good look at myself and I said to me any power that could keep me from want to drink for 36 years a tongue you and babble an idiot drunk like me I haven’t even had one conscious desire for a drink since I got here and I said to me any power that could do that this thing’s peanuts so I’m going to get well and I’ve been getting well ever since I don’t know uh as I’m going to to continue because uh in July uh I’m supposed to let’s kill you I’m supposed to talk to the doctors in hog hospital at lunch and then the I get through with that and then I’m talking to the patients the doctors only get 30 minutes but patient supposed to get an hour and a half now I don’t know why I ever accept that kind of commitment what the hell am I going to take a tell a bunch of doctors huh they probably all need this program I my own Doctor Who is is quite a expert in uh chest problems told me after he hadd been treating me for couple of years that he would treat me and not charge me as i’ treat him and not charge him I said I can’t do that you have a license that gives you a right to charge I ain’t got no license so you treat me and charge me and I’ll treat you and not charge you because uh when I talk I have to call them as I see them even in this lepr colony of ours and I I can’t uh take an honorarium sometimes I get an assignment that has pretty good uh stien for honorari but I can’t take it because I figured that if they paid me I would have to say what I think they want me to say and I can’t felt that way so I’m not charging you for this deal tonight I wanted do when I saw this crowd and most of you look like you had money I’ve been conditioned to believe that all Texans have a large back roll because they’re sitting on an Oilwell that’s what they’re doing but I uh will be happy just to get my carfare I don’t want it to I don’t want to leave uh ow myself money oh man in an hour’s time I can’t tell you much about my drinking career other than this that I had to die to get here in the first 43 years of my life I never made a mistake I always had some place to point the finger it was never my fault it was your fault it was conditions it was circumstances it was the rotten society in which I was born it was my wife’s fault and as good as good an excuse for drinking as she was she couldn’t hold a candle to her mother her mother lived with us for the last 5 years that I drank and she had a grandstand seat watching me crucify her only daughter and she didn’t like me very good and I didn’t like her that good because if she hadn’t been living with us I wouldn’t have had to crucify her daughter it was her fault all the way through she lived us with us 5 years after I sobered up and I could spend this evening beautifully telling you what this program did for her have you ever saw an old bag straighten up and fly right it was her mother and said never attended one AA meeting see here is just embarrass me to death because she wouldn’t believe that you people had been any any help to me she wouldn’t believe that God had been in the help she would come up and put her arms around me and she’d say oh son I always knew that you had it in you well I did too but I wasn’t thinking of the same thing as she was and I want to tell you something I rode this thing right through the gates of insanity and death I’ll tell you a little about my last go round it started on the Friday before Christmas 1945 and and I just got a note from a chap that called himself my brunette son he’s uh a little darker than I am so uh he’s do that all right and uh he sent me a uh thing that gave me the date of on which the Friday before Christmas fell in 1945 and it was the 21st of December so I had 10 days in December and 18 days in January that I lost I don’t remember anything about it talk nothing I don’t remember the first drink the middle drink or the last drink don’t remember anything now that lady that you just heard talk says that during all that time I destroyed seven quarts of whiskey every 3 days and I can’t even argue with her because I wasn’t there she was and I just have to keep my mou sh and that’s one reason next reason is I don’t think seven quarts is too much for 3 days if you only work at it maybe 15 days but if you go 28 days it’s either too much or just enough and in my case it was just enough because I came too after middle of January 1946 with the clearest head I had ever had in my life because all of my excuses and all my I wants burned out in that 28 days I did not surrender consciously I had nothing to do with it I can’t even say to you tonight well I drank the whiskey didn’t I and that’s what burned them out but I don’t remember drinking the whiskey so I can’t even say that I think if I could remember anything at all about that deal I could figure out a way to take credit for the last 36 years but I can’t remember I can’t even say well I drank the whiskey t i because I don’t know but when I came to my excuses were gone and my eye wants were gone and I saw me for the first time in my life with nothing between me and me and for the first time in my life I admitted defeat I had not one time in in 43 years admitted defeat I could not admit defeat I had an older brother three and a half years older than I and three and 1/2 years stronger and we had one fight that lasted 20 years on the installment plan and he beat the Jesus out of me for 20 years straight but he couldn’t make me believe it I left home at 20 believing I could whip him and he had whipped me for 20 years straight I became a periodic 11 years before coming to this program because I was not going to lose to a batttle no way so I became periodic and for 11 years I was as dry as I am tonight between every two drunks but I always got drunk again so I could not admit defeat and fortunately for me and I believe it to be the most fortunate single experience in my life sometime between the Friday before Christmas and the middle of January the ego and the excuses all burned up burned out and I could look at me and see that I’d lost the battle of life I did not know why because I knew nothing of alcoholic synonymous nothing at all I did didn’t know anything about the disease of alcoholism I knew an awful lot about the inside of jails I know a lot about the DCS and the convulsions and very dirty beds but I didn’t know anything about alcoholism and so fortunately for me the Second Great Good Fortune was it after I’d been looking at this thing a little while the morning I came to I remembered that Mrs C had found Jack Alexander’s article in the Saturday evening post March 1st issued 1941 she had read it thought it might help me if I read it so she put it on the left arm of the chair I sit in today open at the right place hoping that when I came in if I came in I’d read it and evidently I did but I never remember the thing about it until that morning and I remembered that I’d read it remembered only two things about it drunks up drunks and didn’t drink and they called it alcoholics synonymous and I said to myself if I ever live to get out of this bed I will find Alcoholics Anonymous and immediately the curtain dropped and I was sicken to death drunk and insane and I had a lot of dying to do but from the moment of commitment until right now I have never had a drink or a sedating or S tranquilizing pill of any kind such is the great sign ific an of this thing called surrender surrender this is a battle we win by giving up the fight in my opinion one of the greatest lines in our book is we cease to fight anything or anybody because that’s what happened to me and I haven’t had a drink her pill since and furthermore and this I get a lot of repercussions over my first group was Beverly Hills group because that’s where we lived and when I get up before my group and tell them I never had a a conscious desire for a drink since my first appearance with you guys half of them it hit the floor and they would say something that you shouldn’t say in church they’d say Chuck you’re a goddamn liar that’s what they’d say in chorus because they were having trouble most of them uh hanging on to not drinking we call it White Knuckles to Bri I never had any since I came to you my 11 years trying to keep from drinking and get off the stuff to get well enough to get back in the ring for the next round I had White Knuckle sobriety then or not sobriety but dryness I think we use the term sobriety too Loosely amongst us my def nition of sobriety is the ability to live comfortably peacefully and joyously with myself because in my opinion alcoholism is not caused by drinking alcohol alcoholism is a living problem and you and I have to have a living answer lest we drink again for instance in so far as I am able to perceive there is only one reason that I’m not drunk right now just one not two just one and the reason is I’ve got the thing I was looking for in the bottom I’ve got it and what’s the thing it’s the ability to live comfortably peacefully and joyously with me and having that ability I don’t have the slightest difficulty living with you even the Meatheads sitting here some of you have known for quite a while on me I don’t have any trouble living with you I had the privilege in the last 36 years of talking in many many many penitentiaries in different parts of the world and I don’t have any trouble there I don’t have a bit of trouble it’s it’s not problem isn’t out there our problem is inside and I believe that every uh soet iety that we have allowed to use our program is a living problem just the same I don’t think fat is anonymous is uh an eting problem some of these days when I’m going to bounce a steel chair off my forehead because they’ve been trying now for years to get me to say ERS are not anous that don’t mean nothing to me fatties anonymous had a real ring Gamblers Anonymous I’m a gambler I always was love to gamble but I’m not a compulsive Gambler I sort of grew up in the South and the blacks taught me how to gamble and they taught me good and so I’ve I’ve won a great deal more money than I ever lost yeah but I don’t go out and throw money away one of the things they taught me if you win some money it’s not you’re not play it on the house if you lose it you ain’t got it and if you went it they ain’t got it it’s yours so you’re gambling with your own money so don’t don’t think gambling on the house put it in your pocket and keep it they taught me never to gamble with scared money one of my wife’s bad problems and we can gamble with uh without having scared money she pays the neckel lock slot machines and and condemns herself it’s a jact PO hates it because she’s got their money that’s not what they taught me if you wi it’s yours and they taught me not to sit around and try to wait for your luck if you sit down in the game and your Luck’s bad get up and leave come back tomorrow you know those things are fundamental but that’s not the way the the compulsive Gambler does it I’m going to tell you a little story it illustrates this few years ago I got a call on a Friday night from man and whiter we we live in Laguna Beach and this chap was in Wier and he says Chuck I’m sitting here with a six gun in my hand and I’m going to blow my brains out but Jim told me not to shoot myself until I talk to you now I says what do you got to say well I says you called me on a bad night I said I’m talking tonight Saturday night and Sunday night but I’m open Monday night if you want to talk to me talk to me Monday night and he hung up the phone and I thought that was it well Monday night about 730 the doorbell ring I go the door and it’s my boy from what what you and he comes in and he sits down and he was a Aly and a compulsive Gambler and he lost a lot of money that he didn’t have and he lost it to professional Gamers and that’s not a good way to establish and maintain longevity and so we sat down there at 7:30 and we started to Preamble and at about 2:00 we were at step 8 and step step8 says we made a list of all person with harm and became willing to make a men to the m and I was getting strung out on that and I was telling this old boy down look you’re going to have to go these people and you’re going to have to tell them that you admit the death that it’s legitimate you lost the money and you’ll pay it back as soon as you can but you ain’t got no money now yeah Chucky says I can’t do that they’ll kill me I said so what you won’t have suicide on your mind and he started to laugh and he’s never good laughon he has never quit laughing I I walked out on the porch and listened to him all the way down the hill laughing every time I meet him he’s laughing and he ain’t very dead and he’s paid off all his bills and nobody killed him you see this this a beautiful thing it’s a beautiful thing that’s the reason I told you because until we get rigorously self-honest we’re going to have trouble with this program we got to learn learn how to be honest with us before we can think too much about being honest with other people rigorous self-honesty is a golden key to this life that we find here it’s fabulous thing so I threw that in to make a point and I won’t be labored m c told you a few times how her life has changed since she is gotten to the place where she can laugh at herself I had my crying before I got here oh I cry easy now but it’s not for me you know I I cry a lot and I when I feel like crying I Cry I stand up here at these podiums and cry like a damn baby and it’s all right with me because I don’t mind you know so I decided to come to this program and I didn’t know how to find it I didn’t know how to find it I knew that you wouldn’t be in the phone book because you were Anonymous weren’t you so knowing you weren’t there I never looked which is the story of my life I knewed DN much that wasn’t true I couldn’t learn anything that was so I had to call people and ask them if they knew anybody that knew anybody in alcoholic synonymous and from a doctor that had treated me a few on a few occasions keeping him from ding he gave me the name of a man that was a member of our society Motion Picture Man and I talked with him and uh he told me a little about the progam and he said he had a drink today and I said no I said don’t don’t take one he says I have to work tonight so can’t take you to Mee him but I might not have to work tomorrow night so call me tomorrow I call him tomorrow and we talk a little while and he says you had to drink today and I said no but he said don’t take one I I’m still working call me tomorrow so I called him the third day and we hadn’t gotten very far into the conversation when I knew he still working so I said said I know you’re still working he says yeah I saids you don’t have to take me to meeting where’s the meeting I can go to and he told me and I decided to go and I felt real good about it until about 10 minutes before I was supposed to leave and then I did the the unforgivable I started to think now I came all the way down here to tell you two things first one is quit thinking this is our problem looking that was our problem thinking is our problem if there was ever a bunch of screw ball thinkers in the world it’s the alcoholic we can justify anything in the world including murder you know so quit thinking you can live yourself in the right you can live yourself in the right thinking but you can’t think yourself in the right living I’m totally convinced that you can’t find God looking for him because what you’re looking for you’re looking with and how you’re going to find God out onor when he ain’t out there yours isn’t yours is right there so you got to turn your eyeballs around it’s an inside job so qu thinking get lost in life and find yourself in God and the second thing is I’ve forgotten for God I’ll bring this up a little later so I I started to think and uh my alcoholic mind said to me look son you’ve lived in Beverly Hills a long time and it just might not be good for you to be seen with a bunch of drunks now you’ll never know how funny that is because the only guy in Beverly Hills that spent more time in the Beverly Hills jail than I did was the jiler I killed two chiefs of police in Beverly Hills in about oh maybe 15 years time you know I mean we him to death so I was little bit afraid that it might not be good for my reputation be seen with you guys but I talked myself out of it because it was time to do something and I said to myself all right disguise yourself so you won’t be immediately recognizable and get to that meeting and I did and I went to the meeting there was a great big Hall big as this one only the way deep too and right in the middle of the back wall there was an outside door and it was open and I came up there and looked in and there might have been 35 people there mind you this is over 36 years ago and they were all in the middle of the room everyone of them talking and nobody listening and it’s been that way ever since now I couldn’t hear a word they said but I could I could hear the the the mumbling and it was happy it was happy talk I didn’t hear the words but it was happy talk and I said to myself they’ve given me the wrong the wrong dope this is the wrong night this is these are the veterans and their wives and they’re here for a party because it was a Veterans of Foreign Wars Hall where they were having to meeting and I’m going to have to leave and come back the night to drunks are here and I turned to leave and I was as near dead as I’ll ever be I guess because at long last I’d come in it wrong night and here the next minute is the very essence of our program this the reason it works when maybe nothing else does I don’t know somebody in middle of that room had been watching me and when I turned to leave he came running over the door and he called after me and he says Mister were you looking for somebody and I said no sir well he said what were you looking for then and thinking he was a veteran I said well if it if it would interest you sir I was looking for SB and everything about that man change just like that he just lit up blit up just like you’d turned the light on inside you and here’s what he said to me why take off your hat and coat you’re in the right place well he didn’t know it but he just stole in my disguise right there he’d undressed me as well and so they took me in rock M sleep I remember that meeting the first one I ever went to better than I remember last night’s meeting everything about that thing I remember the very first thing they told me this is if you’re an alcoholic it’s the first drink that’s killing you now I’ve been drinking for a lot of years and it had never occurred to me it was first drink I thought it was the last gallon I was trying to knock it off before the trouble started for years and the very first thing you monkey said to me it’s the first drink that’s killing you if you don’t take the first drink you you don’t take the second one so I played with that a little while and bought it and I still got it the second thing you told me and this I wouldn’t take all the oil in Texas for there a lot of oil down here I know Dr down here that’s got 43 oil wells my host up the way year or so ago had an inome of $10,000 a day and he had eight Wells that were supposed to come in that weekend so I wouldn’t take the whole whole deal for what you told me the ne the the next time you open your mouth you says today is the day we don’t drink today is the day we don’t drink if you had told me that I had to stay sober 36 years I’d Dro dead if you had said 36 Days I’d have dropped dead but you didn’t you said said today is the day we don’t drink now said you regardless of how long you live in Alcoholics Anonymous never expand that time more than 24 hours and you went ahead to tell me that the past is nothing but guilt and the future is nothing but fear and if you live in the now you duck them both hear me right now is the is our time this is my day I have no past I want no future and I’ve lived this way for over 36 years now and it’s a cent it’s a cent if I had to depend on what I read in the papers and what I hear over that insane TV stuff for my peace of mind and serenity purpose I wouldn’t have any I wouldn’t even finish this talk I’d say call me an ambulance I’m going to the hospital it’s a beautiful thing and somebody uh said something about that a long time ago you know and another book that we read a little bit once in a while now is the only time we’ll ever know right now is eternity you don’t wake up tomorrow morning you wake up and it’s now and that’s the reason it took me so long to get here because I’d come too I never woke up I’d come too and I’d have to have a Tumbl of liquor but it wouldn’t take it I’d look at yesterday and I’d see where I made my mistakes and I would be able to argue myself into the position that today I’m only going to take what I have to to to to live just what I have to live and tomorrow I’ll wake up and I won’t have to take that tumbler Li and when I got it all laid out right I’d take the tumber liquor and tomorrow I would come to and I still had to have a Tumbl liquor you know so when we live one day at time we don’t have to do that second second greatest thing I ever learned in my life this is my day I have no past I want no future the first one is not it don’t belong in this position in my yak yak but I’m going to give it to you is that uh if we are going to live without drinking we have to have some sort of personally acceptable conscious partnership with the Living God that made us in the entire business of living the whole thing if we’re going to live that drink because drinking is a living problem and the only reason that I’m not drunk right now I’ve got the thing I was looking for in the bottom and it’s better than any liquor that I ever had there’s nothing in a bottle pot acid that can do anything to me but tear me down because I’ve got the answer that he was always looking for and I’ll tell you a little about that as I told you I didn’t come here looking for permanent sobriety for myself I came here to find out a way to to not drink right now so I could use the time rubbing out the record I didn’t want my wife and my kids to remember me as nothing but a tongue chewing babbling idiot drunk and I came to you to find out how not to drink right now so I could use that time to rub out and I Stay because it was comfortable I knew you monkeys were alcoholics because you were marked up like me you had headlights here and you had bags under bags and your wiring was exposed you know and I knew you were drunk but I also knew you weren’t drunk because I saw your eyes and I heard your voices and it was comfortable and I was back there I was back there every night I was back because it was comfortable now I didn’t uh I I knew you had something I’d like to have but I I didn’t expect it because I didn’t have the right to it I didn’t figure that God owed me anything you know that I wasn’t entitled to any of his goodies so I wasn’t asking him for anything but he back here because he comfortable now this is the series that happened to me in 6 months I discovered that I hadn’t had a drink or pill for 6 months and hadn’t wanted one now that ain’t bad for tongue sh and babbling idiot drunk is it so I got so busy trying to give it away that another 6 months went by and I discovered I had a family and they were living like kittens and that wasn’t a bad Discovery and a year went by and I discovered that I was still down the office trying to clean up my desk and business was good it was just good not a bad Discovery and another year went by and I discovered that my own state of being was better than anything I’d ever known it was just the good to breathe in and out I’ve rediscovered that lately too those are pretty good discoveries six years went by and I discovered had a god of my very own wherever I am he is now this is the Great Discovery this is what I was trying to bring about for 30 straight years from 13 to 43 and missed on and what I had given up on 6 years before wasn’t trying to bring it about at all and 6 years went by and I discovered that I got him a very own wherever I am he is and I was so elated over this that I immediately started to trying to figure out how I was going to show my gratitude and the first thing I decided I was going to build him a plaque we were in The Woodworking business and I had some of the finest mechanics in the world he can make anything out of wood and stainless steel and for and stuff like that so I’m going to build him a plaque and I got it designed in my mind and I finally before I started him on the project I said to myself who are you going to give it to and I could see me handing in this plaque and he didn’t take it and I dropped it on my foot and broke my foot so I had to laugh about that so then I was back to the Starting Gate I says who you going to give it to and my second decision I was going to become a Trappist monk now I knew a lot about Trappist monks I’d read a lot about him I loved him and I said I’ll just be a trap as Monk and it hit me man you’re not even a Catholic how you going to be a tra as mon so had to give that up so I’m back to starting get did and this time I got the answer and uh there’s a guy called St Peter the Catholics think he was the first pope I don’t think so I won’t explain that but anyway I call him old Pete because uh before he became a saint I could uh identify with him a little bit you know when he got caught with red-handed he lied out of it I said to myself he a little bit alcoholic there you know so here uh I ran off this little de the carpenter man called Old Pete in before he left and he says Peter do you love me and Pete says ye Lord he says tend my sheep now if you’re Catholic he said tend my Lambs but I’m not Catholic so he said tend my sheep far as I’m concerned I happen to be looking at next an next none so uh I’m having a little fun out of her as they go along hi anyway Pete says Peter you love me he says y Lord tend my sheep he turned right around and said to him again Peter you love me yay Lord tend my sheep and he turned right around and asked him again Peter did you love me y Lord tend my sheep I said he must have meant tend my sheep he said it three times you know and I said that’s all I’m going to do and that’s all I’ve done that’s all I’ve done for 36 years I’ve never tried to get anything for me in 36 years I’ve never tried to go any place I don’t run my own life or my wife or my kids and everything’s happened since I quit trying to run my life and hers and the kids we’ve become a family since I quit trying to go any place I’ve been all over the world and since I quit trying to get something I got rich that’s what happened to me I never tried to bring any of it about I just tried to in the Sheep that’s all I’ve done and if I had go ahead I would tell you that I had probably one of the greatest experiences in the business world that anybody ever had in my 11th year I bought the business that I was thrown out of and when I sold it I was wealthy and my people made me wealthy they wanted me to be wealthy now you business people in this room including my friend Ed back there and he’s a way of a businessman we know that this couldn’t happen and I’ll tell you a little story first I’m about to quit anyway because I’m getting hungry nobody give me another cookie or give me a cup of coffee or anything else W even give me a cup of coffee we have a group at home called the West group it’s a big beaten and it’s held in a church and it’s about 20 years old and I’ve talked with every anniversary they’ve had Clancy talks the Saturday before Christmas every year it’s a Saturday night meeting Clancy incidentally claims that I’m his sponsor I’m pretty sure that he asked me to be sponsor so he can sponsor me cuz he’s been running in my life ever since I said well I won’t really be your sponsor but I’ll give you anything I’ve got but I won’t think of he as my baby so he takes that to giving him the license to run my life and ain’t bad but anyhow I was out there last year waiting for him to call the meeting and a man that I’d done hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of business with I looked up and he was walking down the center aisle in that place and he was non-alcoholic I’d known him and done business with him for years years and um I thought what in the words Bob doing here he’s not alol so I went out and hugged a little and told him how much I loved you I says Bob how are you doing here well he says I was over to see so and so a friend of his and a friend of mine who’s member of this Society this afternoon and we had a good visit and uh I said to him what what are you going to do tonight he said I’m going to aming he says you know who you’re going to listen to said yeah I’m going to let old chck see because he always talks that anniversary Bob says can I go with you and here I am and so I introduced him to the four or five guys that were talking with him there Bob stood there looking at the floor and he says gentlemen I want to tell you something about this guy he says he’s the only man I ever did business in my life that I never asked to write down anything and he just stopped and I figured that I ought to say something you know so I said that’s true Bob but it’s also true that I never asked you to write down anything isn’t it he says yes now again you businessmen know better than that a little deal with me was 25,000 because we’re in the the fixture business Market fixtures only we built them designed them built them installed them and a little deal with me was 25,000 the big one was quar of a million and the whole time own that business I never had a written word not a written word and nobody ever beat me out of a nickel I’d put in a deal and Bill them and they’d pay me and it was more fun than deal us pickles there was just nothing but love and mutual trust and a lot of people think it can’t be done but they made me wealthy and they was tickled they were tickled that because they were all wealthy and they wanted me to be wealthy and they made me wealthy and it’s a beautiful thing and I tell you that because of this I am totally convinced that uh God don’t think more of a salmon than he does to you and you know that is salmon born at the head water to the clth river he’ll go down that River when he’s about that long and he’s Li to have gone clear to Japan and back and right back up that clth River where he was born and he spawns and dies now I get lost on the freeway with a sign every 90 ft I have to have help in the airport I suppose if there was just one one line coming in I’d have to have help because I get lost and here’s a salmon goes all the way to Japan and back and I said to myself how you uh I wonder whose travel agent is so I swam with him in my imagination and I knew who his travel agent was God’s idea of a salmon includes everything necessary for its complete fulfillment even going to Japan in back we have another little phenomenon down there where I live we have the swallow that come back to C capistran every St Joseph’s day they show up almost on the second at the uh first mission that was ever built in California right there at San Juan cerr and they winter in Venezuela now who do you think is there calasia and I had to fly with them and it was obvious that God’s idea of a swallow includes everything necessary for its complete fulfillment including going to Venezuelan back without any road map now this this is a this is a sermon that just carries me clear to the sky do you think that God’s idea of a salmon or swallow is more complete than his idea of his kids you and I I don’t think so I don’t think so when you and I get simple enough to live as we live in alcoholic synonymous sharing our experience strength and hope with anybody that needs us in love just because we want to we discover that underneath of the Everlasting Arms and it’s terrific it’s absolutely terrific and I learned it from my blue jays you know my blue jays and my uh my uh hummingbirds sit in the same tree you know and I’ve been watching them I feed them all the time they break me up in business peanuts and sugar and stuff and uh I have never yet heard one of those blue jay SE his partner look at that sword and so he’s flying backwards I can’t fly backwards why can’t I fly backward you know he don’t even pay attention to him he don’t even know he’s flying backwards you know why he don’t give a d he’s busy beat himself if I had a blue J I’d want to be a hummingbird my B and be I’ve had it for 25 years and it looks right up at the Rose Garden and you know that ban V has not decided to be a rose yet it’s perfectly happy to be a Bania and it knows how and it knows how well I’d want to be a rose would you no everything up to us is perfectly satisfied to be what it is and it knows how but we come along and he tell us we’ve got to improve on God’s handiwork we got to be this have that and be no one as before we can live you know and we get all involved in trying to self-improve and a lot of the people in our program thinks this is self-improvement program it is not it’s a self-discovery program and with this I’m going to quit you sent me back to New York the second delegate to the general service conference from Southern California Cliffy Walker was the first and I was the second and I got to beat all the the old times I got to beat the whole bunch back there Abby and Bill and Bob and their wives and Snider and a whole bunch you know and uh it was it was a fine experience very fine experience something I wouldn’t trade for anything at the end of the second conference you go back for two years you know and I was there in 53 and 54 at the end of the conference in 54 Bill sought me out and he says Chuck you’ve been back here 2 years straight and youve never taken 5 Seconds of my time and I think I know why and it’s time for us to become acquainted and I’m going to come out and see you well Bill lived in Bedford Hills New York and I lived in Beverly Hills California clear across the cotton and I and he was the head man and here I’m a neoy and he’s going to come and see me and I for a while I couldn’t speak and what I could I says bill if you’re serious we got room for you and we’d love to have you now that was in April 1954 in June 54 he was in our house in Beverly Hills and from then until he died in 1971 Miss C and I spent much time with him and Lois and in their house and in ours and uh we got to know them quite well and so quite often I say that our program our formula for sobriety is the finest formula that was ever conceived in the mind of man through the grace of God for obtaining and maintaining sobriety but it has two other facets that are equally miraculous it’s the finest program for the good life and for s self-discovery not self-improvement selfis self-discovery that was ever conceived in the mind of man through the grace of God and this is the reason I say it bill was telling me about writing the book you know and they had written four chapters and it was time to write chapter five with our formula in it and uh Bill said he he had to write now the reason had to write kids was that the book in its original conception was to spread the word faster to the drunks than they could do it P on a personal basis but the more they thought about it the more they thought that it was a money-making scheme too and they were all starving to death they were all meeting around bills it’s installed and the only one of the bunch that was working was Bill’s wife Lis and she was working in Macy’s basement and uh they started wanted to get her out of that basement so they were going to make a lot of money off the book and it’s time for him to write chapter 5 and Bill said he sat down and he had absolute absolutely nothing to write he was totally void but he had to write and he would have a book and he would have cell and lost it after remain in the basement so he started to write with nothing to write and in 30 minutes he came up with the 12 steps and the 12 steps have never been changed in essence there’s been a words here the word there but the meaning of the 12 steps has never changed in 47 years and so that’s the reason I say that it’s the finest program that was ever conceived in the mind of man through the grace of God because these steps came out of where they were you know the carpenter man said I am in the father and he in me and I in you Carpenter man said fear not little flock it’s the father’s good pleasure to give us the me give us the kingdom the carpenter man said in him we live and move and have our being and that means to me that you and I are living in the very essence of God right now when we’re open we get it from where it is and when we’re self-thinking the doors are closed and we don’t get nothing you know so we got to 12 steps out of where they are the infinite intelligence in which we live because you see God lives in us and in all other creatures that live on this planet I’m particularly impressed with the Hebrew word for God it’s Yahweh and it means that which is that which is is and it means all of that which is and so we’re related one to another and to the everything else that grows everything that lives the birds and the bees and the beautiful flowers I was looking at your your pink dogwood in this town it’s beautiful I happened to be a CH kid and got a hunk of it in they got mixed up over there in the Colinas and forgot that there were Indians and others so we got all mixed up with the Cherokees and I’ve always had this feeling of uh Unity but I never brought it into conscious awareness until I was through with the business world but since I’ve been in out of the business world I’ve taken all my so-called intellectual wisdom and turn it into conscious awareness and it’s fantastic and it includes the fact that God in Me as me is me and God in you as you is you and we can’t change it we can’t change it the carpenter man said it like this who by taking thought can add one cubit to his stature which means we can’t change the reality of our own being we can only change our experience in reality I sit in the same chair I sat in for 10 years and a half and now I have 36 years in heaven in the same chair nothing happened to the chair nothing happened to the wife nothing happened to kids something happened to me and I moved out of hell into heaven and that’s a sermon as long as from here to Mars and back and it says son heaven was always in that chair you were in Hell God bless you thank you very much 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