The Fight I Couldn’t Win With Alcohol: AA Speaker – Don C. – Silver Creek, CO
AA speaker Don C. from Silver Creek, CO shares his story of the boxing match with alcohol he couldn’t win and how a tough sponsor guided him through the steps.
Don C. from Silver Creek, CO got sober on August 10th, 1978, after repeatedly trying to fight alcohol and losing every round. In this AA speaker tape, Don describes his journey through the steps with a tough sponsor who told him bluntly that “Indian guys don’t make it” – which sparked the anger that became his initial motivation to stay sober.
This AA speaker talks about his powerful boxing match metaphor for fighting alcohol and always losing until he surrendered completely. Don C. shares how his sponsor challenged him to work all 12 steps thoroughly, including detailed inventory work and making difficult amends. He describes integrating Native American spiritual practices with AA’s program and now uses the 12 steps for community healing work in tribal settings.
Episode Summary
Don C. opens his talk with a traditional smudging ceremony using sage and an eagle feather, explaining that in his culture, when you’re in the presence of an eagle feather, you’re not supposed to lie. After sharing a humorous story about a little Indian boy and his fishing tales, Don gets to the heart of his experience with alcoholism through a vivid boxing metaphor that perfectly captures the futility of trying to control drinking.
He describes being in a boxing ring with Alcohol, his family watching from the front row. Round after round, Alcohol would land “lucky punches” and tell him he could still win. Despite getting knocked down repeatedly, Don kept believing he could beat his opponent. His family begged him to quit, but he insisted on “just one more round.” Finally, on August 9th, 1978, crawling on his hands and knees looking at Alcohol’s tennis shoes, Don realized the truth: “I know the alcohol is lying. I can’t whip them.” That was the last time he crawled out of the arena.
When Don came back to AA this final time, he was different – ready and without resistance. He approached a sponsor he had been watching, someone he didn’t particularly like but respected. The sponsor’s response was brutally direct: “I’ve been watching you Indian guys come in here, hang out, leave, hang out, leave. You guys just don’t make it.” This racist challenge ignited something in Don. He thought to himself, “I’ll show you, you white son of a bitch. I’ll get sober.”
His sponsor showed him the Big Book’s first 164 pages and made it clear: “This program isn’t about coming in and slipping, coming in and slipping. This program is about never drinking again. You will die sober.” The sponsor laid out boundaries – he wasn’t Don’s taxi, banker, or motel, but he would be his friend regardless of whether Don drank again. This unconditional friendship became foundational to Don’s recovery.
Working through AA speaker talks on step work and resentment inventory, Don describes his detailed inventory process. He wrote out resentments, fears, and sexual inventory, but also kept a separate sheet for what he called “the dark crannies” – things he didn’t want anyone to know. When it came time for his Fifth Step, he was terrified but knew he either had to do it or drink. After reading his main inventory, the person asked if he’d told everything. Don was torn, but when his Fifth Step partner shared some of his own “juicy stuff,” Don figured they now had mutual dirt on each other and shared the dark crannies too.
The spiritual transformation that followed was profound. Don describes praying to “Charlie” (his early name for his Higher Power, after a college friend who had been respectful to him) and gradually finding himself using the word “God” naturally. He felt the promises of the Fifth Step come alive – that sense of the Creator’s nearness and the lifting of guilt and shame.
Don’s amends process was thorough but initially misguided. He organized them into “light, medium, and hard” categories, starting with the easy ones. One amend went so poorly that the person told him he hadn’t covered half of what he’d done, leading to an argument that required him to make amends for making amends. He learned to write out each amend in advance to maintain his intent. One amend sat in an envelope for years until a chance encounter in a Michigan parking lot allowed him to complete that final piece of his Ninth Step work.
The talk takes a fascinating turn as Don describes integrating his Native American heritage with AA’s program. Initially, his sponsor had him do an inventory specifically about being Indian, recognizing that cultural resentments and racial prejudices could eventually threaten his sobriety. When Don brought the 12 steps to tribal elders, they told him it wasn’t a separate way but the same spiritual path his people had always known, just presented differently.
The elders suggested arranging the steps in a circle: Steps 1-3 in the east (finding God), Steps 4-6 in the south (finding yourself), Steps 7-9 in the west (forgiveness and relationships), and Steps 10-12 in the north (wisdom of the elders). They showed him ceremonies for each phase – taking the Third Step with the sacred pipe, doing Fifth Steps in sweat lodges, working Steps 6 and 7 in healing ceremonies.
Don learned about the four-year cycles of recovery from an elder who drew a circle in the dirt. Like trees going through seasons, humans grow in four-year cycles. The first year is like budding, the second like maturing, the third like harvest time when everything seems to work perfectly, and the fourth like winter when everything appears to fall apart. The elder explained that this seeming collapse is necessary – we have to lose our leaves (our beliefs about what we can control) to grow into the next cycle.
This wisdom helped Don navigate his fourth year when everything seemed to go wrong simultaneously – work problems, relationship issues, financial troubles. The elder’s words, “You’re right where you’re supposed to be,” initially frustrated him, but he learned that this winter season was about working the steps not to get something but to give everything up, placing it all on an altar and learning to trust God alone.
Today, Don runs the White Bison foundation, using the 12-step process for community healing in Native American communities. One tribe went from 85% alcohol problems to 65% sobriety by working the steps at a tribal level – doing community inventories, creating visions of wellness, and making collective amends. This work demonstrates how AA speaker meetings on sponsorship and carrying the message extend far beyond individual recovery.
Don’s personal life has seen remarkable healing. His children, who once left when he visited, now have loving relationships with him. He describes the moment three years sober when his oldest son first said “I love you” and they all embraced – Don had to drive to Colorado Springs crying the whole way, overwhelmed by emotions he’d forgotten existed.
He speaks powerfully about recovering from childhood sexual abuse through step work, describing it as someone turning on a sun for the first time in his life when that burden lifted. This healing brought new challenges – having feelings he couldn’t identify, having to ask his sister to explain what “caring” meant because he’d only known how to help, not how to care.
Don closes by identifying the worst and best parts of his experience. The worst was that persistent loneliness, the hole that nothing could fill while drinking. The best is his relationship with the Great Spirit – dependable, practical, and still protected by that “grace cloud” that helps him learn from his mistakes. He’s learned to cry in front of people, to laugh, to feel the full range of human emotions in balance.
His gratitude extends to his sponsors Frank and Don B., who ranked among the most influential people in his life despite being tough teachers who kept things basic and called him out when he got fancy. To the fellowship, he says simply: “You are my tribe. If I had to pick one, I pick you.”
Notable Quotes
I know the alcohol is lying. I can’t whip them.
This program isn’t about coming in and slipping, coming in and slipping. This program is about never drinking again. You will die sober.
You’re right where you’re supposed to be.
That fourth year, you got to work that set of steps to give it up. You make an altar and you put everything on that altar because you get little pocket gods and you don’t know it.
The worst thing was that loneliness, that hole. No matter what you did, it would not go away. That hole was filled with my relationship with the creator.
Step 4 – Resentments & Inventory
Step 5 – Admission
Spiritual Awakening
Steps 8 & 9 – Making Amends
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Full Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated and may contain minor errors. For the best experience, listen to the audio above.
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[applause]My name is Don C. I'm an alcoholic.
Hello everybody. My sobriety date is August 10th, 1978. I am from the Moakin nation and my Indian name is Tantanka Wambblei. It's just really an honor for me to be here this evening. But before we get going, there's one thing I was taught to do, especially after I got sober for a while when I went back and talked to our elders. One of the things they said I should do is smudge. So with your permission, it just takes a few seconds. I'd like to do that.
For those of you who may be familiar with it, it's a burning of sage leaves. Sage is a medicine plant used for purification. It's put in a bowl and then it starts to burn smoke, and in that smoke the medicine comes out—the purification medicine. What I will do the smudging with is this eagle's fan. This is from an eagle's wing that was given. These are very sacred in our cultures. When you allow the medicine to come on the wing, as the medicine gathers on the wing, then like an eagle's wing flying through the air, it shoots that medicine across the whole place. What it allows is for everything to interconnect. I see some of you know what this is. That's good. That's the way I was taught to do that.
I'm also going to place it on a red cloth here because in our tradition, whenever you are in the presence of an eagle feather, you're not supposed to lie. And I am an alcoholic. So I think I will put that out there.
I was thinking sitting up here that I would have the ego feather on one side and Frank on the other one here. [laughter] I think they call it a sandwich or something.
So maybe I'll start by telling you my best Indian joke that I know. A long time ago, there was this little Indian boy in a boarding school up in the northern part. He attended this boarding school, and there was this teacher there who was always watching for these little Indian kids who seemed to have it—the superstars. She happened to notice this one little Indian kid. He was pretty good—good in math and good in science and he had charisma. She watched him, and finally she said, "He's one of them." She called him up in front of the room and said, "You know, you're going to have the ability to go far. You're smart. The creator has given you a lot of blessings. But as I watched you, the only problem you have is you just lie a little bit. Not like big lies, but just little lies. That's not good. So maybe I'll help you correct that. When you grow up, then you tell the truth and everything will go your way."
He said, "Okay, teacher, that would be good. You help me."
A couple days later, he's out in the hallway talking to some other kids, telling this little story, and she caught him. He was lying. So she called him aside and said, "You know, that's what I was talking about. You weren't telling the truth."
"Oh, teacher, thanks for reminding me."
Weeks go on. He keeps lying. She keeps coaching. She tried psychology 300 series, 400 series, 500 series—everything she knew. The little kid just wouldn't quit lying. Finally, she called him up in front of her class on Friday night and said, "Sit down."
He sat down.
She said, "That's it. I've tried everything I know. You're always lying. I can't get you to quit. Next time I catch you lying like that, I'm going to take you right up to the principal's office."
He stood up. "Man, don't. Don't do that. Don't make me go up and see the man." No little kid likes to go see the principal. He just begged. "Don't, don't, don't."
"Alright."
The weekend went by. Monday morning he came in and boy, he was excited. He came up to that teacher. "Teacher, teacher! You can't believe it! Me and my dad had a weekend by ourselves—father and son. We hiked, we camped, we cooked and talked. Sunday we went down by the lake. We went fishing. We fished all day. We only caught two fish. Dad caught one. I caught one. Teacher, they were trout. Those trout were 100 pounds a piece. God, teacher, they were this long."
She said, "That's it. That's it." She grabbed him by the ear and down the hallway right up to the principal's office. She took him in there and sat him right in that chair.
Of course, she didn't really inform the principal what was going on. The principal leaned forward and said to this little Indian boy, "I heard you had a good weekend."
"God, I had a great weekend! Me and my dad, we went camping, we fished, and we caught two fish we had 100 pounds a piece."
The principal leaned back in the chair and kind of put his fingers together like that. He said, "You know, sometimes you do have to fight fire with fire. Psychology stuff don't work." He leaned forward and looked at that little Indian boy and said, "Me and my wife went for the weekend camping with man-to-woman talk. We watched butterflies, some birds. We really had a marvelous time. Saturday night we cooked this big supper around the campfire and cleaned up everything. We sat in front of our tent. All of a sudden, these bushes moved on one side. This big grizzly bear came running into camp. It walked around that fire really slow, headed right towards me and my wife, and we sat there. Finally, we saw a bush move on the other side. The bush moved a little bit. This little Chihuahua dog came running into camp. You see that Chihuahua dog? It looked at that bear and ran right over that bear. It jumped right on that bear's back, ran up by his neck, and bit that bear in the neck. That grizzly bear dropped down dead."
The little boy looked at that principal, and the principal looked back at that little Indian boy, and they sat there looking at one another. The little boy just stood up with a big smile on his face. He said, "Sir, I'll have you know I'm the proud owner of that dog, and that's the second bear kill this month."
Well, they always say when you do this, you tell your story: what happened, and what that was like, and what's happening now. The best way I could tell my story is something a person here tonight originally told me. It was a long time ago, but I remember when he told this story I related to it right away. It grabbed my heart. It was a story about a boxing match in a big arena full of people sitting all around. There were two people down in that boxing ring. They always save the front row for your family—they get the best choice seats, and they put a rope there so they can sit. My family was sitting there.
In one corner was someone in the black trunks. His name was Alcohol, and he was hanging on the ropes. I was in the other corner in the white trunks. Everything was going like it normally supposed to go. The referee called everybody together, explained the rules. We said, "No problem. We understand those rules." The bell rang. We came out and started to box around with each other. Everybody was kind of watching. It was fun. The bell would ring. We'd sit down. It was no big deal. Bell would ring. We'd come out and start boxing around again.
After the third or fourth round, it seemed like the alcohol got a lucky punch and snuck one in. It really stung me good. I kind of stepped back because it surprised me. The alcohol said, "Oh, that was just a lucky punch. It's nothing. You can whip me." I could feel that building up inside because I knew that I could and I knew it was a lucky punch.
As we got out there a couple more rounds, pretty soon you started to see it was getting boring. People started leaving because it wasn't a good thing to watch. As the rounds continued, alcohol would start to sneak in more lucky punches. Each time it hit that lucky punch, it'd say, "Oh, is this a lucky punch? You can whip me." I said, "I know I can. I know I can. I can do that." Because I felt strong inside.
Finally it got to the point where alcohol was punching a lot more, and most of the people all left. But I looked and there my family was, sitting there—about the only ones left. I was really focused on that alcohol, and the alcohol was smiling at me, giving me that message: you can whip me, man. I knew I could because I was strong.
Finally, after a couple more rounds, the alcohol had put me on my knees. I got down there on my knees, and it wasn't playing by the rules anymore. I started kicking, stomping, doing all this stuff. They rang the bell. I got back to the corner. I kept telling myself, "You can whip me." Finally, one of my sons came up and said, "Dad, let's go. We got to get out of here. You're not winning this thing."
I said, "Just one more round, man. Just one more round. You just watch."
I went back in there and gave that alcohol my best shot. This time it put me right on my stomach. And it wasn't playing by the rules there either. It's kicking, stomping. Finally, I looked over and my daughter came up and said, "Dad, swing now because we can't take this. You come with us."
I looked at her and said, "No, just one more round. I know I can do it."
They laughed and I went out there one more round. This time I was on my hands and knees, stomach crawling. All I could see was the alcohol's tender shoes. All of a sudden I had that realization. I said, "I know the alcohol is lying. I can't whip them."
So I crawled out of that arena and I left. It was very painful crawling out of there with all those thoughts and all those things that you have because you know that everything is gone.
I got out there and I started to get well. After maybe a month or so, I started thinking about the alcohol and I said, "You know something? I think I know another way." I thought about that for a while and I went back into that arena. I swung those doors open. I told alcohol, "I'm back."
He said, "I know you will be."
I said, "I come here to whoop your ass."
He said, "I know you can do it. You come right up here."
I went up there. This time it wasn't like rounds. The alcohol did the dirty punching right away. I immediately was down looking at his tender shoes again. It didn't take very long. I knew I was no match. I knew he lied to me. Once again, I crawled out of there on my hands and knees. It really hurt. I got out there and I started thinking. About a month later I said, "You know something? I think I know another way. I think I know an old Indian trick I can use on them."
So I went back into that arena. I swung those doors open. I said, "Alcohol."
Alcohol said, "Uh-huh."
I said, "I'm back."
The alcohol said, "I knew you would be. I've been waiting for you."
I went in there, but he didn't even let me get in the ring this time because he didn't play fair. It was August 9th, 1978. I crawled out of there and I didn't crawl back in. I have no need to go back in there anymore. But I took what it took. When I left that arena, that's when I came into AA seriously. I wasn't in AA before—in and out, slipping, doing those things. But when I came back that last time, I'm telling you, I was ready. I didn't have any resistance because the alcohol was the reason I came back in. I knew there was no other place to go. There was nothing else to do. It was alcohol or AA that I had to come to.
I came into AA and I started to do things I wouldn't do before. One of which was get a sponsor. I had been watching this guy for a long time. I didn't like him, but there was something about him I did like. It took a lot of days to go up and ask this man if he would help me in this work.
He said, "Well, sit down."
I sat down at the table. It was on York Street in Denver. He looked at me for a long time and kind of shook his head. He said, "No, I've been watching you for a long time—in and out, in and out. I've been in this program a lot of years. I watch you Indian guys come in here, hang out, leave, hang out, leave. You guys just don't make it. Something's going on here. You guys don't make it." He kept talking like that.
I hated how he was talking down to me like that. You Indian guys, you ain't going to make it. I remember how you get a little puppy and then you rub that puppy's face and it gets mad. That's how I felt like a little puppy. He was just rubbing like that, rubbing like that. I sat there thinking. I kind of leaned forward and looked at him. I thought, "I'll show you, you white son of a—I said, I'll get sober. Let's just see if you'll—" But I think that's where I was at that time. I think in his own way, he kind of realized maybe the only thing I had to work with was some anger. I didn't have any kind of other feelings or stuff. I just had that.
He went on and we continued our talk. He showed me this big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. He opened it up and showed me how much 164 pages was. He said, "This is the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. If you are willing to do exactly what it says in these 164 pages, this program isn't about coming in and slipping, coming in and slipping. This program is about never drinking again. That you will die sober. You will never have to drink again."
I'd never heard it said that way. I heard it said many ways—whoever gets up the earliest is the most sober, keep coming back, and all that stuff. But he made no bones about it. What this program was about is staying sober, providing I was willing to do some things.
He went on to say some other things. He said, "There are some things I'm not. I'm not your taxi cab. I ain't your banker. I ain't your motel. I ain't your daddy." Whatever. But he told me these things that he wasn't. But he said, "I'll tell you some things that I will be.
"One of those things," he said, "I will be your friend. And I talked to him about friendship. He has nothing to do with you or what your decisions are. I will decide to be your friend whether you drink again or not. That's one thing you can count on. I will be your friend.
"The next thing you can count on is I'll share some experiences with you. Because I know about how to stay sober and you don't. I know something you don't. And that's hope. Because I know something you don't.
"And we work together because we both want to work together. We don't have to work together. Anything that you don't like, you just quit working with me. Anything I don't like, I'll quit working with you. But we will work together because we choose to do that."
He sent me off with this big book. He showed me these pages where there are 12 proposals. He said, "I want you to go look at each of these 12 proposals. Look at each one of them and ask two questions. One question you ask is: Do I want to do this step? Read step one and say: Do I want to do this? Then ask the second question for that step: Am I willing to go any length to do that step? Go through all 12 of those proposals, answering those two questions."
But I see what he was really doing—he was setting me up for later on. As I saw later on, it was a setup. Because I'd come back whining. He'd say, "I thought you said you wanted to do this." Or I'd come back and tell him, "You said you were willing to go to any length. Didn't you change your mind?"
"No, I didn't change my mind."
"You said you wanted to do it."
"I wanted to."
"Then what the hell you calling me for? Go do it."
But I got into that and I started to look into those proposals. I looked at that big book. The first time I saw that big book, it was the most boring book I ever saw in my whole life. It was really a boring book, and nor could I find any instructions in it. They were saying the instructions were in that book, but I could never find them. I didn't know what that meant.
I got into that and I started to understand what it meant. There's instructions in there. I had to read this many, many times. The first 43 pages have to do with step one. Then I was shown on page 52 there's a paragraph called the unmanageability paragraph. I was to look at that paragraph. There are some statements in there: "We were having trouble with personal relationships." I was to turn that into a question. I was to look at my personal relationships and my unmanageability in regards to those, and in the emotional nature.
I started to take a look at that. I'd never thought about looking at it that way. It says we had to have a different point of view. I got through that step one and I started to see there's some major stuff happening in my life. It was wrong because by the time I got to Alcoholics Anonymous, it was gone. I had three children. I had to go through a divorce. I was thousands of dollars in debt. I was really messed up.
To come into a program and start to hear about sobriety, and it wasn't like I didn't have the removal of that. There were times I wanted to drink during those first years of sobriety, and it would just seem that I was hearing enough in meetings to keep it up.
I remember this one time I left York Street and I was getting that nervousness and I started all that stuff. I knew what I was going to do. I sat there in this meeting and it was the stupidest meeting I ever heard. No one was making sense. I couldn't pray. I won't call Frank because he'd hear what I said I wanted to do and all this other crap. I didn't want to talk to him. Finally, I was so damn miserable. I just said, "If this is so, I want nothing to do with this crap. I'm going to just go drink."
I got my car and I was headed towards the Purple Turtle, which was a bar. Some of you guys probably know what that is. I was headed there, and I remember I was going down 8th Street. Denver General was there. I had heard somewhere in a meeting somebody say something weird like "when all else fails, go work with another drunk." I don't even know if I knew what that meant for sure, but I turned into Denver General. I went up to the detox center. I went in there and I recognized one of the people who worked there. I recognized her from the program.
I didn't even know what to tell her. I'm standing there just trying to figure out what to say. But she had been around long enough. She said, "I bet you need to talk to a drunk."
I said, "Yeah."
She put me in this room with a guy—I think he was Mexican. He couldn't speak English. I couldn't speak Mexican. He was all bandaged up. I talked to him, and he was probably trying to tell me to get the hell out of there. I don't know exactly what he was saying. But the point of it is I sat in there. I looked at him. When I left, I didn't feel holy. I only felt different, but different enough. I got my car. I didn't go there. I went back home.
So whenever I found out when that would happen—if I could get to Denver General—and this was about the first six months—I'd walk in there and she'd say "room five." I'd go in there. And that really was true because I didn't even know it said that in the big book, but it did. When a thing sets in, I now understand what that is. And that was really helpful for me to do that.
Then I was taught how to look at that chapter "We Agnostics" for step two. I went into that and I found out how to look at nine areas. I was looking at this—that possibility or that hope that step two gives. I was to look in those same nine areas: personal relationships, emotional nature, which today I call creating a vision—it's a picture of moving towards something. I like the way that word "step" is worded. It talks about "came to believe." What I understand very early about the step is it didn't mean you had to believe it. You had to mean like "Would you be willing to believe that this power exists? Would you be kind of willing to possibly believe that maybe this power would exist? Would you be doubtingly willing to kind of believe that maybe this power does exist?" I was taught any of those was enough. Well, every little bit you can hang on to. I didn't have that much to hang on to. I came in and I took that step.
Then I was taught where to look for the instructions for step three. I remember going through that step three. One thing that I really was grateful for—whoever it was that added those words "God as you understand him." Because by the time I came in, I didn't really—I was raised in mission schools with a lot of different beliefs I had about God. But I remember this one particular time. I came from a family of seven. I remember my brother was killed. This was when we were all still drinking, and he was killed. I waited for them to cover his grave. I waited there. When they left, I stood on his grave and I looked up and I told God to go fuck himself. I said, "I never asked you for nothing and I didn't. I never prayed. I never said anything because I felt that a God that did something like that wouldn't." So I had some funny concepts. I had this blockage about some things.
But thanks to you, when I first came in the year that I was slipping, I called that power I heard you could call a door knob. I wasn't right in that spot to call him a door knob, but I was in a spot where I made a decision initially to call this power Charlie. The reason I called it Charlie was this guy I met in college when I was there. I really liked him. He really was respectful to me. So I just kind of picked that name.
When it came time to do this third step, I went over to my sponsor's place. We got there and he talked to me about that third step—all those things to understand about self-will run right and running on self-propulsion and being the actor. We went through that almost line by line like it was an instruction. There was a question in that part of the big book I was to answer. I remember when we got done with that, I didn't know about taking how you took a third step or nothing, but we got down on our knees, me and this man. We had that big book. I taught them. He would read that third step prayer and then I would read that third step prayer. I remember that's what we did. We got on our knees and we read that third step prayer.
There was something that happened there. I'm not sure I knew what it was, but what I knew was there was a cat there. And I always had an understanding about cats—I don't like them, they don't like me. You stay away, I stay away from you. But that cat came to me. I could feel there was something that went on there that night.
When we got done, I said, "What next?"
He reached down to his chair and pulled out a legal tablet and a ruler. By the time I was done there, I was starting to write inventory. I wrote the inventory. I was taught to write that in the column inventory. I wrote my inventory. I did the resentment inventory, fear inventory, and sex inventory. I was also told that you had to tell all. You had to tell everything. There were quite a few things that I had done that I just assumed I wouldn't tell them. I put them under the category of "the dark crannies." I wrote the dark crannies on a separate sheet of paper. I didn't put them exactly in with the inventory.
When it came time for fifth step, I knew this day came. That feeling started to sit in and I knew this was going to happen. I was either going to fifth step or drink, and I didn't want to do that fifth step. I called my sponsor. He wasn't there. I couldn't get hold of him. I called another guy. He wasn't there, couldn't get hold of him. I called another guy. I didn't know how to ask him. I didn't know him really well. But finally I was kind of stumbling with my words and he said, "You need a fifth step."
I said, "Yeah. I really need to."
I went over to his place. I read that document. I read the resentment inventory, fear inventory, and sex inventory. He was very helpful in helping me see some things that I didn't see. But when we got done, he said, "Well, is do you have—have you told everything? Do you have it all?"
I remember sitting there. One part of me was saying "tell him yeah and get out." And the other thing I had heard enough in the program that I knew you had to tell all. But I had things in there—legal issues, sexual issues—and there were some things in there I didn't want anyone to know that I did those things.
While he was making the next pot of coffee, he was telling me some things about his story. He got into some pretty juicy stuff about what he did. I remember sitting there thinking about where I was at the time. I thought, "You know, he told me some juicy stuff. So I thought, okay, son of a—I got it now. Because if you tell on me, I'll tell on you." That's just kind of what I was thinking about. But I didn't know that we were in a whole different spaces. He had freedom and I didn't. He was doing it from freedom and I was doing it from fear.
I went through and I read the rest of that to him. When I got done, I was told to go home. He said, "There's instructions in here on what you're to do when you get back home. Then you review those five proposals to see if you've missed anything."
I got home and one of the instructions said, "You thank God from the bottom of your heart that you know him better." I was taught that there are instructions in the big book—every sentence almost. It's like an instruction, something that you do. I got home and I got on my knees. I was just talking at first. I was thinking about what the heck was going on in my life. I couldn't believe I was doing this stuff. I couldn't even believe that stuff worked like it was working. I remember I had this little inside bow to myself. I said, "You know something? This is what I'm going to do. I'm not going to say this out loud, but I'm going to go ahead and work these proposals up to the fifth step. But if I personally don't see something different when I get done with the fifth step, I ain't doing the rest of that." That's about halfway. I thought, "I'm going to try that. If I don't see something—" Because I didn't want to go around people saying, "Oh, you know, you got to light in your eyes." And there wasn't—I had no light in nothing. I was miserable.
But I remember when I sat there in my apartment, all of a sudden I started to have this feeling. There was something that was going on inside of me. I was sitting there and I was talking to Charlie about that. All of a sudden I found myself praying and I started to use the word God. I wasn't using Charlie anymore. I found that this was happening almost like automatically.
Then I looked at those promises in the fifth step and I started to sense that there was something. I could feel that nearness of the creator just like it said. I could feel that. Some of that stuff that I had—that guilt and that shame and stuff—I could tell it wasn't there. It was gone. There was something happened inside—a certain freedom, you see, that happened in that.
Then out of that I got my list of character defects. Then I was taught how to become willing to have the creator remove those defects of character. I remember it didn't—it was sort of like I had to hear stories. I don't know, maybe that's the way I was raised or something, to understand something. But he told me that step six and seven is so simple but so difficult to do. I heard this guy tell a story one time. He said, "Supposing that you have this stove and what you're going to do is bake this cake. You get this pan and you put all that flour and sugar and you stir it up. Get the oven to 350. Now, what you want to do is bake that cake. You got to open up the door. You got to take that cake and you got to stick it in the oven. Then close the oven door and allow that stove to bake that cake."
He said, "That's like your defects of character. Once you are willing to put them in the oven—give them to the creator—then you let the creator. It's his job to bake that cake. But you keep peeking in the oven. Keep peeking in the oven. It wasn't ready yet. It's God's will. I must be doing something wrong. He said put it in there and leave it alone. Don't be peeking at it."
Then I started to see, you know, some of what they were saying—don't peek in there. Don't be taking it over. Leave it in there. I had a lot of shifting that started to take place. I could tell.
Then I got into my amends and I had a lot of amends to make. The first pass through—and once in a while even yet today—I didn't do my amends right. I didn't listen a lot to how to make amends. I read the instructions, but I was in a hurry. I made my amends in three columns: light amends, medium amends, and hard amends. I put them in three columns. I chose some light amends and I went out there and did three of those. It was really cool. It went really fine. I said, "This is really cool. You just go there and you tell them this stuff, and it went really good. They were hugging me and everything else and happy for me."
I went to the next column and I chose another amend. I went out there and made this amend. What I did was I had just written some things to make sure I said it. I went to this person and I read this document and I made the amends. They turned to me and said, "Are you done?"
I said, "Well, yeah."
They said, "Well, you didn't cover half of what you did."
I said, "Well, look it, I'm in this program and I'm writing these amends and this is how I see the amends."
We got in a big fight. I had to go back and make amends for making amends. Those are tough ones to go back on the second time. But one of the things that I was taught—and it was very adamant about—was making these amends in person and making them very thoroughly.
Eventually I was taught to write them out. I found out today I still need to write my amends out because if something goes wrong, I can change my mind or lighten it up a little bit or drop something out. You know, this way I know if I write it, then I know my intent when I go there to do that.
I got through those amends. One amend I kept in the envelope for almost—I just made that amend. I didn't know where this person was. By one of these accidents, I was up in Michigan just about six months ago walking around a parking lot and this person was hollering at me. I didn't even know this person. We both got so darn old we didn't recognize each other hardly, but they recognized me. That was the last amend I made from that very first set of amends that I had carried all that time. That was really a very powerful amends.
Then I got into steps 10 and 11, those maintenance steps. It took a while to find out the power about those steps. I was taught by this initial man who took me through the steps that what this step was about is power. It's about power, not something else. You can't mess with it. That you mess with it, you get hurt. I have messed with it and I have gotten hurt by doing that.
I was also taught to go through those steps every year—go back through them again and go back through them again. One of the primary reasons I was told is that the ego always works right on where you have it together, right? Where you think you're cute and you're sweet and you're hot and you're spiritual. I invariably find that this is true. Right where you think you're so cool, that's where it breaks. Each time through that work, I don't believe like I have already done a set of steps. I said I'm going to write how it's going to come out, thinking it out, and it didn't come out that way and it never does. And is the magic there?
So I started going through those steps. I remember when I was four years sober, I was going through this work for a period of about 30 days or so. I remember I went crazy. I just went like nuts. I couldn't pray. I hated meetings. I didn't want to read the big book. Everything was stupid. I wasn't getting along with people. Starting to get in trouble at work. People getting on my nerves. I was judgmental. Wanted to run. Thinking about leaving.
So I went up, outside of Denver, and I talked to this Indian elder because by then I had learned—when I was about two years sober, I