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We hope that you enjoy today's speaker. >> My name is Bill. I'm a barefoot alcoholic.

>> Um, >> you probably want to sit down for this. >> She doesn't know what I'm about to say and I can't believe I'm going to say it. Um, it's funny, Mike and I were talking before the meeting started because I couldn't remember when I first met, uh, Carrie and Adam.

And, uh, I guess it was about four and a half, five years ago. And soon after that, uh, pretty immediately we had some conversations and pretty immediately it was obvious that we had similar passions. And um recently uh someone referred to someone else as a a serious spiritual seeker.

And I would refer to Carrie as a serious spiritual seeker. And um one of the first things that I had uh seen her do was a a presentation and and it was sort of a back to basics uh with a lot of Oxer group stuff involved if I remember correctly. And uh we were in a really silly mood that weekend.

And um what we did was we started noticing that each time she would describe an aspect of the book in a very um knowledgeable and experiential way that very often she would use sexual connotation unknowingly. And we sat there and we kept track of all the different innuendo that she had kept track of. And it got distracting for her because she saw that we were doing something.

We were laughing because she absolutely wasn't meaning to do that. And I'm wondering if she's going to do it tonight now since I've brought it up, but notice it if she does it because it's very funny. No, I'm just kidding.

And um and uh I I was I was very impressed with uh um this woman that I got to know and that I've seen over the years because uh most definitely there's been some incredible growth uh uh from the five years that I've known her and uh to the point where uh a lot of you know that that we do big book studies and stuff like that and and uh um a woman had come to me from Allentown, Pennsylvania and said to me, you know, Bill, would you do a big book study for for us. And I said, "Yeah, definitely." And they said, "Well, but the the only condition is is that you need to do it with a woman because we want to get a male perspective and a female perspective." And without batting an eye, I said to this woman, "I definitely would love to do a a big book study with a female, but there's only one that I would be willing to do it with, and that was Carrie. And if she's available that weekend, I definitely am available, and if she's not available, then I'd rather just say no." And uh um uh she was available that weekend, and we did a study, and it was really phenomenal, and it helped a lot of people.

and and um I personally do not know very many women that do as much work for AA as Carrie does. Uh there's an amazing amount of women that Carrie works with. There's an amazing amount of of personal transformation and and reworking the steps and carrying that message to other women.

And uh uh with that, I'd like to introduce Carrie C. >> Hi, I'm Carrie. I'm an alcoholic.

Sorry about that. I didn't know when I was supposed to get up or not. Um, and everything Bill said was lies.

Not kidding. Um, I really want to thank you for asking me here. Um, you know, it's an honor to be invited to speak at a group.

I mean, it's always an honor. Um, it's an honor to be invited to speak in a meeting, but it's a it's an immense honor to be asked to speak at this meeting for many reasons. First of all, because when I first really started to get serious about working the 12 steps, I found people in this group who helped me because you guys have been a beacon of light and Alcoholics Anonymous for a very long time and because there's so many women that I know today who are really involved in this group and have gotten so much from it.

So, not only have you given to me, but you've given to people that I love. And for that, I am I am so honored and so grateful to be here with you tonight. And I'm I'm just amazed that, you know, you guys have been doing this for this long.

And and more than that, there are some people in this room tonight who like Bill and Mike and so many other people who have really helped me so much on my path and have helped me to grow immensely and they've touched my lives. And because of my life, like lives, they've touched my life. And because of that, I am so honored to be here tonight.

Um ah so 45 minutes, I think I could do that. Um, I'm kidding. Uh, you know, the one message, the one thing that I want to get across to everybody tonight and the one thing that I want to do when I speak or the my main thought, my thesis for the night, I want it to be that the power of God is real and the power of God works.

You know, you know, I I could beat the big book, but I think I'm preaching to the choir here. Um, but what I what I really want to talk about what I want to talk about is what happened to me. how a girl who came into Alcoholics Anonymous when she was 16 and got sober at 18 who wanted to die who committed attempted suicide I don't I don't know how many times like but if you have to start counting you know what's bad I was completely completely nonfunctional I could not live in the world I could not have relationships I couldn't be in the same room with my mother I couldn't I couldn't have relationships with my family.

I couldn't have a boyfriend because like I just couldn't. Um I would drive them away. Um I could not have close relationships.

What I the only relationship I had in my life was with booze. And I went from that it'll be 10 years next week, God willing, to this. And the question is is how did I get to that point?

you know, how did I come from being a hopeless alcoholic to being a recovered alcoholic? And the answer is very simple. The power of God in the 12 steps.

Um, not all that easy to do, but a very simple answer. Um, my journey through the steps has been an interesting, windy one. Um, I don't know.

I know I don't know a lot of people who like it like you know who go straight out the gate and you know I mean I think it's wonderful the people who like walk out of detox and find a big book thumper and bring them through the steps and they do it right away and have this great experience. That's not exactly what happened to me. Um I did some time in AA.

Um I I call it 90 dances in 90 days. Um I um I first hit the rooms when I was 16. I hit the rooms when I was 16 because um well because I was drinking uncontrollably.

Um I first started drinking I the first drink I could possibly remember I think I was nine. My parents gave me wine when I was younger. Um I drank I lived two lives.

I was the good little girl on one side and I was the bad hell raiser on the other. Um I never really never the twain she'll meet. Um, and I I lived two very different lives for a really long time until like I couldn't pretend to be the good little girl anymore and I was just the alcoholic mess.

Um, what's really funny is like there are people in this room who have known me since I was like 15 years old. And so it's kind of weird telling this story because it's like, you know, there people like and people have known me since I got sober. I mean, this is an amazing night.

Um but um so basically what happens to me when I drink alcohol, I have this thing called craving. And what that means is that once I put alcohol in my system, I can't I can't stop drinking. And I find that once I take one drink, I want another.

And if I don't drink, I become irritable, restless, and discontent. And I be get filled with anxiety. My heart pounds out of my chest, and all I want to do is drink, god damn it, and you're in my way.

Um that's what happens to me when I drink. And I have this mind that says, "But that's okay. Everybody else drinks like that.

You It'll work this time. It'll be okay. You won't end up back in the psychward.

Four-point restraints aren't that bad. Um, you know, you won't get caught. You can hide it.

I I'm not I've never been a very subtle person, you know, so there is no subtlety to my drinking either." Um, so and I have this spiritual malady that that um kicks my butt and has kicked my butt more than once in the past 10 years. And what it does is this is that I have an extreme insecurity complex. I mean like to like the you know like to the cadill you know like I just I am such an insecure mess at times and I was when I got sober.

Um I had I didn't know where I ended and you began. what you thought about me became my truth. Like if you thought I was a bad person, then I was a bad person.

If you thought I was great, I was great. Because the problem is is that I couldn't behave well. I had a real trouble with working well and playing nice with others.

So, I was in this constant state of self-hatred because I had no sense of self, no idea who I was, and I kept stepping the toe on the toes of fellows and they would retaliate seemingly without provocation. So, what would happen to me was simply that I would bring my little tornado, my whirlwind of alcoholic insanity into people's lives and they'd kick me out like they should. And the more that happened, the lower and smaller I felt.

See, the thing is, I didn't want to be messed up. I didn't want to be a crazy alcoholic. I didn't My nickname in high school was Crazy Carrie.

I had two nicknames. It was Crazy Carrie and Janice Joplin. They used to call me, "Hey, Janice." this cuz I had this big mop of hair that came down to here.

You couldn't see my face. Looked kind of like cousin it. Um or crazy Carrie, you know, cuz I was known for lighting fires.

I was known for I was known for like if you pissed me off in class, I would go over a desk and smash your face into it like a lot of times. Um I was known for not being able to control my behavior. Um let's just put that.

And almost all those things were done under the influence of alcohol. Um, so basically I would bring that into people's lives and they'd kick me out and then I would sit there and think,"What's wrong with me? Why can't Why can't I just be normal?

Why can't I be like everybody else? Why can't I just not say these things or do these things or why do I have to set fires?" Um, and and I never really understood I didn't understand that that I had this illness. I didn't understand that that I was as powerless over my spiritual condition as I was over my drinking.

I didn't understand that. All I knew was that I felt alone, degraded, filled with sea self-hatred, and the one solution that I had in my life, which was alcohol, didn't work for me anymore, you know. So, I wandered into Alcoholics Anonymous after like I don't know the eenth suicide attempt.

Some of them weren't all that serious. Some of them were. Um, I uh I just I got thrown out of my house and I got sent to live with my sister for a year.

And um see I was literally physically separated from alcohol cuz she lived in the woods and I didn't drive. >> Yeah. Oh, it was not a happy year for Miss Carrie.

Um so Miss Carrie spent most of her time in her room hiding. And when I wasn't in my room hiding, I was out drinking. And I didn't really tell anybody this.

My sister kind of kept it under wraps because she didn't want to get me in trouble because she felt that I had all this trouble because, you know, I got thrown out of my parents house. I was dating drug dealers. I was doing all these bad things that I shouldn't do and she didn't want me to get in any more trouble.

So, she didn't tell my parents. So, I got sent home from Pennsylvania, a mess. And my parents really didn't know.

They I had gotten I had managed to get good grades that year in school because, you know, I was locked in the woods. You know, you when you're in the woods with no car and it's like a three-hour walk to the liquor store, there's nothing to do except you walk to the liquor store, which I did do. But beyond that, um I uh you know, I ended up getting good grades and getting accepted to this pretty decent um private school.

So, my parents were under the impression that because I got good grades and I I only threatened to kill a teacher once that year, and I did um that I was doing okay. >> >> So, um, I came home and I tried to be okay. I tried so hard.

I wanted to be the little little good little Catholic school girl in my little kilt. I wanted to behave. I wanted so bad not to be that person.

I thought that I could just leave that carry behind. That I could just leave her in Pennsylvania. Nobody had to know about how bad I was.

Well, what happened was I met a nice guy, liked him, liked him a real lot. So, I dumped him, ate a bottle of pills, um woke up 3 days later in the in the uh intensive care unit of uh St. Joseph's Hospital and it was another trip to the psych ward for Carrie, you know, and the main reason why I did that was cuz I started drinking again.

See, I started drinking when I came home and I wasn't really telling anybody and I knew I and I got suspended from school, too. In the middle of this, like my third week of school, I got suspended again because I was drinking in school. And uh so basically what happened with me was that the delusion that Carrie was going to be normal, that if I could just leave that that alcoholic, that bad Carrie, that sick Carrie in another state and I could just pretend to be this some somebody else that I would be okay.

But I wasn't. And I found somebody to drink with and I drank and it started all over again. But see, I couldn't face that anymore.

I couldn't face failing one more time. So I did what any good alcoholic would do. I attempted suicide and um I ended up in Fair Oaks and another psych word and it was not bad as psych words go.

Um uh but what I did do is I ended up going to to to Alcoholics Anonymous. I started to go to meetings and I began to identify that my problem was drinking and not like my family, not my brother, not my sister, not cuz nobody loved me, not cuz I had all these bad things happen to me. And I did.

I had I have to say that I I had a very interesting childhood. Um, and that's but see the one thing that I learned about alcoholism is it's not causal. See, I'm not an alcoholic because, you know, alcoholism and drug addiction runs in my family.

I'm not an alcoholic because I experienced physical abuse as a child. I'm not an alcoholic because I experienced sexual abuse as a child and I'm not an alcoholic because I was date raped as a teenager. None of those things have anything to do with my alcoholism.

I might be crazy because of those things, but I'm not an alcoholic because of those things. And you know, all of those things happened to me and I had to learn how to deal with them sobriety. So anyway, so I ended up going to some meetings and um it was interesting.

Um, I I started attending uh NA before I started attending AA because I thought that was like more fun because there was more younger people there. But what happened was, you know, they make this announcement at the very beginning of NA meetings. They said, "We don't know if you have any drugs or alcohol drugs on you.

You know, you need to leave them out the door. You know, you can't bring them into the church." So, every time they made that announce announcement, I'd wait about three or four minutes and go smoke a cigarette and kick around in the bushes going, "Hm, did anybody leave anything?" So, needless to say, I wasn't all that serious, but I I began to go and I began to see that there were young people there. There were young people in AA.

There were young people in these programs and they were getting better. But, see, I didn't want to get better. I just wanted the pain to stop.

So, naturally, naturally, um, I couldn't stay. And what happened is I ended up picking up again. I ran away from home.

I was gone for a while. Put my mother and my father through hell. Um, and towards the end of my 17th year, um, I know my 16th year, I'm sorry.

Uh, my mom had me arrested in her living room. Um, yeah, I heard the Allen on saying, "Good job." Um, I came home after being run away. After running away, um, I came home and I, it was a Monday.

It was a Monday morning. It was 9:00 and I really thought my parents weren't going to be there. So, it's hot up here.

I'm like so sweaty. my hair sticking to me. I'm like sweating to death if you excuse me.

But um I really thought my mother wasn't going to be there. So I went to go break in cuz you know naturally I didn't have a key. I went to break into my parents house to steal from them.

But my mother was home. So she said, "Okay, you can come in, but you have to go to rehab. You have to go." And I said, "Okay, I can stay on the streets and continue drinking or I can get locked up again.

See you." and I left and I waited till what I thought was her car pull away and I tried to break in again like like an idiot and she was still there. It wasn't her car. Um so she called the cops and I ended up fighting about I don't know four to six Bloomfield police officers in my parents living room and uh they arrested me.

They brought me to the police station and I got a police escort to my last rehab and they sat with me through the whole intake. They brought me up to the ward. They were making sure that I was in there.

But um so I uh and you think that you think that that would scare an alcoholic sober. Your mother has you arrested. You have to beat up, you know, you're fighting.

You I got my butt kicked. You know, I got my butt kicked by six police officers. I was like 90 pounds, you know.

There is no way that I was like winning that fight, you know. And you would think that getting your butt kicked in your parents living room by a bunch of police officers would make you stop drinking, right? No.

Um, so I I went to I went to rehab and I um I took all the slogans, you know, all the slogans, you know, like easy does it, you know, first things first, think upside down, all that crap. And I lived that, you know, I lived a slogan recovery. And uh I got out and I got a coffee commitment.

I I made meetings every day. I got a boyfriend. That was important.

Um I I did everything I thought I was supposed to do, you know. I took it easy does but do it, you know. So I didn't get a job.

Um lived off my parents. Um I first things first, I went to meetings every day and I I did these things and I thought that I was I thought one day at a time. I didn't drink today.

This is good. I'm doing a good job. Well, a year later, um, I picked up a drink.

A little over a year later, I picked up a drink. And I picked up a drink because I didn't have a sufficient solution. I a sufficient substitute, excuse me.

I didn't have a sufficient substitute for alcohol in my life. See, I had taken the alcohol away, but I hadn't filled it up with anything but fluff, but frothy emotional appeal. And because of that, there came a point in time in my life where it was more painful to be sober than it was to be drunk.

And the consequences that I got from drinking pald in comparison to the excruciating emotional pain of reality. Have you ever been there? >> Oh, it sucks, doesn't it?

So, you know, knowing all that I knew, all the self-nowledge, all the, you know, just don't drink today, I went to a meeting and I walked in the meeting and I said, "Well, if the speaker sucks, I'm leaving and I'm going to get drunk." And naturally, the speaker sucked and I left and I got drunk. In the meantime, oh, by the way, I was already on my second boyfriend. Did I I didn't put yet I was already on my second boyfriend who was clean like 3 days when I met him cuz you know like you know that whole 137 thing is really healthy for your spiritual life.

Um so uh I had I was working on my second boyfriend and uh you know he had a couple days clean. I had a little over a year but I was miserable and we decided we're going to go get drunk and it was like if this this meeting sucks we're going to go drink and naturally it sucked. So we went and got drunk and I said to myself this is what I said and this is why I'm a real alcoholic.

I said, "Okay, I'm gonna drink tonight and I'm just gonna have this drink and I'm gonna get drunk because I'm 18 and I deserve it because I should party like a kid because I'm a kid and I deserve this and I'm going to get drunk, but I'm going to go back to AA tomorrow." What's time mean? What's clean time? It means nothing.

I'm sober only as long, you know, as you know, basically the idea that like the person who wakes up earliest in the morning is sober the longest. So, so what if I drink? I'll wake up early the next day and I'll go to AA and everything will be okay.

So, after not having had any alcohol in my system for a year and a half, I proceeded to drink massive quantities of alcohol. Like massive quantities. We're talking like anything to get my hands on.

Tequila. I mean, like everything I hadn't done and the new stuff that came out while I was sober, like Zema, all this stuff. I drank and drank.

I drank like my whole paycheck in one night. And I woke up the next day and I'm standing too close to the mic. I'm I woke up the next day and I had about $5 and change on me because two, you know, one night of drinking costs a lot of money, man.

I had five bucks left on me and I said, "Well, I can either buy cigarettes or I can buy alcohol." Now, this is a tough decision. So, I dug around in the couch cushions for a little bit. Found a little bit more change.

I and I went to the liquor store and I bought cheap wine and a pack of cheap cigarettes and I drank for the next four months. And see, for me, no matter how long I'm away from alcohol, no matter how long I'm away, once I put it into my system, I have no choice of when I stop. See, see the thing with me is I don't get done with alcohol.

Alcohol gets done with me. I have no choice as to when I stop drinking once I put alcohol in my system. The only thing that comes between me and the bottle is a power greater than myself.

And one day about four months later, the day after my h my now husband's birthday, I woke up and crawled out of a basement because I had lost my apartment. I had lost the two jobs I had. I was about to lose the boyfriend.

And uh everything that I had built up in that year, year and a half, I lost everything. And I was homeless living on the streets and uh my clothes were in a garbage bag and uh I'd been out the night before and we parted our paycheck away again because we were going to get an apartment. We swore we were going to get an apartment this time but you know I had a drink and I woke up and uh I crawled out of this basement and I'm like I can't do this anymore.

I don't know why that came to me. I don't know. All I know is that that moment the power of God came into my life and I walked and it took me about an hour and I walked to an AA meeting and I went and sat in that meeting and I cried.

I stole their big book which I've then replaced. I have now made amends and replaced um and I went to another meeting after that and then I went to another meeting later that night and I went to a meeting the next day and I just kept going to meetings. But see the problem was is I at that point I was scared enough of drinking but I still didn't have anything to replace the alcohol with.

So I was a very miserable person and I lived unhappily like that for two years. And um I wandered God se saw a fit to move my husband and I and my daughter because I ended up getting pregnant 60 days. Well I found out I was pregnant 60 days sober.

So, I ended up getting pregnant. I think it was during detox. I was during detox.

I got pregnant during my detox. I found out I was I was pregnant with my daughter when I was 60 days sober. And uh I knew like I knew that I couldn't drink because I had someone else to be sober for for the first time in my life.

But see, I didn't know how not to drink and I didn't know how to live. And I was very miserable. And uh I had my daughter when I was a little over 10 months clean and my husband got an opportunity, a job opportunity in Staten Island.

And uh I moved to Staten Island and uh see there's this this awesome community in Staten Island, this big book community who, you know, work the steps out of the book. And I kept hearing these people talking about like working the steps out of the book. And I had worked the steps out of the stepbook.

And well, actually, I worked some of the steps out of the stepbook. Some of it I took it out of the big book and I did a three column four step because that was the picture. I I I still like the only thing I would change about the big book is have Bill illustrate the fourth column because there's a lot of lazy alcoholics like myself.

He only put three on here. Um so that was the amount of work that I had done up until that point. Um and I had this eightstep list and I had made some really halfass amends.

um just enough to alleviate the pain and uh not enough no see I hadn't done a forcep so I couldn't really own my part so I made amends so that everybody would like me and didn't really you know sink in like exactly what I did or why they didn't like me to begin with um so I ended up moving to Staten Island and my husband met these people who were working the steps out of the big book and little you know a little bit at a time I met all these people who were doing this and this was this awesome community of people who were doing this thing and uh and I started to go through the steps. I got caught up in the enthusiasm of it. And that's what I love about these meetings.

I love people who are enthusiastic about the steps because if you're boring about the steps, what why would I want to do them? If the steps don't illuminate your life, if they don't change you on a radical level in the deepest fibers of yourself, then why would I want to do them? But I saw these people who had this immense change, who did this awesome stuff, who worked with all these people and had all these groups and did all this stuff and I was like, I want to do that.

I want that, you know. So I began to work the steps and um I um I got up to my third step and was working with a man and I felt uncomfortable continuing to do a force and a fifth step with a guy. So, I ended up um I found a set of Joe and Charlie tapes and I got their little worksheets and I filled them out and my friend and I both we were doing the steps together at the same time.

So, we both my friend Denise I shared my fistep with her and she shared a fistep with me and we swap fisteps and uh we wrote up our ninestep amends and or a step list and we went out and made our amends and something happened in my life. Something changed. I didn't want to die anymore.

I didn't have I didn't have the rage inside of me. You know that rage where you just can't control it. It's it's like I'll see myself throwing something.

Before I know it, I threw it. That doesn't happen to me anymore. And there was a time in my life where I was so uncontrollable.

My emotions dictated every aspect of my life. If I felt it, I was saying it and doing it, you know, which was dangerous to those about me. Trust me.

Um I went through many remote controls because of that. Um, I had a habit of throwing the remote control because it was seemed like the the least like harmful thing to throw, you know. Um, I don't know.

Anyways, handy, portable, fit in my hand, nice toss. But, um, so, you know, something began to happen in my life and I stopped doing those things like I stopped reacting to the world like that. And uh I began to work with newcomers and then you know God brought me to New Jersey and I was doing this in New Jersey.

I was doing I found back to basics and I was doing back to basics out of my living room and uh and there was a group of people who were all like-minded and we were all doing this and uh and the the amazing thing is I was sitting I was actually at a sober club promoting a dance and uh there were a bunch of girls there who knew this the the set aside prayer and it was something that I had learned in Staten Island from a guy who worked with Joe Hawk and I'm like you know that you speak my language you you know what I'm talking about hold me I'm Oh my god, who the hell are you? Who's your sponsor? Where do you go?

And um I wounded up I wound up uh wandering into Bernardsville and um I ended up getting a sponsor and the first time I had been sponsored by a woman through the book. Up until that point, I had been kind of working it on my own and with other people and with spons we all kind of did it in a communal thing, but I had never been brought through the book from page one to the end. And I had this woman who did that for me and it was the most amazing experience of my life.

Um, and that's how I said I had this windy path through the steps. And anybody who's sitting here who's in early sobriety doing this work, I mean, God bless you. I mean, it took me years of pain in order to really really find this solution.

And it's been an amazing journey for me. I I I have, like I said, it's like the one thing I want to want to get across is the power of God is real and it works in my life. I have an amazing life.

I do amazing things. I have a family that I, you know, I look at my family, the family that I grew up in and I still can't believe that they were the same people I hated for years. You know, I I went through the steps and I made I made direct amends to my mother owning everything that I did.

And for the first time in my life, I didn't own my amend I didn't make my amends wanting her to return it, demanding that she be who the mother I wanted her to be because she failed me. Don't you know she's the one who messed me up and that's why I have to be in this damn place. And that's the way I felt my whole life.

It was like she did something wrong and that's why I'm stuck in AA, you know, because at that time for a long time I really believed that my alcoholism was caused by outside circumstances. I didn't know about craving. I didn't know about these things.

I didn't know about my spirituality. No one, you know, and when I found out about it, it's like I couldn't blame the people in my life for doing what they did because I am who I am because of who I am. um you know and I went and I made these amends and I had such a sense of relief, such a sense of I I it's indescribable to me.

I can't tell you what happened inside of me. All I know is that um I was a terrified little girl, you know, when I when I came into Alcoholics Anonymous, I was a terrified little girl for a very long time and something happened inside of me and I became a woman. And I and I mean that I had strength and integrity that I never knew before.

I had this confidence that I never knew existed. And I had the ability to love other people in a way that I had never done before. See, the most amazing thing about the 12 steps is it gives me the gift of love.

For years, for years, I was dominated by the belief that if only you behave differently, I would be okay. And if only you love me, then I would be okay. See, I never thought about what I was bringing to anything.

I never thought about what do I bring to this relationship? What do I offer this person? What can I do to be of service to you?

It was always about you make me feel good because I am nothing without you. And what the 12 steps have given is me given me what God has given me is the ability to love people without the condition. Doesn't mean I do it perfectly.

You can ask anybody around me, but I really do. I mean, I can have unconditional love for people in a way that I never knew before. And I can live without judgment.

See, one my one of my biggest issues was that I love issue man. One of my biggest issues was that I judged myself and everyone around me to such an extreme level. Like I I was basically and I this is what I learned through doing a lot of inventory was I I learned that I judged other people because I was afraid you were going to hurt me.

And if I found out what it was about you that was threatening to me, I could push you away before I had to risk being hurt. So I lived my whole life keeping everybody at arms length, evaluating everything about you. But see, but the problem was is that every time I judged you on something, I would look in the mirror now and again and be like, "Oh, I do that." And then my sense of self, my self-love would shrink because I'd judge you.

I'd behave the same way as you and have to hate myself because of it. And I love it that in the big book on page 42, it tells us that, you know, we can have philosophical convictions galore. Says that we can have all these moral beliefs.

It tells us that we could we can we can believe anything that we want to believe about spiritual terms, but we have a hard time living up to it because we lack power. See, lack of power was my dilemma. I knew how I should behave.

I knew how other people should behave. But the fact is is I lacked the power to institute that in my life. And what the 12 steps did, what God has done is given me the power to live up to the ideals that I set forth to myself and to be loving on my with myself when I fall short, to admit it when I fall short.

And so my judgment in it it it kept me from being able to really love anybody, to let anybody in, to develop close relationships, to let go of the anger towards my family, to let go of the anger towards the people in my life. Um, what I learned and when I realized that my judgment was killing me, it was that was doing absolutely nothing to you, but it was killing me. Because see, love and judgment can't live together.

They don't work together. And I can't I can say I love you, but if I'm in my head going, but if only you then see I'm not loving you. I'm telling you who you should be.

Then I'm playing God. And see, when what I love about the third step is it tells us it says that f first of all, we have to quit playing God. See, God is my director.

I am the actor. He is the principal. I am the agent.

He is the father. I am the child. And I can't I cannot allow God can't work through me when I'm fighting him.

See, I can't serve God when I'm playing God. And I spent most of my recovery doing that. And when I learned that this is what I was doing, when I saw it and I felt the powerlessness of it, when I realized that I was as powerless over my fear, my resent, and my selfishness as I was over my alcoholism, that I could not wish them away any more than I than I could wish away alcohol.

I had to have a power greater than myself. I had to turn to God to fix me because I could not fix me. So for a long time I believed that if I gave God my alcoholism, my drinking, that I would be okay and that I would control my relationships, I would control uh my job, I'd control my children, I control all these things and everything would be okay.

Just you just keep me from drinking God and I'll handle everything else. And what I learned was that I can't live in communion with my higher power like that. That's not how God works in my life.

So what happened is I hit bottoms in recovery. I'd hit a bottom with a certain with with a certain relationship, a certain thing. And when I say relationship, I don't just mean people.

I mean my relationship with myself, my relationship to God, my relationship with my husband, relationship with my children, my family, my sponses, my friends at infinity. You know, when the 12 steps are about relationships and they're not about they're about my relationship with God and as a result of my relationship with God, what happens with my relationship with people? It's very simple arithmetic.

If my relationship with God, if I'm living in communion with my creator, if I am living in the sunlight of the spirit, if I am in the realm of the spirit, then my relationships with people are pretty good. They're full of love. They're full of compassion, empathy, companionship.

See, when I'm not living in those things, my relationships are the complete opposite. And what I really love and I love to do with responses and whenever I'm doing a big book workshop, I always I love to go to page 52 and I love to read the beds and then I like to turn it to the ninestep promises. And if you've ever noticed the the beds on 52 are almost the exact opposite of the nine-step promises.

And there's a reason for that because somewhere between step two and step nine, something happens in your life. If you really do this and if you live this, something happens in my life. Something happens in an alcoholic's life.

What happens is God comes in and starts to rearrange you. And I love that. That's why the third and the sevenstep prayer, it's like my creator, build with me as thou will.

Of course, I'm, you know, I'm not saying like I'm like taking little pieces of it, but what I'm saying is it's talking about my creator and ask God to build with me as it will. So, what am I saying? I'm saying, God, create me and use me in your creation.

So I can be I can be involved in the creation of this world on two very different levels, internal and external. I can serve God and be a part of life at last. And I can allow God to create me in his likeness of an image in the way that he wants me to be, good or bad.

Take it all. I don't evaluate anymore. I don't have the ca the capacity to evaluate my own self anymore.

All I can do is surrender this self to God and ask God to do it for me. And when I live in that place, I'm a very happy person. I'm free.

I have hope. I have joy. I can do things that I never thought I could do.

Um I can be effective in ways that I cannot imagine. You know what I love is when I'm doing my morning meditation and um you know, I sit down, I have my pad and my pen and I do the Oxford group meditation. As Bill pointed out, I'm a bit of an Oxford group person and I love I love I like big book AA and I like big book AA without a lot of fluff.

You know, just give me the big book and I and I love it. I love it. I eat it up.

I enjoy it. I suck the marrow out of the big book. I love it.

Um that's a poem, by the way. I didn't make that up. Not kidding.

Um but I I devour the big book. And what I what what I love is I sit there in morning meditation. And I still have my little pad, my little pen that I had when I first started doing the work.

And I made my list for the day. Like, you know, how am I to serve you today, God? And I sit quiet and I make my list.

And all these things come to my head. And it's like, sometimes it's like, shut up. Sometimes it's be loving, sometimes be patient, call so- and so, call and so and so, do this, do that, do this, do that.

And sometimes it doesn't make any sense, like dogs barking, sun, you know, sometimes it's just kooky. But um when I hold it up to the four absolutes and I look at what my plan is for the day, I uh sometimes it's call this spons, call this person, or it could just be a name and I'm going to see that person that day. And you know, and I call my spons, but I was too scared to call you.

And see, and that's what I'm talking about living in the sunlight of the spirit. That's what I'm talking about being in the realm of the spirit. That's what I'm talking about about being of service to God.

See, when I allow God to direct my day, I can do the most amazing things. I can know things that that vital six sense that the big book talks about. Bill's not joking.

He chose he chose his words of the big book very very carefully. And if you pay if you read that book, there's nothing that's in there by accident. And when when he talks about that vital six sense, that's what he's talking about.

It's about looking at somebody and seeing the mask, seeing them putting up the mask, hiding the fact that they're in pain and knowing it because I'm for once not thinking about myself. See, and if I could not think about myself for five minutes, I could be of immense service to the world. And see, when I can do that, when I can live in that, the effectiveness of God, the effectiveness of this program, and the reason why I'm here is apparent.

So the point of the 12 steps is, and I love this, a speaker at my group said this. She said, "The point of the 12 steps is not to stop drinking. The result of the 12 steps is to have a spiritual experience, to have a spiritual awakening, the vital spiritual experience, psychic change, whatever you want to call it.

That is the point of this. The book stops talking about drinking very early on." And the fact is is that it tells us to lay aside the drink problem and look at the causes and conditions in our life. It tells us to look at why we're having a rough going.

So the point for me is that I work at the 12 steps and I live this not because I don't want to drink. I started because I didn't want to drink and I certainly don't want to drink and I certainly don't want to die. But the result has been an amazing spiritual awakening and an an amazing turnaround in my life and these these things that have happened to me not because of anything that I did myself.

And see this is this is the thing is that on my own I'm a catatonic suicidal alcoholic. Very good description of me. That's me on my own.

Um with God in my life I can be so much more. I can be an effective mother. I can be an effective sponsor.

I can be an effective wife. I can be an effective friend. I can be effective in areas in my life that I could never do before.

And um you know I'm blessed today. I have a lot of sponses. I'm you know I do.

And um and it's amazing to me that these women actually want me to work with them. I'm always like are you sure? You know you you know you're talking to me right?

You know you know I'm crazy right you're sure about this? Um and they all just kind of laugh. They're like, "Yeah, we know you're crazy, but we love you and you know, bring me through the steps." And um and I have to tell you that, see, I didn't realize when I keep talking about this vital spiritual experience, when I talk vital as in like life, vital.

Um when I talk about this, I didn't realize that it had happened to me until I began to work with other alcoholics. See, when I was sitting across a kitchen t my kitchen table and I was listening to one of my sponses tell me this harrowing harrowing story and uh I was able to find clarity like I was able to feel her pain yet I was able to bring her through it and I was able to bring her through the to their fourth column and I didn't get mired in what a jerk. I had love and compassion, yet I was able to bring her through that.

And the fact that the woman trusted me enough to tell me these things and I was able to have the presence of mine. I was able to be present in that moment to help get her to God in that situation. See, that has nothing to do with me.

That has to do with the power of God that dwells within each one of us. And I believe this. And you know, like I said, the opinions of the speaker, the opinions of the speaker.

I really believe that there's there's a little bit of God in each one of us and that deep down inside every man, woman, and child is a fundamental idea of God. That we might have to search fearlessly, but it's there. And my job to as an alcoholic today, my job as a recovered alcoholic is to continue to seek that little speck of God within me, that idea of God.

And to, you know, I I explained to my sponses and I said, you know, a relationship with God is a relationship with anyone else. If you don't talk to them, you can't have a relationship. And if you don't listen, the relationship isn't working.

So for me, I have to use my relationship with God in order to be more effective. You know, I can't just call up God and say, "Hi, this is my second step. I believe you're there, and I'll I'll get back to you in 10." It doesn't work that way with me, you know?

I How am I going to How am I going to trust a God that I have no experience with? And so my job is to continue to deepen and broaden my experience with God so that my trust, my reliance on this power can become deeper and greater. So then it was not just giving him my alcoholism or giving him my little teeny bits of unmanageability here and my teeny bits of unmanageability there, but I'll take care of all the rest till I can get to a point in my life where I can surrender myself to God.

Now, mind you, I and I'm a human being and I, you know, it sounds really good. Um, and I do live like this, but there are days when I don't, and I make amends for that, too. And I make that really clear up here that I have clay feet, that I'm a human being.

I fall short. That's why I love I said to my sponses all the time, I said, you know, that's why we have step 10. And said, continue to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admit it.

So, I mean, and Bill later on says that, you know, that we may make assumptions based on uh what we think to be God's will, but it may be completely wrong. And that's okay, you know, because we're I'm new at this game. I'm a newcomer.

And slowly but surely, I'm gaining an experience with God. And because of that, I'm beginning to rely more and more on this power greater than myself. And the results I get are amazing.

And I'm an alcoholic. I drank for effect. And I'm a recovered alcoholic and I work the steps for an effect.

And the effects that I get, the effect that I get is that I am not the Carrie that I was 10 years ago. And 10 years ago, I didn't want to be that Carrie. I hated that Carrie.

I wanted to be anyone else but myself. And today, and this is the amazing thing is that I used to look at like um all the speakers. I used to look at guys like Howard, guys like Bill and Mike, guys like Mark Houston and Joe Hawk and all these guys and I'd be like, I want what they have.

So I got to do what they do. And that worked. And now today, I want what I have.

I want to be me and have my experience cuz it's the first time in my life I'm okay with that. See, cuz the one thing that I learned was that I, you know, I I was either up here, up here, or down here. I was always a piece of crap or the best thing that there ever was.

But that I was never in reality. And what I learned, what I learned humility was, was knowing ex exactly who I am, good and bad. It's not about saying false humility, claiming to suck when I don't, and it's not about grandiosity that I'm great at everything.

What humility is is knowing who I am and loving it anyway. And today, I've been able to do that. I've been able to truly look myself in the mirror, know my faults, and love me anyway.

I have my bad days, but they are far and few between compared to where I was. Um, and so to c to recap and just let you know now, I've been talking about this amazing life that I have, right? Well, I've been married.

I've been married for we'll be together like 10 years. Um, we have two children. So, I'm 28 years old.

I'll be sober 10 years next week. Knock wood. By the grace of God.

I have two children. Um I'm in college. I sponsor vast quantities of women.

Um I have not had a harsh word to my mother in over three years. I've not yelled at that woman. And trust me, that's good.

Um um I have a relationship with every single member of my family. There is not one brother or sister that I sit there and they're like, "Yeah, you know how you have that that brother and sister thing like, "Yeah, they yeah, I love them, but they're really a schmuck." I don't have that with any of my family. And the reason why I don't is because a beautiful thing called the ninestep.

I was able to go back to the the people in my family that I hurt and the people that hurt me. I was able to find forgiveness in my heart. I was able to go with a frank and loving and forgiving attitude and I went and I admitted my harms.

And because I've done that, no matter where they are in their life, I've been able to find freedom. And so I have this wonderful relationship with this family that I hated. I have um the amount of friends that I have in my life.

Sometimes I lose count of them. I forget who I'm talking to sometimes because I have such I have a wonderful home group. I have a family in AA.

I have my AA family. I have my my blood family. And what the amazing thing is my blood family, my AA family know each other.

That's pretty cool. I mean, think about that. I mean, for a long time, it was my AA family was over here and my blood family was over there.

And those two were not going to meet because then someone would find out something about me. They'd start sharing notes and start comparing and I'd get in trouble. See, but I don't live that double life anymore.

So now my blood family and my AA family, they've met, they know each other. I've they're a part of my life. And the the thing that my sponsors tell me and the one of the main reasons why they hire me as a sponsor is because when we first meet, almost every one of them, I say, "Well, listen, you know, you may want to work with me.

I sound really good in a meeting, but you you need to meet me. You need to come to my house. You need to see me in my element.

Then you can decide whether you want to work with me." And so they come over and they have a cup of coffee in my in my kitchen and we talk about where they're at. I talk about where I'm at and we just get to know one another. And as they're doing this, my children are usually throwing popcorn on the floor fighting.

Um who's touching who, who's hitting who with a golf club, um who's got who's what, and the phone's ringing off the hook with the million, you know, with the with the other ton of sponses who are calling and have issues. And what happens is is these women see that in my life through the grace of God by the power of God working in my life that I can I can carry in my conversation with them bandage a knee answer the phone and not lose it and not lose it. And so for me the best advertisement I have for the 12 steps is my life.

And there's nothing there's nothing greater than that because for me, the girl that I was could not do that. The girl that I was couldn't even look you in the eye. The girl that I was sat in AA meetings and couldn't get a cup of coffee for fear of getting up.

And that's not the girl that I am today. And the girl that I am today can have an effect on other people's lives in an amazing way. And these women, moreover, can have an effect in my life.

I can be as open and loving with my sponses as they are with me. And I don't have to hide anything from them. I don't have to be, oh, I have to be the perfect sponsor and I can't fall short and I can't let you see my faults.

My sponses know who I am and they know my faults and they love me for it. And I do the same for them. And so for me, that's the fellowship of the spirit.

That's why I'm here. That's why I keep working the 12 steps, why I take on new sponses, why I take on commitments, why I show up at meetings, why I do the damn gsr commitment and I I chair the meeting and I do all these things. I do that because because it's my job to give love to the world.

And when I do that, love is reflected back to me. And so what the 12 steps has given me is an ability to love without demanding to be loved because I'm loved anyway. See, because if you guys don't love me, there's a power greater than myself that does because I would not be standing here today if it didn't.

And that's just my experience. I really want to thank you guys for having me here. Thank you for letting me share.

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.

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