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Whether you join us in the morning or at night, there's nothing better than a sober sunrise. We hope that you enjoy today's speaker. >> My name is Mike Es.

I'm an alcoholic. >> It is good to be here tonight and it's good to be sober. And uh several things before I start.

One is uh kind of on a serious note. My sponsor is Cliff Roach. Um some of you are also sponsored by him.

He was going to be here tonight, this weekend, and he had a family tragedy and couldn't be. And I just want to to remember him and to thank him for everything because in a few minutes I'll forget about him and think just of myself. And I'd also like to remember a friend of ours from Oceanside, um, Kelly D.

And, um, and he's been on my mind a lot. And tonight, I I saw several people who were close to him, too. And just, you know, keep him in your thoughts.

He's not doing very well. I just wanted to cheer up the group with that kind of news. Uh, John forgot one other thing besides saying the third step prayer every day.

He asked me to to ask you to to let you know that he has a prize for anybody who can identify what the dessert was after after you may have won. I'm not sure it's orange cheesecake, but it I'll accept that answer. I uh, you know, it's been nice to be here.

I'd like to thank Ted. I'm not Hank Johnson. Um, Miss Kimberly pointed that out to me a while ago.

Wherever you are said, it must feel nice to be the bridesmaid. Most of the weddings I've been to, the bridesmaids have had a little more fun at the parties, I'll tell you. So, I I don't mind.

I um I got in last night and uh Eileen came down with me. We got in last night and we were were just in time to settle in a little bit and hear Mark and then today got to hear Mary Pearl um who I still believe is misdiagnosed. I don't care whether you have an allergy to alcohol or not.

Come on in. You will. J D, I'd like to talk to you sometime alone.

Um, and then I got to hear Lee this afternoon given most of his talk I got to hear and u that was very nice too. But, you know, I went up to my room and I was tired and and I kind of dozed and slept a little bit and um you know, it's not for some of you accomplished speakers, it's this is easy, but for me it's not. And um and I started to dream a little bit and I had this this weird dream and and I dreamt that I'd died and gone to heaven.

And I got up there and I met somebody who it turned out was St. Peter. And um he was kind and I was surprised I was there, but he he was kind and he took me around a little bit and we were coming through the clouds and I saw somebody that as we got closer um was in fact Lee and Lee had a chain on his arm and at the end of the chain was a little ogre, a real ugly little creature and he was walking along and I said, "What's that about?" St.

And Peter said, "Well, you see, Lee almost didn't make it here, and for the next 5,000 years, he's got to walk around with that little creature attached to his arm." And went a little bit further, and uh sure enough, it was Mary Pearl. She too had a chain with a giant ugly beast of some kind attached to her. And he said, "She really almost didn't make it here.

For the next 10,000 years, she has to walk around with that creature attached to her arm." went a little bit further than I thought. First, I saw John Travolta from Saturday Night Live, but it turned out to be Mark from last night, had the same same kind of chain get up on his arm and uh and Britney Spears was attached. >> So, wait a minute.

I heard him talk. I met him. Something's not right here.

It's not fair. And he says, "Well, you see, Britney Spears almost didn't make it here." It's an old joke, but I like it. I don't know who that judge was that let you out years ago, but uh I'd like to know his name cuz I'd like to start a recall on Monday morning.

Get him off off the bench. I um I don't know. You know, I it is nice to be here.

There there are a lot of people in the room that I've known for a long time and and Cliff P, I'd like to thank you for a fine main talk tonight, too. I uh a few minutes ago, I've known some of you for a lot of years. And a lot of you have have heard me give my talk and and um Robin came up to me earlier this afternoon, made me feel welcome to be a part of San Diego.

She explained that she'd been at a meeting a few weeks ago with me in in Escandido, and I remembered her. Um she was sitting in the front row when I spoke and but she explained it a little better tonight. She said um that just as I started to get interesting and have something to say, I'd quit.

I'll try to do the same thing tonight. So if it all sounds interesting, let me know. I don't know.

You know, it's Let me tell you, I drank badly. I drank badly for a long time. And uh I'm one of those kind of people who was seldom mildly intoxicated.

I was always more or less insanely drunk. And uh it was the kind of deal that you know, surprise. I grew up in an alcoholic home.

And I was born in a little town in upstate New York in an Italian section. Um am I supposed to get down? You know, I would have swear a while ago I heard a flute.

I I I don't know if it's just warm in here and I'm hallucinating more or and I grew up with these real mixed values from my family. I mean, I know what it's like to be absolutely terrified to live in an alcoholic home where the fear is just overwhelming. I was scared all my life.

I was scared from the time I was little. I was scared of the dark. I was terrified that my parents were going to separate.

My mother had come out of an alcoholic home. Is that you, Mark? Um, my mother had come out of an alcoholic home and had married my father who was a handsome Italian man.

She was scared to death about drinking and about that kind of life. And yet my father ran bars and nightclubs. I mean, it was just that kind of deal.

and and when you were talking earlier today about the clubs, my father got called back into the service when I was real young and ran all the the NCL clubs and officers clubs and uh it was just a wonderful life. And I've shared this with a lot of you before. I remember from a very early age having unbelievably warm, wonderful feelings about bars.

I loved bars. Even as a child, I liked my father taking us in in the mornings when he'd go by to pick up the money and stuff. He he ran those kind of joints in civilian life that people were in there early drinking.

And um we would go in and he would set us at the at the stools on the bar and they would give us little shot glasses full of Coca-Cola and money for the shuffle board and for the pinball machines and I like the smell and I like the pretty women and I liked everything about it. I had an uncle and uncle Dominic who had come from Italy and he was a tall well for our family tall came in about 5'7 and it's all relative is it? I mean and uh he always wore white shirts when he attended bar and a little bow tie and he was a gentleman.

He smoked these little Italian cigars and drank little leors and would give them out and he was just real classy. I liked watching him wash the glasses in the stainless steel tubs. I like the air conditioned bars and smells.

When I was growing up, when my father was in the service in the mornings when I would go wait for the bus, I would go outside the officers club. The bus would take us to town to school. I'd go in in the morning and just smell just stand there and take in some big whis especially in the smoking room.

It was just a it made me feel comfortable and uh you know and I had a good life but I always had these mixed messages like I said we were I was raised Catholic and and I had went to a lot of Catholic schools went to an all boys Catholic high school which I believe is the only thing that kept me out of prison and we were told to be good to do the right thing and on the other hand with my background and my family background there was always something a little more special if you got something illegal. You know what I mean? It was just a a little bit better if it was illegal.

Um took a my father took great pride in the fact that our family dog had been won in a poker game. And uh and I grew up with some beliefs that that uh held true for me for a long time and some sometimes would still slip back into my mind on a cold harsh night like tonight. Um, I liked gambling and I liked women and I liked and I couldn't wait to be able to do those things from I mean I'm talking about a little kid.

I liked it. Um, and I'd s I'm old enough and I told you this before, too. I'm old enough that there was a TV show on when I was young called Maverick.

And I would sit and watch Maverick and want to be just like those two guys traveling around the West drinking, finding pretty women and playing poker. And I'd sit and I'd watch it. I'd get a little deck of cards out and a and a a bottle of Coca-Cola and a shot glass and I' and I I would go on and I could not wait to live like that and and I got my day that finally came.

Now, I'm not going to, you know, I don't even how much that I'm going to talk about tonight about my drinking except to tell you this. I don't know that I ever drank well. I waited till my senior year of high school and I'll tell you about my first drunk because it's just a it was very uh I don't know symptomatic or was evidence of the way I was going to behave later on.

It was a summer day. I had not had a real drink yet and I'd met this young lady who told me that her parents were going to be gone on Friday and I could come over during the day. Now I'm the kind of person who gets excited about little things.

That was a big thing. I was in like a frenzy for days ahead of time and I was worked up. Um, and uh, I'd made plans to go over there and and and I I got a case of beer and I called a friend of mine.

He got a young lady and we were going to have the house all to ourselves and I had great big plans and ideas. Got over there and I was having a good time. I was healthy.

I to the best of my recollection, I was happy and I drank and I went into what I now know was a blackout. I didn't know it at the time. I thought that everybody who drank had periods of times in their lives when they would lose track of what was going on, wouldn't remember at all.

And I thought that uh that was being drunk. But that day, I went into one during the day after just a few beers and in a good mood, I went into the bathroom and I slit my wrist. Now, it wasn't enough to get medical attention, but it was enough to get a lot of embarrassing attention.

The kind I was going to learn to get always. That's what I did on a good day when I was drinking. It got worse over the years.

when I I'm going to speed forward 14 years. Oh, one other thing just to to identify with and I think somebody here might might identify with this part. I'm old enough back when I if you possessed any type of drug back when I was a young man, it was a felony.

Everything. You couldn't you couldn't even have marijuana without it being a felony. And at the same summer that I started drinking, I heard about the best value in California narcotics, Benny's.

big fat doublec scored whites a dollar for 10 and they really worked. Nobody stepped on them. They didn't they just got you wired from the get and I'm and I arranged to have this purchase.

Um I didn't have the FBI follow me but I had the same kind of fear that Mark had. And I would I called what you would now refer to if I wanted to be real cool as a connection. And I made arrangements to buy $1 worth of bennies.

And I got in my Volkswagen and drove across town making fertive moves and maneuvers to evade anybody who was I had become convinced somebody in law enforcement had gotten word of the purchase. Uh, and I got over there and this guy known for years, but he was like big and stupid like and and um and as paranoid as me came sneaking I had to go over to the 76 station and at night he comes sneaking out of the back and he runs over and looks all around too cuz he too thought we were under surveillance and he said I couldn't get him but I got you something else. And he gave me a little tiny aluminum foil packet and he lurked off into the dark and there was a problem.

Yeah, I drove off. Thought I thought I'd been made. Head down some streets.

Finally pulled over. And he told me when he when he gave it to me, he said, "Couldn't get the Benny's, but I got you this. It's called methadrine." Now, it's the grandfather of methamphetamine.

Um, and I opened up the packet and it wasn't pills. It was just a little bit of powder, little brownish white powder. And I'd forgotten to ask him what to do with it.

True story. And I sat through that night and I put a little on my tongue and uh I waited. It was bitter.

It was nasty. Waited four or five minutes, nothing. Put it all in my mouth.

And we had a rule in my house because my mother was so scared about drinking and had seen so much trouble with it that no matter what time my curfew was, I would get home. No matter what condition I was in, I would get home. If I'd been beaten up, I'd be there.

If I'd been in trouble with the police, I would somehow try to get out of it and get home. uh if I rolled my car, all things that really happened, I would get home near time, sometimes early when I would get real drunk. I would get home a little too early.

And I did that night, too, after ingesting this little powder. And my father happened to be accidentally home that night. He was usually at the club.

I was a teenager, remember? And they'd wanted to talk to me for quite some time. And that night I felt like talking and we began a discourse.

They went to bed. And I experienced that night something I was going to love was being up late all night when good people were asleep. I don't know what it was.

It was like an evil thing, a real naughty thing to do. I wasn't doing anything. It was just up chewing my mouth raw and up.

And I remember the night very clearly. I I cleaned the house that night and I wasn't a reader. I never could read.

I didn't have the patience to sit still and read, but I was fascined to read it. I even read the legal notices. It was like, "Oh my god." and sister.

I wanted to share uh the information that I uncovered that night and when they got up the morning I resumed the conversation and by afternoon um they hated me. They they didn't want to know any more about me at all. I was just kind of tired and I used speed in one form or another until I got sober.

And the reason I bring it up is this. I never minded being an alcoholic. I took a certain sick pride in it.

If I was in a bar somewhere and especially if a young lady said to me, "You drink too much." I thought that meant I really like you. Uh because the women I hung around with seemed to like that. They liked it until we were together for very long, but they initially it seemed to be like a magnet.

You're a bad drinker. You're you're bad. Yes, I am.

So, I never mind and I I took no offense to being an alcoholic. I took a certain pride in it because the people who I knew that were alcoholic and that used and ran and did the things that I liked all drank badly. I felt sorry for people who didn't.

I had a genuine sorrow inside of me for people who didn't behave badly. It it was a real warped sense of things by by then. It never bothered me to be alcoholic until I came to Alcoholics Anonymous.

And when I got here, I realized no matter how you were going to try to hide it, even if you said just don't drink one day at a time, if I said I was alcoholic, somebody was going to say, "Well, just don't drink." And I don't care if you try to hide it under the guise of one day at a time or not, you're going to say it every day, aren't you? And so, uh, I wasn't sure anymore if I was really that alcoholic. And one time when I was real new and I was at a meeting and Clint Hodes was speaking and he got up and he said, "You know, our program doesn't say that uh we're alcoholic." Said, "Our step says we're powerless over alcohol.

Ask yourself how well you drank when you drank and it was always badly. There was almost always some kind of ugly scene. Sometimes it was the actual physical kind of violence.

Some often times it was just the meanness and the pettiness. And I got I became one of those kind of drunks who made everybody around me miserable because I was so miserable. I picked I made fun of my wife's clothes and her weight.

I tormented the children for what I thought were good reasons. Trying to make them behave, trying to make them do better. But I was so desperately unhappy.

And life just seemed to I'd gotten just about everything I wanted in life. And I was absolutely miserable. Now we'll speed forward.

It's 1979, the end of the year, and I was living what you all describe as pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization. I knew exactly what it was. The thought of suicide was on my mind all the time.

I was on my second marriage. I had a pretty wife. I had a young baby daughter who was just a few months old.

And I couldn't think of anything except myself and how unhappy and miserable I was. Everything seemed horrible to me. Nothing made me happy anymore.

Not the chasing and the and I wasn't, as you might be able to tell, a good father or or a husband, you know. I'm the kind of person that only has morals when it's convenient for me, you know, and if they get in the way of my pleasure, it's not convenient. And I was behaving and living that way, and I couldn't figure out why I felt so bad.

And something real strange happened in our house. I was getting ready to leave. I was going to leave her, too.

It was my second marriage. I'd already left a wife and two little girls. And I was getting ready to leave this one.

And things changed at home. I could be gone all night long and come home in a bitter, ugly mood in the morning with a good lie to make up as to where I'd been. And there was this eerie silence.

There's one thing I cannot stand, and that's to be ignored. I I can fight. I can I can I can lie.

I can do lots of stuff, but good God, please don't ignore me. What I didn't know at the time was my then wife had gone to Alanon and she picked up on the concept of detachment or release. She forgot the love part, but she picked up on everything else.

I can't say as I blame her. I was in no great shakes and things got real miserable for me and and and a lot of things happened that brought me where I am tonight. And they happened quickly when they started to happen.

It was like an avalanche of of of of events that seemed so odd and so strange it made no sense. You know, I suffer from something else. I'm almost always convinced that whatever event is occurring in my life is the wrong one.

If it's a decision to be made, I'm convinced it's wrong. If it's uh something that was just given to me, I'll give you a current example. We checked in yesterday and I asked the I asked the girl first of all could if I could get a room here and um she wasn't sure but after a few minutes decided we could selected which side of the building I wanted a room on so I could have a view of the of the bay the so she gave it to me and then I saw the other view I don't want to say I'm a baby but I wanted somebody to switch rooms with me last Anyway, I had these things going on and and and I got went on this particularly bad drunk and I came home and my wife said to me, she said, "You know what?

I still love you, but uh I can't live like this anymore." Now, when it was my idea to leave, I thought it had been a real good idea. When it was hers, I wasn't so sure. And and I made a couple of silly promises.

First thing I did is I went to my first AA meeting. And let me just describe it to you because sometimes I hear people tell opposite experiences and I realize they're both true, both ends of the spectrum. But here was mine and this is real.

I went to a meeting in uh in Riverside at a little hospital. Um it turns out now I realize it was a participation meeting where a man sat up at a little table with a gavvel and would strike it and then point at somebody and have them share it. Well, when I went in, I sat along the wall with some other guys who looked just as pissed off as I was.

some real angry people and and luckily none of us spoke to each other. I get scared if people speak to me and so I sat along the wall with them and I was just buzzed enough that they didn't and I didn't. And I experienced then what I often experience simultaneous conflicting emotions.

As soon as he would hit the gavvel, I was terrified that he was going to call on me. And so I would do things like close my eyes, pretend to be asleep, drink coffee, whatever I could not to get called on. And then as soon as he didn't call on me, my feelings were hurt.

I I wouldn't have said anything had he called me, but it was just irritated me to no end that he didn't even try. And and then they did what would honest to God would have kept me out of AA had I known you did it. Of course, they stood up and held hands.

I was mortified. I was beyond embarrassed. I felt dirty, violated.

It was like, "Oh my god, it was it was so sad." Uh, I remember a counselor one time had told me to try Alcoholics Anonymous. Her name was Mary. And Mary, I liked seeing Mary.

I'd go see her when I was drunk. And um, Mary had a light on in her office and it was always peaceful. It was the exact opposite of my life.

I would go there and I would have this whirlwind of stuff. I'm getting a divorce. I've lost a job.

I got all the catastrophes are going on in my life. And I go in there and she was always just quiet, just very peaceful and quiet. A little light on.

I liked it on the desk. And I and I I I I arrived there one night after staying at a bachelor party all night and um and I was still drunk. I was drinking beer on the way over and I came in and Mary said, "Why don't you go to Alcoholics Anonymous?" Said, "Alcoholics Anonymous?

What is it? What do you do?" And she said, "Well, it's really hard to explain. We drink coffee out of styrofoam cups and we just laugh, laugh, laugh." I thought, "How sad." And it was like sincere sad.

It almost brought a tear to me. I thought, "That is so sad. that an adult would think that's fun.

I mean, it was embarrassing. I felt sorry for her and uh and the only thing I'd ever known about AA was our folks had taken my brother and I to see Days of Wine and Roses when we were kids. I felt sorry for Jack Lemon.

I mean, I just I feel sorry for people all the time unless they annoy me, which is most of the time. And so anyway, I came back from that first meeting and my wife was hopeful and she said, "What'd you think of it?" And I told her the truth. I hated it.

I mean, it was it was worth I picked up on any of the really crummy stories and people people's bad behavior and explained it to her to to convince her I shouldn't I didn't belong in AA and and I made this promise. I said, "Listen, if I don't drink for 30 days, will you just leave me alone and never ever suggest Alcoholics Anonymous again?" And she agreed. Now, of course, that never happened.

But I'm going to skip forward three years. I was in an AA meeting. It's a true story in Riverside.

One night, a man got up and got like his first year birthday cake. He senses died. And he got up and he talked about going to his first meeting and having the exact same negative feelings and experiences about Alcoholics Anonymous.

And he said that he went home and his wife asked him how was it. And he was a very smart, clever man because he explained to her that it was wonderful, that he thought it would help them, that he thought it could help him personally and them as a family. And he explained there was only one problem with it.

That it was full. There was no room. He He didn't stop there either, which is what I even applaud him more.

He said, "I'm on a waiting list. And they told me to tell you that if I drink while I'm on the waiting list, you can't get mad. That they're going to call when there's an opening.

I worshiped him. I was irritated. I was sober 3 years cuz I would have used it.

Whenever I speak, I pass that along to whoever needs the story for home. And I'll tell you why it doesn't bother me to do it. Because on May the 30th, 1980, I was gone away from my house again at the cantina where I drank one more night.

And one more night, I'd run into some young lady that I can't remember her name. And one more night, I woke up at somebody else's house. And I was I remember I woke up that morning and it was gray and it was ugly and I was as sad and miserable and suicide was eating at me again.

And the hangover was just as bad as if it had been for 14 years. I never got over hangovers. I had terrible, violent, sickening hangovers.

And I woke up and there was animal hair on me. And I remember thinking, I know I was lonely, but God, please no. Not.

Luckily, it turned out it was a cat slept on my chest and I was heading nowhere. I mean, I was supposed to go home, but I stopped at the Circle K and I bought two tall cans of Kors. I also went to Del Taco and got a chocolate milkshake and took a black beauty to try to help ease the pain.

And I was nursing one of the beers and got just enough of a buzz that I went over to that hospital that had been at that meeting six or eight weeks before and drunk enough because it bro rose my raised my blood alcohol level sufficiently. I guess I had the courage to go in there and sign myself into the hospital to their chemical dependency unit. But in about 30 minutes I real and I by the way just for the record I hid the other beer in the bushes outside for later that afternoon.

In about 30 minutes, I realized that was stupid, that I'd overreacted and one more time made a bad decision. Again, never recognizing what's good for me. And I started to leave.

And I was walking out the door when this large imposing figure was coming through the sunlight as the big wide back doors opened up. And it was a man named Jimbo. Jim H.

And Jimbo and I had worked together years before as probation officers. Uh I accidentally got in that career. I didn't know it was law enforcement.

And uh I swear to God. Uh but it was a good source for some things occasionally. I I I will say no more.

And uh although I did have power to search and the last time I'd seen Jimbo had been one night about 16 or 17 months prior to this date I'm telling you about when he and I at the last moment in a bar in Riverside decided to go to Las Vegas. Seemed like a good idea at the time. We got some benny's and he got some vodka and beer and we were laughing and singing all the way up until we hit bars stole.

You know, the fun starts to wear off in the middle of the night. And Jimbo was the worst alcoholic I'd ever known in my life. Everybody knew it at work.

In fact, he got fired from the probation jobs. The only person I know that they medically retired for alcoholism from that county. We all knew he was a bad drunk.

And that night, he was worse than usual. And somewhere out there in the middle of the desert, he mistook me from for one of his ex-wives. And uh luckily he was too drunk to get out of his seat belt.

But I pulled into Baker, California, very nice town, to help get him sober and we went into the Bun Boy where Jimbo promptly fell over a table drawing the attention of the deputy sheriff sitting in the corner. I cleverly waited five or 10 minutes, packed him into the car and drove down the street and was arrested and uh blamed Jim for that. I went to jail.

They towed my car. The last I the only satisfaction I got that night was I saw him crawling off. They made him crawl away and uh that made me kind of happy.

I'd warned him not to tell anybody. He called my wife and work and we had never spoken since I got arrested. May the 30th, 1980, as I'm making my escape from the hospital, his big heavy arm comes and he puts it around me and he gently turned me back and he said, "You know what?

It's going to be okay." He said, "I've been sober. You're going to be all right." And here's what he told me a few days later when I got sober or at least I got dried out. He didn't live in Riverside.

He was driving through town on his motorcycle when he says he had a compelling urge to call my house to see if I was okay. and he got off and he went to a pay phone because there were no cell phones then and he called the house and um my wife had just received a call from the hospital and he thought he better go over there and see if I was all right and he turned me back. Now I heard you all talk about God and having things happen in your life and I remember thinking at the time was that God after a few minutes realized it couldn't have been that it had that it had to be coincidence.

And I started to see later on as time passed a pattern of those kind of events happening that I have a choice about how I decide what they are for me. And let me tell you about a couple of the other major ones that were early and were necessary for me. I was a terrible patient in there.

I didn't want sobriety. I feel uncomfortable in crowds. I don't like to mingle with people.

I'm not real good at that kind of thing. I didn't like it at all. And I didn't want to get sober.

And every Sunday night, they would have the hospital institutions panel come in and speak to us. They'd say, "The H&I panel's here now." And it was always one guy, which used to annoy me. And I would point out to everybody, "That's not a panel.

That's one person." They would make us turn off the TV and go listen to the panel talk, and it would just drive me crazy. And it seemed to me, and I don't know if it's true or not, but it seemed to me it was the same guy every Sunday night. I don't know if middle-aged AA men all look alike after a while or if that was true, but I'm sitting in there with the panel on this particular Sunday and I'm thinking about getting out and and I met some some women in a had some plans and uh I was daydreaming about all that when my mind accidentally got quiet.

I try not to let that happen too often, but it did that night. And the little guy says, "Hey, you want to know what I found in Alcoholics Anonymous?" I thought, "No, I don't want to know what you found. And you know how a people sometimes repeat things twice if they think it's kind of cute or clever?

He said, "Uh, you want to know what I found in Alcoholics Anonymous?" Thought, "No, I really didn't like him at all." I said, "God damn it, no, I don't want to know." And uh cuz I knew what it was going to be. I'd been to 3 weeks worth of meetings. It was going to It was fellowship, love, God.

I didn't care. And he said, "Well, I'll tell you." And I thought, "Oh, man." And I like I couldn't not listen. He said, "I'll tell you what I found.

I found a higher degree of mental comfortableness." Said, "I have peace of mind." And he stunned me for a few minutes into quietness. And I looked at him and he explained some little details of his life that impressed me so much they still touch my heart. He said he was a butcher and he was going to go home and he was going to fix a sandwich and put it in his lunch pail for work the next day after he left us.

And he was going to sleep in a bed with clean sheets with a wife that he actually liked and loved. That in the morning he was going to get up, have breakfast with his family, go to work, give him eight hours of work for eight hours of pay, come home and have dinner with with his wife and kids because he liked spending time with them. go to a meeting and smoke cigarettes and drink coffee and he had a good life and he just impressed the hell out of me.

All my buddies at the cantina were waiting for me to get out. We were big shots. We were driving our Mercedes and other cars.

I had I owned a lot of property. I was just so cool. But nobody had what he had.

None of my friends had it. He had what you all have. Those of you who've been here and worked the steps, he had serenity.

He somehow had found the gift that I heard you talk about so much and that is a belief and a higher power that allows you to trust that maybe something really takes care of the details of your life. He stunned me and I went back to my room and I started to read the big book Alcoholics Anonymous. It was the first time I'd ever read it and to this day I read it again this morning.

It always talks about peace of mind and a quiet heart and a way to live and how to address the kind of emotional problems people like me have. And I'm a mess. I relate so well to to to you and when you talk about your feelings and your active minds.

Dr. Paul's little phrase about having a magnifying mind when he looks at a problem. I was fortunate in several ways to all all again all these events happening within a matter of days of each other or weeks.

I got a sponsor and I'll tell you why I picked the man I picked. At the time I picked a guy named Don Hopes and he drove a big Lincoln and he had big cufflinks which were ugly but impressed me. Smoked cigars and I thought he was rich and I wasn't doing too well financially and I thought maybe he could help me with some connections and I asked him to sponsor me.

I didn't know that that year he was going to have his car repoed and his house foreclosed on but But he was perfect for me. He had moved to Riverside a short time before and he'd come out of the Pacific Group out of West Los Angeles. And he believed in unbelievable discipline.

Now, had I known that, I would have never asked him to sponsor me because I preferred to sit in the back like some of the people that I was sitting near last night at the meeting and talk and visit and carry on and pay no attention. And he started me taking actions better than the way I think and feel. He made me take actions.

And he never yelled really. He just made me. I don't know how to explain it.

And and I'll tell you some of the things real quickly. I felt so uncomfortable in AA. I felt so out of place.

He would say to me, "I want you to go around and meet five people you don't know." And I would be terrorized to go do that. I'd walk over and I would uh just be sick to my stomach. And I'd try to find five of you all at once and do it real quickly and then sit down and then spend the rest of the meeting wondering how I looked.

How did I behave? And I would tattle a lot on people. My feelings were always hurt.

Um, that may not be past tense. Uh, and I would tattle a lot, especially he would I would I would notice who didn't put away their chair, for instance, important. And I would go up and said, "Don, you know, I just saw someone and who never puts away a chair." He go, "God damn it." He said, "Go over there and uh, I want you to meet 10 people you don't know tonight." Meet 10 people.

And then one night he was up front. He was talking to his buddies and I was sure they were planning some kind of aa get together without me. And uh I went up and I said, "Could I just tell you something for a minute?" And I don't remember who I tattled on or what it was, but I I tried to do it quietly cuz I didn't want to be embarrassed.

I said, "Don," you know, and I told him and he screamed much to my mortification. He said, "God damn it." He said, "Put your keys on this seat and come here." And he stood me at the front door of our Castle Blanka meeting, my home group. And he said, "You're so sick.

I want you to meet everybody who comes in here. and Angie knows back even in those days we had 150 people coming. We didn't have greeters yet.

I was the first, you know, and most people don't mind. You say, "I'm Mike. I'm Alic." People were kind, say hi.

Glad to meet you. That was the majority. Some people I still remember one guy named Bob.

Not that I carry resentments or hurts for very long. Said, "Hi, I'm Mike." He said, "So what?" how that did it. I have watched Bob for almost 22 years.

Show him. So what? And um and I was standing at the door and I was there a couple weeks later and Don grabs this other new guy and he puts him over next to me and he says, "You're so sick.

Stand here with him and meet everybody." And I looked at the guy and I thought, "You are sick." And I explained to him the value of standing at the door and shaking hands. Somehow I had thought of it. He made me get involved in AA and I had to have commitments at all the meetings and I had to arrive early help.

I couldn't just sit I couldn't be a spectator. I had to sit in the same seat. I still sit in that same seat all these years later.

I had to take those kind of actions. There were many many more. But you know the funny thing that happened to me was all of a sudden I became a part of of that group.

I was 18 months sober and they had an election for Secretary of Casablanca and I got nominated. And back in those days, they ask the candidates to get up and give a little talk about themselves. And the guy gets up and it was he gets up and he says, "You know, I was I don't know what he was, GSR, delegate or something.

I was something new." And he was and I sponsor like most of the men in the room. Hi everybody. And I I work with the poor.

I'm a good man. I love my wife. And I don't know.

And he sat down. They called some lady up who was nominated. And I mean, she was like a saint of some kind.

I'm going, "Oh, God. She'd been everything and and held every position there is in AA. They turned to me and goes, "Look, are you talking about you?" Been sober 18 months and I'm the trash man at Casablanca.

I got elected secretary that night. And I was secretary there for a year and then I accidentally went by the Saturday night meeting. I didn't go to that one regularly.

Was in the same building, speaker meeting. They had an election. I got there election night one night.

I wasn't paying attention. I got elected secretary there. I called Don.

I said, "I'm going to quit." And he said, "Uh, no, you're not." He said, "You must have some there must be some reason for you to be there." And he made me take that. So, for two years back to back, I had to be involved getting speakers and doing this stuff. And I'm really grateful for that.

Let me tell you about things at home and at work, too. Before I finish up, home was obviously difficult. We had that young baby.

In my first year of sobriety, my two daughters from my first marriage came to live with us and she had a son and things were crazy. She went to Alanon for the first six or eight months and then once I started to go to meetings, she backed off and um and I'm not putting anything on her. She just didn't at that time see the need for it.

Things were still though better at home than they had been. But I've been sober about 90 days one day and she said to me, "You know what? I think I liked you better drunk than I do sober.

So I told Don, you know, she likes me better drunk than sober. And he said, you know, I want you to go home and I want you to get a little little card says I love you and put it on her pillow. I said, you want me to lie, Don?

He said, it's not a lie for you. You don't know how you feel. Just go do it.

And he said, he said, "Her reaction to you is none of your business. If she tells you she loves you back, great. If she tells you to go to hell, just shut up." And uh and I did it.

And then she did something else equally bad. Soon after, and I told again, and he said, "I want you to get her some flowers." And and not a big expensive bouquet either. He said, "Just don't try to be a big shot.

just go buy some simple flowers and put them where she does her makeup with a little card says I love you. And again, same thing. However she responds is none of your business.

And I did that. And then one night we were getting ready to go to a meeting in Los Angeles and she said, "Where are you going now?" And I said, "Well, Don's going to speak in LA. I'm going there." And she said, "You know, I don't think I like him." Now, he had told me I had to stay put my first year.

I couldn't make any major changes. Couldn't leave home. Couldn't change jobs.

All the plans I'd had. and um told me I had to act like a married man. I mean things areas we weren't I didn't didn't want to discuss.

And uh and so on the way to LA I said, "You know, guess what?" And he said, "What?" I said, "She don't like you either." And he told me that night, he said, "I want you to get up in the morning and fix her a cup of coffee." I said, "Well, she's so lazy she's not up when I get up." She wasn't lazy, but I I tried to exaggerate to make my point. And he said, "Then make the coffee and cover it with aluminum foil and put it on the side of the bed for her." And I remember doing it those first, he made me do it every day. I remember doing it those first days.

And it was like my manhood was gone. I wasn't maverick anymore. Uh I was this confused, miserable human being.

And I put it on the side of the bed every day. And then one day I got up and as I've told many of you, there was coffee on the side of the bed for me. And so the message is real simple.

If you want somebody to do it for you, all you have to do is get up every day and do it first for 2 years. The real message of course was as long as I took actions better than the way I was thinking, things held together well for us. And they did.

And I got to experience something that was truly unbelievable for me. I got to be a father and I loved being a father. I loved being a father and especially with my little my littlest one.

and we got to spend lots of time together and I enjoyed it and I got to live at home and I'll tell you many of you know it I went through a divorce at 12 years sober because of my own actions my own negative actions and it was horribly painful and in case I forget when I came in here with all the problems that I had as a newcomer and you all told me there was a loving kind considerate God who would help me through those things. I didn't know if it was true or not, but I had to start to learn to act as if. Because the only way I ever know if I can trust God is to try.

The only way I can ever know if I can really let go or abandon myself absolutely about a problem is to try it after I've usually exhausted every other means. But I I went through that that period of time. And the lesson in that for me is this.

It doesn't seem to matter how long I've been sober. It's the same God. The same kind for and and the reason I say that is this.

If you're going through something bad for you tonight, even if you created it, you don't have to drink and you don't have to use and things do get better just like they did always. It's me that forgets that. I was fortunate because Don took me to hear Chuck see a lot when I was new and I became fascinated with listening to him and going around and I even got to spend a little bit of time with him.

I didn't realize what a big shot he was or I would have never spent the time with him. Um but at the time I didn't know and I just so desperately wanted to be okay. The idea that maybe there was a higher power who took care of my life was something tremendous for me.

And and and Chuck C would come out and he would say things like, "I came out here to tell you monkeys two things. Quit thinking and surrender. I don't know how to quit thinking.

I don't know how to I'd quit thinking if I could. Don't you know? I mean, I don't want to think like this.

Do you know what torture it is to live in this brain for God's sakes? I mean, to be offended by everything to uh to always realize you just made the wrong choice to to try to outthink and outperform everybody. It's, you know, it's hard.

And I would listen and I would try and I would practice and and I remember the first time I heard him. Chuck was up speaking in San Bernardino and he came in and the room got real quiet and it was real smoky. It was kind of cool in there.

It was like a bar in a lot of ways. And he came in and I said they said there he is. And he said, "Who?" And he said, "That's him." And he came in.

He looked nice and he and Chucky was speaking and he got up and he said, "You know what? I know who you are even if you don't." And I said to Don, "Who are we?" Said, "Shut up. Will you just be quiet and listen to me?" And later on, Chuck had said, "We were all God's kids." And it was a concept that was difficult for me to accept for me.

I wanted to believe it, but I just couldn't believe it. And a series of events now have convinced me over the years that I've been here that it's true, even when it doesn't seem like it. Maybe especially.

Chuck also used to talk about, remember he said he had a picture of a man on his desk with a long beard with that caption under it that I believe actually comes from Mark Twain that says, "I'm an old man who's had many problems, most of which have never happened." That's the experience in my life. I worry about the things since I've gotten sober and nothing terrible has happened to me in spite of myself. Not really.

It just feels like it sometimes. The work area was a a terrible, terrible situation for me that first year cuz he told me I couldn't change jobs. And then I was selling real estate and I was scared and I couldn't sell and I lost everything.

Just about everything. I sold the car. I had to I sold the properties I had to pay off bills and to do things.

And then I owed the IRS and I set up a payment plan with them and I made my payments every month just like that little butcher talked about cleaning up his act. Like a guy named John Haley. I heard John Haley speak years ago and he talked about the fact he was a priest, an ex- priest who borrowed money from everybody and he owed so much he could never pay it back and his sponsor told him to set up a payment plan of like 50 cents a month to some people but to make sure he did it every month.

And Don had me do those kind of things and I would set up my little payment plans and I would send things in and you know all that stuff goes away after time if you don't create too much more. it all it all goes away and I but work was bad and I and at the end of the year I started applying for jobs again and I and I applied for all these big shot jobs and I couldn't get one. I mean, nobody was I wasn't qualified for one, but but I'd read about them in the LA Times and apply anyway.

And uh would then be have hurt feelings again. And and um the only job I could get was being a probation officer. And this time it was in Orange County and it was working with gang kids in a little area in Fullerton called Tokerstown.

And um in my first day of work, I got there and before I'd been when I was a probation officer, I'd worked with adults and this day they hired two probation officers for Orange County. The other guy had worked with kids and I'd worked with adults and there were two positions open, one in each area. And the chief called us in and he looked at me and he says, "I want you to work with the kids here." And I thought, "You're no I don't want to." I mean, I didn't say it, of course.

I just smiled and thought, "I'm going home. as soon as I leave your office, I'm getting my car and I'm going home and um I called Don. He said, "You know, people like you are quitters." He said, "Nobody cares what you think about the job for God's sakes." He said, "You're not you're going to stay there one year." It was like a death sentence.

I remember. And he said, "You're not going to make any change. You're just going to stay put and go to work.

Give them eight hours of work for eight hours of pay, and they don't care what you think. Just go there and do whatever they tell you to do." And some of those days were terribly hard. I remember days when I would just be cringing inside or dying and tense and worried.

And he would tell me, "You've got to go do something for somebody and not get found out about it. Get up off your ass, off your desk, and go do something." And I'd go around, I'd find somebody's ashtray in the break room and clean it real quick and then run back to my desk. I mean, I'd read the big book.

I would do anything just to try to hang on. And um and a series of things happened there, too, that that started showing that tapestry of the way God takes care of somebody like me. What I didn't know was the territory they gave me was also around a law school.

The other one wasn't. It was at the beach where I wanted to live. But this one was around a law school.

Now, I tried law school twice. Same law school both times. It was next to the bar I drank at I went two weeks once and the other time I attended half a class.

And uh and I'd heard Clint again speak one time and I wanted to be what anybody was in AA who appeared happy. I didn't care what you did. If you were a housewife, I wanted to be a housewife.

It it didn't matter anymore. I just didn't want to feel bad. And and um I signed up for law school and I immediately knew I made a mistake and I called Don.

I said, "I hate it. I don't want to go to school. I want to be with you and AAM agent." He said, "You know what?

People like you are quitters. You start all the time. You don't finish anything." He said, "Nobody be cares whether you become a lawyer or not.

Can you finish a class for God's sakes?" Thought no, I can't finish a class. And but I finished it. And not to drag this out too long, that would happen from semester to semester and I would complain and he would say just finish this semester and we don't care at the end uh what happens and I finished law school and then I and then some choices had to come because by then I was working for the Santa Fe Railroad.

I was their employee assistance counselor. As a result of having been a probation officer, they asked me to come to work for them. Something I would have wanted.

I worked with people who had drug and alcohol problems in California and in uh Arizona and uh New Mexico and it was a great job. I loved working for the railroad and working with people who had our problem. And when you take the bar in California, you have to wait several months to get the results.

And I was speaking at Hog Hospital in Newport Beach one night right after I took the bar and I was just kind of teasing but I said, you know, I know by now that God takes care of sobriety because he had taken away my obsession to drink when I asked him. And I said, 'I know he takes care of families because things in my family life are really good. And I teasingly said, does he take care of the bar exam?

And there are a lot of lawyers in AA down there, I guess, because after the meeting, several of them came up and said, "Yeah, he does. Don't worry about it." And I got to experience from that what I get to experience every time I'm faced with some what I perceive to be a dilemma. And that's this.

As it got closer to the date, I got afraid. So what if I become a lawyer? What if I pass the bar?

I'll have to leave my job. What if I don't? You'll look stupid.

And and I agonized and went back and forth. And I had to have happen to me what often has to happen, and that's to surrender because at some point it became okay for me inside no matter which way it went. And I remember when it happened that day.

It was a real freedom. It didn't matter. And I on my 6th day birthday on May the 30th, 1986, in the mail came the results of of the bar and I passed and I became a lawyer.

Now, being a lawyer doesn't make you happy, Joyce, and free. Um, you can look at this table over here and tell that. But I'll tell you, finishing something that I started made me feel pretty good.

I work as a district attorney today. Now, let me tell you something about that. I was always the one in trouble.

I was always the one who was being looked at by the teacher and going, "Oh my god." I was always the one having to explain my way out of a deal. I was always the one as a kid who stayed after school to get whipped every day. It seemed like I was.

But when I applied for the probation job in sobriety, when I applied to take the bar exam, and when I applied to be a district attorney, I told him the truth about me. I told him about my arrests, and I told him about my alcoholism and my drug use. So, you can't blackmail me, right?

I mean, it's a it was a done deal. And and it went down like this both times. When I did it in Orange County, I got a call one day from the medical examiner, a doctor, and she said, "Let me let me ask you something." and she said, "I'm look over looking here at your health application.

You were hospitalized for alcohol and drug addiction." I said, "Yeah." And she goes, "You got a couple minor arrests here for alcoholrelated things." She goes, "Are you an alcoholic?" I said, "No." I said, "Yes, I am." And and uh she said, "What do you do about it?" I said, "I go to AA." And she said, "Do you have a sponsor?" And I told her, we went through a few questions. She said, "You know what? Welcome to Orange County.

We like to have people like you. You're good employees. We're glad you're here.

When I applied to the DA's office, I got a call from the guy doing my background and he called me in and shut this little metal door one day. He said, "I'd like to talk to you." I thought, "Oh, God. I bet." Uh, and he said, "We're looking at this." He said, "Are you sober?" And I said, "Well, yeah, I am." And I, you know, I've been sober seven years then.

7 years. And he asked me, "What do you do about it?" And I told him, and he said, "You know, my dad's been sober 25 years." And hey, I'm glad you're here. I'll clear you.

We want people like you. Now, I found this out to be true for me. The best things in my life have always come to me when I wasn't trying to make them happen.

All of the good gifts I've ever gotten in sobriety have come to me out of nowhere. Now, that doesn't mean I can't make things happen, because I still can. But they don't seem to have the same quality to them.

If I'm asking God every day for knowledge of his will for me and the power to carry that out, if I really mean it, then the events shouldn't be that important. But they always will be because I'm human. And Don used to have to say to me over and over again, you know, there are no big deals today because everything to somebody like me feels like a big deal.

The wrong view in a hotel is catastrophic for somebody like me. You taught me how to be an employee. I go to work and I would I'm a shy man by nature.

I took Fs in classes if we had to take a speech. I mean, I would finish a whole semester and at the end they would say instead of a written test, we have an oral presentation for 10 minutes. I would take the F for the whole class cuz I couldn't stand to talk in front of people.

And I never wanted to be a trial lawyer. I wanted to be a business lawyer and do real estate and become real rich. That was my goal to help you.

And uh and through a series of things I went to work where I do and I do the big cases. I do I do the murder cases. I do capital cases.

I handle investigations where I get to see how people with my same rage and feelings act when there's nothing stopping them from killing. And it makes me sad sometimes to see it. And I never judge them for the for them.

I don't like what they do. But when I look at them and I hear them talk and I realize their people, I understand how in instincts gone astray could have easily put me there. I remember the night I chased my wife and kids with a knife and finally fell into the ivy and lost the knife and they made their escape.

I'd have killed him if I could have caught him. I wouldn't have drowned him, Mary Pearl. But I would have killed him in some way.

Um I uh I was violent and I was ugly and I I'd take those whites and drink that stuff and I would become enraged with anger. You know, God has been truly good to me. I was thinking of my life this morning.

I got up this morning and I joined that uh 5K, 10K deal here. And uh let me just tell you about that. If any of you were out there with me today, I was running In case you couldn't tell, I had done the 5K when I came in and a guy congratulated me and said, "Hey, you just finished the 10K, huh?

That's how fast I am." Um, but but just a little footnote, you know, where why I started to run, not because I like it particularly, but I was at a convention one time and I heard Bobby Earl speaking and and I'd always had this little I don't know what to say. um strange feeling about Bob Earl and it was a Sunday morning meeting and I was kicking nicotine badly and uh and he got up and he talked and he gave one of the best AA talks I'd ever heard somebody give and he was talking about feelings and emotions and stuff and he then he talked about running and I'd hurt myself in the past and I couldn't and he said how he learned in AA you can do just about anything and he explained that he went to a specialist and they helped him with some shoes and he was able to run. That's not a big deal to you, but I'll tell you how it is for somebody like me who always wants to look good and do it best.

To be able to go out today with a bunch of people and just be a sloppy little runner who kind of plots along and finishes and feel okay about that is truly a long distance for me. I know this to the extent that I let go and surrender my life to God, my life seems to be just fine. But give me a few minutes to begin to think about it, to feel shortchanged and cheated.

And I'm a crazy man again. And I'm caught all up in trying to make it be the way I need it to be. I made a mistake a few months ago, and I hired a guy sponsoring another guy to remodel my kitchen.

I shared this the other night with some of you, and uh I hated them after a few days. They hated me. It was real pleasant at meetings.

We'd glare at each other. They would have to call me for sponsorship advice, which I was tempted to slant my direction every day. And every night I would come home and I would walk in and I would see some mistake and just go crazy.

I mean, just being in a frenzy about it. And I'm talking about things like a tile was off a quarter of an inch. I don't know.

I was I'm gifted with this perception of everything being crooked and um and I would complain and whine and about certain stuff. And that morning I was at work and and and and some things are real strange in in our life right now about work and some other stuff. I got in a death threat that day.

Um I some things were really bad and I was tense and I was worried and I was concerned and I got the big book out and I turned to Dr. Paul's story. Now, there's a portion of page 449 that I won't discuss here tonight that I have a little bit of trouble with, but there's other things on there that help me an awful lot.

And I was reading there and then I turned to the next page and he writes in there about how he had to lower his expectations because he was a perfectionist and he tried to make other people and himself be so perfect. I've read that a lot of times. It jumped off the page at me the other day and I'm starting in the house and I feel my tension up again and I'm worried and I'm concerned and I thought just lower your expectations.

And I went in and sure enough I saw where they dab some extra paint on a cabinet. The kind of thing that would normally make me suicidal and it was okay. Doesn't sound like much.

That's who your speaker is tonight. That's a big deal for somebody like me to be able to live in the world and not be tortured all the time by my own brain. I know this.

If I really let God run my life, it's fine if I really surrender. But it can't just be words. I have to work the steps.

And when I do that, I have a good life. Thanks 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.