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Source: Peter M – From Boca Raton, Florida – Date Unknown.mp3 File: peter-m-from-boca-raton-florida-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 00:49:56
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Introducing our speaker. A couple of years ago, we have a small conference that takes place here in Lexington called the We Have Recovered Big Book Workshop. And Peter was a guest speaker in that workshop for us. And he's somebody that really embodies what it is that I want. And when I first came to Alcoholics Anonymous, I couldn't have told you what it was and I couldn't even have recognized it. But I want to introduce somebody that really presents a genuine solution. Help me welcome Peter.
Good morning. My name is Peter. I'm a recovered alcoholic. I'm grateful to be alive and sober and part of a sacred place called Alcoholics Anonymous. And first things first, thanks Susan for waking me up to do this 9 o'clock meeting in a frozen tundra on a Saturday morning. Thank you, Susan. And thank the committee and Dave and the rest of you guys for being so kind to me since I arrived. You haven't heard me speak yet. We'll see how it is on the way out. A loving God separated me from alcohol on June 23, 1988, and I am a recovered alcoholic. And I say recovered because I am. Anything less than that would be falsely humble.
But a loving God took me from the scrap heap on June 23, 1988 to where I am this morning with you. Recovered from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body, and for that I'm very grateful. And that's why I suit up and show for fun and for free to shout to a newcomer or perhaps someone's around here a little while still struggling with bedevilments, still walking around with untreated alcoholism, trying to find God, searching for God, can't find it in Alcoholics Anonymous, and perhaps something that God will give me to share with you this morning might connect the dots for you. And that's why I'm here. I came to get and I stay to give, and that's been my purpose in life, to give away what was so freely given to me. My life consists of, on most days, being very present and very mindful and working with breath and having a life of invitation. That's how I got here, through an invitation.
I get invited into relatives' lives. I get invited into relationships. I get invited to Alcoholics Anonymous, and it keeps me away from me and you with the life of invitation. I surrender to my Heavenly Father and ask Him to carry out the vision of His will today and what relationships I'm supposed to have and how to have them today. It's a daily surrender and a constant breaking down of self. And I walk with the spirit of acceptance on most days, unhooked from this predator-caller thinking mind. And when I put all that together, it allows me to have a life of discipline. And in the discipline of the spiritual life, we experience a tremendous amount of freedom, as the road has already been paved and all I need to do is follow it. And I can't do that if I'm sound asleep. I need to be awake and present to this power called God that we find in Alcoholics Anonymous. So I'm very grateful to be here. The other thing I'd like to share, and I know I'm going to embarrass him, is to see one of my heroes, Gary, be here with his lovely wife, Julie. I met Gary a long time ago, and oh, about a couple of years ago, Gary started to sponsor me for a while and help me through some extremely difficult personal times. And he would listen to my tales of woe and read inventory to him, and he would just navigate me through that.
And one of the things that I remember speaking to you with was, I'm going to be okay, I don't know how, but just as reassurance from a guy like Gary that I'm going to be okay and thank the good Lord I'm okay. And it's always darkest before the dawn, as Bill says. So I want to thank you for that. And Julie, thank you for allowing me to call him all the time and bother you guys. So what a deal Alcoholics Anonymous is, huh? I've been through seven treatment centers before I got to Alcoholics Anonymous. I was homeless and panhandled at the hands of alcoholism. And I came to Alcoholics Anonymous and found out that the meetings don't treat alcoholism, that I removed the symptom of a greater problem, and I'm still just as sick as I was without a solution called God. And I was one of those guys who was making meetings and thought meeting makers make it, and I bottomed out almost six months into Alcoholics Anonymous, thought I was having a nervous breakdown, and I wanted to drink or take something to get me away from me because I couldn't find it in meetings anymore. And I said, maybe meeting makers don't make it. I don't know what's going on, but I'm chasing my tail constantly. And December 22nd, 1988, almost six months to the day of being sober, separated from alcohol, I was living in Minnesota, and I was driving a rent-a-wreck, and down I think Washington Avenue or Washington Boulevard, just driving, and I couldn't take it. The pain of living sober without a solution was that great. And I said, I'm going into the
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first bar, man. This is just not worth it. Who am I kidding? And the thinking mind was
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running the show again. That's where the main problem centers, in the mind, not the body. And the mind is not done with me because I walk into Alcoholics Anonymous or come to meetings. Wants me dead, will settle for me drunk, and it was working on me. I had kind of a sponsor in name only, and I was just doing the meeting thing. And I would drive by a bar and go to the next one and then go to the next one, and I says, God, I'm in a lot of trouble. Have you failed me once again? And I thought of this one gentleman who was kind of helping me, and I said, well, I'll take the highway. When I get off the highway, then I'll go into a bar or I'll go into a liquor store. And I saw a liquor store, and I said, well, I'll go to the next one. Next thing I know, I'm knocking on his door. And he opened up the door, and I gave him my tells of, oh, you know how newcomers are. You say hello, and that's the last thing you say for the next two hours, right?
Always got drama. We always get, even some of us around here, we always got drama, just lots of drama. I got drama. You got drama. Let's share drama. If we don't have drama, let's invent drama. Let's just get drama going, right? And when I came up for air, he says, he did one of these, and he says, Peter, where are you at God in the 12 steps? I says, when do you start the steps? He says, when you stop throwing up, you're late. And I wanted him to tell me make 90 meetings in 90 days and practice acceptance, right? That's not what he told me. He said I needed to get busy with the steps, and I began. And I didn't thank the good Lord Drake that day. And this man helped me for a couple of months, and I came back to where I was living at the time in Brooklyn, and my first appointed teacher showed up, and we began a journey through the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, which has been a life saver for me. It's the prescription. It's the magic bullet. Many times we hear there's no magic bullet for this illness. It's called the 12 steps. Now, the steps don't keep me sober. Did they take me to this power? That's going to keep me sober, which is keeping me sober all along through grace. And what I found out through, you know, forging this out and chopping wood and carrying water, is that my Heavenly Father is begging for a relationship with me. He's begging for a relationship with you. So I don't only pray to God, I pray with my God, and everything has changed. And I still am able to seek this power with the desperation of a drowning man. I still have a prayer life and a meditative life and a life of inventory and a sponsor I'm accountable to, and a bunch of men I sponsor, and I'm able to live in all three sides of our triangle. It's the only way I can stay current when we put all those things together. Intuitive thinking comes from being current.
I can't rely on, you know, being sober and spiritually fit on an experience I had 10 years ago. I remember my sponsor called me up at like 5.30 in the morning, and he used to call me money. He says, money, how are we doing today? I was hanging in there, and he read me the riot act for just saying hang in there. He says, what are you doing for your spiritual practice? I told him, let me ask you something. Did you eat today? He says, well, I had breakfast. Why did you eat today? Didn't you eat yesterday? I says, yeah. He says, well, what happens if you didn't eat today? I get hungry. And then what would happen?
I get sick and die. He's right. You need to get your soul food, your spiritual fitness every single day. So what's that look like? And he kind of set me straight on a lot of things. And I was very desperate to get well. And little by slowly, I'm here this morning to share what it was like, what happened, what it's like now. What I'm trying to be like today. No longer driven by a thinking mind, but moved by the spirit. And one of the things I always ask folks is, do you have a life that's a mind dominated life, living along the lines of human conscious where you pray to misery and depression, and we still think external conditions are going to fix what's wrong in here. I get her, I get the job, I get the money, I get the car, I get the house, whatever it might be. That stuff feels good for a short time, but little by slowly that stuff starts to get old. And sometimes they'll be removed. And what do I do if my sobriety is based on my external world? I'm in for a rude awakening, aren't I? Living in a world of impermanence, even people leave.
And I'm always looking to feel happy and relying my happiness is based on what's going on out there, rather than inner peace. And I can gain the world, lose my soul in a heartbeat. It all comes down to what my relationship with God looks like. Experientially, can I talk to you about that? Where am I currently with this power called God? And I got it all from you and Alcoholics Anonymous. Prior to getting to AA, I would go to my religious community. I'd have priests pray over me. My dad came home with like a vat of holy water one time and threw it on me, right? Like a scene out of The Exorcist, that didn't work.
They took me to shrinks, they took me to therapists, they tried throwing me out and taking me back in. And the only solution that appeared, that showed up for me in 1988 when I was in that place of desperation, the gift of desperation, was Alcoholics Anonymous. And it still blows
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my mind that God could have gave this to anyone, this message to get us recovered from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body, to bring us back to this power called God. He could have gave this to the greatest minds on the planet. He could have gave it to doctors and shrinks and scientists and so on and so forth. And he selected another drunk like me, because we can speak each other's language. And that's the great thing about Alcoholics Anonymous. I don't know most of you folks in this room, but over a cup of coffee, we'll quickly find out we know each other. Different parts of the country, different parts of the world. I was in Spain not too long ago doing one of these deals. Sit down with a cup of coffee and we knew each other. Completely different walks of life. But alcoholic is alcoholic and that's the great thing that God knew we needed to do. We speak each other's language. And our job with this message is not to come from a spiritual hilltop, but to get down into the trenches with another drunk, especially the new folks, because we know about remorse and guilt and embarrassment and degradation when you walk in here. Whether it's Park Avenue or Park Bench. And God gave it to us. And so I shout from the rooftops about this power called God. And I shout from the rooftops about God. And I shout from the rooftops about our 12 steps in the big book. I'm not going to hide it. And that's what we ought to be in AA, is a pep rally for the power of God and what God does for folks like us. Because I'm willing to lay ours from here to Vegas based on our track records. We're not supposed to be sitting here sipping coffee on a Saturday morning. I'm still out from last night wondering how to get home. Or calling someone to bail me out, right? So to tell you in a general way what it was like, what happened, what it's like now. My first drink came when I was 14 years old. I grew up in Brooklyn, New York, a place called Bentonhurst, Brooklyn, New York, where we thought The Godfather was an educational movie growing up. You know?
Don't require me for membership. There's a pinky ring, sunglasses, and gold jewelry. I mean, it was, you know. But my first drink was 14 years old. And I remember my first drunk very clearly. I remember who was there and what was going on. It was on the corner. And back in the day, in New York especially, back in the day you had to have a corner. Everyone belonged to a crew, a group of guys who hung out in the corner or in the schoolyard.
And that was your, you honored that. That was everything. We were like, you know, 14 and 15, rebels without a clue, relied on the elder statesman who was 17 for our life lessons. But this was it. In fact, if you were going off to like some Ivy League school in the fall, we felt really bad that you're going to leave all of this, right? My friends were drinking cold 45 beer one night. It was a Saturday night. And they were drinking beer and seemed to be joyous, happy, and free. They were roughhousing with each other, talking to the girls. There was music in the background. There was a feast going on. There was a lot of stuff happening. And they seemed to be having a great time. But there was something different going on within me. It was the chatter of a thousand voices. And none of them were good. Like, if you think about it, anyone drove over here alone this morning, just to show of hands, anyone drove over here alone this morning? Right. You're all lying to me.
And I'll tell you why. Because you really weren't alone. Because if you played a drive over here, how many people were you talking to and talking to on the way over here? Right? We got dialogue. I shouldn't go to this thing. Why not? I don't even like my sponsor. What am I going there for? I don't even like these people. They're always asking how I'm doing it. It's none of their business. Why am I going for it? I can't believe I'm still married to her. And when you get out of here, they're in the car saying, hey, it's late. What is this all about? Right? And they're constantly talking. And as a kid at 14, I mean, who do you talk to about that? Therapy wasn't popular back then. Everything was a secret. Nothing gets out of the house. And at 14 years old, it was spring, summertime of 1974. And January 23rd of 74, my mom took her life. She was one of us. Never found Alcoholics Anonymous.
Mom shrinks in medication. And after about 3 or 4 or 5 times, whatever it was, of trying to take her life, she finally succeeded. And that morning, I woke up to absolute terror. It took me years in here and years of seeking professional counseling to put that one to bed and resolve that. But that was one of the greatest pains I experienced. And I woke up to this. And my life completely changed. And by spring, summertime, I was the kid whose mom took her life. I was the kid with the secrets. I was the kid who walked into a classroom and everyone would mumble, that's the guy whose mom killed herself. So there's a lot of stuff going on with me. Between ages 8 and 10, I was, I had a distant relative who was very inappropriate with me.
I had a distant relative who was very inappropriate with me, let's put it that way, and I walked
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around feeling dirty on the inside, like I caused this. Questioned my manhood as I was growing up, how could I let this happen to me? Lord, I was eight or ten, between ages eight and ten. Mom, who's a drunk, falling down, cleaning her up, putting her to bed, finally commits suicide, by the time I show up to a corner, it's a difficult time. I had the voices tell me what a loser I was, if they only knew all about me, and I had a guy at home who was cunning, baffling, or powerful, I called him Dad. This guy made Tony Soprano look like Tinkerbell, you know, and I was very gun-shy around him. My mom got in the middle of all of that, and when she died, I was completely left standing raw, naked to the world. I had no idea what to do, and I knew quickly, there's no way I'm going to be able to grow up. There's no way I can do what teenagers do. I want to, it sounds great, but I can't do that, I'm Peter M.. I just don't, I'm not worth it. And when I hear adults talking about adult things, like careers, and buying homes, and things like that, and they were excited about it, it just sounds like fun, but it scared me to death.
I'm Peter M., there's no way I'm going to pull this one off. I've got to get out of here. Big mistake showing up. Then I put my hand in there, took a few pops off the court, and nothing happened. I thought my dad would drive around the corner and catch me drinking, because he warned me so many times about not hanging out with those bums on the corner. Don't bring any of those girls who drink with the guys on the corner to the house. I happen to like the girls who drink with the guys on the corner. And I drank a few more, and I drank and took a couple more, and took a couple more pops off that court, and then something indescribably wonderful happened to me. It was the first time in my life I was back in my skin. I felt a sense of ease and comfort. I liked the girls. They thought I was really good looking. As I got drunker, they got really pretty. What are you laughing at? I got my best suit on this morning. I got bigger and taller. I got beer muscles. I was like Al Pacino by the end of the night. It was a great thing. I loved the effect produced by alcohol. The other thing I remember was this. My dad scared me to death.
He looked me eyeball to eyeball, and I'd shake in my shoes. He was like that type A, alpha male, strong guy, good captain of a ship, a great kind of football coach kind of guy. There was no time for crying, no time for, you know, hugs. It was just do what you got to do, and I was scared to death of him. He loved me, but I couldn't see it back then. Mom's out of the way. I drank liquor. I drank cold 45 beer. I'm not thinking about my dad.
I start to realize I'm not such a loser. I feel pretty good about me right now. The girls are looking pretty. My friends are the greatest guys in the whole world. Everything was great. Bill says it best in his story. He says three words. I had arrived. I haven't met an alcoholic yet who does not identify with that statement. On the first drunk, we get rocketed out there. I have arrived. Everything's good right now. Just keep them coming. I had no idea. I stepped onto a road paved to hell called alcoholism. Who knows about a mental obsession phenomenon craving at 14? Spiritual malady, never heard of these terms. I just know more was my drink.
I love the effect produced by alcohol. It was not a problem for many years. It worked on the bedevilments. Just give me drink and I can function. What I have found out is this. I and many of us who are alkies don't do life well. We get a big F on the report card. We don't do life well. We need a drink just to get in the shower. I need a drink just to start my car. I just need a drink to breathe. I need a drink. Then I can do whatever you ask of me. But then the drink takes over and I'm not even showing up anymore. I don't do life well. And therefore I will never tell a newcomer or perhaps someone who comes to me who's struggling in AA to live life on life's terms. Who's doing the living? My thinking mind. What is my thinking mind want? Fear and a drink. Never live life on life's terms.
In fact, my big book tells me live life on God's terms. It's easy, simple and open. I can't do life well. In the center of all of this is fear. And what generates all my problems is a sense of separation from this power called God. I can never be literally separated from that power which we already are. But there's a feeling of separation between us and God. And the opposite of that is the solution which is a sense of a connection with God. At 14 there was no God at all. When my mom died I figured there is no God. I'm on my own here.
I got this guy called Dad. I can't even talk to this man. I drank. Everything was fine. I got rocketed to that place out there and I had arrived. I'm always puzzled that in we always talk about how much. Sorry. It's too early in the morning to be doing this.
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That's why. I need a drink. How we always talk about the phenomenon of cravings intensify never satisfied. More is the drink. More. Give me more. IV me Jack Daniels. Give me more. And we come into Alcoholics Anonymous and we hear in some of our meetings too much God. I've had enough God. I'm driving tonight. So enough God. Makes no sense. When more is what we're always after we come into Alcoholics Anonymous we always put a lid on God. I don't get it. But that night I drank. I loved the effect produced by alcohol. I got to a place out there that was indescribably wonderful. And I remember when the night was ending how I went into instant sobriety. I went into instant panic. My friends had to get home and I didn't want the party to end. I loved the effect produced by alcohol. It worked.
I remember the next morning getting up and going down to the park to play ball. And when I remember walking into the park and guys my shoulders were about this wide. I had a passage into manhood the night before. I got my stripes. But underneath that underlying all of that was I had a panacea for my ills. It was called Colt 45 beer. I can deal with the rest of the week. And on Saturday, next Saturday I'm going to get to that place out there that's indescribably wonderful. There's something radically wrong with a 14 year old figuring out how's he going to do the whole week. I've got to get through the week. I can understand adults with high pressure lives. How am I going to get through this week? At 14 why is that? But that's what I was facing. And I couldn't wait for following Saturday to drink. And I drank. And I got someplace out there that was a little bit different.
And I began to chase the drunk. And I started to experience consequences as a result of my drinking. I have two younger brothers who idolized me. They always looked up to me. Played the same music I did. Wore the same clothes I did. Loved the same sports teams I did. And they would follow me around. They weren't afraid of me. But as alcoholism does and start to infect people around us. That's why I just don't drink. Go to meetings as selfish and not alcoholic synonymous. Because what about the people we harmed on the way in here? My family was suffering from full blown alcoholism in 1988 when God separated me. But at the beginning my brothers started to become afraid of me. They were wondering who is this guy? And why is he cursing? Why is he getting sick? Why is he throwing up?
And then my dad would wonder what was going on with his oldest son. And then one morning I woke up and I needed money and I started to take things that didn't belong to me. Little pieces of jewelry. Go into the dresser drawer and find money. Go into my dad's bedroom and take money out of his parents pocket. Because I needed money to drink. Now I'm like 15 and 16 and I'm doing things like this. I'm already a thief because I knew I needed to drink.
I was experiencing a phenomenon called craving but I didn't know that's what it was. I just knew I liked to drink. When I wasn't drinking I needed to drink more. Now my thinking mind would never, the alcoholic mind would never tell me, hey you're starting to hurt people. Hey this is wrong. You need to do something about it. Why would an alcoholic mind for one minute give me a seat of compassion but I'm completely self-absorbed. It's all about me. Well he has enough. I can take a little bit. I would justify the inappropriate behavior and make it spiritual in my mind. One morning I woke up and I stole my dad's, from my dad's checkbook. I'll never forget this one. I saw he had a checkbook. A bunch of checks in there.
Lottery. How great is this? So I took a check and forged his name. I made out for like $20. I went down to the local store. They all knew my dad. I said my dad gave me this. Can you cash it for me? He said absolutely. Anything for you dad. In fact tell your dad. I said hi. Gave me $20. Bingo. He was a little puzzled when I went to the beer cabinet and took beer out and paid for it for $20. But I started to do this for a while. I was taking checks every day, every other day. I knew nothing about checking statements. That stuff came back. And then he came looking for me. And this is not the type of guy you want looking for you. And I was sitting in a car one day next to this young lady. I was in love. We got drunk the night before. She was my new wife. I was in love. And my dad drove up.
And typical daddy. He screamed my name. He throws down the cigarette. And this eyebrow goes all the way up. And that means you've got to run as fast as you can. He called my name and he walked across the street. And I was a man's man. And I told her honey that's my dad. You talk to him. I'm out of here. And I ran away. Notice when we're in trouble she becomes honey. And he caught me. And I went to my first treatment center. Now this was an interesting thing. Being in treatment not conceding to my innermost self that I
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was an alcoholic. Being in treatment didn't even think I had a problem. Didn't even know what alcoholism was. I went to treatment because my dad says you're going to treatment. And I figured I'd get out of trouble for a little while. And so I did the 28 day treatment center shuffle. And I talked about my dysfunctional family. My enablers. My triggers. My issues. I needed a drink on the way out of treatment more than I did on the way in. They would take us for physical therapy. This was a treat. We had at the time you had the crackheads.
You had the heroin guys. You had the pills. You had the drunks. And we're all in different cliques. And they take us detoxing for physical therapy. And it's a gymnasium about this big or so with two basket hoops on each side. And we had one basketball. And the basketball rolled from one end of the gym to the other. And this is what physical therapy sounded like. I'm not getting it. You get it. And as the ball bounced it kept rolling. The crackheads were going I'll get it. Don't worry about it. I'll get it. Don't worry about it. I'll get it. The potheads were going wow. And we went outside and had a cigarette. And that was physical therapy. And on the discharge day they had a girl meet me at the door. She says honey I'm coming home. Like I treated I did some bit in a prison. And bring a jug.
And they told me to go to meetings. And I never went to meetings. I inquired. But I cracked the seal. And the liquor went down. The phenomenon of craving took over again. Because I was in treatment or even an alcoholic synonymous being separated from alcohol there's little to do with getting recovered. I still have the same thinking minds I did out there. I'm just removed from the substance. I've been locked up a whole bunch of times when the judge let me loose. You don't want me to sponsor you. Believe me. So I get out of my first treatment center. I have this drink. And I go right back to the same vicious cycle.
I got a job as a dock worker and a longshoreman in South Brooklyn. Not the training ground for spiritual growth. Some very rough characters. Basically fed up with the day at sunrise. And there I am. And I learned how to hustle up right away and steal and do a lot of things I had to do. Because I needed drinking money. And I knew that. That was made abundantly clear to me. My paycheck is going nowhere. I'm going to need money. And so I learned how to make money. Illegally. And I made my second treatment center. I made my third and fourth and fifth treatment center. And I remember going into my fifth treatment center. And I had conceded to my innermost self. I didn't know it was conceding to my innermost self.
I just knew at a gut level I'm in serious trouble. I can't stop drinking. I want to stop drinking. I had gone past the wanting to want to stop. I really want to stop. My family is getting blown up by this. I couldn't really see to the extent to which I was hurting them. I just knew they were really angry with me. And my dad threw me out. And I go into this fifth treatment center. Conceding to my innermost self. I've got to do something about this. And I'm in this treatment center for nine weeks where I'm physically separated from alcohol. Discharge on a Saturday and drunk on Monday. And it was as if I never went to treatment. I was right back to the same thing again. And progression does what progression does. And my drinking was assuming more serious proportions and I could not stop.
And I wanted to. I had firm desires not to stop. I had powerful desires not to stop. I had consequences in front of me not to stop. Broken relationships, try to mend them. I need to stop and still kept drinking. That's powerless over alcohol. Why do we pick up a drink after being separated from alcohol? There's no phenomenon of craving. The body doesn't need the substance. But the thinking mind's not done. And meetings don't treat that, huh? Then what you all have is this one gentleman who sponsors me now. He's been telling me, he asked me a question one time. He says, where does it hurt? You know what I mean? He's thinking about where does it hurt. I had a whole bunch of them. I had a truckload of that stuff. We all got that thing that needs to get resolved by the hand of God which we'll find in the 12 steps. And prior to that, I'm going to pour alcohol on it. Because I operate out of the fear. I operate out of the hurt. I hear out of the fear and the hurt. I speak out of that. I interpret the whole world through that. And I'm never ever present. And the only solution I got is to pour booze on all of it and put it to bed. And that's been my experience. The hideous four horsemen weren't done because I spent nine weeks in treatment. They were waiting out the front door. I said, okay, he's out.
Let's go. I remember going to meetings blind drunk. Kind of remember being there. And I kind of remember people telling me, keep coming back. They never threw me out. I remember going to meetings sober. Listen to the speaker, criticizing the speaker, sharing from the floor for like six seconds. Criticizing the speaker, sharing from the floor, like six seconds sober, and going to
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get drunk. I will tell you this, in six treatment centers, before I got to my seventh and final treatment center, in six treatment centers over the course of a bunch of years, I managed two days of continuous sobriety on my own power, and that was after the fifth treatment center. I'm the type of drunk, if God forbid I got drunk this morning, I'd probably be in a dumpster tomorrow, suit and all, I'd just blow up.
So what do I do? There was a time I was dating this, I still don't know to this day why this young lady was dating me, but she was dating me, and we were living in this flea bag motel up above a nightclub, which wasn't really a swanky joint, and she was a barmaid, and I would just lay in bed. And bless her heart, she would come up every night, and crash out in bed, and was trying to fix me, I don't know why to this day, other than God, that this woman was with me.
Every once in a while, it'd be a knock at the door, and someone would come up, a little tray with a drink for me, I was drinking Jack Daniels at the time, it'd go down, I'd go down. And one morning, she came up, it was about 4 a.m., and she crashed out, and I went to her purse. I went into her pocketbook, because I knew she had a whole bunch of money in there from working all night, and I was going to take the money and run.
But what I discovered in her pocketbook was what was left of a bottle of pills, Valium at the time. And I said, there is a God after all. This is it. This is so great. And I remember swallowing what was left in there, and washing them down, and I got back into bed, and I waited to go to sleep, not to wake up anymore. I wanted to die. The courage to do battle, as Bill says in his story, was not there.
I wanted out. I'm done. I can't do this thing called life. I missed it. I'm not right for this, and I'll just go away. And as I got back into bed, I had this little flicker of clarity, this moment of clarity, prior to this day, of me trying to take my life. When my mom took her life, the same exact way, by the way, I was brought up with belief systems of the time. Men are strong, women are weak. Women commit suicide.
Men don't do this. The M. men are strong. Mom was sick. She was a woman. That's why she did what she did. I thought suicide was a gender issue. And when I ate the pills, and got back into bed, because I can't do this, I can't do life, this thought said, this has nothing to do with gender, Peter. This has everything to do with alcoholism. This is what alcoholism wants. Me dead or drunk, either way, it wins.
And when we drink or we die, we take people with us. Because they put us in the ground, or we go on another drunk, and they cry themselves to sleep, over and over and over again. This is why, just don't drink, go to meetings, I cannot digest. My Alcoholics Anonymous talks about getting this glorious message, and shouting from the rooftops, and going into our homes, occupations, and affairs, and bringing it to the still wounded, and perhaps getting them to heal.
And we heal in Alcoholics Anonymous. We heal other people. We've been given a tremendous amount of power in Alcoholics Anonymous, to touch their lives, and heal others. You go into a drunk's house, and the wife is saying, get him out of here. Just get him out. And the house smells and looks drunk. I've done a bunch of these calls. You can feel it. There's no God operating, if you will, in there. Or very timidly, she says, is he coming home?
And then we bring him to us. We bring him to us. And the ones who are armed with the facts, sit down with the drunk, right out of detox, and start taking them through the 12 steps. And in two weeks, or three weeks, God will determine the time, but we move them through with a sense of urgency. And they take these principles into that home, the occupations, and affairs, home being number one. And you go visit that family in six months.
You go visit that family in 90 days. You go visit that family in a year. It's changed. It's a different house, whether they're in Al-Anon, or therapy, or not. That awakened spirit, that God spirit, now touches the lives of others, and the kids aren't afraid anymore. The house smells different, looks different. It's a God house. We get the power to heal in Alcoholics Anonymous, because God gives us a tremendous amount of power.
And quite frankly, up to here, people are saying, I'm going to be powerless, I'm going to be powerless. Well, where's God? That's a life of self-reliance. Where's God? This whole thing is put together by God. We're all together because of God. And God's not going to let any of his children suffer. He will bring us right to the edge, right to the edge of the cliff to get our attention. He will interrupt our sober lives from time to time to get our attention, the same way when our children aren't paying attention to us, we stand in front of the TV, or shut it off and say, hey, I'm talking to you.
Well, God will do the same thing with me, and we'll remove things. He will bring us right to the edge to get our attention. And then once we get that, and we're in a place of desperation, and we lock in, we get
[00:35:02]
spiritual wings, and off we go. It's a lot more than just getting to a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. It's about getting spiritual wings and bring God's children to him, huh? And how do we do that? The first thing we know is all about sponsorship. Why does a drunk make themselves available to someone they don't even know? When the new guy or the new woman comes up to you and says, can you sponsor me?
I don't know you from Adam, but as soon as you say that, okay, that's my responsibility now. As soon as you walk through the door, you're new. Go over and say, welcome. No requirements, just welcome. And then you're going to ask me to sponsor you. I'm going to get a book out. I'm going to spend time in my life with you. It's God's handiwork. And it happens all the time in Alcoholics Anonymous. Back to me getting drunk.
I hit the streets. After my fifth treatment center, I got drunk. My family was done with me. I made treatment number six for about a day and a half, and I signed myself out, and my family was done. They locked the doors. I lost my job as a longshoreman. I lost this little apartment that my dad gave me. I brought like the Bowery, and it had like these characters running around in and out all night. I had garbage all over this apartment and soiled clothes, and I got thrown out of there, and I was homeless for a while.
And I'm wondering, what do I do? Can't go to AA. Been there. Don't work. Can't go to a shrink. Been there. Don't work. Can't go back to my religious community. That don't work. I tried eating these pills. I didn't die. God interrupted my death. I can't die. I can't get drunk. What am I doing? That young lady, by the way, left, and I was on my own. Got thrown out of that motel. I ate a bunch of pills, found out it's not a gender issue.
I find out I can't die. I can't get drunk. I can't get sober. Treatment doesn't work. AA doesn't work. What do I do? Six treatment centers. I've had enough of this. I can't detox anymore. I've been detoxing basically since I started drinking. I can't do this anymore. And I signed myself out, and I was one of those guys who just roamed the streets in the same clothes. Sleep on a rooftop. Sleep in an abandoned building.
There's a lot of those in New York. Panhandle by the Manhattan Bridge for some money. Get some drinking money. Have a drink. And what do I do? Lost contact with my family. I remember this. I was outside the Port Authority in Midtown Manhattan one day. Till this day I don't know how I got there and what happened to me afterwards. But we get struck sober. And here's God bringing me to the edge of the cliff to get my attention.
God played my life perfect to flip me around to say, I'll do anything. And at the beginning, because I had to, now I get to. But he brought me to the edge. And it was outside the Port Authority one day, and I had this moment of clarity. And in this moment of clarity, we get struck sober. Blind drunk struck sober. And I saw my life pass before me, if you will. I thought of my mom. I thought of my dad and my brothers who I hadn't seen for quite some time.
And I was forced into a place of taking a look at me where I was. I don't know the last time I ate or bathed. I mean, what went wrong here? And what about my business? Curse God out. Every four-letter word I can think of. It was a short time later, it was June 23, 1988, and I'm in the back of a hallway. Another hallway. And I'm in worse condition than ever. If I live to be 100, I'll never be as old as the day I walked into AA.
I knew nothing was going to work. I was in that place of there were no reservations, no lurking notion. I wasn't trying to get sober for anyone else. In fact, I wasn't even thinking of sobriety on June 23, 1988. I just remember saying this, as I kind of slumped along on the floor and just rolled up into a ball and started heaving, crying. You know, when you're in that place, you're just having the breakdown, which doesn't feel good, but it was exactly what was needed.
I had to get broken to a place of willingness. That doesn't feel good. Sometimes getting the truth doesn't taste good, but it'll get us free. The truth doesn't always taste good. And if it feels good, doesn't mean it's good. And if it feels bad, it doesn't mean it's bad. June 23, 19, didn't feel good. And I made a plea to this God, if you're out there, please take me from this. I don't want to die.
And that was it. I just don't want to die. It was the first time in my life that I can recall, in all the years I've been sober, that I didn't want to die. Prior to that, I was looking to get a way out of this. I can't do life well. And God interrupted my death, and I knew something had changed,
[00:40:00]
because what I got in this moment, in this moment of clarity, I don't want to die, was enough and I have other work for you to do. And I thought I was completely loony. I'm hearing voices. I don't know what that meant. I was completely out of my mind. Ain't that great? I hope everyone is completely out of their mind for good. I hope you all lose your mind. If someone, if you get really angry with someone, you ever hear this?
I'm really angry with, I'm gonna go down there and give them a piece of my mind. If they're nuts, give them the whole thing, you don't need it, right? I can't experience God in a thinking mind. In fact, what my mind comes up with that thinks is God is not God. And June 23rd, 1988, I was out of my mind where the resistance, the illness just is constantly pumping out. I was in here. If you would, I touch the soul.
You can't take the spiritual journey with a mind. You can take it with the soul. You can take it with the spirit. And everything's gotta get removed in order for that to happen. That doesn't always feel good. I don't want to die. Enough, I have other work for you to do. I was presented with some directions. That was to call my dad. Because the only guy on the planet who's gonna come get me in this condition was my old man, who I hadn't seen in a while.
And I kind of remember shuffling along the street to a payphone to call him collect. And I have these crying jacks that hang up the phone, and hang up the next phone, hang up the next phone. My dad was in a place called Atlantic City, spending some time with his wife there. And he told me this story at my first AA birthday. He described as having a feeling in his gut, that he had to make it back about a four hour drive from Atlantic City to Brooklyn to find his son.
He told me, I gotta leave, my son's in trouble, I gotta go find him. And God will connect the dots when we don't know how. God will remove the obstacles in a way when we don't have a clue. It was the most sincere and honest as I may be in my entire life, the worst day of my life, June 23rd, 1988. And God recognized that. The intent was pure, I don't want to die, Father, take me from this. And he sent the messengers and sent the cavalry.
And all things become possible in God's world. Everything becomes, there's nothing impossible, huh? And so my dad made a trek back and he finds me running through the streets. And this time when he got out of the car, he didn't scream my name. He walked across the street like any loving parent who couldn't find their kid would. And as he walked closer to me, I said something like, I'm okay. And then I collapsed.
And my dad held me up. I've shared this from a million of these podiums. Our roots grasped new soil in the worst moment of our life. He's holding on to his oldest son. I come from an Italian-American family. I'm the firstborn. The expectations were simple, Pope or President. That was it. And I'm literally dying, literally dying in front of my dad and I collapse. And I reeked and I had dirty clothes on and he held me up.
And I remember him saying this over and over and over again. I'm not going to lose my son to this. I'm not going to lose my son. Almost like a mantra. And he was angry. I'm not going to lose my son to this. And off I went and I found myself in my seven treatment center. On the way to the, after about 10 days of being in his treatment center, they sent me out to Minnesota. And those people put me back together.
It's the first place I heard the message of Outfalls Anonymous, a meeting called the Three Legacies, a meeting that blessed their hearts. But on the plane, it was pre-9-11. The family could take you pretty far before you get right on the plane. And I remember as I turned around to look back at my dad and my younger brother who took me to the airport. My younger brother couldn't fight back tears and my dad was trying to.
And I had this other moment of clarity, if you will, on the damage I've caused. I've leveled my family and I need to make this right. And so God gave me a mustard seed of willingness. And with the mustard seed, we can move a mountain. I'm an alcoholic synonymous. The miracle has happened. The mountain's been moved. What am I doing to get my soul food and honor and worship this power called God in alcoholic synonymous?
And it can be as simple as me sitting down with you and taking you through the book. Me spending time with you on through those very dark and lonely nights. Me giving you my time, the same way God gave me time and you give me time. It's a never-ending circle. It's about a life of service. And as messengers of God, I'm not here to be served, but to serve. It's what we do. And I had this thing, I gotta get this right.
And I spent When I had this thing, I got to get this right, and I spent almost 10, 11 months in Minnesota and was brought home, and people in AA took me to my first meeting, they remember me bouncing
[00:45:00]
in and out, and I went to the free spirit group, and I found my first teacher, and we began the steps, and a bunch of years ago I found a new sponsor, and we start reworking the steps regularly, and I got into a life of meditation, about quieting the mind down, and coming from a place of stillness rather than noise, over the years I've been able to make amends and live this amends with my family, and that guy called dad is my best friend, he's old school, he ain't changing, but I still love him and I can see where he's coming from, I can see where he comes from, I'm not looking at him with old and sick and twisted perceptions anymore, and my brothers and myself have reconciled, and the issues with mom have been put to bed, and we don't have hops and doves playing in my home, believe me, you know what I mean, hops and doves flying around, it's like tranquil, we have stuff, like most families, but how do we move through it, how do we navigate through it, my brothers have found homes, on and off, and on and on in therapy, my dad actually went into a therapist office to talk about his stuff, little by slowly the circle got closed, the gaps in the circle got closed, it's about experience wholeness, not separateness from God, and through the power of meditation by some very neat folks in AA, some gurus in AA, some enlightened AA members who talked to me about the disciplines of 10 and 11, to keep the spirit nurtured, I find out in meditation how much God knows me, one of the greatest gifts I've gotten from Alcoholics Anonymous is this, besides sobriety, is knowing that I am known by my creator, and he delivered in meditation, he delivered in my prayer, about things to do with mom, about things to do when I was growing up, and I was able to follow through on some of those deals, get information in meditation, and follow directions out there, and little by slowly things get put back together, and I'll just share one quick story, I'm sitting in meditation, and I get a vision of this saint holding this baby, and I didn't think much of it, I go back into meditation next day, and this statue becomes lifelike, and I go back into meditation again, and this lifelike statue holding a baby is me as a baby, she tells me, gives me some directions, and I get this scent of roses through this whole thing, and I'm completely confused about it, and I sat with my sponsor at the time Mark H., what do I do with this, and he gave me some directions, and I had to go back to this place in South Brooklyn, always wondered what happened to my mom, wanted to erase her pain, and I went back to this spot in South Brooklyn, and I found some things that brought me back to my past, I went down with a guy by the name of Joe H., and we're walking around, and I had a younger brother, John at the time, when my mom had this god awful nervous breakdown, I was about three years old, and I watched her collapse in the street, and the ambulance took her away, and in the directions I was told to go back there, and I went back there, and I was able to make peace with my past, and I made some prayer to my mom on how I couldn't help her pain, because I always felt guilty about not being able to help her, and Joe was walking around and looking around, and I said, Joe, I can't get back in a car to leave you, something's stopping me, and he said, well, you need to look in this concrete, and Joe told the story a few times before he passed away, so people know this is a real story, but it's unbelievable what happened to me, he looked in the concrete, and it said this, to Peter and Johnny with love, and little X's and O's underneath it, my brother John was alive when my mom had this nervous breakdown, I was alive when I had this nervous breakdown, and two of us wondered what happened to mom, and it was like this message that we got, that God hears my heart, reads my soul, and knows when I need a healing, and it all happens in Alcoholics Anonymous, and I get to do this for fun and for free, and I hope to always stay teachable and give this message away with the same love and gratitude that you guys give it to me with every time I walk into a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous, this is my home, I don't have a life, it belongs to God and you, and I'm very grateful for that, that's all I got, peace.
Thank you.