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Source: Rick J – OAR 2014 – Date Unknown.mp3 File: rick-j-oar-2014-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 01:19:32
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I got to meet Rick last night at dinner, and his buddy Ken, too, and I thought it was kind of neat because where they're from, from Canada, by Toronto, and I used to go up there fishing when I was a kid with my parents, and not too many people know where the Trent River is or Campbellford, but they knew where it was. I thought that was kind of cool. I got to know Rick briefly at dinner time, and I know he loves music because he's a music instructor, and we don't have a lot in common as far as stuff because two opposite things as far as what we do for a living, but as far as with Al-Anon, we've got a lot in common because we're there for the same purpose.
So I'm going to give you Rick J. from Canada. I'm slowly recovering Al-Anon. My name is Rick J.. Good evening to you all. And as they say over in Omaha, by the grace of God, the power of a program called the 12 Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, which we practice ourselves, a fellowship called the Al-Anon Family Groups, the loving, very clear guidance of a big book, Black Belt Al-Anon Sponsor, not been necessary for me to plan any kind of death, yours or mine, since the 10th day of April 1987, and for that I am most certainly grateful.
My hometown is Oakville, Ontario, a little town right outside of Toronto, and my home group is the Oakville Saturday Morning Al-Anon Family Group. And I missed my meeting this morning, but I certainly have been at some meetings today. So nothing quite compares to the home group, but hey, you guys are doing pretty good. It's nice to be back here. Was that the oar, or was it somewhere else? No, I was at the oar one other time in 2001, the Ohio Al-Anon Roundup, when it was at Lake Atwood.
And I must say it's nice that it's remembered that I was here once before, because it's happened to me a number of times now, where someone will call and invite me somewhere, and I'll say, oh, I've been there before. And they say, have you? Well, I guess I really tanked on that one. Standing at a conference one time in Toronto to thank the speaker, and I'm in front of a member that I know, and so I start chatting with her as we're in the line waiting to go up and thank the speaker.
And she said, gosh, she said, I was just down in Akron. And I said, where? And I said, I've never been to Akron. And she said, I bought a tape of yours in Akron. So in the split second it took for her to finish that sentence, this is where I went. Akron. It all started in Akron. I've never been to Akron, and they're selling my tape in Akron. That's really cool. Then she finished the sentence. She said, yeah, it was in the box marked any tape a dollar.
Okay. Just when you think you're doing good, they can't even give them away. So as soon as you start thinking too much, God's going to say, you need a little bit of humiliation. And so that was very, very good for me, actually. And I was actually at a conference one time, it was the actual taper that did that. I giggled with him, and he thought it was pretty funny, too. So I want to thank the committee, really, for inviting me.
And I have all of you thank this committee. I mean, they've done a spectacular job. With this weekend. And really, I do love your acronym, you know, the Ohio Al-Anon Roundup. Or, you know, when things get tough, get the hell going. I'm in trouble. They have one in Texas. Now, Texas has two areas. But they do one conference. The All Texas Al-Anon-Alantine Conference. The ATTACK. Perfect. That is the most perfect pre-Al-Anon acronym I've ever heard.
Yours is the DESPERATE acronym. I'm in trouble. So I had a great drive down, stopped in, and, you know, picked up my longest friend in the world, Ken. 50 years, 49, 51, I don't know. You lose track after four decades.
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The rest of it doesn't matter.
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But Ken, you know, I brought Ken to his first meeting, and he brought me back to mine many, many years later in 1987. I'm the class of 87. Anybody else class of 87 here? There we go. Thank you. Nice to meet you. And, you know, beautiful, beautiful drive from Toronto all the way down here to Ohio at this time of year. Gorgeous. And couldn't you feel it? You must have felt the same when you drove into this beautiful place.
I don't know. I just kind of, whew, I've landed. And when I came in, it was welcomed beautifully and reminded that I'd been here before. And I thought it was very nice. I guess I didn't tank. Actually, Bill's selling those CDs for 50 cents. They're just over there. But the welcome is beautiful because, you know, we have our tradition that says we welcome and we give comfort. Now, we certainly do that to the newcomer.
And we do it to the middlecomer. And we do it to the long-timer. We do it to everybody because that is something we do. Welcome. It is wonderful, wonderful to have you here. And I say that to you. Thank you very much for being here tonight. Thank you for the nodding heads. Take a look around. All right. The key element of this whole deal is identification. We're not here. I'm certainly not here because I'm different from you.
I'm here because I'm the same as you. It's our sameness that allows me to recover. You are my people. And it's a beautiful thing to know that. We all kind of nod our head. And I know there's some people saying, he's saying nodding in my head. I'm going to try not to. I don't want to give them the satisfaction of knowing. So I'm watching you right now. And I'm going to watch you this whole couple hours.
And just see who's going to try to really nod or who's going to go, I'm not going to give them the satisfaction. Isn't it great to laugh? Awesome. I had this experience one time. I was at another one of these deals. And it was an AA deal. And, you know, they laugh all the time. You know, we're generally the criers. But they laugh all the time. Where are the Al-Anons? Hold on. Oh, there's the crying.
They're right over there. The whining, wailing, and gnashing of teeth. Welcome to Al-Anon. How are you? He's bugging me. Oh, okay. What about you? He's bugging me. How about you? What about him? We are the same. We get that. We do that to normal people. They go, what? They do this. Poor you. Oh, yes, here's somebody trying to nod her whole body. Anyway, I've had a great day. I enjoyed the speakers today.
I loved Liz's talk last night. I've known Liz for a long time. So her water breaks and she goes to the laundromat. I've never heard that one before. We're all here because of our sameness, but I have never done that. I did not identify. But it is the most accurate description of denial I have ever heard. Do you remember the time when all we could do was cry? We all do, don't we? We all do. And it was at that conference out there, this AA thing.
And it was a luncheon deal. And it was a good crowd. And they divided the room up like this. And we are laughing. The Al-Anons are laughing. And the AA chairperson came in and stood at the back of the room and said, Hey, could you guys keep it down? We're trying to have a meeting next door. We laughed even louder. And I saw that guy all weekend and he said to me, Imagine that, a whole room of Al-Anons laughing.
I said, you don't know the half of it, pal. See, because we have things that we can recover from, too. And when we can laugh about them, we know that we're getting better. This is the only room I know anywhere on the planet where I can stand up here and say I haven't had to plan any kind of death, mine or yours, since April the 10th, 1987. Everybody goes. Got that one. I'm identifying. And it's really nice to be in an Al-Anon crowd.
You get a chance. I love to go to these deals when it's an AA conference with Al-Anon participation. That means there's a token Al-Anon speaker. Are you the token Al-Anon? Well, I guess so. And then, you know, like 15 people.
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There's a conference of like 3,000 and 15 people come to the meeting. That kind of thing. But we get it. And so I do those as we all will. We participate in those. But there is nothing like this. When we, the family members of alcoholics, when we who identify with the problem of alcoholism, and we don't drink, get together, nothing is better. We used to have a poster in Al-Anon many years ago. Sometimes you'll see it on an archive display.
I think it's the best public information poster we've ever had. And it said you don't have to drink to suffer from alcoholism. And is that not? Everybody's doing it now. I got you. Come here. Your resistance is futile. You will identify. Be still, mind. My heart wishes to speak. Thank you very much for this. I will keep this in my ODAT book. This little marker that I have in my ODAT book is the very first time I was ever asked to speak in the United States.
It was in Erie, Pennsylvania. I was in Allentown. Because even though I tell you today that I've been here since April the 10th, 1987, my first date was April 1968. I was 11 years old. And I was in Allentown until they kicked me out. They said you can't be bald and have a beard and be in Allentown. It's kind of when I started my whining career. Definition of whining. Anger escaping through a very small hole.
I want to stay in Allentown. So I went and found a room full of blue haired little ladies and they kind of took me in and kind of hung out there for a while. I met her. She was way more exciting than you at that time. And I said, pfft, heck with you guys. And I took off. And I'll talk to you about that as we move on. This is fun. People say, do you get nervous? How can you get nervous doing this? This is like a blast.
Want to come to Ohio and talk about yourself? Sure. Why not? Anybody ask you to do it, say yes. Really, it's fun. We say what it was like, what it's like now. We all know that. So basically what that means is our stories are fundamentally historic. Like what happened, happened. And no matter how many times I share this thing, what happened, happened. And I can't change it. And if I do, you know it's my ego talking.
And I'll share some of that as we move along. I'm in this two hour tome here tonight. But I do think it's important for me to let you know where I'm at right now. That 27 years in, I need this more today than I've ever needed it. I heard somebody say one time that when you're here for five months or six months or you're here for a year and you leave, you have something to lose but not as much. When you've been here for 10, you have a lot more to lose.
Because, you see, we're starting to build a life then. We're starting to get a God. We have a God. And we're starting to kind of make ourselves right with those people around us. Kind of with our communities, with our families, with our work environment. We're becoming active, thriving, involved members of Al-Anon. We have a lot to leave if we decide to go then. And you get 20 and even more. And as we get older, life just continues to move forward.
Just because I'm coming to an Al-Anon meeting. Just because I sit in my group. Just because I'm with you people. Just because I'm doing all the do things. I'm doing the deal, as my sponsor said. Do the deal in all that doing the deal entails. And doing all of that. And I've gained so much. I show up for life now. I show up for people. I show up in every kind of place that I go to the very best of my ability today.
And if I was simply to step away from it, I just have this full and total realization that I would lose this. Because what I have is a reprieve today. I have a reprieve from all of those things that haunted me. I have a reprieve from that scream inside my soul that said, You're different, Rick. Nobody else knows what you're feeling. Even though I'm sitting in rooms where people are telling me all these things I identify with, I just had this inner core that said, You're different.
And there was this screaming that went on. And I had this raging age anger inside of me. And this sense of all I ever wanted. The only way that I could ever feel I fit was if I had somebody that I could take care of. And if I could control you. Or if I just kind of lived being a victim. All of that stuff was there. That stuff was there. And it's still there. Except it's like it's in a cage now. And I've
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closed the door, but the door is not locked. And what I get each and every day when I open my eyes and I say, Good morning, God, is a reprieve today. And I show up in every way that I possibly can. And I bring that God into every situation that I possibly can. And I try to see each person that I see through the eyes that God has instead of my judgmental eyes. I don't know if anybody identifies that one, but that's one of my big deals there.
I just try to do that. And if I do that, by and large, I have a really good day and I get great connections with people and the door in the cage stays shut. But if I don't do the deal today, kind of the door starts to open a little bit. And it's kind of like that old band leader, Doc Severinsen. Every night he was on the Tonight Show, a phenomenal trumpet player. And he said this, he said, If I don't practice for one day, I know it.
He said, If I don't practice for two days, the band knows it. If I don't practice for three days, the world knows it. And isn't that so very true about practicing my Al-Anon program, about just kind of bringing this into everything I do? Maybe one day, you know, just when you feel a little bit crispy, a little of an edge, you know, people might notice, but okay, by the second day, by the third day, what's happened to you? It's the kind of deal, you know, I think, don't you think sometimes, you know, when the AA's kind of just, you know, in his cups and they come to do a 12-step call and they come in the house and sometimes they say, And who needs the help in here? Because really, sometimes they can't tell which one because we are just so insane. And I am as capable of that today as I was all of those times ago. But I do now have a relationship with a God, as each and every one of us have. And isn't that the most respectful thing that we do in our fellowship?
We don't say, You have to have this God. We just say, We will support you in any God that you come to experience. And that is the fulcrum. If you take our triangle and just kind of turn it a little bit, it turns into a diamond, actually. And if a diamond spins, it's that one little point is revolving on one, one thing. For me, that one single thing would be God, as I understand God. God, as I have come to experience God, as I have admitted my powerlessness, as I have surrendered, and I have come to believe, as I have made the decision, as I have done the inventory, as I have made the amends, as I continue, as I pray and meditate, as I reach out to others to share with them what you have so freely shared with me. As I do all of that stuff, I have come to experience a God. And there is a God that I kind of thought I knew when I was at two, but there is a God that I came to know in 12. Isn't that the best promise we have? That beginning at 12 isn't a direction to action. Everything else virtually is a direction to action, something for us to do. But step 12, having had a spiritual awakening, is the result of these steps.
That is what we get. And we are stories. All of us tell that, hey, when I get right with God and right with the world, many things happen to me. Many beautiful things happen in my life. Relationships happen, all kinds of things. But these singular promises, I will have an awakening into the Spirit if I well and truly take 11 directions in front of that, and then follow two more after that. By carrying that message to others and trying to practice it in everything that I do, I will well and truly continue to expand upon that. So I stay very active, as a matter of fact. Back in December, on December the 26th, I went up to visit my father. My father lives about an hour north of Toronto. And he had been in for some tests and not feeling well at all, having a pain in his side. And so he handed me a sticky note with the name of a disease on it. And he said, this is what my doctor thinks I have. And so I kind of went online. I had it on my phone and looked it up. And I started reading it. And my wife was sitting beside me. And I kind of looked at it. And she said, you better not read that anymore. And what my dad has, totally diagnosed, is an asbestos-related cancer called mesothelioma. He was in touch with asbestos when he was in the Navy in the early 1950s. He was in the Korean War. And the prognosis is, one, there's no cure. There has been a singular palliative treatment. They call it a life extension treatment. And I am so grateful, not that he has that, but I am so grateful for what my sponsor told me all many years ago. He said, after I made my amend to my dad, I made my amend to my father in the form of a letter, actually. She said, Rick, you be the best son to that man you can be, no matter what the condition of his alcoholism.
It is your responsibility to be the best son you can be. And I was never more grateful that I had done that than when I sat at his bed and the thoracic surgeon came in and told him the prognosis. Because from that moment to this, we're present with one another.
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That there's no, oh, my God, I have to go back. There's all this stuff I have to say before the time comes. All that I have to do is be present with my father. And we've had some amazing, amazing father-son moments together as a result of taking the action of making an amend. And when he did his first chemo treatment, we didn't know how he was going to react. He did it on a Wednesday. And so I was going to stay with him for the Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. And I had a speaking engagement to go to. And so I phoned him on a Thursday night, and I said, I just can't come. I just can't. I said, I don't know how he's going to respond to the chemo, and there's nobody else around. And I need, this is the right thing I need to do. And I talked to my sponsor. And they were awesome about the whole thing. And on Saturday morning, he was definitely feeling way better.
And there was no kind of untoward episode. And I kind of, you know, about 11, 12 o'clock, I said, you know, Dad, I think I need to head home. He said, yeah, I think it's a good idea. And he just, as I was heading out, he just grabbed me and hugged me. And he said, you know, son, he said, any man would be lucky enough to have a son like you. And all that I did was what you told me to do. Because you see, you told me all those years ago when I was in Alateen, you said, Rick, your father is not a bad man. He's just an alcoholic.
He is a disease. He is not a disgrace, Rick. He is a disease like any other disease, and he deserves some compassion for that. And that was the beginning of that for me. That was the beginning of coming to have a relationship with my father, who is an alcoholic. I didn't have to continue to define him as the disease. I could see him as the person, the man, the loving man that he is, who has disease called alcoholism. And now at the end, we're right there. The next day, I was visiting my sponsor. My sponsor lives in Arkansas. I got a message from my sister, Rick, mom's in the hospital. She had a disease called pulmonary fibrosis.
And so within two days, both of my parents were given this terminal diagnosis. And again, I was grateful for the amend I had made to my mother. As many years ago, I had sat down face-to-face with my mother and identified all of the things that I used to do. My mother was a 47-year member of Al-Anon, 47 years. The kind of service my mother did was the kind of service where she'd stay at home and take the phone calls, the first contact, someone reaching out. Remember that? We've all done it. Do you remember that pain? We're the only one. How do I live in a situation like this? Help me. I just need some help. And my mother for decades was the one to say, welcome to Al-Anon, and give them a meeting list and chat with them. That's the kind of service my mother did. And my mother saw that she had two kids at home, and she started an Alentine group, and she was the sponsor of that group for 10 years. Ken was a member of that group, 10 years. And I had to take a look at when I got older, all of the wretched things I said and did to my mother. This woman I never thought cared for me. There's the disease taking its place. That was totally my perception.
Totally wrong, but it was my perception. It's not a thing my mother would do. My mother was always there, always there in the midst of hell. We know that alcoholic horror. In the midst of the act of alcoholism, we know what that is. We know the sound. We know the tenseness. We know what's coming, and if there's nothing there, we're waiting for it to come. We know what that's about. And in the middle of all of that, she was never not there for her kids, ever. And even in my adult life, my mother was always there. I'm a high school band director is what I do for a living, soon to be retired. But one of these things, I was at a music festival one time, and we were the second last group on. And the way these things work is that the group that's coming on after you is in another room warming up.
And so normally the people who are playing at the thing are in the audience to listen to you. And so we were the second last group. It was like 8.30 at night, and this big hall was empty except for the adjudicators at the back and two other people. So far back, I couldn't even see them. So we played our pieces, did well, walked through this empty auditorium to go to another room where we'd work with an adjudicator. And who was there? My mother.
Good job, son. Kids sounded great. That was my mom. And I'm the one that ridiculed her in public. I'm the one that told her I hated her. I'm the one that just ignored her. I'm the one that thought she was stupid. I did that. So when it came time to make the amend, crystal clear and direct, the way my sponsor told
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me to make amends was make an appointment, show up, admit what you have done, and then say this. What can I do to make that up to you? Because it is an amend. It's a repair. Not an I'm sorry. It's an amend. My mother looked at me, and she said, you know, Rick, what I'd really like, she said, I just want you to call me more often and drop by for dinner every once in a while. That all my mother wanted was a relationship with her son. And kind of in the ending months of her life, she had macular degeneration, so I'd bring her down as my sister would to get these injections. And on the way back, she'd say, Rick, I'm so sorry. I know this takes so long. And I said, Mom, this is nothing that I have to do. This is what I get to do, and I'm so glad that I get to do that.
And when she was in the hospital there in January, and she couldn't read anymore, so I'd take out my ODAT book, and we'd read the ODAT together. We'd talk about it. I'd read The Courage to Change, and we'd talk about it. My mother loved, loved Al-Anon. And on March the 27th, she died. And on the day that we brought her to the funeral, I just had this overwhelming sense of love for my mother. And as I sat there alone in that room with my mother's lifeless body, I felt nothing but gratitude, and gratitude for Al-Anon, and these steps that save our lives too. We don't drink, and we get to use the steps.
They work for us like they do for the alcoholic. And I had this piece, and we went after we brought her to the crematorium, and she said, all I want you to do is be there for me. And I was there to the end. They pushed it in. And on the way home, I just had this sense of my mother. It's like she washed through me with this gratitude that said, thank you, son. You did exactly what I wanted you to do. You were there. And I was. And that's what we get to do when we hang around. That's what can happen to our life when we believe that this will work for us, because this will work for each and every one of us every time, bar none, when we just do those simple things.
So my dad is still alive, and kind of say some prayers, but that relationship continues. Beautiful. So that's kind of what's going on. That's going on right now, and you're here with me now. The spirit of what this is. My people and my God are here with me now. You know, we have this tradition that says the only qualification for membership is that there be a problem of alcoholism in a relative or friend. Now, where we live, or Ken used to live, but where I still live, we do this funny thing. At the beginning of every meeting, the chairperson qualifies. And I kind of guess that's a good thing. It's a direct connection to our tradition. But as we all know, anybody can join AA, but you got to know someone to get into Al-Anon. And so I'm here to let you know that I've known five of them. Two by birth, father and a grandmother, and three by choice. One, two, three in a row, you're out. I did that. And of the three alcoholics that I chose, two of them I met in Al-Anon. So if you're here tonight, wondering, what if I have a problem with the alcohol? Ignore anything that Bill or any of the other fine AA members in this room will share with you or show you, any of the list of questions that they would give you, and simply come up to me at the end of this meeting and say, do you find me attractive?
And if the answer is yes, run like hell to AA. Because if I think you're cute, you're a drunk. It might not be comfortable, but it sure is familiar. And haven't we all done it? It's amazing. You're identifying. Here we are. We're all laughing. We're identifying. So let's just have a bit of fun here. These are real questions. I'd like you to pipe your hands for these, just to find out who we are. So is there anybody here in AA, any AA members in the room? Yeah, hold the hand up. Look around, ladies. There's a future ex-husband right there. A few of them. How many people are in Al-Anon? Okay, there's probably a number of us. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, me too, me too. Absolutely. Good, good. So how many people here in Al-Anon have chosen one? Put up a hand. Yeah, a lot of us. It's pretty common, right? We've chosen an alcoholic, absolutely. How many have chosen two? Okay. One person's hand is just glued in the air. Okay. Whatever you ask, the answer is yes. How many have chosen three? There you go. How about that?
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many have divorced one and married the same one again? There you go. Amazing. It's amazing. I have never done that one, but I can assure you if I'm asking that question all over your country and mine you are not alone. How many have done this? How many have gone to AA looking for one? There we go. All right. Isn't that an amazing thing? But of course the problem is the alcoholic, isn't it? We all know that. There's nothing wrong with us. Come here.
You're like another hostage. But of course, why are those people attracted to me? Not me attracted to them. Why do I need somebody like that in my life? It's a question. But isn't it so true? You know, you have this other tradition, right? Our tradition five that says, you know, we encourage, we have one purpose, one single thing. We help the families of alcoholics. That's what we do. We don't do anything else. Nothing else. We have one, it's like the prime directive in Star Trek. That's all that we do. One single thing. And it goes on to tell us how to do it. I mean, it's like the best tradition ever.
So we work the 12 steps of AA ourselves. That's why I introduced myself that way. That's the program that I practice. Exactly what it says in the tradition. I'm not making it up. It's so crystal clear. It's in italics. They really want to highlight that for ourselves. We practice the 12 steps of AA ourselves. We do that. And that's what we do. And then we encourage and understand the alcoholic. Now, the description for what we encourage them to do is thin.
I don't know about you, but I've never met one that needed much encouragement. Here, honey, I know you're having a bad day. Have a beer. No, I don't think I should. I just never run into one of those. Right? So I'm not quite sure what we encourage them to do. But the understanding part. Now, that's not in the AA traditions. Understanding the Al-Anon. Should it be? Well, yeah. But it's not in the AA tradition. But it is in our tradition. And it's in our tradition for a really good reason. Because if you're like me, the focus is solely on them. Even if we haven't lived with one for a long time. Even if they're dead. Let's think about that. And that's an amazing thing. That we can still victimize ourselves by the person who had the disease. Or has the disease. We even do that when we identify. Like the tradition three. The only requirement for membership is it to be a problem of alcoholism. What we always start to do is identify the person who has alcoholism as the problem. And we use all these victim statements. Well, use all these victim words. I do it too. I've done it. We talk about I'm an adult child of an alcoholic. Like I'm a victim to that. So I identify myself through the person who has the disease. Instead of with the disease. Which is that the only requirement for membership is that there be a problem of alcoholism. Because that's what I'm recovering from. I'm not recovering from the alcoholism that the father had. That the wife had. That those long-term relationships had. That the grandmother had. I'm not recovering from that. I used to use this term many years ago. My alcoholic. My house. My cat. My dog. My car. My alcoholic.
There it is. Right? But again, I'm just kind of identifying myself not with the disease. But with the person who has the disease. It's kind of one of our deals. It's even like that in our public information posters. Someone's drinking, bothering you. Absolutely. And we come to Al-Anon wanting to find out how to stop doing that. It's just classic. Absolutely classic. Even the tradition can kind of be misinterpreted as saying, you know, problem of alcoholism in a relative or friend. So we come in and what's the first thing we say?
No, we don't talk about them. It's like the Al-Anon con. It's like a bait and switch. Really. And all we want to do when we come here is talk about them. And we say, no. We don't do that. We talk about ourselves. And that's when the Al-Anon room gets really quiet because you have nothing to say. Because we're totally 100% focused on them. I'm an adult child of an alcoholic. My alcoholic. I'm a co-alcoholic. Oh, give me a break. I'm a para-alcoholic.
I just heard that one. Oh, son of a gun. Then there's this one that started in California.
[00:35:01]
I heard this was in California many years ago and it's everywhere now. My qualifier. You mean I'm not even sick enough to qualify for my program myself? Then they ask me to admit that I'm powerless? That my life is unmanageable? What are you talking about? My qualifier. I'm my own qualifier. When I start, and I can start answering those questions. I picked one. I picked two. I picked three. I married another one. I'm in AA looking for one. Left on my own devices. I'll find another one. Oh, yeah. They're the problem. I'm my own qualifier. But that's an essential element to my recovery. And I really couldn't see that until I started to take a look at the understanding the alcoholic part. Because it's critical to Al-Anon. We had this, the original Al-Anon book, the Al-Anon family groups. They republished it a few years ago, a number of years ago. It's kind of the maroon cover, right? The Al-Anon family groups, a classic edition. This is what it said in the description to Tradition 5. Going to AA meetings, this is from Al-Anon literature. Going to AA meetings gives us greater understanding of the alcoholic's problem. And why do we need to do that? Because we think that they are the problem. And so you go to these AA meetings, and you hear alcoholics talk. And you hear some amazing things. I mean, amazing things. Alcohol is but a symptom. The bottle is but a symbol. How does an Al-Anon wrap their head around that kind of nonsense? What are you talking about? The alcohol is but a symptom. To us, it's the problem. Stop drinking and everything will be good. That's the only answer. That's the best answer I ever had. Just stop. But the alcoholics don't say that. They say stopping is not the problem. Actually, they say drinking. I heard an alcoholic say this. You were at that conference, and I heard a woman say this. Tina was her name.
She said, alcohol, drinking is not. Now, stopping, how does she say this? Drinking is not the problem. Not drinking is the problem. And what's our answer? Stop drinking. For the alcoholic, not drinking is what they can't. That's when the problems really start. For us, the problems start when they begin drinking. For them, the problems start when they stop drinking. Oh, isn't that a bit of understanding? These are the people that we love. We don't love bad people. We love people who have alcoholism. They have alcoholism. We have alcoholism in the family disease. They have alcoholism. Isn't that an amazing thing? This is from another Al-Anon piece of literature, The Merry-Go-Round Named Denial. Great piece, eh? P3 for the Al-Anon police in the room. Oh, you have some of those in Ohio, do you? Think we need to give around armbands that say AP, Al-Anon police. P3. We're good. So they're what it says about the alcoholic. Again, I'm just kind of riffing on this thing, understanding the alcoholic, but how important it is for the recovery for this Al-Anon member. The alcoholic has learned that the use of alcohol makes him feel better. To him, it is a blessing, not a curse. His medicine, not a poison. For a few hours, it floats away his troubles.
It melts away his fears, reduces his tension, removes his loneliness, and solves all of his problems. And our solution is, just stop doing that. To us. To us, it is not a blessing, it is a curse, in our view. It is a poison, not a medicine. It brings in troubles. It doesn't take them away. It freezes us with fear, increases our tension, adds to our loneliness, and in our view, creates all the troubles. And then we hear the alcoholic say that drinking is not the problem. Not drinking is the problem. That they know they're powerless over alcohol, means they can't drink. That life has become unmanageable, I can't not drink. It's a pretty good definition of powerlessness. These are the people that we have married. These are the people who are our parents. These are the people who are our children. And how many years did I vilify, denigrate, condemn, berate, harass the people who have this disease? I did that. And by following
[00:40:06]
that instruction, in that tradition, I have began to find some compassion for the alcoholics in my life. I heard a guy say this, I just wanted to, all I wanted to do is get a bottle and just bury myself, to hide away from everything. And I thought, I heard him say that, and I said, we think we cause it. And he just wanted to get away from everything he did. Heard someone else say this, kind of on the flip side, again an alcoholic describing this. He's at a holiday in France with his mother and his brother and his sister-in-law. And in France, when you have a meal, they give you a little glass of wine with every meal, you know, it's kind of, they make it there, it's all over the place. So he's having Diet Coke, his mother has a glass of wine, glass of two, second glass, and then the waiter's coming around for another one, the mother says, no, no, I'm good. So this guy, this alcoholic member of AA says to his mother, mom, why don't you want another one? And it'd be the answer that I'd give. I'm beginning to feel it. Right, the alcoholics, that's when they stop identifying. They don't nod their heads up and down at that point. They go, you poor soul. Right? But he realized, this alcoholic member realized, he said, that's when I want to keep going. And these are the people that we love. And our answer is, just stop. They can't stop. Then there was his brother and sister, again, not alcoholic. And they were having a good time, and they were kind of getting a little buzz. And he says, well, you know, how come you're doing that? They said, well, every once in a while, we just kind of like to get away from things. And he thought, wow, he said, I have to drink just so I can join.
And this al-Anon had a deeper understanding of the alcoholics in his life. Because I can't cure it. I sure didn't cause it. I can't control it. All that I can do is work on a program for myself and offer some compassion and understanding. I don't have to accept unacceptable behavior. But I need to have some compassion. And I start to get our fundamental idea in al-Anon, which is that of loving detachment. We begin to detach from this disease that the people we love have. And this is from listening to alcoholics. I heard another woman do it like this. She said, you know, we think I need to love them more. If I just kind of love them more, they'll stop drinking. This woman tells a powerful story about she had two children with her husband in Jamaica. And she finally got sober. And she was talking to her children. She desperately wanted to see her children. And they said, mommy, we love you. Love you so much. Will you please come down for the holidays? And so she got permission from the husband to come and do that. And she left from Western Canada and got to Toronto and picked up a bottle of vodka in Toronto for the flight to Jamaica. Drank the whole bottle. And when she fell down the stairs in Jamaica. And despite how much the kids loved her, it couldn't stop her from drinking one more time. And these are the people that we love.
We don't choose bad people. We just choose alcoholics. They're not bad. And again, I had some more compassion for that. We tried drinking with them. We're lousy to drink with. I have one, they have five. I'm so boring. I'm like, I'm the worst drinker in the world. I didn't know the alcoholics don't want to drink with a guy like me. And we say, just have a few. Then we discovered that there's this thing that the alcoholic has called the phenomenon of craving.
And we get that by listening to the alcoholics talk. This little quote that I read you goes on to say, after it says, going to AA meetings gives us greater understanding of the alcoholics problem. And that then goes on to say, in Al-Anon literature, as well reading some of the many books on the subject, particularly the basic book, Alcoholics Anonymous. So I was at an AA conference with Al-Anon participation many years ago. And there was a flyer on Sunday morning on the chair advertising a big book seminar, Al-Anon members welcome. Tradition five, understand the alcoholic, big book seminar, Al-Anon's welcome, I'm going.
So I went to London, Ontario. It was the original Joe and Charlie, if any of you guys know any of that stuff. And I sat there and listened to Joe McHugh, this beautiful man from Little Rock, Arkansas, describe the phenomenon of craving for the alcoholic. For about half an hour, alcoholic drinks is what goes on. And I'm in Al-Anon listening to this, right? Understand the alcoholic. It says that in our tradition. And then he said this at the end.
He said, and that's why when an alcoholic is in the bar all night, and they go outside in the parking lot and fall flat in their face in a puddle of water, and somebody comes over and lifts them up and says, can I help you? The alcoholic will say, yes, get me another drink. will say, yes, get me another drink. And the penny dropped for this Al-Anon. From here to here. They really could not stop. And when they said they would, I believe they wanted
[00:45:07]
to. I'll just have one. And as soon as that one gets in, I'll sell her soul for a second. And understanding that, freedom started to come. And it allowed me to start to look at myself and start to focus on what is it that's wrong with me if it's not them. And that is the greatest thing, one of the greatest gifts. Because if there's, the news is here that if there's nothing wrong with me, this doesn't work. This is not for people who are well.
Our public information posters don't say, are you feeling fantastic? Is life working a charm? Are you just loving all over him? Come to Al-Anon, we can help you. It doesn't say that. This is for people who come in here broken. This is the last stop on the road. We don't come here voluntarily. But what we find here gives us a life we cannot even imagine. So you're kind of with me on that understanding the alcoholic part. So I encourage you, follow that old world direction. Go to a few. Go to the AA thing. Listen to our alcoholic brother and sister. Listen to them share. And listen underneath for what's going on. Heard a guy just last week say this, alcohol is the solution to my alcoholism. Alcohol is the solution to my alcoholism. It's true. It's true. And we in Al-Anon need to hear that. Because freedom can come to focus on what I need to focus on. I need to cross the bridge from the side that says, it's them, to the side that says, it's me. And that can be a long journey for the Al-Anon. But once we do it, we have available to us every tool that the AA member has available to them. And most particularly, the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. Isn't that amazing how that happened in the history of Al-Anon? Bill was the one that saw the white light.
We're in the motherland here, just kind of south of Akron and all around. And it was kind of like Mother's Day in 1935 that those two guys met. And I'll bet there was a lot of head nodding going on when those two guys were sitting in that gatehouse up in Akron, Ohio, kind of identifying. And what we know for sure is that we're here because of that meeting. Even the Al-Anons are here because of that meeting. And a book was published, we all know that. And then the book went out there and the non-alcoholic members, us, started to use the book. And they started sending letters in to Bill. Saying, hey, we're getting together. We're finding this helps us. And we're not the alcoholics. So he gets a number of these letters. This is kind of like a little kind of encapsulated idea, how this thing works. And he gives the letters to his wife and said, hey, why don't you contact these folks and see if they'd like to get together. And there's Al-Anon. And that's where we came from. They knew that in those early days. We were there with them. We're part of the deal. We are the original second program. So I don't know, that's just kind of something that's been so important. I think it's because of what's going on with my dad. And I've been spending so much close contact with him. And I just see this more clearly and more clearly and more clearly. And I'm finding more and more and more freedom.
So if you're identifying with any of this, just I encourage you to follow that old world direction. Kind of listen, read some of their stuff. And just see what's underneath it. Because these are the people that we love. And when I can kind of understand that to whatever level the Al-Anon can understand it, I'm free to begin to practice these things for myself. So in Al-Anon, I did a quote out of this book one time and one of the APs came up afterwards. Is that Al-Anon literature? I said, yes, this is our original reader.
I just happen to have a brown cover on mine. That's all. I took the brown. And mine's falling apart. And I love to meet people whose ODAT is falling apart like mine is because it's used. A lot of life in this book. So here we have, this is what some of the Al-Anon says about this stuff that I'm kind of talking about. The problem is not them, but the problem is in us. But this is Al-Anon literature saying what I'm going to just listen to this. Many of my punishments are self-inflicted. Really? I thought they were inflicting them. Al-Anon stuff. Many of my punishments are self-inflicted. In some way unfathomable to my human intelligence, my suffering could be the consequence of my own attitudes, my own actions, or my own neglects.
Mine. Okay, I'm understanding the alcoholic. Okay, what's wrong with that person in the
[00:50:01]
mirror now? This is where it starts to get uncomfortable. People stop nodding their heads and start to go. This is getting a little too close to the bone. If your alcoholic is sitting beside you, they're going, listen to that. This is payback for the alcoholic right here. Of course, we've never done that. You need to hear that. Listen, Al-Anon said this is, again, Al-Anon literature. If we really do want peace of mind, the first thing to realize is that it does not depend on conditions outside us, but those inside us. And listen to this. Al-Anon's prime purpose, that's another pretty powerful statement, our prime purpose is to help us deal with the problems that alcoholism has aggravated, not caused. My sponsor says it like this, adding an alcoholic to a person like me is like sprinkling Miracle-Gro on my defects. And in that book that they ask us not to talk about, you know, that big anonymous volume, this is what they say in that book. All those years ago, 1939, when it was published, written in 1938, whether the family has spiritual convictions or not, the family, that's us, they may do well to examine the principles by which the alcoholic member is trying to live. They knew that in Hackeran and in New York and all the places in those four years. All those years ago. Listen to this one, again from that same book.
Our design for living is not a one-way street. It is as good for the wife as it is for the husband. Or in today's speak, it is as good for the non-alcoholic as it is for the alcoholic. And here we are in 2014, in Salt Fork Lodge, somewhere in Ohio, I don't know where the hell we are. I said Ohio. Canton, or how did the Football Hall of Fame ever get into Canton? A small little place like that, anyhow. So here we are. And I think we still need to know that today. That it's as good for the non-alcoholic as it is for the alcoholic.
If you believe in me, and I know it's a hard sell sometimes. It's a hard sell for me. I started here in 1968, like I told you. Got kicked out and went into Al-Anon for six years left. Came back three years later in 1987. Was here again for seven years without a sponsor. Do not do what I did. And I felt lonely. I felt different. I felt like this wasn't working for me. And it wasn't. Because I had nothing to work on. I didn't have anybody to work with. I brought my isolation of my disease into these rooms. I kind of hung around in fellowship, but I failed to work the program. And it wasn't until I really hit a bottom that I finally said to somebody, I want what you got. How did you do that? I need to have that. That's when she started telling me how to work these steps. And she started working with me. She said, you're one sick puppy. I took that as a compliment. And we started doing it. And I needed it because of all things. I just want to tell you just a tiny little thing here. So you know, I say it's all about, not all about us, but I said, you know, you need to see who we are and where we are in this stuff. But there was an alcoholic there.
And my dad was the alcoholic. And so he used to do a few things. And this kind of starts to illustrate part of what's wrong with the Al-Anon. So my dad loved to do a few things. He loved to really lumber things. One of his favorite things was he liked to garden. He liked to drink. And he loved to take off his clothes. And he would do it kind of in the order of he'd start drinking, and then he'd go out into the backyard. And he'd be kind of dressed. And he'd start working in the backyard and kind of work his way to the front.
So by mid-afternoon, it was hot. And there would be many, many beers gone. And you know, this was in the time when we weren't afraid of the sun, when we'd put oil on to attract the sun. We're old enough to remember that. And so my dad drank beer. And so we all know the beautiful physique of the beer drinker. And so you'd think knowing the way, knowing the pattern, he'd start in the front and work his way to the back. But no, no, no. The keen alcoholic mind would start in the back and work their way to the front. And so by mid-afternoon, he's out there. And you know, many of the articles of clothing that he had been wearing are now gone. He's all oiled up. You know, the Bermuda shorts have been turned into a thong. And he's wearing sandals. They're brown, stubby, beer bottle and a cigarette. And you know, I can see my mother now. Hey, we married them, didn't we? Oh, you're beautiful. Get in here now, you hunk. I want it right now. Don't remember a time like that. Remember, we used to
[00:55:03]
think that now it's like, oh, good God. So my dad had a bit of an anger problem. I know that, you know, actually, you know, really, there's alcoholics have anger problems. We know that the only people who have worse anger problems are the Al-Anons. I'm going to kill you. That seems like the legitimate solution to my problem. I'll be good if you're gone. And I'll be, I'm very happy to help you do that. And so there we are inside, you know, like all greased up. And you know, my dad would get mad at people. And he went after this guy out in the street one time. The guy stopped and they had this to-do in the middle of the street.
Cigarette, oiled up, brown body, bottle, Bermuda shorts turned into a thong, streets kind of gathering around. He's out there really making a spectacle. And we're embarrassed. Isn't that one of the symptoms of alcoholism to family disease? They do it. We're embarrassed. He's showing the world his ass. We can't show our face. Our solution, stop drinking. You come here, I can't drink, I can't not. It's not the solution.
But that is the beginning of us, isn't it? We start to cover up. We start to do all of that stuff. We start to obsess trying to control all of that. And that's kind of the household I was brought up into. I went to those Al-Ateem meetings. I can tell you they kicked me out. I heard those great things in Al-Ateem. You know, Rick, your father's an alcoholic. He's not a bad man. He has a disease. He's not a disgrace. Amazing things. I kind of went on for a while. I left.
And met this woman. And then came back like just totally, totally broken. So take a look at the stuff I read. You know, some of these quotes from that book we're not supposed to talk about. Some of the, just by virtue of their laughter that you have, you understand what I'm talking about is that we get embarrassed when they do stuff. That we feel the shame when they do it. We kind of feel that it's about us.
I ask you this question. And don't answer this one with your hands. Just kind of meditate on this one. So am I who I am because of an alcoholic? Or did I choose an alcoholic because of who I am? And if you can answer yes to that part, I'm the latter. I've gone from the side that says it's you to it's me. And this is available to us. But there's other things we do, aren't there? Lots of them. Al-Anon, we call it. I hear it all the time in Al-Anon. I'm a people pleaser.
That's the biggest misnomer I've ever heard. Kind of, you know, kind of insinuates that I have a scintilla of regard for your well-being. And I really do not. The only thing I do is I'm a people pleaser. The only thing I want is for you to approve of me. And so if I can do everything I can to get you to approve of me for a brief moment in time, that becomes my God. And so I am not a people pleaser. I am well and truly an approval sucker.
And I will do anything in any way at any time, left to my own devices, to get approval from you. Because when I am living with the kind of pain that I was living with, and I am not accepting a God into my life, when I'm not sharing any of that with you, I have to come up with my own ways to stop the screaming. And this is the best plan I could have. Just seek approval. Other things we say, we have low sense of self-esteem. Well, that would be a rise up for where I was at. It's kind of like no sense of self-esteem.
And it manifests itself in really interesting ways. So, for example, I've been a teacher for 33 years, and if you take a look at the first six years of yearbooks, the place where my picture is, is empty. Because you see, I couldn't stand my own image. And so I wouldn't have my picture taken. Two university degrees, and I won't have my picture taken. I won't go into a store to buy pants. Because I have to stand in front of a mirror, and there's three sides, and you're buying pants. How do you want to look? I want to disappear. I wouldn't cut my hair, what's left of it. I wouldn't go to a barber to get my hair cut. I'd hack away at my own hair. Because I could not stand to sit in a chair, and have someone stand behind me and say, how do you want to look?
I could not stand to look at myself. to look at myself. That's where my esteem was. I'd walk down the street or in a mall and, you know, you see your full body reflection in the plate glass, I would always turn away.
[01:00:01]
Somebody caught me to take a picture, I'd make a funny face because the real me is not good enough. If anybody asked me what I'd want to do, what do you want to do? What do you like to eat? What do you like to eat? What movie do you want to see? What movie do you want to see? I did a personality test when I was in grade 13, we did grade 13 when I was in school. I failed. We did this personality test and it came back with the results, and my result was I was amorphic. I said, what does that mean? They said, well, it means you can kind of bend yourself to any situation. I said, that's good. They said, no, that's bad. It means you don't know who you are. And that was totally and completely accurate.
I'm not drinking. I'm not an alcoholic. I don't drink alcohol. I drink and it doesn't do anything for me. I'm one of those disgusting alcohol abusers. I drink half a beer and I throw the rest away. And have a glass of champagne and you dump the rest out. I mean, like, I abuse alcohol. The alcohol is not doing it, but I needed to find other things that did it for me. And so one of them, and we all identify with this one, I know, is we find the people who need us. Right? That's like the granddaddy for this Al-Anon. And I found it in this woman. And I was kind of in university and I was going to school. I play the tuba.
And so I applied to go to this music school in Western Canada and I'd been accepted to go and the person who accepted me said, why don't you call four of the other people that are in this little group you're going to be in, a quintet, and arrange time for a rehearsal. And I did that and I called three of them, made arrangements for a rehearsal, then I called her. And I'm here to tell you that I don't even have to see the alcoholic to be attracted to them. So I phone up this woman and what was supposed to be this short little conversation to arrange a rehearsal turned into an hour-long lust-fest on the phone.
And I had never set eyes on her and she was exciting and she was energetic and she was alive and she'd been places I wanted to go. She'd played music with people I wanted to play music with and she was just kind of ahhh. And it was fantastic. And so I started asking around about her and I found out that she was really cute and that she was really experienced and I wasn't particularly experienced. I had no experience at all with other people. She had a lot and I wanted it. She was a great musician and we'd start to talk on the phone every once in a while and she'd tell me things. Like she said, you know, my father kind of does these things to me. And inside, I didn't know I was doing this. Really? I can help you with that. And another kind of, oh, my brother, you know, it's amazing how my brother treats me. Oh, really? I can help you with that. And one day I'm in a summer job. A summer job I worked in the liquor store. Ken's father got me the job. I mean, you can't make this stuff up. That's really God's honest truth. As Ken always said, his father, the alcoholic, was the manager of the liquor store. He had the key to the door. Amazing. He was the one that got me the job. So anyway, I'm at the liquor store and this woman calls me up. Saturday afternoon. She's drunk. She said, my boyfriend was supposed to come over. He didn't come over. I drank this bottle of wine. Do you want to come over? I've been an altoine for a long time. A little part of me went, that's bad. But that part of me that still needed addressing went, I can help you with that. So the fateful day came and we're at the airport in Toronto and I'm sitting there with my mother on my right side and my father on my left and she comes in and gentlemen, she was bouncing. Beautiful. Glistening black hair, this little blue top and a lot of firecracker. Suitcase in one hand, trumpets in the other. She came right over in front of us and bent right over. My mother had mild cardiac arrest right on the spot. The ice popped right out of my father's head and I'd been an altoine long enough to know that I was about to have a spiritual awakening. And I did. I definitely wanted what she had. And I got it in spades, I'll tell you that. So we get in the airplane and I had a beer. When an Al-Anon says they have a beer, we mean one. Well she had five. And if there's anything I say to you tonight that you can take to the bank, it's that she had five because I have never met an Al-Anon that can't count. And conversely, I've never met an alcoholic who can. Amazing. Amazing. How many of you had? We all know the answer. Two, that's right.
[01:05:06]
They must learn that at alcoholic school. Never admit to more than two. A couple. A couple. You're so easy. Oh God, listen to these Al-Anons laugh. Come on, this is Al-Anon, we're not supposed to be laughing. So, you know, we got out to that school and we played music and I just found out how great some things are when there's another human being in the room. Thank you for that laughter of identification. It was a lonely life. God, admitting that to a room full of women. Strike me dead now. So we'd play music and we'd do it and then we'd have something even better. And if you're an Al-Anon like me, you'll love this. We had therapy. She would tell me what was wrong and I would fix her. Oh my God. So a couple of weeks into this, what I used to call a relationship, I had a friend at home, her name is Mildred, she said, Rick, that was not a relationship, that was a parasitic entanglement. Go searching for one of those on some kind of internet dating site, looking for a parasitic entanglement, you're going to find one. And another guy said it like this, you know, two ticks without a dog. So whatever you want to call it, I had it. So two weeks into this thing, she says this to me. She said, Rick, I've been seeing a therapist for a long time, but I don't need to see that therapist anymore because now I have you. Beautiful. I felt like I belonged to the human race. I could stand tall. She needs me and I can help you. And on some level, that just called to me as the sweetest thing I had ever heard in my life. And left to my own devices, it still would be. But it's in the cage and the door is closed. But that did happen. All of that happened. And all of us are nodding because we can understand that and kind of extend it, extend it, extend it. My time is starting to run out. But that's one of the things for me, needing to be needed. Another one is just that gangrene of anger that would just hold it on the surface. And we giggle about, you know, the kind of wanting to do it to somebody. But, you know, I think there's a homicide Al-Anon and there's a suicide Al-Anon. And I think sometimes we can be the same thing. And all I want to say about anger and rage is that would be like a whole topic to investigate, just what that is and what that does for me. When I did my step six with my sponsor, she said, which defect are you having the hardest time letting go of?
And I said, my anger. And she said, really? And I said, yeah, it's my closest friend. Kind of an illusion of power. Totally an illusion. But I had it. I didn't want to let it go. But anger and rage has two sides. Homicide, suicide. It's either an outie or an innie. And I'm sad to tell you that last Sunday night, I got an email from the GR in our group saying that our past GR made the ultimate decision.
What we deal with here in Al-Anon is life and death. And we say that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result. And that is totally true. But I would submit to you tonight that there's another definition of insanity. That when we really believe that making the ultimate solution, we really believe that suicide is the answer. We are well and truly in a condition of insanity.
I'm sad about that. I really like she was one of those members that when she came in, I was happy she was in my group. And some are along the way. So it can happen to us. I guess it was no longer in the cage. And the door was open. And am I capable of that? Left to my own devices? Absolutely, I am. Let's not be smug about this. Because I'm here for any length of time. I get a reprieve today. And I'm so grateful
[01:10:02]
for that reprieve today. And I want it tomorrow, too. When tomorrow comes. Take a look at some other things. We control things. We're victims. All those statements. Kind of all those statements. Love being a victim. Love being a victim because when you're a victim, you never do anything wrong. You get all the pity and the attention. And nothing holds me down worse than being a victim. And on and on. So kind of, I would encourage you, in your own quiet time, take a look and answer yourself this question. Why am I in Al-Anon? Am I just doing fellowship?
Or do I really want to get better from alcoholism to family disease? Because you see, I don't identify myself with the alcoholic at all anymore. Why am I in Al-Anon? Because I am recovering from the disease that I have. And it's right on one of our pamphlets. Alcoholism, the family disease. And that's something I have. Regardless of the condition of alcoholism in any of the parents, grandparents, children, spouses, anybody alive or dead with me or not, I have it.
And I bring all of this stuff into my life. Because off my own devices, it's the best idea I have. And I'm here to tell you that you guys have a way better idea. A way better idea. You have 12 better ideas. You have 12 ideas that work for me. You have 12 ideas that I've done. And I've done these with my sponsor. My sponsor is an Al-Anon member who I met in Toronto 20 years ago. And she's my sponsor to this very day. And I sent her a letter asking me to be your sponsor. And she sent me a letter back saying, you're one sick puppy, but welcome to the family. And we started to do the steps together. She said, get all the Al-Anon books. Read all those books. Read a couple of the AA books. That was part of my personal recovery.
She'd answer the questions for each step of the back of past recovery. Answer the questions to me. And I did that. So I kind of wrote out the answers. Kind of read them to her. We discussed them. And then she said this to me after step one. She said, congratulations, Rick. You've done step one to the best of your ability today. Now listen to this. Move on. This is a moving on program. This is not a stock program. This is not an activity program. This is an action program.
That I'm kind of like a hamster on a wheel. I can be active all day. And at the end of the day, I'm in the same place. I'm just tired. I want to move on. And I did it with two. I did it with three. I did the inventory in four. I got an airplane. And I went down and did my five. She sat in the kitchen for two days. Listen to me. We went out in her backyard and burnt it. Said a prayer with every page. And we came back in. And I looked at her. And I said, there is not a single thing I have not told you. And she looked at me and said this. She said, Rick, I love you more because I know you better. My deepest fear was that if you knew me, you would loathe me. You would banish me from your very existence. In that my other deepest fear was that I would be alone, would be fully and truly realized. And what I found by taking these actions that I really did not want to take. And that's our supreme wisdom here. We don't think our way into this stuff. We just act our way into new thinking. We don't think right and then I start to take the actions. I just take the actions. Generally, the more you don't want to do them, the better they work. It's kind of just funny little corollary. It's this odd little thing.
And so my whole life, I've been walking in New York, but I wanted to go to Los Angeles. But my own way, I couldn't get there. And you gave me the new map. You know, it's 12 things. As I started to do it, I started to get pointed toward Los Angeles. And I had that awakening and things start to get better. Things get better in my life. You know, we say, you know, I got everything I always wanted. I don't want everything I always wanted because what I wanted comes from this sick mind of mine.
I don't want that. My best ideas are not great ideas. My best thoughts are not best thoughts. My sponsor says, don't go in alone. It's a dangerous place. And I kind of need to, I need to kind of keep that. I need to allow God to get in there. I want to tap into the intelligence that created this. He's got a much better idea than I've got. And so I just stayed open to that. I stand before you today. I'm 58 years old, and I am a man who does not have children by choice. But I married a woman two years ago who has grown children.
And one of her daughter, one of her, she had two sons and a daughter. The daughter had a baby and now has two. Five years ago when we were kind of, you know, we dated for 12 years. Perfect day for an Alan. We're an Al-Anon couple. Who obsesses with who? And I don't know how that quite works. Anyway, we know a lot of Al-Anon couples now. We kind of see that. The alcoholics go, and just who obsesses about whom? We don't have to obsess about anybody now, buddy.
Because I'm an Al-Anon. But anyhow, if I was But anyhow, if I was leaving this to my own devices, this thing wouldn't have worked. But I just kind of left it open. So here I am, this childless man, never wanted kids. Five years ago, Julianne, is this girl's name, has a baby, her and her husband. And 18 minutes after that baby's born, I'm invited into the delivery room.
[01:15:04]
I've never seen one, they're gooey, lying there, black hair. And there's me, and my now wife, Lise, and Lise's ex-husband, and Julianne and her husband, and Lise's other children. And Lise's youngest child, he's like 25, I'm talking about young, that's how young he was, reached over to me. This is even before we were married, he said, congratulations, Rick, you're going to be a very important part of this little boy's life.
I never knew I wanted that one. That never came into my radar, that one. And then the discussion happens, well, what do you get called? I said, it doesn't matter. I will participate in this little boy's life in any way that you allow me to, be honored to be anything. Just call me Rick, that's good. So as it turns out, the father's father wanted to be called Papa. And the daughter, Julianne's father, wants to be called Grampy.
So the guy that has no kids gets Grampa. I didn't know I wanted that one. So I'm Grampa Rick. Now this little girl born a few years later, she just calls me Grampa, in this cute little voice. Grampa, Grampa. The other day she was over, and she says, Grampa, come downstairs and play. My wife looks at me and says, how can you say no to that? Didn't even cross my mind. But I was away at one of these deals.
I forgot to tell you straight at the beginning, when I was a young kid, I used to hide in a closet, hang up a big sign that said, keep out. Built forts all the time saying, keep out. I always wanted you to come in, but I was always hanging up the sign that said, keep out. Part of my disease. And so I get home, and this was about a year ago, I was away at one of these things, I was in Omaha actually, and I get home on a Sunday afternoon, and the grandkids always come over, they bring their parents with them.
Lucas, come on over. Yeah, bring your mom and dad, it's okay, but I want you to come over. And so we had taken in all the lawn furniture, all the cushions from the lawn furniture, hadn't put it away, I just threw it in the basement. So I get home, and Lucas had built a fort, like I used to build forts. And said, Grampa Rick, come on down, and let's go in the fort that I built. And I'm lying in this little fort, with Lucas, thinking, when I was a little kid, I guess I did what little boys do.
The alcoholism part was that I hung up to keep out. What this beautiful little boy is doing, is saying, Grampa, come on in there with me. And I started to cry, lying there with my grandson, and thinking, be open to wherever you can hear the lesson, Rick, because God will speak to you through anything, at any time, at any age, anywhere, be open to the message. And I am so, so grateful for that, and I never wanted it.
But now that I have it, I can't believe I ever not wanted it. So I remain open, I'm retiring in June, I'm just being, I'm playing the faith card. What are you going to do? I don't know, but I just believe that God will bring something into my life, and I'm not controlling it. You guys are awesome. There's a painting that stands in a side altar in a cathedral in London, England. It's a picture of a traditional robed figure, standing with his right hand raised, knocking on the door of a thatched cottage, lantern in the left hand, right hand raised, knocking on this door.
Up in the top of this painting, it's a life-size painting, I've sat in the room and seen it. It says, The Light of the World. Beneath the painting, it says, Behold, I stand at the door and knock. Any man who hear my voice and open the door, I will come into him and sup with him, and he with me. And when you look at the picture real carefully, we all realize, we've all seen the picture. There's no doorknob there, because my God loves me enough that he's circling around, but he'd never barge in.
But when I start to take the actions I don't want to take, I start to open the door, and that God starts to come in. And the more actions I take, the more that that door opens, and the more that that God comes in. And I'm just saying when I'm taking those steps, God, please come in. I want what you have. And I leave you with what I believe to be the absolute strongest wisdom we have, and my sponsor said it to me right from the beginning, and it's what I've done to allow myself to open that door.
And she said, Rick, you do not think your way into right action.