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Source: Unidentified Historical Recording – Fellowship Review Recording 842 – Date Unknown.mp3 File: chris-r-powerlessness-fellowship-and-the-real-addict-in-ca-ca-date-unknown-archive-842.mp3 Duration: 00:59:28
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The Big Book's description of powerlessness, which is this book, and it's found on page 24, in There Is a Solution, the chapter There Is a Solution, and there's this quote, The fact is that most addicts, alcoholics, for reasons yet obscure, have lost the power of choice in drink. Our so-called willpower becomes practically non-existent. We are unable, at certain times, to bring into our consciousness, with sufficient force, the memory of the suffering and humiliation of even a week or a month ago.
We are without defense against the first drink. And to share his experience with us about what makes us real addicts, please help me welcome again our friend, Chris R.. Welcome, welcome. Can you all hear me? That sounds pretty good. I better stay away from that. That's probably what's… My name is Chris R.. I'm a very grateful, recovered addict, alcoholic. I am just blown away. I've got to tell you thanks for letting me come up here and do this.
The cats on the committee, I mean, they've been so good. This has been planned for years, literally, guys, because I'm booked out a long way, and these guys, they took that to heart, and they planned this stuff, and they got my flights and stuff arranged so I don't have to fly in a cattle car. They were the best. Put me up in a hotel. Listen, I'm in a hotel, downtown Toronto, right around the corner from the Zanzibar.
No, but listen, I'm going up. Because here, listen, on the outside, Texas is littered with these places. They're just nude women, nude women. This is nude and sinful women. On the outside, I mean, the two together, what a concept. I mean, because I've seen plenty of nude women. They weren't sinful. They had nothing. I'm so excited to be here. It's like being in a little bit of Europe and New York City. It's just a gorgeous place. You guys are the best. I've said it before. I'll get in trouble. These little CDs, they travel everywhere, and they'll get in trouble.
It sounds like I'm dissing Texas women, but you Canadian women, it's probably an ordinance someplace. Somewhere, somewhere, there's a town with just ugly women in it. In Canada, I don't know. They're not here, I guarantee you. Y'all are something. I love the way we're doing this, because we're going to kind of squeeze it in, guys. We're going to hit some topics. We're going to talk about traditions.
I stayed up half the night last night thinking about it, and it just kind of busted up the flow of this. We're going to kind of stay in the steps, and we're going to give a general sum of my thoughts. I'm an alcoholic and a drug addict who nearly died getting to the fellowship. Once I got to the fellowship in the early 80s, I dang near died then, too, because I couldn't get anybody to get off Dead Center and tell me the truth.
I'm the real McCoy. I'm not a little disco cocaine user. I'm like some of y'all. Not all of you. Some of you. We want to talk a little bit about this. About five or six years into my sobriety, I moved to the Hill Country. I couldn't find a job anywhere. They needed a clerical worker at this treatment center. I said, well, pick me. I'm in recovery. I started working at this nice hospital down in Hunt, Texas. I've been there ever since. For 15 years, I've been at this hospital.
I'm delighted to work there, but I get a chance to see thousands of alcoholics and addicts come through our doors. We're one of the last big detox hospitals, full-service detox. The pill is coming at us, and we stay full 24-7. I'm just saying, I get to work with thousands of alcoholics and addicts. One of the things that's the same, it seems like, with everybody is their dislike for the 12-step movement.
Oh, this is AA stuff. Oh, this is Narcotics Anonymous stuff. Yeah, but you don't understand. This is the real McCoy. This is the stuff you can sink your teeth into here. The ones that stick get excited, and a lot of them flourish and stay sober. The ones that don't, they're out the door. We have done such a disservice to a perfectly wonderful fellowship that works every time, and we've taken it because we feel like it's our right to water down this message.
I'm going to say this going in the door, guys. I was in Amarillo, Texas not long ago doing a talk, and I'm eating what little I can eat before I talk, and I'm just picking. And this girl sits down next to me, and she's excited because she gets to sit across from me. Basically, she wants to bust my chops for a couple hours. Well, I've heard your CDs, and I agree with most of what you say, which means she don't agree with some of the stuff I say.
[00:05:03]
And now she wants to take exception, and she wants her time to explain to me why she doesn't agree with what I say. And I've got to say, I understand all of you all are the same in your own little ways, and we can discuss this until the cows come home. But at what point did it get to where you've got to agree with everything you hear in these fellowships? I mean, you don't have to do that in the rooms. Oh, he's so full of BS. Don't even listen to him.
You don't have a problem there, but if somebody comes up and speaks from the podium, all of a sudden they're supposed to be qualified as some kind of guru or something. Guys, you're not going to agree with everything I say. You're just not. It's okay. I'm coming out of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. I'm coming out of the literature. I'm coming out of 20 years of experience, and it may not jive with your experience.
Y'all follow? But sooner or later, we've all got to get on the same page. I was at a meeting. We have a little group, Ingram Solution Group, and we have AA groups and CA groups that meet there. Conscious Contact, our little CA group, meets there at this same place. It's called the Outpost. It's a club. I mean, how Texas is this? I mean, we're lucky to have indoor plumbing at this place. But it's a little thumper conclave. There's dozens of other groups in the area down in the hills there, but all the little thumpers end up coming over there because they're not going to catch any wrath of anything from anybody.
They're going to be okay. Walking in with a big book sometime in some of the groups we go to is like heresy. There's groups in Dallas. They'll ask you to leave your big book. Excuse me, is that a big book? Well, yeah. You can't bring that in here. Literally. They don't want you to bring books in the meetings. We're here to share from your heart, not from the literature. Oh, so we want to kill some more people. Is that what you're telling me? Okay.
Well, anyway, I saw this guy behind me. I've seen him. I've met him in Houston before. He's a nice guy. And he's 19 years sober, and everybody shares. We're reading out of the literature, and he says, my name's so-and-so, and I got up this morning and chose not to drink and drug. And went on and shared his little pitch about what we were reading. And I turned around and looked at this guy like, you what? 19 years sober.
Now listen, I'm looking at this guy, and I've got all of these alumni, these big cats from our hospital, and little guys I sponsor. I sponsor about 30 guys, and they're all looking, and every head in the place looks at me. You know, it's like, I'm looking at him, and they're looking at me, because I'm fixing to go eat this guy. You know, and it's like, but you understand, my heart, I didn't want to embarrass this guy or cause any kind of conflict.
But my heart goes out to the poor little newcomer that's finally got under his little head. He's qualified himself for what fellowship he needs to be in, and he's on some solid ground. And now this idiot, I said it, wants to share something like that. Layla just read it. The book is crystal clear. If you can stop doing cocaine because you want to, you ain't one of us. Now listen, guys, I'm going to talk to you for about four hours today on and off, and we're going to answer some questions and stuff.
We're going to have a hoot. I'm going to say this again. You don't have to agree or disagree with anything I say. We're coming out of the literature, but don't argue with me, because it's the literature you're arguing with. And if it makes you uncomfortable, let's visit about it. But I'm not backing off this one thing right here, right now. Cocaine Anonymous is not a self-help program. It never has been, never will be.
We're a spiritual program of action. The big book instructs us to talk about the spiritual end of this freely. It's all based on the resolution to our problem being a spiritual experience. If that settles crooked with you, go find someplace else to hide out. Because you're not helping us, and you're doing the newcomer a huge disservice. You're confusing everything. It is not your right to come in these rooms and say anything you want to say.
We have one message. This is as controversial as it's going to get, guys. I love you, and I don't want to piss anybody off. But you've got to get straight with this. If this business of the end result being a spiritual experience sticks in your craw, you need to either sit and learn something today or go away. We have one solution for alcoholism and drug addiction that we know of that works in this entire world.
Pharmaceutical companies are working overtime trying to come up with medication that will fix this. Treatment centers like the one I'm working at are 24-7 trying to work out new ways to present a message that can help us poor busted up alcoholics and addicts. And the one basic thing that we know that works and works every time is the 12 steps. And yet you think it's your right to come in and use this as a dumping ground for your problems
[00:10:04]
and use it as some kind of a self-help program. I go to those meetings so I can keep my experience green. Then you're going to the wrong meetings. Because if all you're doing is going into meetings talking about cocaine, you're in the wrong meeting, I'm telling you. No wonder you feel like you're coming out of your skin. I don't go to those meetings. I go to literature-based meetings where we sit and talk about the power of God and we watch people grow up and get well around us.
And that's what this is about. Let me hit this on something that… Something that Layla was talking about earlier. How can I put this? Ten years ago at the hospital where I was working, we didn't get too many relapsers in there. We got people that were brand new off the street. A little crackhead come in and this was after the 80s and they were coming all fried up. And then we got to see the little epidemic of the meth addicts coming in and now we're starting to see the tip of the iceberg with these pill addicts.
And I guarantee you some of y'all in here right now are tangled up in the medications already. And that's the next wave. And it's going to make the crack epidemic look like kissing a baby's butt. Because this is nasty stuff. I'm telling you, detoxing off these pills is like… Give me cocaine any day. Oh my gosh. And they're suffering. And they suffer for months. Months and months and months. So it's just something we were looking at.
But we didn't see a lot of relapsers come back in. I'm going to tell you the anomaly of what we're starting to see. And I'm going to tell you the anomaly of what we're starting to see. And I'm going to tell you the anomaly of what we're starting to see. And I'm starting to do some statistical work on it. Is that we're seeing a lot of people that were sober many years in Alcoholics Anonymous or Cocaine Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous.
Into the fellowships. Who are now relapsing coming back in after 15 years, 10 years, 20. I've got, I know 3 guys, 2 of my sponsors that had 21 plus years sober and relapsed. Now why? Well, they got sick again. The obsession to use returned. The spiritual malady returned. They got uncomfortable in their skin. And their head started telling them they could use again. And usually it's with us, with long term sobriety, we go back to a prescription pad to try to fix the problem.
What we're trying to treat here is not drug addiction. We're trying to treat this untreated internal condition that is drug addiction. Everybody thinks that alcohol and drugs, drug addiction is about the alcohol and drugs. It's not. And that's what I want to talk about for the short time I've got with you in this deal about this deal about powerlessnesses. One of the problems that we have is that we're not qualifying the newcomer.
Why do we see so many? We were talking at breakfast about it. Why do we see so many people sitting in Cocaine Anonymous uncomfortable in their skins? Oh, that's, I hear people all the time in my meetings. Oh, that's just cocaine. It's different than alcohol. That's rubbish. That's not true. We have the same problems in all of the fellowships across the board. Overeaters Anonymous, Gamblers Anonymous, Sex Addicts Anonymous, all of the fellowships are experiencing the same problem.
You present yourself at the door and say, I want to come in. We'll let you. And we should. Bill Wilson, over and over in the chapter more about alcoholism, he uses the terms, but what about the real alcoholic? We can substitute in here. What about the real drug addict? Everybody gets pissed off at that. Real stuff. I'm a cocaine. We were just. I'm a cocaine. If I say I'm a cocaine. No, you're not. You're a member of Cocaine Anonymous.
If you say you are, you can come right on in and drop your little loony or toony or whatever the heck that stuff is in that little bucket. Or some of them littler ones for you cheap buckaroos. And I know, I know. But you can drop that stuff in a bag. You can call yourself, drink our coffee and date our women and read how it works and do all that you want to do. But calling yourself one doesn't make you one.
In Texas, we say it all. You can call yourself a chicken if you want to, too. That doesn't mean walk around in a yard and scratch. But that doesn't mean you're one of us. In order to be diagnosed with alcoholism and drug addiction, you've got to have certain characteristics. And in treatment, we have this big fight. I was talking to Mike, my buddy from wherever the hell he's from, here in Canada someplace.
But he works in a treatment center industry, and I've known him for years. But he has the same problem in his facility as we have at ours. It's qualifying. It's qualifying because everybody's idea of what an alcoholic and addict is is different. And it's not. The big book describes it quite clearly. And, guys, we're going to run over it real quick. But I've got to tell you, buddy, I'm around all day.
If any of you guys want to get together and write this stuff down and jot some notes so you can qualify, a lot of you guys are working with people in sponsorship situations that the reason there's such a pain in the butt to work with is that they haven't figured out what they are yet. Let me give you a little history. Some of y'all are not off to sleep. This is going to be a five-minute history. Unless I see you squirming too much.
a 10-minute history. In 1971, one of our great presidents, we have had so few. I catch so
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much trouble for these CDs. You're bad-mouthing America. I'm bad-mouthing our leadership. It freaks me out sometimes that y'all didn't even let us come into your country. We had a… We had a… President Nixon, in 1971, on his way out the door. One of the last things he did was sign a piece of legislation in our country that allowed… Basically, what it did is it did away with a thing called… a piece of paper called a Certificate of Need, which allowed anybody and everybody…
He understood that alcoholism and drug addiction was a disease. He had some faults, but he understood that. And he knew that treatment was the answer. And so what he did was he signed in this legislation called the Hughes Act, which allowed us to open a treatment center on every corner we wanted to. They were like Timmy Hortons all over… I wish we could trade you now. What do you like best about Canada?
Timmy Hortons. That's the best. So anyway, all these insurance companies started opening up, and people started coming into these treatment centers. But the insurance companies got involved, and they started paying like slot machines. They said, damn, we're going to get rich here. And so everybody's insurance policies, even the worst insurance policies, they had a little rider on the butt end of them saying, and if you need treatment, we'll pay for that too.
Now this wasn't cheap treatment, you know, $10,000 stuff. Average treatment stay in the 70s and 80s was about approximately $40,000. And it would go up from there. If you had any other kind of disorder or maybe more than one illnesses you follow, they'd watch you in the cafeteria and you had two pieces of pie. He is, we have an eating disorder here, you know. And it's like, you sit next to a good-looking girl.
I saw you sitting with her earlier. Oh, we have a sex addict here. But the insurance companies were just going, okay, we said we'd do this, so we're going to do this. And, buddy, they were paying for it. That's another 30 days. That's another 30 days. That's another 30 days. And you're like, what the heck? I can't do anything. And so the pendulum swings back the other way. The insurance companies, after paying billions of dollars of these claims, because we were out there.
The industry got crazy. We were out there on the streets dragging heroin addicts in. Oh, I don't know if I want to get sober. That's okay, buddy. Come on, let's go. We're going to give you some food and we're going to give you a nice place to stay. It's cold out here, isn't it? Come on in here. Let's go. And we get you signed up and you're going to go. Because the little knucklehead is going to go back in 30 days.
We're going to wait 30 days and go get him again. Remember that? Come on, let's go. And we were doing it. We abused the system. A lot of people went to jail for that kind of stuff. But what happened was the insurance companies said, screw this. We're not going to do this anymore. And they stopped paying. But the damage was done. What happened was, the point I'm getting at, is that we had a lot of people come into our fellowship, all of our fellowships, that didn't need to be here.
We had little social misfits that had been bored all their life, and all of a sudden now they're alcoholics. They've never had a problem with alcohol, to speak of. They've never had a problem with drugs. Are you with us? But they walk in the rooms and they get a, come on, give me a hug. A hug. I just love to hug. Oh, my God. And now we've got them for life because that's all they're here for. The coffee, the women, the hugs.
Oh, I love the fellowship. But they don't have to work the 12 steps to stay sober. And they're the ones that are pissing and moaning out there and wanting to say that you can say anything you want. Alcoholics Anonymous, about the same time, about in the early 70s, they got on board with this treatment center crap. They got completely on board. They started producing literature that watered the message down.
You all know that Living Sober book? Do they allow that in Canada? If you've got it, open the garbage, hold your nose like this, and drop it into the piece like that because it's a piece of crap. You were probably given it in your treatment center. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh. If you want to stay sober, don't get too hungry, angry, lonely, tired. But listen, this is Alcoholics Anonymous doing this. Everybody wants to knock the treatment centers for watering down the message.
Our own fellowship allowed that to happen. It was an article in the grapevine that started this great influx of things called open discussion meetings. Oh, my gosh. Before that, what we had was literature-based meetings and stories. We'd get up, and I want to hear your story and how you got well, and then we're going to talk about the steps. Not anymore. We're going to do open discussion meetings. Come, talk about your day like I'm interested.
You know what I'm saying? Guys, I want to get to know Kate. I want to know everything about her. What a wonderful woman. But you know what I'm saying? On a daily basis, we can be friends, and we can talk everywhere else, but if every hour that I got to go to a meeting, I got to listen to her story again, after a while, you know, it's like, come on, let's give it a break here. Let's talk about, you know what I'm saying?
And that's why people are leaving our fellowships by the thousands. The only people that gravitate to those open discussion meetings, I just love hearing about people's lives. You're a loser. I'm going to say it from the podium. You're a loser. Are you kidding me? Because the kind of power that, I'm telling you, the kind of power that Layla and I were talking about
[00:20:00]
is not the kind of power that you, that, uh-uh. Buddy, I'm talking about sitting in a meeting and looking at a little somebody that you sponsored for a few weeks, and all of a sudden, the light's on in their face, and they're standing up for themselves, and you can see the life changing right before your eyes. I'm going to tell you, that's what we need to be talking about. Where are we going to go carry the message of hope back to again?
Amen. We're going to sit here and listen to somebody. Well, I got so crazy this morning, irritable, I was pulling on that weed eater, and pulling on that weed eater, and I just, I'm pulling on that weed eater, and I can't get it to work, and I… Oh, my God. I've got people in this room that are dying of the obsession to go smoke crack cocaine, but we're going to talk about your freaking weed eater for an hour?
And somebody sitting in here right now, well, what's wrong with that? He should be able to talk about that. He might smoke crack cocaine if he doesn't talk about that. He's going to smoke anyway. How do I know that? You don't know that. I do know that. You know why? On page 62 it tells me. 62. You little note takers, I love you a little bit. All right, all right, that's it. Page 62. What does it say the root of our problem is?
Some of y'all have never read this. Selfish and self-centeredness, exclamation point. That we think is the root of the troubles. Driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity, we step on the toes of our fellows and they retaliate. Sometimes they hurt us seemingly without provocation, but we invariably find that at some time in the past we've placed ourselves in a position to be hurt, blah, blah, blah.
So our troubles we think are basically of our own making. It goes on to tell us above everything we've got to be out of self. It didn't say out of everything. We don't need to be hungry, angry, lonely, tired. But out of everything we have to stay away from crack cocaine or alcohol. It didn't say that. It says above everything we have to be out of our head. Selfish and self-centeredness is the problem.
But I think I can go into a meeting and talk about anything I want. Now how selfish is that? And Alcoholics Anonymous allowed it to happen. We watched our meeting schedules change hugely. Thousands of these stupid open discussion meetings opened up. And now, of course, in Cocaine Anonymous in 82, we just picked up the traditions and the steps and we said, well, AA's been doing this, we'll do the same thing.
And so now it's the same thing. You look at any schedule for Cocaine Anonymous and it's the same thing. It's a huge preponderance of OD meetings, open discussion meetings, as opposed to literature-based meetings. Now there are pockets, obviously I'm standing in one, where there's some places where they actually talk about the literature. How cool is that? Why can't we keep the… We ought to applaud for that.
Because it's the truth. We're starting to see it swing back the other direction. We're still outnumbered. We were in England not long ago doing a primary purpose deal with just the big book and talking about the 12 steps. Intergroup over there boycotted us. Wouldn't even put us on the schedule. I'm so sick and tired of organizations like intergroups telling us what we can do at the group level. In case somebody will come up.
You're knocking intergroups. Yes, I am. Why should they be able to decide who goes on a schedule and who doesn't? Just because it doesn't jive with what they're doing. If anything has got to do with the literature guys, let's do it. Because that's what's going to excite you. I hear people all the time in Cocaine Anonymous and NAA especially. I'm just getting bored with the fellowship. You know why you're bored with the fellowship?
Because you're going to the same kind of meetings. If you go study the literature and sit in these rooms and watch people have spiritual experiences, you will never be bored. You will have a constant flow of newcomers coming in excited about actual recovery. Guys, lack of power is the dilemma. This is what the book talks about on page 45. Lack of power, that's the dilemma. How are we going to get some power?
Well, that's what this book is about. That's what the 12 steps are about. You're not going to get the power by just coming into a meeting talking about the divorce one more time. And don't misquote me. People, they're constantly doing that. Like Chris Ramer says, we can't talk about our problems. I've never said that. I just said you can't do it in my meeting. No, it's different. What's wrong with coming before the meeting?
Let's go to the coffee shop and talk about our day. I've got a bunch of expansees. Non-stop we talk about our problem. You with us? Stay after the meeting. Well, I don't have time. Oh, great. You might want to make time. I don't know. But we're not a dumping ground for your problems in our meetings. And unless we as a fellowship gets hip to this, we're going to be in trouble. There's the program and there's the fellowship, folks.
[00:25:00]
And we've completely laid the program aside. The program is what's in the book. We've completely laid that aside. For seven years, I'm in and out, excuse me, of Alcoholics Anonymous. And nobody, I don't even own a big book. For seven years. Oh, don't worry about the literature. Don't worry about the book. Just come to meetings. Because after all, meeting makers make it. The problem was, about 1979, a merchant marine had shown me this little white powdery substance called cocaine.
And I was up to my neck in this stuff. And going to a meeting was not going to fix the problem. It freaks me out that the cats in Cocaine Anonymous can't see this. Treatment centers said it's all the same thing. Alcohol is the same as drugs. No. No, it's not. Are you nuts? What's the same? I know the solution's going to be the same. We're never going to get around to talking about that. But the rest of it, it's all different.
The terminology's different. One's legal, one's illegal. The physiological changes are different. Y'all understand it. The addictive qualities are different. The psychological impairment stuff downstream are different. What it does to your pee-pee is different. I've got to check the time. I've said this from a million podiums. If you think it's all the same, sit down and do a fist-step with an alcoholic.
And then the next day, do a fist-step with a crack addict. You did what? With what? Everybody just… Y'all follow? But it's all the same. It's all the same. This brings me to the point where I'm going with this little piece here. It's the time it takes to work the steps. Even in Alcoholics Anonymous, we've watered the message down so much. This idea of taking your time to work the steps has got to be smashed.
I guess if I've accomplished nothing in this room, we need to do this now. That stuff nearly killed me in Alcoholics Anonymous. And I guarantee if there's anybody in Cocaine Anonymous or Crystal Meth Anonymous telling people to take their time to work the steps, you need to shut up. Because when that person dies, I'm going to get in your face about it. I can't stop using. That's what qualifies me for this fellowship.
I can't because of you or mom or the court or her or the job or my health. For there's no reason I can't stop. So you need a spiritual experience. So we work the 12 steps. That's what brings on the spiritual experience. But some well-meaning puke leans over and tells the little newcomer, easy does it. He takes the line out of context and tells the newcomer to slow down. Let me tell you guys. This is what treatment centers did for us.
We got a lot of cats coming into treatment. We got them detoxed. We got them sitting on their ass. We got them defocused, carrying little teddy bears around and stuff in the 80s. We got them doing a whole lot of stuff. And they leave 30 days, 40 days, 21 days at Mike's place. And we get to leave, right? And we feel so much better. How many of you cats have seen people come out of treatment with any kind of sense of urgency at all?
It's like, hell, I've done my time, brother. I dug the ditch. I'm just here to check out the babes now. Everything's okay. Okay, but they weren't just sitting in there on their butt. They were actually doing work. So there were some results to what they were doing. You with us? They got comfortable. They got detoxed. They were feeling pretty good. Dig? So where's the urgency to sit down and actually do the work?
And we buy into it because the little guy slides up next to him and he don't want to sponsor the guy anyway. And the guy says, well, I'm not real sure about doing this four steps. He says, don't worry about it. We'll get on it. In the middle of summer, we'll start cranking on that. Don't worry about that. Right now, you just go to a bunch of meetings and everything's going to be okay. But you see, the little guy that's sharing that information might or might not even be really one of us.
Maybe he's got years to sit on his butt waiting to do a fourth step. But let me tell you, the internal condition's fixing to reach up and catch this little alcoholic crackhead right by the neck. And all the stuff he learned in treatment and all the promises he made are going to go south because when the mental obsession comes back, we get loaded. Then the little kid comes back in, mouth all burned up, can't look anybody in the face looking down at the ground.
I'm sorry I let you guys down. I thought I was on some solid ground, but I guess the guy punches him in the back and says, yeah, little bastard just didn't want it. If he'd wanted it, he'd have stayed sober. He didn't make enough meetings. I want to puke. I want to puke. I got a bad rap out there with people talking out their butt like that. You show me in the big book where it says that anything about going to a bunch of meetings will fix what's wrong with you.
90 meetings in 90 days. We've got to stop that stuff in a heartbeat. You've got to stop telling people that crap, because that's exactly what it is. It's crap. It's easy to tell this little guy he doesn't have a job, he doesn't have a relationship, he has nothing.
[00:30:01]
All he can do is just go to meetings. I'm like, 90 meetings in 90 days is a piece of cake for him. What are you going to do about this nice lady over here? got three kids at home and a husband that don't want her to go to meetings anyway? Now what's she going to do? 90 meetings in 90 days? I can't go to 90 meetings in 90 days. When the hell am I going to work? Who's going to take care of the kids? Well, how bad do you want it? Y'all with me? Y'all understand where we're at? That didn't stop you from going to get coky. It's two different things. Two completely different things. We just got to get back on track. What does the book say? The book says we beg of you to be fearless and thorough from the very start. In order to get somebody to be fearless and thorough from the very start, they've got to be convinced they're really one of us. You with me? I'll climb the mountain, but you better show me a reason to climb the mountain. Because I ain't going to do it. Because about halfway up that mountain, it gets to be a bear. And I'm going to crap out. Oh, I'll do your little first step, second step. Oh, we're going to get to hug and do another third step. Oh, I'll do that. Now you want me to start actually writing some stuff and then go make amends? Uh-uh. Wait a minute. I think we're being a little rash here. You know, maybe. And then you want me to what? Go work with a drunk?
Go find a crack addict and work them through this? No, listen. I already told you. I don't have time to mess with this. What makes you think I'm going to have time to mess with that? You with us? But if I can hold a fatal illness over your head, you'll do it. Guys, we don't have cancer wards today filled with people that are there having to go to 12-step cancer meetings to get them to go to get chemo. You know, they just like, here's the jury.
Here's the evidence. Boom. I'm going to die if I don't do this. I'm going to go do what I need to go do. If that means puke and lose my hair and want to die, I'll do it. Come on, guys. Alcoholism, drug addiction kills more people than cancer and AIDS combined. And we want to treat it like it's some kind of a behavioral problem. It's not. Alcoholism is this. It's a physical response to alcohol and dope that separates us from normal people.
Yeah. Dr. Silkworth was one of the first cats that did some writing about this. He was a neurologist at Towns Hospital in New York for about 16 years. He began to see some similarities with young people, old people, black people, white people, gay people, straight people. They all showed similar things. Rich people, poor people, guys with patches. Oh my gosh. Yeah. A cross section of the world. But he began to see the same things. All the things that tied them together in the doctor's opinion. It's first starts to talk about it. Once I start, I can't guarantee you how much I'm going to drink or drugs. Sometimes I can.
Alcoholism we know today is genetic in nature. Guys, if any of y'all want to come talk to me, they've done some great studies throughout the eighties and nineties. And then now with the advent of cat scans and pet scans, we, there's just no question. This is genetic in nature. I hear people all the time, especially in cocaine and everybody that does cocaine is going to get addicted. That's not true. You're full of it. That's your crutch. You've got to get away from it. You should see the room shift. Oh my God. Did we upset some people with that? I'm sorry. It's the genetic nature. Can I give, can I get somebody addicted to cocaine if I give them enough cocaine? Absolutely. Addicted to the chemical cocaine. Can I get you addicted to heroin if I give you enough heroin? Absolutely. Opiates. Anybody in this room can get addicted to opiates. If I give you enough, you'll get addicted. Does that make you a drug addict? No. I get you detox off of them. You dust yourself off and you go away. We saw it come to the cats coming back from Vietnam in the, in the, in the state.
Most of the pace, the prisoners coming back were addicted to various chemicals, heroin and morphine. Explicitly. We got them to the VA hospitals. We got them detox. Most of those people left. Absolutely never touched another drop of that nonsense ever went on. And there was a small percentage, 10 to 15% of those, those soldiers coming back were true drug addicts and we've had a bear keeping them sober ever since y'all follow. It's genetic in nature. Just out of curiosity, how many of you guys can see a genetic connection in your own families? If you gave that family tree a good connect, good. Yeah. I don't even know what we're talking about. Most of us in here can see it. Yeah. And it's not just like mom and dad. Look up, look up the generation. It skips many generations and, and, and stop looking just for alcohol and drugs. Cause some of the family situations were such that there was just no alcohol in your family, but, but, but the spiritual malady, the disease comes out sideways in other areas, sex addiction, work addiction, overeaters, you'll follow.
We get to see an addictions addiction in this context. It's a, it's a bear. It all needs to be, it's genetic in nature. You're with us. Great book called born that way that talks about the genetic predisposition. Anyway, I can talk more about that, but the physical
[00:35:02]
stuff is this. It doesn't mean that every time I drink, I turn into a zombie. It means that often when I drink, I turn into a zombie and ended up drinking more than I intended. You with us? Did you ever, that's the question we ought to ask instead of asking how many times have you been arrested? How many times did you rob that liquor store? How many is this? Stop that nonsense. You asked the first question to qualify for the physical piece.
When you used, did you ever do more than you intended? You used to get some new young adult little collegiate guy says, yeah, I do every time. But you see, that's not me. Cause I mean, I was in society. I had to work for a living. I couldn't, I had to force myself to not do it every time, but there were times I forced myself to not to do it, but I did it anyway. You know, the question ought to be with all of us as alcoholics and addicts to qualify us about the physical piece is this. Did you ever get sick on alcohol or dope? Did you ever do so much that you, that you blew beat? Well, yeah. Did you ever do it more than once? Well, of course. Welcome. Normal people don't do that. They do too much and they go, Oh my gosh, I shouldn't have done that. I won't ever do that again. I watched my little sister do that. You with me? My twin brother and me caught the bullet. My little sister and half sister didn't. She drank one too much at a fraternity party, a sorority party one night and she said, Oh my gosh. And she got sick. She said, I'm never going to do that again. And she never did. That's her answer. When you want another drink?
No, I'm starting to feel it. And that means I don't want another drink. I'm starting to feel it. That just doesn't relate to me. You know, I'm starting to feel it too. I want another drink. Do you answer my question? The physical piece, the physical piece can be treated by a thing called detox. A lot of us in there, uh, Bill Wilson wrote a lot about it. A lot of, most of us that first got to Alcoholics Anonymous in the early thirties.
And I mean, that's exactly what we got to detox first and get the crap out of our system. Once we get it out of our system though, why can't we stay in that spot of sobriety? The problem is not getting dry. The problem is staying dry. You with us? I'm a great quitter. I'm just a better starter. And that's, and that's the problem. That's what so many people don't understand. We can get detox a lot of these cats and they go, Oh my gosh, I'm never going to do that again. And they have the power to not do it again. Boom. They're not alcoholics and they're not drug addicts. We shouldn't force them to be. But, but guys, let me tell you this. Stop means stop because every one of us in here has stopped for periods of time. I guarantee you for Layla, I could have stayed sober for two months, two, two in a day, probably not, but two, but two months. Come on guys. That's what we do. I can stop for periods of time. I'm on probation. I'm a whatever, but then I get caught in that mental blank spot. So up to, from the doctor's opinion up to page 23, if any of you guys are working with the sponsees, that's the first thing you do. You sit them down and you qualify them. Do you, can you relate to this physical piece of drinking too much when you don't want to, or taking too much dope when you don't want to? Yeah, I can relate to that. I share some stories with him and he shares some stories with me and we get comfortable with that. Then we go to 23 to 43, the 20 pages that talk about the mental obsession where Layla read this, this afternoon about the power of this morning about the power of choice. Given sufficient reason, can you stop and stay stopped? Or do you get taken to this mental blank spot? Bill Wilson wanted us to take the newcomers to this spot in the chapter of the wives in the back of the book, it says two places to take them to that chapter where she was reading. Show them again the chapter about alcoholism so we can look at this mental insanity. If I can stop because you put enough legal pressure on me, then I'm not an alcoholic or a drug addict. What's your truth based on your experience?
I mean, the United States, we just lock them up by the thousands, by the millions. Y'all follow? They get out and they just start using again or they use while they're in jail. Doesn't that seem a little insane to you? And everybody goes, yeah, but we do it anyway. You follow? Had a friend come back into the hospital for her second visit to the hospital. She'd just been attacked in a dang crack house over in Austin. And she comes back in and she gets to stay for a couple of weeks and we get her detox, pat her on the butt. And she goes back to Austin, goes back to the same crack house, not even a different one. Oh my gosh. And you want to try to figure out some kind of behavioral problem that caused this? This woman's insane. It's the problem is we want to water this down. So everybody's included that everybody's apart. You're not. These are the people that are killing us in our programs because they're talking about crap. They don't know nothing about when you, when you, when you, when you use and you know, you don't want to, but you do it anyway. Knowing the consequences are coming straight at you and you do it anyway. That's what we're trying to alleviate. That's why I need God. That's why I need the spiritual experience. Ask somebody that's had a first step experience. I got counselors at the hospital said there's no such thing as a first step experience because you've never had one. When you're sitting
[00:40:01]
in a room, when you're sitting in a room across from somebody who's explaining this to you and all of a sudden it starts to creep in. Listen guys, I'm an alcoholic for seven years and I've never had a first step experience. Do you have a problem with alcohol? Uh huh. Are you willing to go to? Uh huh. You betcha. Okay. Welcome. Okay. That's in that. I never bought a book. I never got a sponsor. I never did do anything. You with me? Because I still believe that this is the problem. This is beer. This is cocaine. This is the problem.
And if I just don't do this, I'll be okay. But what I don't understand because nobody wants to talk about Layla, what I don't understand is that this is not the problem. It's the solution. You take the alcohol and dope away from the real McCoy and my life gets worse. Not better. Your family members don't understand that, but the real alcoholics in this room understand that. And there's a few of you in here, a handful of you in here that are looking and says, listen, but I quit doing dope and my life did get better. Okay. Listen, my external world always got better for a month or two. You follow? And then the further away I got from that alcohol and dope, the worse this got. This internal condition that we don't seem to want to talk about in our fellowships anywhere. Bring this up as a topic at your next CA meeting. Spiritual malady. Big Book talks about it, but I guarantee it'll be like roaches leaving the room. Everybody's like, oh, I got to get this call. I got to get this call. I'll be back. I mean, looking to get the heck out of the spiritual malady, but that's exactly what Bill Wilson's talking about in the book.
Chris Ramer drinks and drugs because of the spiritual malady, the internal condition. Without the alcohol and dope, I am irritable. Come on guys, sit with it. Just a second. I'm watching. I got five more minutes with you and then we'll open up for some quick questions. Irritable, restless, discontent. Y'all know right where that is up in the doctor's opinion, yeah? But how many of y'all understand irritable, restless? You'll come to treatment and what they want to do is they want to talk about that after you drink. Your life's miserable because you're drinking. They're not asking the question they need to be. So when you stop drinking, isn't your life the same or worse? Guys, every suicide attempt I ever made, I did coming off a dry spell. My first wife used to come home and bring a bottle of vodka and set it on the table and say, here, drink this. I like you better drunk.
I said, well, okay honey. If it means that much to you, anything for this relationship. Guys on page 52 it talks about the bedeviled ones. The trouble in personal relationships. How many of y'all understand that? Trouble making a living. Go back to the trouble making a personal relationship. Look at the one with yourself. Oh my gosh, you may be treating your friends a hell of a lot better than you're treating yourself. In Cocaine Anonymous we see it all the time. The little cutters that rampant. The little people that want to self mutilate. What's that about? It's a spiritual malady. No, it's a deep-rooted psychological. It's not. We've been there, done that. It's the spiritual disconnection from God. I'm not talking about tattoos. I'm going to get me a tattoo. It's going to be so good. I just sponsored a little guy. I just started sponsoring a little tattoo artist.
It's going to be good. Well, there happens to be one over there next to the Zanzibar too. Some of y'all will be over there watching from that little camera. Trouble in personal relationships. Trouble making a living. Book talks about no sense of direction. How many of y'all understand no sense of direction? We've got thousands and millions of people on adult attention deficit disorder medications in the United States. These little guys are put on those. They don't need them. Most of them don't need them, truly. Most of them, trouble in personal focusing. That's all about the spiritual malady.
How about depression? Book says we were prey to misery and depression. How many of y'all understand that one? Number one symptom of untreated alcoholism and drug addiction is depression. How about boredom? Anxiety? Buddy, I've got a friend of mine right now going through the anxiety business and all stems from the same thing. Oh, it's a medical problem. Well, gee whiz now. We haven't had it for 10 years. Now all of a sudden we got it. What's happening now? Do you think because I stopped doing cocaine that my disease stopped progressing?
This is why we're having so many people relapse coming back into our fellowship. You think Because I stopped drinking, that everything's okay. You stop drinking, folks. My friend Danny, up in Maine, says it better than me. If alcohol and dope's your problem, then detox is as hard as it's gonna get. If alcoholism and drug addiction's your problem,
[00:45:01]
it's fixing to get really, really crappy, really, really quick. Then detox is like kissing a baby's butt. to what your mind is going to ask you to do. Y'all understand that? Guys, we don't have any problem getting people to come to Cocaine Anonymous. We don't have any problem getting people to come to all of our fellowships. We have a problem keeping them, just letting them stay. Because the insanity, when that comes back, I'm irritable, restless, and discontent.
I'm two weeks away from the alcohol and dope. And all of a sudden, my head starts to talk to me. With me, it's classic every time. I'm not going to drink anymore, and I'm damn sure not going to do cocaine because it costs too much, and the meth, no, nothing. And I hear this little voice two weeks out, you could probably smoke a joint. Yeah, Rasta stuff. Yeah, it's herb. It's not dope anyway. And it may or may not be, but there's a thing called cross addiction, and I smoke pot, and it triggers the same area of the brain that the cocaine triggered, and a week later, two days later, usually with me, it's within hours, I'm back at the 7-11 buying some booze, and then I'm at the dope dealer's house. I thought you quit. I thought I did too. And I did that for seven years, in and out, in and out, in and out. First time to Alcoholics Anonymous in the early 80s, trying to save a marriage and a job, and I spent seven more years. Ended up bad things happening. The cocaine really kicked in, the methamphetamine really kicked in. In 1987, I tried to commit suicide. I tried to take my own life. I'm living in a little apartment that my brother's co-signed for me up in Dallas, Texas, and I'm working for him. It's the only reason I'm not on the street. And I picked up another stack of return checks, and I am so done. I just… You alcoholics and addicts, you just don't know the damage you're doing. I'll kiss my butt. I know everything I've done. I know every way I've hurt you. You with me? And while everybody else is asleep, and I'm wildly awake at 3 o'clock in the morning, that's all I can, that's all I'm thinking about. Why did I talk to him that way? Why did I treat him that way? Why did I do her that way? Why did I… I'm a worthless… A lot of you nodding your heads because you know exactly what I'm talking about. Guys, I'm insane. Why do you drink so much? The pressure at work? Oh… Our families, everybody around us, the therapists, they're all trying to help us figure out why we do it. I do it because I have a genetically predisposed disease.
I don't need a reason. I drink because I'm a drunk. I do dope because I'm a dope fiend. That's what I do. When I put that stuff in my system, I don't want to get ripped. I want to get right. I ain't looking to get loaded. I want to get well. You with me? Any night you can catch me. I'm balancing my checkbook. I'm washing my clothes. I'm getting ready for the next day. You with me? I'm not down at the club partying. That was long many years ago folks. Now I'm just maintenance. I'm just trying to stay on the beam. Not get arrested.
Not piss her off bad enough to get… Okay. You know what? In 1987 I tried to commit suicide because I couldn't. I couldn't not drink. I couldn't not… I lay the booze down and pick up the dope. I lay the dope down and I pick up the booze. And it always ends up back in the same damn spot. You follow? And yes, I wanted to get well. But I went off the checklist. I've been to church. They just said to believe. We were talking about…
I've always believed. I've been to treatment. I got your Gorski crap. In case anybody didn't hear me. I got your Gorski crap. Again guys, this is not a self-help program. If I could have helped myself in 1976 instead of eating out of that dumpster, I'd have done something different. So would have you. So I took the medication, sat on the side of the bed and heard a voice that said, don't do this. Go back to AA. Don't know what it was. Could have been the ferrets. Could have been the person next door. Don't know. I was sitting on the side of the bed. There was no furniture in the house. My dope dealer had my… I lent my furniture to my dope dealer. He was going to hold that leather furniture for me until I got back. And he, for all I know, he's still holding my leather furniture. And there's nothing in that house except the two little ferrets in a big old cage about the size of this right here. And I'm looking, nothing under the bed, nothing. I heard a voice. Don't do this. Go back to AA. Heard it a couple of times. Made myself sick. Laid down the bed. Heard it one last time there. The next morning, before I could just wipe the sleep out of my eyes, I come to, sit up and I heard the voice one last time. Don't do this. Same,
[00:50:04]
no inflection, no, good morning. That would have been better. This is the sunbeam talking to you. Don't do this. Go back to AA. I said, to heck with it. Okay. Don't want to go back to AA. I was arguing with the voice. What are they going to show me in Alcoholics Anonymous this time? And this time I went back and they did some things different with me. We're going to talk about a little bit more of that, but they opened the book and they qualified me the first time. And I knew I was an alcoholic and I knew I was a drug addict and any fellowship I wanted to belong to, I could participate in. But the first time though, I didn't have to question what I was. I knew that I was dying of a fatal progressive illness because men and women loved me enough to tell me the truth. Cool. We have any questions on this particular disease thing? We'd love to do that. Just come on up to the mic. Is this on? Can you hear me? Okay. And actually just come up and ask a question, but no comments or commentary. Otherwise we're going to be here, uh, all afternoon. So you have a question, just come on up and ask Chris. Yeah, Chris, thanks. Thanks for, uh, um, as lack of power was a dilemma, but, uh, let's hear about, um, the step three prayer. Can you get a chance, please? Yeah. Offer yourself to the, thank you. Next, next hour. We're going right there.
Any other questions? I, I either did a masterful job explaining the, the, uh, the problem or you, you all need to go to the bathroom really, really bad. I suspect the latter. Go get them brother. Um, you were talking about being miserable after getting off the dope and the alcohol. What else can you recommend besides doing the steps? Nothing. Nothing. That was not the answer she wanted to hear. Guys, here's the deal. Here's what we can do because I watched thousands of you guys do this. You get sober. My deal was every time I would get sober and then I would go to the gym, you know, I would get sober and I would learn how to roller skate. You know what? That's not, I'd get active and I'm feeling great.
I'm doing so good, but I'm coming apart at the seams gradually internally. This internal condition, the spiritual maladies coming back, the illness is coming back. Unless I treat that illness, nothing else I do. How many of you guys have done that? You know, you go get a new relationship, you go get a new job, you go rack up a credit card, you whatever, but nothing's going to fix you. Let's do the steps and then let's go do some of that other stuff too. But that's what you got to do.
Hey, how's it going? I was just wondering, uh, I'm an alcoholic addict and uh, every time I drink it makes me crave crack cocaine. So is that like… Welcome to Alcoholics Anonymous. I don't know what to tell you. Underneath, we're going to talk about this more this afternoon, but underneath most of you little garden riding, you little purists, I'm not an alcoholic. I'm just a crack monster. Uh huh. I understand that. But once we take the cocaine away, what happens is for most of us, we're, what is that? Oh, a cocktail. All of a sudden we get real thirsty, you know, and all of that. And you'll either become a lush like I did, you with us? Or it will just leave you and me.
I don't like the way this makes me feel. And the craving kicks in and we go straight back to the cocaine. Either way, here's the question. The second question to the disease deal is, given sufficient reason, can you leave it alone? Knowing that it'll lead you back to the crack cocaine, can you leave it alone? No. That qualifies you for Alcoholics Anonymous. You're as big a drunk as those bums out on the street. That's just, welcome.
I'm an alcoholic named George. Hey George. Ah, much like you, uh, got sober, uh, floundered in the fellowship of AA, and someone presented, uh, the fact that, am I a real alcoholic? And uh, I found myself, uh, having to look at that. So for the longest time, I'm sober and clean, and the dry date didn't change, but I'm only a member of the fellowship and wasn't working the program. So now that, uh, I'm into the work, I look around and I see a lot of other Georges that are in the fellowship and not in the program. And, well, I'm gonna get to it. I'm trying to make the point first. Come on. I gotcha. I'm with ya. Are you with me on that? Mm-hmm. So. It's rampant. So, yeah, it's very rampant. So now, here I am going to meetings and I'm trying to sponsor people and I'm trying to be sponsored and I'm trying to get into the work and my direct question is, is I go there and I see a lot of people that aren't alcoholics or addicts and I really want to say, buddy or gal, you know, let's get back to, are you, are you the real alcoholic? And then I find in my opinion that they're not. Right? But they're stuck in that middle of the road solution and I really want to say, hey, you know, let's look for someone that is real. And I'm, you
[00:55:04]
know, I try to lay aside all that kind of stuff and I'm really troubled over all this because I see the rooms full of what I think isn't a real alcoholic. You understand where he's going with this? Y'all, all of us are experiencing a lot of the same kind of deal. We've got to get real clear. We're not in a social environment here. This is not, I'm not here for your, I'm going to be your buddy, you're going to be my buddy and we're going to go together and skip through the tulips. That's not what we're doing. We're sober members of a fellowship that are, that have one job, so the traditions say, which is to carry the message of hope back to the newcomer. And that's all we're going to do is we're going to carry the message. If you, if the little loser wants to hang around with us, that's fine, but I'm going to make sure that the guys that I sponsor know what's going on and we know when to, how to spot one when we see it. You follow? If the only reason you're going is to pick up a woman, we can see that and, and, and we're going to talk to the guys and the girls that we work with to make sure that everybody understands that we are soldiers in a trench and we're going to talk a lot more about that this afternoon, but you've got to start standing for something. Stop worrying about what everybody's thinking about you and start. It doesn't mean you have to be abrasive, but you've got to stand for something. I just want to know on the newcomer or someone dealing with them when, what's like overwhelming them with information versus what they can take in. And again, y'all hear the question? He's talking about being overwhelmed as a newcomer with a lot of information. Here's what we don't do. We don't drop them in here and lecture to them. And we're going to talk about that some in this afternoon when we talk about working with others. But what I'm going to end up doing with a new guy is I'm going to use some thing called discernment.
I'm going to watch and see how far you detoxed, how this little guy comes in and you can just see by knowing. I mean, he's, he's getting confused at the coffee bar for God's sakes. So I'm not going to spend a bunch of time talking to him about, Hey, let's talk about the concepts. How about you come and sit down and get a couple of, no, no, no, no. There's plenty of time for that. It's just, but it's like triage when they first get here. I got them. Now let's keep them here. So first thing I'm going to do is I'm going to qualify them.
Do you really need to be here? Well, I'll drink and then I'm going to qualify them. Let's talk about the physical allergy and the mental obsession. And you can see it on their face. They just, they get so comfortable. They go, Oh shit, I didn't know. Absolutely. And then we talk about the spiritual malady. Even the most little fried pie can understand that. You know, I got a book, show them where the book is. Maybe see if they want a copy of that. You with us? That's perfect question. You can't jam everybody the same way. Some of these guys are rocket. They come in, they're ready. Some of them, but, but, but nobody, I'm not going to wait too damn long to do that with. I'm just, I'm just not, if you're not ready to stay, that's it. Thanks Chris. I'm a recovered cocaine addict. I'm a big book sponsor and it's nice to have somebody openly make that distinction about a real drug addict and a real alcoholic. Cause we've been saying that for years and people look at us like we have three heads. They're like, what do you mean? You're trying to separate yourself from us. You know, Oh, you've got terminal uniqueness. You know, they look at us like this. I know the difference. I've had that step one experience you're talking about where I knew I was fucked, you know, completely, completely done. You know, I didn't have any other option. Um, for those of us out there that are working in the trenches, like you said, you know, big book sponsors, um, it's nice to have somebody else as a target for a change because when we say what you say, they throw us out of meetings. You know, how do you deal with that, Chris? Okay. You know, we try to do it in, in a, in a diplomatic format, but sometimes we don't try hard enough. I'm right there with you tonight. Again, this afternoon we start talking about this. We want to really focus on this business about how to do this. We don't want to go in and be horses, but we, I don't want to go in and abrasive it. You're not doing this right. I mean, the steps are open and roomy. There's lots of different ways we can do this, but what we have to look at is in a, in a great scheme of things is the message being carried properly. Y'all y'all follow. And guys, I've got to tell you something. We are different. The real alcoholics and addicts guys, we have a common problem and a common solution. And you're either with us or you're on the periphery against us. And that's what we're trying to do is bring you in. Do you think everybody that you go to the meeting with is because they say they're in cocaine anonymous or actually in cocaine anonymous? That's ludicrous. That's nuts. Their actions will show you whether they're in or not. Okay. I know that we have more questions, but we're going to have to take a break at some point. So we're just going to take a break now, a 10, 15 minute break, and then we'll be back for the second half of the morning. And then you can ask more questions, but first, first, first, first.