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Source: Brian S. Atlanta GA – BOX OF CHOCOLATES – 2026-07-23.m4a File: brian-s-atlanta-ga-box-of-chocolates-2026-07-23.mp3 Duration: 00:50:38
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It's Ramona. My name is Brian Alcoholic, and we just moved, and our Wi-Fi is still figuring that out. So if I start getting choppy or something, I'm going to run out of this room real quick to get better signal. But thanks for asking me to speak. I used to, my sobriety date is June 5th, 2012. I have a sponsor, as Ramona mentioned, and I used to have this fantasy that I actually used to be sponsored by another guy who was sponsored by my sponsor, current sponsor, Jerry.
I used to have this fantasy that Jerry would ask me to sponsor him so that if I really needed to run it up the chain, I'd eventually get to myself and then I'd get to tell myself what to do. But that never ended up happening. Probably a good thing. But I guess I'm supposed to talk about in a general way what it was like, what happened, what it's what it's like now. And it's pretty good now. I've got to say, you know, thinking back about we were talking, we had this like little meeting on Wednesday nights that I go to and one of the questions what we were talking about was, you know, what was it like in your first ever a meeting and if you can remember it and I have a terrible memory.
I can barely remember what I ate for lunch today. But, you know, I remember how I felt when I was coming in. You know, I think I felt probably a little bit different. You know, I think I felt that other areas of my life I was managing OK. And maybe this whole drinking thing wasn't that big of a deal. I thought I was young and overreacting. And in the first time I came in, I didn't stick around. You know, I didn't really look for I wasn't hopeless, I guess.
And but at the same time. I was talking to another guy sponsor today and, you know, we're talking about home groups and. During the discussion of, you know, where would you have if you never had that meeting wasn't open, you know, if your first meeting wasn't there, if no one was there to open the door. To chair the meeting, to set up the coffee, to set up the chairs, would you be sober today? I don't know. No. So it's so important, you know, groups like this and my home groups, the primary purpose group out of Atlanta, Georgia.
And, you know, I try to think about that, you know, when it comes to what goes on in my own home group. And I probably take it a lot more seriously than I used to. I used to think of it kind of as a I remember when I came in, I used to think of my home group more of as a as a if I can get to it, you know, if nothing else comes up. I'll go to my home group meeting or if there's something better comes around, something better comes along the way.
You know, I'm going to go do that instead. Something more exciting. And now, you know, I look at it a little bit differently or much a lot differently. And then I try to make that as the priority. You know, I guess if I was committed to it, it wasn't much of a commitment. If the first nice thing that a person like shiny thing that comes my way, I take that on instead. So that's different. And I think that's been over time.
See how important it is. I see people come in and. You know, it's it's I probably sponsor differently than I used to also. You know, I see people come in and they get a home group, they work the steps and they start sponsoring, they get involved, maybe they get a service position and start getting in general service and do all this other stuff. And there's all this literature out there and then they get involved. I never see any of them have any trouble ever.
You know, guys, I take through the steps that, you know, and I was one of them at first that just did just barely enough to get by. And then, you know, I got my trust from my family back a little bit. I stopped spending nearly as much as I used to, so my bank account was a little bit more on the in the green or in the black. And I got a little bit of trust back. Maybe I've got my car back now and that's good enough.
And then I stopped doing anything else, and then lo and behold, I'm drinking again. And it talks about the stories in the book when it mentions that they failed to expand or in a larger spiritual life, you know, doing the rest of the steps. And that was me at the beginning. You know, so I was I've been in a twice the first time I was in 2009 and second time in 2012.
[00:05:04]
After the first time I really, you know, I came in, I was young and I'll kind of go into that. I was so I grew up in Marietta, Georgia and born in 1989. And it was a great I had a great childhood. I often hear people talk about, you know, well, you know, maybe I drank because. Of trauma in my past, which might make you a little thirsty. Maybe I drank because of how people treated me or all this other stuff, but like I really I mean, sure, kids were middle school's awful.
Kids are mean in middle school. But other than that, you know, I didn't really have a reason to drink. Things were going pretty good. You know, I'm one of those guys. And I see people that don't that have terrible tragedies happening to them in their lives and they're not alcoholic. And so I don't know if that has anything to do with it, but I came into Alcoholics Anonymous. I had no idea what an alcoholic was. I caught alcoholism in Alcoholics Anonymous.
I've heard that before. That's always stuck with me. That's so true. I didn't know what I was doing. And so when I when I grew up, things were going all right. I had a good mother, a good father who provided for me the best that they could. And I really had almost everything I wanted. I always thought that everyone else had. Like, I remember I would go to my friend's house and next door and he always had all the best, coolest toys and gadgets and video games.
Always wanted to hang out with him. Never wanted to be at my house, even though I had, you know, plenty of whatever I needed. But I always I'd never had enough. And it could have, you know, that was kind of the story of my life. What I had wasn't enough. What you guys had was better than what I got. Always. I was. And that's how I looked at you. You know, through a couple of fourth and fifth steps, it was pretty apparent that I was always on a different level than you.
I could never be on the same level. I was either worse or better. And if I was worse, I was asking why I was, you know, you know, why why I was worse and why why you had better stuff than me or whatever. It was better job, better, you know, girlfriend or whatever. And if I was better, you know, it's like I always thinking about, oh, yeah, you know, thinking that would make me feel good. But, you know, I was never on the same level.
And so even as a kid in my growing up in my nice suburban neighborhood, I was on a different level. Right. And so, you know, I had a normal childhood. Things went OK. I had a one at a sister. I still have a sister. And we get along fine now. You know, as kids, we fought a lot. She'd throw stuff at me. But then, you know, once I got big enough and that stopped, I wasn't tall enough. Can't really do much to you anymore. And it was nothing extraordinary.
And I remember getting I remember being in fifth grade. And I remember when my first resentment that one of my first resentments developed. It was Alan. And I remember Alan in my fifth grade class. He was more popular than me. I'm 10 years old and I've already got this concept of like what people think about me. And, you know, they like him better than me. And I should have like they should like me more than him.
And he was one of the first people on my resentment list. And I talk to people about going through when we talk about resentments in a, you know, some people might go through the top ones. I've heard that before. Just list your top resentments out. And, you know, I don't want a whole life story, but I read it. The big book is I've been taken through that. It should be a life story and putting everything down there.
And so Alan was on on my resentment list. And so, you know, I elementary school, the middle school, like I said, middle school was, you know, mean. But then I developed another resentment, you know, Nick. Nick was this huge kid and he was so much bigger than me. And like when you have someone that's like that much bigger than you, there's not much you can do, but just, you know, appease them. And he was on my resentment list. And so I'm going through life and I'm building up my resentment list.
That's really what the first half of my life is like. And. And and I'm in middle school about to go to high school, I have this idea that I should probably. Go to private school, I was in a public school and I want to go to a private school because for some reason I thought that would be good. And my parents thought it'd be good. Maybe it'll look good for college. And so I go to a private school and it's you got to imagine I'm on I live in Marietta, Georgia.
[00:10:04]
Marietta, Georgia is in like northwest of Atlanta. And now I'm going to this this private school that's like southwest of Atlanta. And so it's like all these it's far away, like 45 minute drive. And so I don't know anyone there other than a few people. And I don't really make any friends. I was miserable, but. About. You know, I was about 15. Is when I discovered liquor. I always love hearing someone's story and they talk and I remember hearing someone say it.
It's always stuck with me when they say, you know, I needed a I didn't drink till I drank when I was, you know, started drinking when I was 15. I needed a drink when I was about like six. I could have used one. That's always resonated with me. I could have used a drink, you know, when I was 10 years old. But, you know, I started drinking. I'm at first drunk when I was 15 and I can remember it. You know, I remember a lot of that.
And we used to go around homes and, you know, if you've got a garage and you live in a neighborhood, probably a good idea to close your garage because then kids like me sneak into your garage and steal your beer. And that was like what my drinking started like, you know, go around drinking people's stealing beer out of people's garages. Like, you know, you get the refrigerated beer, so it's at least cold. And it's funny.
This one, the first time as I drank, you know, I used to have a sips of my dad's beer. But the first time I drink with intention and we're 15 years old, 16, somewhere around there. And I think what always stood out to me when I look back at that is. I went to drink the beer and then I went home. My friend Andrew, he went home. My friend Joseph, he went home. You know, all these other guys, they went back to their homes.
They probably went to bed, watched some TV, maybe ate some cereal. I got home. I went to my garage and stole my dad's beer and started drinking in the kitchen by myself. You know, I didn't know that I had this craving that was beyond my mental control. I just knew I wanted more of that. And I never knew. That I always thought that people just drink to get drunk. That was just my thought process. I never realized that people go to, you know, concerts to listen to music.
People go to ballgames to watch the ballgame. You know, they go do these things to joy. I go there to drink. I didn't realize that everyone wasn't drunk. And so the first time I got drunk, I remember being 15, 16 years old. I'm at my parents' house. We're having a I grew up in a Jewish household. It was Passover. And if you know anything about Passover, you don't. One thing that is part of the custom is there are four.
You're supposed to drink four cups of wine with dinner. And this was the first year that my parents let me have my cups of wine. Now, usually everyone when you drink these cups of wine, people have like a sip. Like, it's not like you're drinking a full cup. I had my full cups. And then I had about five more. And so I'm like 15, 16 years old. I'm like in the bathroom, you know, falling down drunk. And I remember waking up the next morning.
Hungover. You know, feeling awful. And I couldn't wait to do that again. It was great. And I hung on to that thought for a while. I never I wasn't really drinking regularly or anything, but I was turned into more or less a big drinker. I would you know, I ended up transferring high schools, going back to. Public school where all my friends were at that I didn't fit in with, but now I had alcohol. And the amazing thing with drinking is I took a drink and going from feeling like I didn't fit in to now feeling a part of, you know, I could tell funny jokes. I could talk to all of my friends and I could be interesting.
You know, I thought you were interesting. I wanted to know more about you. I never cared about anyone else but me. But now I'm suddenly like, I want to know about you. And, you know, it was great. You know, I could dance. I could sing. I could do it all. And. And that's what I associated with drinking. Let me you know, when it talks about in the in the big book, when it talks about the doctor's opinion, like.
Like Drinks Which Other People Take With Immunity,
[00:15:04]
Oh, Sorry, Where It Talks About The Sense of Ease and Comfort That You Get By Taking The First Few Drinks. That's What It Gave Me, Ease and Comfort. I Can Feel That, Just Even The Thought of Drinking, That's What It Gave Me. So I Started Drinking, It Was In High School, I Was Drinking On The Weekends, And That's Really All I Could Do. You Can't Really, Unless You Have A Fake ID, Which I Did End Up Getting, If Unless You Have A Fake ID, You Can't, It's Hard To Get Liquor, You Gotta Know Someone.
So We Drink On The Weekends, I Would Steal My Parents Liquor Out Of Their Liquor Cabinet Because They Didn't Drink Much. And I Remember It Was Time To Graduate High School. And It's Hard To Graduate If You're Not Passing. And So I Barely Passed, And I Was Able To Pull It Off In The Last Minute, And I Applied To One School. And You're In Alabama, Well, Ramona Is. I Saw Someone From Louisiana, To, I Don't Know, Julie From Alabama.
But You Might Know Georgia Southern University, It's In Statesboro, Georgia, It's Not That Far. And It Was, At Least When I Was In High School, That Was The Drinking, Like That Was The Party School To Go To If You Wanted To. And So I Applied To One School, And That Was All I Really Wanted To Do Was Go To Georgia Southern And Drink. And So I Applied There, I Got In, And I Got My Wish. And I Got A Fake ID, I Was Able To Buy Beer And Liquor.
It's Funny, Statesboro Is A Dry Town, I Don't Know If It Still Is. But You Just Drive Through The County Line, And You Get What You Need To Drive Back, And All's, None's The Wiser. And That Year I Was At School. You Know, It's One Thing About School Is If You Wanna Pass, You Gotta Show Up To School. You Know, You Gotta Actually Study For Tests And Do Your Homework. And I Don't Even Know What My GPA Was That Year.
You Know, It Was Abysmal. I Ended Up, During That Year, It Was Just One Big Party. And I Had A Roommate, And We Were Getting All Sorts Of Trouble And Doing All Sorts Of Stevious Things. But You Know, I Would Get Home At Night, I Was Using A Three-Pat Check, So You Pat Your Two Front Pockets And Your Back Pocket, Keys, Wallet, Phone, And That's All You Really Needed. So I Never Lost My Car, At Least.
So, I Thought I Had Arrived. You Know, This Is What I Wanted To Do. It Was Great. And I Thought I Had Arrived. My Parents Were Footing My College Bill, So They Thought Differently. You Know, Brian, You Know, We're Paying For This. You Kinda Gotta Go To School And Do All This Stuff. And We're Not Hearing Great Reports Back From The Front Lines From You. And So, I Wasn't Allowed To Go Back To That School.
And That Summer, I Got Into My First Little Altercation, We'll Call It. And It Was Decided Amongst My Family That I Need To Go To Rehab. And I Was 19 At The Time. And At That Point, I Don't Think I Was Ready For That. And I Meet A Lot Of Young People At AA. There Are Some People That Get Sober Really Up. There Was A Lady, If You Read That Pamphlet, What Was That Pamphlet We Were Reading? If You, I Don't Even Remember.
We Were Reading It Last Night. And There Was A Girl, Lady Who Got Sober At Like 15 Years Old. You Know, It Happens. But For Me, I Just, I Hadn't Met That Bottom Yet. I Meet People In Alcoholics Anonymous. And I Got Sober When I Was 23 Years Old. I'm Skipping Ahead A Bit, And I'll Kinda Back Up. But I Meet People Who Get Sober. My, One Of My Sponsor, Like Brothers, I Guess You Could Call It. Back In The Day.
He Got Sober At Like 65, 70. He Waited Until He Retired. I Don't Even Know If He Started Drinking Until He Retired, Alcoholically. Ramona, I Can See, Pointing To Herself. You Know, It's, I Don't Really Know If It Matters When You Come In. It's Nice To Get In Early. But, I Don't Think It Necessarily, It Comes Down To, You Know, What, Or I Don't Even Think It Matters Why You've Come In. You Know, I Came In Twice.
Once Because Of Consequence. And The Second Time, Also Because Of Consequence. But Eventually, Something Clicked In Me Where I Kinda Was Ready For This Thing. And That's Where The Thing, I Don't Think It Matters If You Come From Jail. You Know, Threat Of Death, You Know,
[00:20:00]
From A Doctor, You Know, Through Your Own Will. I Just, I Have Yet To Met The Person Where Life Is Just Going So Exceptionally Well. They've Decided To Come To Alcoholics Anonymous Just For The Fun Of It. I Haven't Met That Person Yet. So Usually, When Someone Comes In Here, Things Aren't Going Well. And I Appreciate That. And So Meeting A Newcomer In A Meeting, I Try To Keep That In Mind That, You Know, Things, They're Probably Not Doing The Best Right Now, But They're Also Gonna Be The Most Susceptible Right Now To Try This Thing.
You Know, It's An Amazing Thing. What I Thought Was The Worst Day Of My Entire Life Ended Up Being The Best Day Of My Entire Life. If That Never Happened, I Wouldn't Be Here Today. And It's Amazing How, You Know, Standy B. Would Say, You Know, Your Story Changes. And My Story Has Definitely Changed The Longer I've Stayed Sober, My History. You Know, I Can Look At It With A Little Bit Different Lens Now.
And So I Didn't End Up, I Went To Rehab, Didn't End Up Staying Sober. And I Remember I Went To, A Little Funny Aside. So I'm In Like A Liquor Store. I've Got My Fake ID. And It's Around The Time I Finally Got It Taken Away Because I Still Wasn't Allowed To Drink Yet. The Liquor Store Wouldn't Let Me Bring In A Friend Of Mine To Buy Liquor Because He Was Underage, Even Though I Was Underage. But A Lady Behind Me, She's Pushing A Baby.
And So I'm In There Buying Liquor, You Know, With A Fake ID And I Shouldn't Be. But I'm Complaining That The Lady Behind Me Is Buying Liquor And My Friend Got Kicked Out. Why Aren't They Kicking The Baby Out? You Know, That's Like, That's The Kind Of Stuff Like I'm Thinking About. It's Just, Just Get Your Beer And Leave. And So My Fake ID Got Taken Away Eventually. But It Didn't Really Matter. And So Bill, He Drank Most Of His Drinking Career.
If You Think About It, He Started Drinking In Like 1917. I'm Not Sure When The Volstead Act Took Place, But It Was Right Around That Time. And I Think It Ended In The Early 1930s. And He Did A Lot Of His Drinking When Drinking Was Outlawed. You Know, Bill Did His Drinking When It Was Outlawed. It Doesn't Really Matter So Much. I Did A Lot Of My Drinking When I Wasn't Allowed To. And It Didn't Make Much Of A Difference.
And So, Long Story Short, I Ended Up In Alaska. And I'm Fast Forwarding A Bit Here. And I Ended Up There To Work At A Little Resort That They Had There In Denali National Park. I Worked In A Pizza Kitchen. And My Parents Thought It'd Be A Good Idea For Me To Get Away. I Thought It'd Be A Good Idea Because It Sounded Fun. But In Alaska, It's Like 23 Hours Of Daylight. And So, Guess What? You Can Do For 23 Hours.
You Know, You Can Get It On. And So, It Was Just A Big Party. And It Was A Great Time. And I Met My First Girlfriend There. And I Brought Her Back Home With Me To Live With Me And My Parents. And So, Now I'm Living At Home In The Guest Room With My New Girlfriend Who I Brought Back From Alaska At My Parents' House. And She Was Also Maybe One Of Us. I Don't Know. She Might Have Turned Her Life Around.
She Could Have Just Been A Hard Drinker Like Me. But We Ended Up Being Together For Like Three Years. We Did Move Out Of My Parents' House After Just A Couple Months. But Life Was, You Know, Talks About Like Alcoholics Are Like A Tornado Rolling Through The Lives Of Others. We Were Roaring Through Each Other's Lives. And I Was Roaring Through Everyone Else's Lives. You Know, It Was Like A House In Turmoil, Right?
It Was Kind Of Crazy At The End Of It. And One Thing That's Really Awkward Is, If You Ever Want To Try This Is, If You're Going To Break Up With Someone, Don't Live With Them For A While After. That's Never, That's Never Fun Either. And So, You Know, I'm Drinking At This Point. We Go Out, I'm Like, We Break Up. And My, When It Talks About Like Our Alcoholic Life Was The Only Normal One. My Alcoholic Life Was, You Know, I'd Be Up Till Four In The Morning Regularly.
You Know, I'm Still In College. I'd Make It To School Somehow. I'd Be The Guy In The Classroom That Was Snoring And People Have To Like Give You Dirty Looks And Nudge You Awake To Shut Up. Barely Failing, Almost Like Failing Out Of Classes. Really One Class At The End, I Did Okay. And I Would Care If I Was Drunk, I Would Carry A Bottle Of Cherry Pepto-Bismol With Me Wherever I Went Because I Was Just So Sick All The Time.
And I Gotta Tell You, You Know, You Drink Enough Of That Stuff, You Develop A Taste For It. You Know, I Got To Use Some, Get Some Cherry Pepto-Bismol The Other Week And It Wasn't So Bad. And,
[00:25:02]
You Know, I Would Not, Was Not Eating. My Meals Consisted Of Going To Racetrack And Eating A Muffin, That Was It. And I Was, As Bill Said, I Was 40 Pounds Underweight. You Know, Just Like Bill. You Know, I Was Knocking On Death's Door. And I'm Living Alone. Me And The Girlfriend Broke Up. There Was Ants In The Kitchen. You Know, Going Through All My Crap. And I End Up Like Having To Go To The Hospital Because I Feel Like I'm About To Die.
And So I'm Driving To The Hospital And I Have To Pull Over To The Side Of The Road Because I Don't Think I Can Make It. And I Have To Get Picked Up By An Ambulance. And My Parents Are Like, What's Going On? You Know, This Isn't Right. And It Had Only Been Like Three Years Or Four Years Since I Tried Getting Sober Before. They Kind Of Knew The Song And Dance. And The Jig Was Kind Of, The Jig Was Up.
And I'm Not Doing Too Hot. And I End Up, You Know, At The Age Of, You Know, I'm 23 Years Old. And What's The Best Thing That Could Possibly Happen At 23 Year Old Is Going To Sleep In Mommy's And Daddy's Bed. Or Like Their Guest Room. You Know, So Now I'm Sleeping In Mommy's And Daddy's Guest Room Because I'm So Ill. Just Like, You Know, Trying To Recover. And They Asked Me, You Know, You Willing To Get Sober?
You Know, You Want To Do Something? You Know, Because You Got Two Options. You Can Either Stay Here And Then Leave Because You're Done. You Know, We're Cutting You Off. We Don't Want Anything To Do With You Anymore. Or You Can Go To Rehab Again. And At That Point, I Was Willing. You Know, I'd Always Thought That There Was This Light At The End Of The Tunnel. Did Any Of You Remember The Light At The End Of The Tunnel?
There Was This Light At The End Of The Tunnel That I Was Going To Make It. You Know, I Was Going To Get Through Everything. And I Always Had This Idea. I Was 23 At The Time. For Some Reason, When I Turned 30, Everything Was Going To Be Okay. By That Time, I'd Have A Career. And I'd Have Enough Money. And I'd Be Able To Afford My Lifestyle. And For Some Reason, Those Two Things Together Made It So I'd Be Okay.
And I Don't Think I Would Have Made It To 30. You Know, I Don't Even Know If I Would Have Made It To 25 If I Kept Going How I Did. You Know, I Am One Of The People That If I Was Not Sober Today, I Really Do Not Think I'd Be Alive. And I've Sponsored Other Guys Like That. And It's Amazing To See Some Folks That You Know Come In That Are Not Doing Good. You Know, They're Actually Doing Awful. And Then You Get To See Their Life Completely Change In Front Of You.
That's One Of The Coolest Things. You Know, I Can Think Of One Guy For Sure. I Can Think Of A Couple People, You Know. And So I Came In To Rehab. And You Know, I Decided, I'm Like A Kind Of A Thick Headed Guy. And I Decided That Well, If I'm Getting Sober, I Might As Well Start Smoking Cigarettes. So I Start Smoking Cigarettes, But At Least I'm Getting Sober Now. And Because Everyone Does It At AA Meetings.
It's Not Really A Thing Much Anymore. Now Everyone's Vaping At AA Meetings. You Know, It Used To Be Everyone Smoked At AA Meetings. That Was Like A Thing. Maybe In Alabama, I Don't Know About Ramona. But And There Was A Guy At The Rehab Named Mike. And Mike Would Bring In A Book Study. So Him And This Other Guy, Dave. Him And I Think They Would Both Come In And They'd Read From The Doctor's Opinion Up Through The First Couple Chapters.
Probably Through More About Alcoholism. And They'd Go, That's All They Would Do. You Know. And Actually, I Failed To Mention This. I Had A Sponsor The First Time I Tried To Get Sober. And The Funny Thing Is, I Couldn't Even Remember What We Did. You Know, We Might Have Done Worksheets. We Might Have Done Something. I Just Remember I Got To My Third Step And I Didn't Want To Do A Fourth Step. That's All I Remember From It.
And This Time, I Was Ready To Do Anything. And So Mike Comes In And He's Bringing This Book Study. And We're Reading From This Book That I'd Never Really Been Familiarized With. And A Lot Of The Things In This Book Make A Lot Of Sense. And So I Asked Mike To Be My Sponsor. It Was Right In Front Of Me. And We Started Going Through The Book Together. We started going through the book together and ever since my life has changed ever since that and Mike was a pilot he his life was a little bit
[00:30:08]
together now I mean it's over a couple of years at that point he drank like me you know what it talks about in the book that you know Bill Bill sitting in his at his kitchen table and Abby comes and visits him and Abby Abby's talking and Bill says you know he was you know at that like he had been hopeless just like I was he had a committed complete defeat defeat and all these things that just like Bill but he'd been resurrected raised from the dead to a level of life better than the best he'd ever known you know and that's what my experience was here was a guy who was just in the same position that I was like three years ago and he's sober and he can leave you know I can't leave he can leave this place and he has a wife and kid and things are going all right in his life and all he did was go through this book like he's doing with me just reading and stuff but I can do that and so I was interested I remember getting through the doctor's opinion I was hooked you know when it talks about men and women drink essentially because they like the effect produced by alcohol that their alcoholic life is the only normal on their restless irritable and discontent unless they again experience a sense of ease and comfort which comes at once by taking a few drinks you know that little paragraph is one of my favorite in the entire book it made so much sense to me and I always thought out like I always thought that you know the alcohol was the problem you know or whatever was the problem and then the question you know is asked as well just don't drink you know how's your life you know if that was the problem you just wouldn't drink and then everything would be okay you know and but when you stop drinking how is your life are you okay it's like well no it's like well then it wasn't really your problem you know your problems in your mind you know you need a solution and alcohol wasn't really working for you anymore so I learned a couple things from that guy I was afraid like I think I mentioned the beginning I caught alcoholism in a in alcoholics anonymous I didn't know I was one you know I thought I was there for other things and he asked me how I drank and you know do I develop the phenomenon of craving when I have that first drink can I control the amount I take when I start drinking my dad will actually I'll use my wife as an example this is a good one at home my wife's are not an alcoholic but she has a device at home in this device it injects nitrous oxide or whatever into a wine bottle to keep it from going bad so you can put nitrous oxide into a wine bottle and it'll stay good for like I don't know a week or two I have never had the problem of opening a bottle of wine and needing it to stay good for a week they don't last the night maybe at least after the next day and so I mean my wife she drinks a lot differently than me you know she does not react the same to alcohol as I do and I found from the alcoholics anonymous is starting to observe you know everyone else because I've been so caught up in my own life for so long that never took a second to look at other people what they were doing it's like most people don't drink like I do they can stop they can moderate I was drinking I would me and my friend Caleb my roommate in high school I mean my roommate in college he drank a lot like me in college and I if I had to think of another alcoholic it was Caleb but when he got out of college he ended up getting a DUI and his girlfriend this girl he met told him that look if you ever drink like that again if you ever get into any of the stuff you're doing again I'm leaving you and he just stopped he just started moderating his drinking you know the consequences were enough for him I and we drank just like each other that wasn't enough for me to stop the consequences were never enough for me to stop so my wife it was like you know when you think of like a moderate drinker or like my wife or my dad you know they can just stop or moderate and then I got my college roommate like a hard drinker well enough consequence and he was able to also stop or moderate but what about the real alcoholic what about Brian that once he starts drinking he can't control the amount he takes once he starts to drink and that made sense to me going through that the types of drinkers and there's a solution I really didn't need to overthink it and then you know if that's your problem then you just stop right but I couldn't just stop and I had this obsession and that was all explained to me and so we start working steps and
[00:35:05]
things are going good things are going well I remember doing a fourth and a fifth step and you know I'm the I like to like read ahead so I'm sitting in my first meeting and I'm looking at the wall and I'm like step one two and three that's fine but four and five I'm not really too excited about and and the fourth it's interesting the fourth and the fifth the fourth step actually doesn't really scare me it's having to tell it to someone else that's what I didn't like you know I know I could I've got I know my like the force that I know all that stuff it's been sitting in my head for the past my entire life but the fifth step having to tell someone else all this stuff you know that's scary and I'd come to find out after doing it that I really made a big deal out of nothing my stuff really wasn't that important in fact there was one thing in my list that was not going to tell you know I was that was like the one thing I was like you know what I don't need to tell anyone about this and my sponsor you know he before I started as I was about to start my four-step he told he shares a little bit about his stuff and the what the thing he tells me is the exact same thing I wasn't going to tell him almost right and sounds like well I guess after that it was easy and I've sponsored a lot of guys I've heard a lot of this steps and I got to tell you it's a lot more interesting to that person that is to you know the person that's hearing it you know from now seeing on this day because it's like my stuff is my stuff it's very important to me and their stuff is their stuff it's very important to them and so it was good to have someone that was just a neutral party they didn't care you know and I think it's good to have a sponsor that probably wants wants you to get like wants what's good for you you know that's not afraid to tell you their opinion that's one of the reasons I have a who I have got today because I wanted someone that was really busy but also I valued their opinion too and and I think I've got that and and so we're doing all the step work and we're you know we get through the amends and we start going through all of the getting to sponsorship and you know prayer meditation and sponsorship you know I just want to fast forward now is like probably you know one of my favorite things about AA I don't always want to do it and it doesn't really matter but you know I do it anyways and I get all the benefit from it because AA stuff isn't always convenient and my sponsor always reminds me that you need to be spiritually inconvenienced because I just you know my wake up in the morning and my feet hit the ground and it talks about you know God you know in the 11 step please direct my thinking especially that it'd be divorced from self-pity dishonest and self-seeking motives and I think it's like they say that for a reason because those are my first thoughts of the morning like what about me I remember being six months sober and this girl she cut it off with me you know updating this girl and she didn't want to see me anymore and I'm praying every morning for this girl to take me back you know I hope she gets back together with me or maybe she'll call me and then that was my prayer life and as I'm reading in the way you know as I'm reading through my morning readings you know on page 86 and 87 it talks about we be careful to make no requests for ourselves only and I'm like huh is that was that a request for myself only and it dawned on me it's like so maybe it does if selfishness is self-centeredness to the root of my troubles and I start every morning by praying for myself that probably doesn't do it probably doesn't go too well with what I'm trying to do here and so I stopped doing that you know if most of the things I've learned in AA or most of my growth I guess has come from messing stuff up and seeing what doesn't work I have a whole but I have a whole book of my own personal little book of things that you know in my mind at least in it right now of stuff that just doesn't work and I have learned to do things differently and that's been I wish I was one of those people that I do I know not to do something and I grow and I don't do it and you know I do the right thing but I just end up I just bump my head a lot and over time I hope by moving like a little bit upwards and in the right direction you know some years are you know some there's a peaks and valleys and Bill talks about the certain trials
[00:40:00]
and low spots ahead and if it wasn't for sponsorship and it wasn't for being involved in a home group and knowing a bunch of AAs you know it would be a lot harder you know when I came in Alcoholics Anonymous I thought that it was just going to be filled with a bunch it was going to be like very culty and religious and filled with a bunch of like like maybe like a bunch of like kooky people I was definitely wrong about the culty religious part you know definitely a lot of us are a little bit kooky including me it talks about in the big book that you know when it talks about the different types of alcoholics and the last one that says then there's the type that's entirely normal in every respect except the effect that liquor has on him I could have sworn that was me and then I started doing a little bit of analysis through a good fourth or fifth step and through living a couple of years and I was like I was anything but normal in every respect you know I was definitely an alcoholic but also completely abnormal maybe there's some completely normal people in here other than alcohol but I'm not one of them and so you know I'm starting to sponsor people and I couldn't wait I don't know if it was because now my my sponsor kept telling me what to do and I get to tell some other poor soul what to do but it was definitely it would didn't really matter what my vote is worth be getting because it was keeping me sober and I really was do trying to help people for sure it says in there that like they're gonna help you more than you help them and that's so true I've been in some tough spots sober you know the trials on those spots I've had them I've had trials I've had those spots and thank God my feet do things that I don't want to do you know my home group meets on Monday nights at 8 o'clock and Friday nights at 8 o'clock and there are days when I've had a long day at work or it's been a long week and I don't want to go to my home group you know I don't want to get in the car and sit in any traffic I want to sit home with my wife I want to watch the TV and eat some food and snack maybe go to bed who knows and I'm thinking all this while my like hands are steering the wheel you know it's just your body kind of takes over after time I love what Don M said you know it talks about like antibiotics how you don't have to understand them just like alcoholics numbness you don't have to understand how it works you don't even have to want it to work but you take the medicine you get the result and that's so true with a I don't have to understand it I don't have to want to do it I do it anyway I get anyways and I get all the results sometimes when I don't want to do something even and I do it anyways I even get a better result than you know maybe a little bit more spiritually than doing something that I want to do in the first place and I do a lot of things I don't want to do and I think that's okay and so I started sponsoring people and it's that part of you know talk about like I've got yes I got run out of time I've got you know one legacy I started sponsoring people and recovery I got a home group you know I start getting involved in traditions and during kovat my sobriety is June 5th 2012 I didn't mention that and for a while I didn't really know anything about traditions at all nothing and during kovat our group went online and because if anyone was around during kovat if you remember it was either like go online or you're not meeting anymore you had two options depending on where you were in the country and so I was like well I guess we're going online and so we went online and I think like kovat was for the traditions what Joe and Charlie were for the big book during kovat I got to suddenly the world became very small in that I could listen to people and I could go on workshops and I could hear things that I'd never had access to before and so suddenly I'm like listen to people talk about traditions and listen to all these folks go through tradition studies and everything I start learning about this and then my sponsorship family starts talking about all this stuff and suddenly we're going through traditions and learning about it and then I start getting involved in service and I went from you know what before kovat someone that just you know had a home group in a service position and in that group in sponsored guys to now I'm you know learning trick now I know traditions and then I start getting involved in service like general service and that was really cool you want to meet some crazy pumped up a a's go to a state assembly
[00:45:00]
stuff and see some crazy people and make some crazy friends. I got to be a GSR and that was so much fun. I would kind of like read stuff about what it was and I feel like, I don't know if it's just limited to AA, maybe it's life, but it's hard to understand something until you actually do it. And so I didn't really know what I was doing until I started doing it. And I'm like a lost little lamb trying to figure out what to do. How do I make a motion and all this stuff? And I got to learn about the general service conference and all these agenda items that now we got to study for our group. And it was really cool. It was really a great experience. And so that was also really fun. And Alcoholics Nom is something I would have never been exposed to. And, you know, in 2021, I got married and I met a girl and we were driving in the car and we're chatting and she's asking me, why don't you drink? And I'm like, well, I party too much. And when you say that, when you say you party too much, it implies there's more than one person. I didn't really party, it was just me. And she kept asking me, why aren't you drinking? Why aren't you drinking?
I was like, well, I don't drink, I'm an alcoholic. I go to Alcoholics Anonymous. And she's like, oh, I'm an Al-Anon. And no wonder she was so interested, just happened to be an Al-Anon. And so I met my wife. We got married in 2021. And then we had a kid in 2024. And that's also been great. You know, that's one thing that I had to, you know, you just got to have faith sometimes that it's going to work out and it worked out. It was great. You know, I never thought I never could see myself as a dad or anything. And, you know, through AA, you know, I won't think I would have been able to be one. You know, by the time I got, had a kid, and by the time I was married, you know, I had a home group that I'd been going to for years. And that's my commitment. I'm up there on Monday nights, unless I'm like out of town or just can't make it.
Same with Friday nights. We meet on Friday nights. I'm always there on Friday nights. I show up to my group conscience. If I have a service position, I'm there to fill that service. If I can't be there, I find someone else to fill it in. And so it's like, I've got all these things that are, like, these are things I do. And now I've got a kid and I still do these things. And all these things, including like sponsoring other guys and staying active, these things that I've been doing have been keeping me sober. And so I got to keep doing these things. And life is like super busy now, but it's a good busy. And sometimes it's a lot and it's okay. You know, I often am one to, I don't know if catastrophize is the right word, but you know, I'm the kind of guy that might find something like I've got like a cough and it's cancer. You know, obviously it's like, that's like my first thought. And I like, it's just like the worst possible things could happen.
And it's never true. You know, my history has told me that, and that's kind of what faith has been for me, you know, through AA is realizing is I can look back and see how great life's, how great, you know, I've been because of the stuff I've done in AA. And so I just keep doing that stuff and things just seem to keep being okay and getting better and I'm out of time. So that's all I got. Thanks. Thanks, Brian. That was great. Thank you all for joining us tonight where you never know what you're going to get. You'll just have to keep coming back. We surely hope to see you here next week.
Our special guest, according to the plan, we get new surprises every week, Allen B. And so we're going to see how that goes. If you like this meeting, please do as Bill Wilson always said, pass it on. You can help others right from your phone or your computer and tell them about this special meeting. Everyone is invited to hang out with us afterwards in the meeting after the meeting on the back porch. I love that, that we have meetings on the back porch. That's what we do in Alabama and Louisiana. If you like, okay, Brian, do you have any closing comments and would you please close us out with the prayer of your choice? Oh, thanks for letting me be here, Ramona, asking me to speak. And I guess just the Lord's prayer. Okay. I'm going to take you out.
Yep. All right. A moment of silence followed by the Lord's prayer. Who keeps us sober? Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come,
[00:50:03]
thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever and ever. Amen. All right, everybody. Yay! Thank you, Brian. Thank you, everybody. Thank you.