Ben's Journey: From Rock‑Bottom Chaos to 12‑Step Hope

to be alcoholic. Yeah, I'm an alcoholic with alcoholism and thanks for your share and

circumstances are so different and circumstances a lot of times people get confused and think

that's alcoholism and nothing should be further from the truth. So Ben, thanks so much for

going through the archives and finding a drastic old bullet to come up here and share. I'm

definitely the type of alcoholic that has been rocketed into a fourth dimension of existence

which I had not even dreamed possible. Let me tell you, I smoked a lot of angel dust,

it'll have cocaine, probably six, seven hundred LSD trips. I don't know how many nights in

a row I stayed up for how many years and drank and drank and drank and drank. I mean, I'm

the type of alcoholic that takes a U.N.M. syringe, puts it in a bottle and put it on

a bottle and sticks it out of my bag and shoots it. I mean, I'm the type of guy, why spend

all night getting drunk when you can get snot, slinging, can't stand up, want to puke, can't

walk, think you can dance, over dehydrated, drunk and, you know, like five seconds. Why

spend the whole night doing that? I'm the type of drunk that, you know, it's like if

you're going to drink all day, you got to start when you first wake up, you know, commitment

to the cause, that's all. So I was born in the middle of the last century, just like

you. I got to my first meeting a couple of weeks after my 30th birthday and the deal

was people have been coming over the house for 10 years, you know, get court cases, what

have you, and try to get me to go to meetings. And I was like, oh, they'd be all excited

and hyped up about going to meetings. And, well, tell me about these meetings. Was it,

well, there's people just like us, but they don't get landed anymore. It's like, well,

why do I want to go hang out with them? I want to stay stoned. I love the effect produced

by alcohol and all the very little sidekicks, dry goods, stuff that grows out of the ground,

stuff that grows out of manure, you know, mushrooms, whatever, you know, it's just like,

you know, my first block out, I was still in the diaper. My mom, I was sort of drinking

early. I was a periodic from, you know, when I was young like that, but that didn't last

long, you know, before I was able to legally drink, I was just getting loaded every day.

I mean, my mom left my dad with a Catholic, you know, and in a Catholic church, you don't

get divorced, so my mom had the choice of staying with an abusive man, getting kicked

out of the Catholic church, so she got kicked out of the Catholic church. Me being with

my grand monster, I mean, my grandmother, you know, like you were talking about a periodic

with the worst kind of, see, like with me, if you see me before I got here, I'm always

drunk and loaded. And if I'm not, I'm trying to figure out how to get something to get

drunk and loaded because I need, I have alcoholism, it needs to be treated. And see, they're going

to be treated with the spiritual remedy contained in the 12-step process of Alcoholics Anonymous,

the program, or I'm going to treat it with alcohol and whatever else I can put into me.

And what happened was my grandmother lived in depression, poor lady, careful, hated life,

just couldn't stand men and all the hatred she had for men, she took out some men, you

know, she did things to me like, oh, I'm just a little diaper bike running around, she's

knocking me upside the headband, get that look off your face, she looked just like your

dad, no, I'm knocking off your face, you ain't gonna cry, I'll give you a reason to cry about

it, dropkick me across the living room floor. Just, you know, the physical abuse, it was

tough enough, but the mental and the emotional abuse, still from time to time comes up, but

it doesn't have much power anymore. Do you see some therapy in the light of 12-step working,

being clean and sober and living this new AA way of life? Yeah, my first time, my grandfather

was having a poker party, you know, and I'm just walking in the table doing more, more,

you know, now it's just a championship for things to come. It's always more, more, you

know, drink more, more and everything. And basically what happens, I grew up in the San

Fernando Valley in the sixties, it was a great time in the United States, it was bad, good

guys were getting bothered, those dresses were getting shorter, you ladies stopped wearing

bras, which made the view even better, you know, it was a perfect time to grow up, you

know, I loved it, sex, drugs and rock and roll, we were just out to have fun and that's

what I did, and I had no idea there was a problem. I loved the party, you know, I just

loved the party. How many of you know the Fabulous Freak Brothers? Oh my God, out of

the sixties cartoon characters? Well, one of their mottos was, times of no money and

drugs will get you through better than times of drugs and no money. So I spent all my money

on drugs. My mom eventually got married again, and she married a guy who was a World War

II sergeant in Germany, and he was pretty disciplined, and he really taught me how to

drink, because whatever, your Saturday mornings have to get up at like six o'clock and be

on the halfway seven, my mom would pick breakfast by nine o'clock, go out and eat breakfast,

work until about one or two should have lunch, and then we'd shoot pool for three or four

hours, he'd polish up a fifth or fourth of the room, while we were shooting pool, and

he'd go out with my mom, they'd go do their stuff, I'd go out and, you know, do my stuff.

Sixties, seventies, it was far more about drugs than alcohol, drugs, all different kinds

of stuff like that, starting with commercial weed, mini bennies, drugs, all the pharmaceuticals,

everything, just a plethora of everything, all the time, just more and more. And see,

what makes me alcoholic was really two simple things that it says, there's a big book, you

know, I drink when I don't want to, or when I start to drink, I drink better than I want

to. Two question interview to find out if we're alcoholic. How many people are in the

first year? Welcome to Alcoholics Anonymous, man. John, right? I'm sorry he's come to this,

dude. But the good news is, this is the solution. The bad news is, we're the solution. Because

like this format stated, the primary way this works is what's actually working with another

for fun and for free. What happens is that God within us works to talk to the guy within

you and that's how we get sober and maintain sobriety. I'm beyond human aid. I have alcoholism.

The disease I have, I'm beyond human aid. I need God. Right here, right now, if I don't

have the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, I've been working in this moment. See, the

only thing that will drive me to drink and get loaded is sobriety. I get loaded from

a sober state. I mean, my sobriety date is April 11th, April 12th, 1986. You know why

it's April 12th, 1986? Because on April 11th, 1986, I was headed to an H&I board meeting.

I had had sobriety dates in '83, '84. I don't think I had any in '85. I came in, I had a

very different set of principles that I did by. In '86, I was on the H&I board. I probably

had three pals at the time I was on the board for the San Fernando Valley. The H&I board

meeting was out in Arcadia someplace and I was smoking a couple of packs of cigarettes

a day at that time. One of them was a kind of roach that was about that big and I was

working in. You know what? I got one hit off that roach. After not being loaded for a while,

I was really loaded after that one hit. Now see, the non-alcoholic, my plan was to take

one hit, put it down. You know what I did? I smoked that thing until I sucked that whole

cherry down my throat. You know? I said, "Should I bring me to an H&I event?" Let me tell you.

When I got there, I got there late because when I'm limited, I'm late. I'm not waiting

for you. You're going to wait for me. That's one of the environments of Kurt Kirby being

Kurt Kirby back in those days. I was like, "God, you're willing to get me a Kurt." I'm

like, "Yeah. Got anything to drink? Something to munch on?" The last time I put chemicals

in me, I had a good time. I got here. I got to my first meeting a couple of weeks after

my 30th birthday which was in the summer of 1983. It was a perfect meeting for me. I told

you people have been trying to get me to meetings for years. It was in West Hollywood called

Architects of Adversity. It was a closed meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. I was not an alcoholic.

I was a hope to die pilfering. You know what happened? I kept coming to these AA meetings

and I caught alcoholism. John, I don't know what you know about alcoholism, but it's incurable.

Once you got it, you got it. You can't get rid of it. The good news is we have a solution

for it. You so eloquently spoke about the 12 step process and about having a good sponsor

and having sponsors and being in the middle of the herd. I can trace my lineage in Alcoholics

Anonymous. I have a bunch of big books. One of them lists all the people all the way to

Dr. Bob. I guess it wasn't written about Dr. Bob because Dr. Bob's way of doing things

is a little bit different than Bill. It was all a 12 step process, 6 step process at that

point in time. Bill decided 6 are good, 12 is better. What the hell? Think about it.

I love things that move unexpectedly like that. Hell yeah. Everything's gonna change.

You know, it's like, blow with the go. Just keep moving. Keep it simple. I forgot where

I was when this thing was installed. Imagine, yeah, 6 steps and then 12 steps. Imagine coming

in here, you got a nice newcomer, you're bringing them in, you're gonna tell him about the 12

step process and you walk in and they're leaving. You know what? We got 24 steps now. That's

what Bill did to these four characters when he wrote the 12 steps. And he didn't even

know it was 12 steps until he went and numbered them. In fact, Mike and I go to a meeting

called Love and Tolerance on Wednesday nights and there's a guy that was really excited

named Tim about the steps and being sober and all this stuff, you know, and he wants

to argue with me about 6 and 7. You know, he's like, why? He's like, what's the difference

between character defects and shortcomings? I'm like, nothing. He goes, no, no. Now, this

guy was like 8 months. I even went to go with 37 years and 40 years membership. You see,

the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. And I got that desire at

my first meeting. Up until that first meeting, I was gonna stay stoned the best of my life.

And what happened? See, John, why we come to meetings really is to ruin it for you newcomers.

You know, we can't have it in my family. We're gonna win it for you. That's what it's about,

dude. Oh, my God. But, you know, he wants to argue with me. I got that desire at my

first meeting. And basically what happened was I caught alcohol and I'm so happy I did

because I have a solution. I didn't know that there was a problem. I mean, every once in

a while I'd run into like an Al-Anon or whatever, you know, and they'd want to fix me and change

me and all that kind of stuff. And it's just like I would feel pitiful for a few hours

because he'd be doing that shit to me, you know, just like that. And then I do a couple

more hits and I'm fine, you know, just like like two different times. Today, we call them

Al's. Al's doing it, we were just bummed, you know, I was a bum a few times, you know, I lived on the streets for 12 months,

nine months, whatever it was. It was just, you know, Janice Joplin started about it, you know,

you've got nothing left to lose, you know, it's just freedom. I love Sunday Night Show and I'm homeless,

you know, because I walk around the city, it's so quiet, you know, you can hear things two, three, four

miles away, car driving or whatever. It's quite a snipe. But I tell you what, I like when I leave

here, I'm gonna go to my house, go to sleep in my bed, got a king size bed because I think I'm a king,

you know, have really nice flannel sheets on it because it's that time of year, you know, I take

time to spoil me. And the reason I do is I'm like my own best friend, you know, I'm in a no matter what club,

I don't drink, I don't use no matter what. So what time am I going to talk to? Okay, I just want to

stay somewhere crowded because I don't have a canned pitch of people come up here, you know, every

time five years later, it's the exact same thing. Just like every time I think I'm, thanks for hunting

me down. Yeah, I'm gonna speak at that meeting. Like, oh, God, just use me. Let me help somebody.

No, basically, there's not a whole lot of new stuff that comes out of me. I've maybe heard

everything I'm going to say. And most of the time I would rather hear me than a lot of you. That's why I

talk to me a lot. Also, I love to hear intelligent, good looking men talk, you know, just the problem

is if I ever catch myself going, what'd you say? Then I might have a problem. So anyway, that first

meeting, you know, who was there? Guys and gals, like you people, clean and sober. And you spoke

about spoke about they had a conscious contact with God, and the energy in that room really got

me. And by the end of that meeting, what happened was, I was like, Yeah, I think I'd rather not get

loaded than get loaded. If that's what it's like, the way you guys are. And what happened was after

the meeting, nobody took me, told me what I had to do, anything like that. I haven't had a whole lot

of people tell me what to do. And so I checked, I'd share what I do. And if that's what you want

to do, if you don't, you can keep what you got, enjoy what you got, not enjoy it, feel pitiful,

incomprehensible, demoralization, or whatever you're feeling. So anyway, what happened was

they got a line in front of me, you know, there were some people came up, Kurt, you got to go on

family surrenders, you're gonna die. I'm like, relax, relax, maybe somebody comes over and finds

me blue and almost dead. But I'm still here, you know, I like to shoot the mark and just do the

other thing, you know, when you come back. And then a few people came up to me and said, Kurt,

I'm so glad you're here. Welcome to Alcoholics Anonymous. Here's that book, Alcoholics Anonymous.

We know you're not an alcoholic, you're a drug addict. So where it says alcoholic, put in drug

addict, where it says alcohol, put in cocaine, speed, heroin, LSD, whatever, read the book,

tell us what you think. And I thought, well, there's somebody they want me to straighten

their book out, you know, they they know an intelligent person when they see one,

you know, you know, our book tells us one of the problems, selfishness, self centeredness,

that we believe is the root of our problem. And then somebody else came up with a directory,

the other really important piece of literature, second most important piece of literature we have

here. They go, here's our directory, here's the meeting we're going to be at Thursday,

here's the meeting we're going to be at Friday. In fact, if you want to get get there early and

help us set up, that would be great. Oh, in fact, we're going out to coffee afterwards,

you want to come with us. And you know what I thought? What do they want from me? You see,

when I got here, I was a taker, not a giver. When I'm a taker, I'm a loser. It's as simple as that.

Seems like the more I give, the more I try to share it, the richer my life becomes, and the more

at ease and comfort I have in life. Who would have thought? See, that's what you're in store for,

John. Look out. Everything. What do they say? Only one thing has to change? Anything. That's all.

Just one thing. Everything. And everything has changed. And I still think I'm looking out at

30 year old eyes, except the body's a little bit older. So anyway, then came the quandary

trying to figure this thing out. And what I found out is there's no step that says figure it out.

And what happened was, I kept going to meetings, and I finally took a sobriety day, kept getting

loaded, but just kept that sobriety day. Because, you know, after six months, I got tired of the way

you guys were looking at me, I'm still raising my hand as a newcomer. And there's people taking,

you know, chips, six month chips that I saw come in, and I'm living in the recovery house,

out by the clay house. And one of the reasons you don't get in fights, and you don't get loaded,

you have to move out. I could not get in fights, I could do that. But I couldn't not get loaded.

And see, even now I can't not get loaded. But we can get I can stay sober with you guys. See,

I still have no power. First step is such a clear step. What it says is we admitted we were

powerless over alcohol. Admitted, I tend to think the word admitted in that sentence means to let

in kind of like we get admitted to a sporting event or the movies or whatever it is. I let that

idea in. You said you were a conceited alcoholic, conceited to your innermost selves that you were

alcoholic. So I got to let that in way, way, way inside. And, you know, it doesn't say in that

step. We're alcoholic says we admitted it. But we admitted we were powerless. And see, I know what

powerlessness is. Powerlessness is when I'm standing in front of the Honorable Judge Hughes

in Division 101, dressed looking nice like this because I want to fool him, waiting for him to

tell me what the next five to 25 years of my life are going to be like. Because see, the police don't

play fair. They come to my house and take me away, telling me I'm having way too much fun on my

schedule, my road to a happy destiny. They want to give me a break. You know, I'm not safe for society.

Anyway, what happened was I took an inventory, probably the best inventory in the history of

Alcoholics Anonymous. I took it on speed, you know, just a little medicinal speed because

my brain was so broke. I couldn't figure that shit out. Resentments? It was a resentment. You know,

my sponsor gave me a whole list of ideas of who, you know, it's just like I couldn't figure it out.

It was just medicinal speed. I just shot like, you know, twenty dollars worth and he's like,

"Oh, that makes sense. Yeah, I got that shit. Such good inventory. Oh, yeah." You know,

basically what happened was I turned it in. I got a hundred percent plus extra credit on it,

you know. No, I sat there with my sponsor with whole sweats running down and I was being as

honest as I had ever been with anybody in my life. And it was a scary thing to do. Anyway,

I'm sponsoring copious numbers of people taking people through, you know, the first seven steps

in a Monday night group. You know, we take people and we run around a lot of people going like,

"I'm in a covered half hour." No, fix you. We've been in a meeting on Monday night, 6 o'clock,

going till midnight and 3 o'clock, 6 o'clock the next day, taking through the first seven steps.

And basically what happened was I was on my way to that H&I board meeting on April 11th, 1986.

Took a cake around to the board meeting the next day, didn't tell anybody. I just thought it was

none of your business that I smoked blue and shot a little speed up, you know. So I was doing

everything else except not getting loaded. I mean, what happened was a buddy of mine,

one night I had a bachelor pad here in Woodland Hill, this perfect bachelor pad with a four

bedroom, had a great stereo, black bottom swimming pool, jacuzzi, all the necessary things for fun

for a young guy. We had a present in February of '88. He came for two years from me for four years

and he looked across the living room and he says, "Tape, you know, I can honestly say I haven't been

loaded in two years." And I couldn't look back at Lenny and go, "You know what, dude, I haven't been

loaded in four years." And that lie died inside of me. What happened is I'm in a couple of meditation

books every morning. I'm trying, I'm meditating, I'm sponsoring a bunch of people, taking them

through the stuff, doing all this stuff, have commitments every day, you know, every activity

stuff. And I feel good. You know, it's just like, it's easy for me to lie to you guys. I grew up

with people, people who told me don't lie, but I'm really good at getting you to believe what I want

you to believe without actually telling you the lie. You know, I'm just so dishonest. And that's

what chapter five, that first paragraph tells us, you know, who makes this program, who doesn't and

why. And it's all about honesty, which says, "There's rarely ever seen a person fail to definitely

follow their pain." Now listen to this, those who do not recover are people, there's two kinds,

who cannot or will not completely give themselves to this simple program. And it's usually men and

women who are constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselves. You know, I was incapable

of being honest with myself. I'm not that way anymore, but I was up until that point. And

basically what happened was it was when that lie died inside of me, and I knew I had to get honest,

okay. I almost saw my ninth step work, I was really enjoying life, had a good job. Things

were really nice on the outside, they were really comfortable on the inside, except for that one

little lie. And basically what happened was it was really, really simple. I went to God and I go,

"God, you know what?" Every person that I've heard that lied about their sober day, they went out and

got loaded and created even more havoc and more problems than they came in with. And I came in

with a lot of situations that had to be rectified, that I got to rectify and clean up. And basically

what happened was I got to go to a meeting one night that I had started years before and get

honest. And let me tell you, at that moment when it was a candlelight man, I said, "You know, guy,

why ask God for the courage?" And I don't know how you guys pray, but when I ask God for certain

specific things, see, God is really old and sometimes she moves way too slowly. So I give

her praise, you know, it's like, "I want the courage and I want it by this date." You know,

if it's God's will, the courage came long before the date. Went to the meeting, I'm sitting in

there, it's candlelight meeting, I'm like, "You know what, guys? I've been lying to my whole time.

I don't even know what my sobriety date is, but I've been lying to you guys." And at that moment,

there was such a peace inside that I knew that forever everything was going to be okay. Whether

it felt comfortable or not. And what that was, was I was all in on this deal. I'd completely given

myself to this simple program at that moment in time. And basically what happened was my life

really changed a lot after that. I ended up impregnating another girl, you know, and instead

of abortion this time, we had a pregnancy. In fact, I talked to that guy today, I think it was

an hour and 15 minutes when I was done because my phone automatically touched people, you know,

he's one of my best friends. And he's got a brother, he's one of my other best friends.

Another one of my best friends is Mike Spence right here. If you don't have a Mike Spence in

your life, I hope you have a guy as wonderful as Mike is to me, you know, and I hope I am to him,

and I think I am. You know what, we build relationships with people. My two sons are 32

and 34, and before I got here, there was no way I could have kids. I was way too selfish and self-centered.

Kids, oh my God, they're so icky, you know, just like get away, you know, it's just like,

you know why they're called dependents on the tax form? Because they depend on us so much,

like I didn't want any of that crap. I was too selfish and self-centered, and you know what I

found out? Once I got clean and sober, the transformation that the 12-step promises us,

a complete rearrangement of everything, I found out what was always inside of me was a compassionate,

caring, loving, understanding person that just wants to be nice and love people. I couldn't have

had a better day today. I woke up in my house, went to the grocery store, bought some stuff,

went home, made a nice breakfast, got dressed, went and umpired the game out in the Gore Hills.

I love spending time on the baseball field. I'm the most loved guy on the baseball field,

the umpire, you know, between El Camino and the Gore Hills. Basically, there were some kids at

El Camino that I've umpired. They were so happy to see me run into a lady who's in our fellowship.

It was one of the parents at El Camino, another one who's a parent who I haven't seen in like a

year, whose stepson is playing for Gore, so we got to check quite a bit and get caught up and stuff.

And you know, I went home, almost fell asleep, talked to my son. He called back when I backed

into the driveway. So I talked to him for an hour plus. And it's just, I get to live such an

incredible life out there. I'll tell you, I tell you, we've got five minutes to go. I take care of

five things every day. And I could talk for 35 minutes on each one of these things. But the five

things I take care of every day is mind, body, spirit, family, friends, and the other effort,

finances, because money is important here. I take care of my mind as I'm constantly feeding it new,

diverse information. I'm reading new stuff, gathering new information, living life with

an open mind. Oh, look at that. The light came off. Five minutes. Good job. Good job, Jojo. Yes.

Yeah. I didn't throw those lights out because I didn't think I could talk. I loved listening to

me talk. I didn't talk until midnight. Easy. So mind, body, oh my God. In 2019, I'm running

by the planet just having a good time. I had the little thought, but I'd had hepatitis A, B, and C,

got rid of the C, got tested for a year, came back, morphed into a different genotech,

went in, got rid of it again, got tested for a couple of years, didn't come back,

stopped going to the doctor. It's like four years later, we have the little God voice,

you know, male intuition, whatever you want to call it. Because see, I work hard to keep

a conscious contact with God. And I had the thought, "You shouldn't let your blood work,

God." I'm like, "No, I feel great. I'm like a lot of people 10, 20 years younger than me.

They can't keep up with me. They're having trouble keeping up with me. I'm fine." About

two weeks later, I have the same thought. I go in and have this poor doctor. I tell him my story,

you know, about everything. He's like, "We're going to run every test in the world around you,

right?" I call back about four days later when I'm supposed to call back. And they go, "Oh,

you have to come in and talk to the doctor for results." And that's never good news because if

everything's fine, I'm just like, "Yeah, you're great. Thanks for coming in. We'll see you in

six months." I go in, "This poor doctor, you would have thought he was getting a death sentence."

He's like, "Your hepatitis C has come back. You have liver cancer, stage 4 cirrhosis of the lip."

And see, he can't scare me with that shit, you know? You know why? God's in charge. She's got

the perfect plan. Whatever's going to happen is going to happen. I haven't been hanging on

back for 30 plus years. It's not a big deal to me. So what do we do? Get rid of the hep C,

then the liver? He's like, "Do you know how serious this is?" And I'm like, "Yeah, that's what

I want to know. What's the plan of action?" You already know what the problem is. Anyway,

tomorrow will be the celebration of getting rid of the liver cancer and being cancer-free for

four years, which is really, really a full thing. You know, God has brought so many great doctors

to us, and my job is to really lead them. Bless you. Do it again, and I'll tell you to stop it.

I love doing that. Anyway, checked in for one night at UCLA, and then probably had 20 whatever

sleepovers in 2020 at the Hotel Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. Give me complications with

the liver and the wild like clothing and infections and all kinds of stuff. Nothing to do with COVID.

You know, Mike was such a great friend. He'd pick me up, take me there, drop me off, come back later,

pick me up. You know, like going on Tuesday, I'm supposed to get up that Tuesday evening and not

get out until Friday. You know, it's just like, they've only one in one time. You don't know if

you're coming in a deadly line. Mike, what do you want me to sign? Let's go. You know, it's just

like, it's not that I wanted to die. I just knew that God has a perfect plan. I have such a reliance

and a trust that I got nothing to worry about. My life is really, really simple. Mind, body, spirit.

You know what? I see constantly through prayer and meditation to improve my conscious contact

with God. I live in the 10 step. To me, the 10 step isn't some writing thing at the end of the

day, month or year. It's a walk around step. So it's very clearly we've entered the world of the

spirit. What does that mean? I've left the world of self behind and entered into the world of the

spirit with God. One minute? Yeah, one minute. So the 10 step is really, really simple. It says to

watch for selfishness, dishonesty, resentment, and prayer, the four things from the four step.

You know what? You're sitting here and you don't think you're God's favorite? You are. I think

we're all God's favorite. You know what? We've been given such a priceless gift here, sobriety.

Oh my God. I'm so lucky. This is the best thing that's ever happened to me was that first meeting

of Alcoholics Anonymous and then being able to pick this way of life up and practice it on a

daily basis. I just get to hang out with somebody I love all day, every day. And that's me, you

know? And then God puts a bunch of really cool people in front of me and I get to add a lot of

joy to their life. I get to give rather than take. Time's up. Thanks for letting me share.

Thanks, Kurt.