1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:02,160 and make sure there's the cameras at the right level. 2 00:00:02,160 --> 00:00:04,200 - Hi everybody, my name is Hal Bastian 3 00:00:04,200 --> 00:00:06,160 and I am an alcoholic. 4 00:00:06,160 --> 00:00:07,840 Thanks for asking me to come out. 5 00:00:07,840 --> 00:00:10,440 I live and work in downtown Los Angeles, 6 00:00:10,440 --> 00:00:12,000 but I was raised in Northridge, 7 00:00:12,000 --> 00:00:14,320 so I know a little bit about the valley. 8 00:00:14,320 --> 00:00:16,880 And it was a busy drive out here. 9 00:00:16,880 --> 00:00:18,960 And I kidded with Nathan. 10 00:00:18,960 --> 00:00:20,960 I said, people heard that I was coming to the meeting. 11 00:00:20,960 --> 00:00:22,760 They want to come see me on a freeway. 12 00:00:22,760 --> 00:00:25,360 Yeah, you know, my primary purpose is to stay sober 13 00:00:25,360 --> 00:00:28,200 and help other alcoholics achieve and keep their sobriety. 14 00:00:28,200 --> 00:00:29,960 And if I can help anybody in this room, 15 00:00:29,960 --> 00:00:31,120 let me know. 16 00:00:31,120 --> 00:00:33,960 I'm listed as Harold Bastian for my landline. 17 00:00:33,960 --> 00:00:35,920 I'm one of those people that still have a copper line 18 00:00:35,920 --> 00:00:36,760 into my house. 19 00:00:36,760 --> 00:00:39,160 So you can find me on the internet. 20 00:00:39,160 --> 00:00:40,400 If you look up Hal Bastian, 21 00:00:40,400 --> 00:00:43,080 any other social media platform, you can find me. 22 00:00:43,080 --> 00:00:44,200 So there's no hiding. 23 00:00:44,200 --> 00:00:48,680 And it's been a really good experience for me being sober. 24 00:00:48,680 --> 00:00:52,360 My sobriety date is February 5th, 2001. 25 00:00:52,360 --> 00:00:53,720 And it's kind of interesting 26 00:00:53,720 --> 00:00:55,440 'cause I always think it's interesting that I got sober 27 00:00:55,440 --> 00:00:57,640 before the catastrophe of 9/11. 28 00:00:57,640 --> 00:01:00,360 And it was also the printing of the fourth edition 29 00:01:00,360 --> 00:01:03,480 of the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous was in 2001. 30 00:01:03,480 --> 00:01:06,440 And I'll tell you a little bit about what it was like 31 00:01:06,440 --> 00:01:07,760 'cause I think most people in this room 32 00:01:07,760 --> 00:01:09,040 probably know how to drink. 33 00:01:09,040 --> 00:01:11,720 In my case, I use other substances too, 34 00:01:11,720 --> 00:01:14,320 but this is an AA meeting, so I'm gonna keep it to AA. 35 00:01:14,320 --> 00:01:16,520 But they were significant substances. 36 00:01:16,520 --> 00:01:21,520 And so I was born in downtown Los Angeles 37 00:01:21,520 --> 00:01:25,600 on June 25th, 1960. 38 00:01:25,600 --> 00:01:28,040 And I was raised here in the San Fernando Valley. 39 00:01:28,040 --> 00:01:30,880 And now I live and work, as I mentioned, in downtown LA. 40 00:01:30,880 --> 00:01:32,920 So I didn't fall too far from the tree. 41 00:01:32,920 --> 00:01:35,920 And I come from a long line of alcoholism, 42 00:01:35,920 --> 00:01:38,160 double barrel down both sides. 43 00:01:38,160 --> 00:01:39,880 I think it's very interesting, Bill, 44 00:01:39,880 --> 00:01:43,120 that we talk about the allergy of the body 45 00:01:43,120 --> 00:01:44,280 and the obsession of the mind. 46 00:01:44,280 --> 00:01:45,400 But if I go to my doctor, 47 00:01:45,400 --> 00:01:49,280 he can't pull blood or saliva and tell me I'm an alcoholic, 48 00:01:49,280 --> 00:01:53,880 which leads me to believe that it is a spiritual disease. 49 00:01:53,880 --> 00:01:56,560 But it came down both sides and it was really hard. 50 00:01:56,560 --> 00:02:00,280 I'm an only child and growing up was tough. 51 00:02:00,280 --> 00:02:03,680 I have almost no memories of before 10 52 00:02:03,680 --> 00:02:07,000 when my father left and went away. 53 00:02:07,000 --> 00:02:08,600 So I know it must've been kind of bad. 54 00:02:08,600 --> 00:02:10,680 And I vowed I would never drink 55 00:02:10,680 --> 00:02:13,840 because I saw what it did to my father 56 00:02:13,840 --> 00:02:15,720 and what it did to their relationship. 57 00:02:15,720 --> 00:02:18,280 And when I was 17 years old, I was in high school 58 00:02:18,280 --> 00:02:19,800 and I was with a couple of guys 59 00:02:19,800 --> 00:02:21,680 and they were painting a room 60 00:02:21,680 --> 00:02:24,520 and they had a six pack of beer and I liked beer too. 61 00:02:24,520 --> 00:02:26,760 And I did 12 a night, that was a starter. 62 00:02:26,760 --> 00:02:28,560 So we have that in common. 63 00:02:28,560 --> 00:02:30,000 They had a 12 pack of beer 64 00:02:30,000 --> 00:02:31,840 and they said, "Come on, have a beer." 65 00:02:31,840 --> 00:02:33,920 And I'm like, "No, no, no, not me." 66 00:02:33,920 --> 00:02:37,760 And so finally I just did it to get them off my back. 67 00:02:37,760 --> 00:02:39,800 So we had one beer each 68 00:02:39,800 --> 00:02:41,720 and there was three left in the six pack. 69 00:02:41,720 --> 00:02:43,080 And by the time they turned around, 70 00:02:43,080 --> 00:02:45,000 I had drunk the other three as well. 71 00:02:45,000 --> 00:02:46,920 So I had four, they had one each. 72 00:02:46,920 --> 00:02:48,520 So that was a harbinger of things to come. 73 00:02:48,520 --> 00:02:50,960 And I knew that, and then I got in the car and drove. 74 00:02:50,960 --> 00:02:55,000 And I knew that was not good, that I liked it way too much. 75 00:02:55,000 --> 00:02:55,840 And so I stopped. 76 00:02:55,840 --> 00:02:58,800 I had a lot of willpower 77 00:02:58,800 --> 00:03:01,880 and I was successful at that till I got into college 78 00:03:01,880 --> 00:03:03,200 and I was in a fraternity. 79 00:03:03,200 --> 00:03:05,320 And this was in the '80s in UCLA 80 00:03:05,320 --> 00:03:08,240 and alcohol and drugs are very, very prevalent. 81 00:03:08,240 --> 00:03:11,280 And my nickname in my fraternity, 82 00:03:11,280 --> 00:03:13,200 since I didn't drink or use drugs, 83 00:03:13,200 --> 00:03:16,880 was Hal, don't have any fun around me, that's true. 84 00:03:16,880 --> 00:03:20,440 So one day we had this recruitment dinner 85 00:03:20,440 --> 00:03:23,040 and the protocol was everybody was sitting there 86 00:03:23,040 --> 00:03:25,760 and people brought potential new victims to the fraternity. 87 00:03:25,760 --> 00:03:27,800 And they would introduce themselves 88 00:03:27,800 --> 00:03:30,640 and they would take a big handle of Jack Daniels 89 00:03:30,640 --> 00:03:33,520 and they would take a swig and everybody would be yay. 90 00:03:33,520 --> 00:03:37,520 And so it got to me and there was this hush over the room. 91 00:03:37,520 --> 00:03:39,200 And I don't know what possessed me, 92 00:03:39,200 --> 00:03:41,200 but I was like, here we go. 93 00:03:41,200 --> 00:03:43,000 And I took a drink 94 00:03:43,000 --> 00:03:45,400 and then I drank alcohol three for 20 years. 95 00:03:45,400 --> 00:03:50,040 And I had an incredible, incredible tolerance of alcohol. 96 00:03:50,040 --> 00:03:52,120 At that same dinner, I went up to the bar 97 00:03:52,120 --> 00:03:54,400 and they said it was 12 ounce amber glasses 98 00:03:54,400 --> 00:03:56,920 that we had in fraternities so that we couldn't break them 99 00:03:56,920 --> 00:03:58,760 or get it I hopped, that's what I remember. 100 00:03:58,760 --> 00:04:01,960 And I told the pledge to fill it up with vodka. 101 00:04:01,960 --> 00:04:04,160 And he looked at me and I said, let's do it. 102 00:04:04,160 --> 00:04:07,520 And I drank that 12 ounces like you could drink 12 ounces 103 00:04:07,520 --> 00:04:09,880 of room temperature water after a run, right? 104 00:04:09,880 --> 00:04:11,640 Well, people thought that was pretty terrific. 105 00:04:11,640 --> 00:04:12,960 So that's what happened. 106 00:04:12,960 --> 00:04:17,960 And I want to fast forward to February 4th of 2001 107 00:04:18,400 --> 00:04:20,720 when the bottom came up and hit me. 108 00:04:20,720 --> 00:04:24,560 And I had been around AA at times in my 30s, 109 00:04:24,560 --> 00:04:26,360 but my joke, it was like auditing the class. 110 00:04:26,360 --> 00:04:28,320 And if you don't know what an audit of a class is, 111 00:04:28,320 --> 00:04:30,560 in college, university, if you don't register for the class, 112 00:04:30,560 --> 00:04:32,840 you just go, you're not registered. 113 00:04:32,840 --> 00:04:34,320 You don't have to take the test or do the reading. 114 00:04:34,320 --> 00:04:35,760 You just go and kind of, yeah. 115 00:04:35,760 --> 00:04:40,760 And I audited AA for about 10 years in my 30s. 116 00:04:40,760 --> 00:04:46,120 And so I called a friend of mine who was sober, who I knew, 117 00:04:46,120 --> 00:04:47,520 and he worked at the Midnight Mission. 118 00:04:47,520 --> 00:04:49,680 When the Midnight Mission was at 4th and LA street 119 00:04:49,680 --> 00:04:52,320 in downtown LA and Clancy was running it at the time. 120 00:04:52,320 --> 00:04:55,960 And I called him hysterical 121 00:04:55,960 --> 00:04:59,640 and he really did wonderful 12 step work with me. 122 00:04:59,640 --> 00:05:01,560 And he said, well, listen, 123 00:05:01,560 --> 00:05:04,600 there's a cocaine anonymous meeting tomorrow at six o'clock 124 00:05:04,600 --> 00:05:05,480 and why don't you come? 125 00:05:05,480 --> 00:05:07,080 And I qualified for that program. 126 00:05:07,080 --> 00:05:10,080 So I went and that's my sobriety day. 127 00:05:10,080 --> 00:05:14,040 And there's talk about this spiritual experience 128 00:05:14,040 --> 00:05:15,800 of the burning bush variety. 129 00:05:15,800 --> 00:05:20,200 And I had one of those and my first week, 130 00:05:20,200 --> 00:05:22,000 the week of February 5th of '01, 131 00:05:22,000 --> 00:05:25,720 I really wanted to drink as you can imagine. 132 00:05:25,720 --> 00:05:29,160 And I'm not gonna use profanity in this meeting. 133 00:05:29,160 --> 00:05:30,840 So I know that's good. 134 00:05:30,840 --> 00:05:35,520 So I won't use the swear words, but I will just say, 135 00:05:35,520 --> 00:05:37,800 somebody who had a significant amount of sobriety said, 136 00:05:37,800 --> 00:05:40,480 go home and get on your blank, blank knees 137 00:05:40,480 --> 00:05:44,120 and pray to God to remove that feeling of wanting to drink. 138 00:05:44,120 --> 00:05:46,640 And you stay on your blank, blank knees 139 00:05:46,640 --> 00:05:48,240 and you say that over and over again, 140 00:05:48,240 --> 00:05:50,560 God, please take away my desire to drink. 141 00:05:50,560 --> 00:05:51,400 Please don't. 142 00:05:51,400 --> 00:05:54,640 Until that compulsion is lifted and then get out. 143 00:05:54,640 --> 00:05:56,040 If you're in a public realm, just bow your head. 144 00:05:56,040 --> 00:05:57,280 And when it comes back, do it again. 145 00:05:57,280 --> 00:05:58,120 So I did. 146 00:05:58,120 --> 00:06:02,680 And it was miraculously lifted at that moment. 147 00:06:02,680 --> 00:06:04,760 And then 10 minutes later it came back 148 00:06:04,760 --> 00:06:08,880 and then I did it again and then it came back in an hour. 149 00:06:08,880 --> 00:06:12,120 And I haven't had a desire to drink in over 24 years 150 00:06:12,120 --> 00:06:14,960 because that compulsion and that desire to drink 151 00:06:14,960 --> 00:06:15,840 just gave up. 152 00:06:15,840 --> 00:06:18,640 At one point in my career, I do real estate 153 00:06:18,640 --> 00:06:20,900 and I was managing a property out in Tenogo Park. 154 00:06:20,900 --> 00:06:22,320 And when I would come in in the morning, 155 00:06:22,320 --> 00:06:24,800 there'd be graffiti every morning on the same wall. 156 00:06:24,800 --> 00:06:27,640 So I get my paint out my door and I roll it out 157 00:06:27,640 --> 00:06:28,960 and I would do it every day. 158 00:06:28,960 --> 00:06:31,800 And finally it stopped because it's no fun to do graffiti 159 00:06:31,800 --> 00:06:33,000 and then have it not stay up. 160 00:06:33,000 --> 00:06:34,400 Well, the same is true 161 00:06:34,400 --> 00:06:39,400 when you deny the disease of alcoholism and use a prayer. 162 00:06:39,840 --> 00:06:43,040 And eventually it just said, let's go to the beach 163 00:06:43,040 --> 00:06:45,080 because he's just gonna use the prayer and it's gonna work. 164 00:06:45,080 --> 00:06:47,780 And so let's not stop bothering him. 165 00:06:47,780 --> 00:06:51,160 And so that's what happened. 166 00:06:51,160 --> 00:06:54,480 And I like to focus on what it's like now. 167 00:06:54,480 --> 00:06:58,320 And I like to talk a lot about the steps. 168 00:06:58,320 --> 00:07:02,040 So I believe that alcoholism is, 169 00:07:02,040 --> 00:07:03,440 and this isn't a unique thought. 170 00:07:03,440 --> 00:07:04,960 I mean, it talks about it in our literature, 171 00:07:04,960 --> 00:07:08,080 is it's a symptom of an underlying dis-ease 172 00:07:08,080 --> 00:07:09,680 at being a human being in this plane. 173 00:07:09,680 --> 00:07:10,520 And that's what I was. 174 00:07:10,520 --> 00:07:13,720 I was uncomfortable in my own skin from the day I was born 175 00:07:13,720 --> 00:07:15,480 until I took that four beer drink. 176 00:07:15,480 --> 00:07:17,240 And when I was 17, I felt better. 177 00:07:17,240 --> 00:07:21,120 I heard something recently that alcohol gave me wings 178 00:07:21,120 --> 00:07:22,480 and then it took away the sky. 179 00:07:22,480 --> 00:07:23,880 I thought that was a really good, 180 00:07:23,880 --> 00:07:26,920 really, really great, a great metaphor. 181 00:07:26,920 --> 00:07:31,920 And I love sobriety for a lot of different reasons. 182 00:07:31,920 --> 00:07:35,840 I was talking to Nathan about things that he likes. 183 00:07:35,840 --> 00:07:38,920 The number one thing is I have gone from being in dis-ease 184 00:07:38,920 --> 00:07:41,280 as Hal Bastian 100% of the time 185 00:07:41,280 --> 00:07:44,360 to at ease as Hal Bastian 95% of the time, 186 00:07:44,360 --> 00:07:47,120 if I'm practicing the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. 187 00:07:47,120 --> 00:07:51,600 And this is a spiritual program. 188 00:07:51,600 --> 00:07:54,080 June 10th of this year, we'll be 90 years old. 189 00:07:54,080 --> 00:07:56,000 The book was published in '39. 190 00:07:56,000 --> 00:07:58,640 The 12 and 12 was published in '53. 191 00:07:58,640 --> 00:08:02,040 So it's got something going on for it. 192 00:08:02,040 --> 00:08:05,000 And God has mentioned in the literature 193 00:08:05,000 --> 00:08:07,680 and that makes a lot of people upset. 194 00:08:07,680 --> 00:08:09,640 And I tell people now, I said, 195 00:08:09,640 --> 00:08:11,480 I don't think you've ever had a problem with God. 196 00:08:11,480 --> 00:08:13,400 I think you've probably had a problem 197 00:08:13,400 --> 00:08:16,280 with various religions and dogma and shame. 198 00:08:16,280 --> 00:08:18,040 And I'm not anti-religion anyway. 199 00:08:18,040 --> 00:08:21,040 I now describe myself as a recovering Lutheran. 200 00:08:21,040 --> 00:08:22,920 I knew that at a very, very young age, 201 00:08:22,920 --> 00:08:26,680 like I think '60s, 1967 or something that I was different. 202 00:08:26,680 --> 00:08:29,280 And the word gay wasn't even used then. 203 00:08:29,280 --> 00:08:30,840 I think it was just homosexual. 204 00:08:30,840 --> 00:08:32,240 And I knew I was gonna go straight to hell. 205 00:08:32,240 --> 00:08:33,800 And that was a big dark secret. 206 00:08:33,800 --> 00:08:37,680 And as a child, I considered checking out 207 00:08:37,680 --> 00:08:39,800 so nobody would find out this deep dark secret. 208 00:08:39,800 --> 00:08:44,280 So I started to pray for God to remove that from me 209 00:08:44,280 --> 00:08:47,600 and make me straight so I could have a wife 210 00:08:47,600 --> 00:08:49,160 and a family and everything else. 211 00:08:49,160 --> 00:08:50,680 And I did that from eight to 22. 212 00:08:50,680 --> 00:08:53,480 And then when I graduated from university, 213 00:08:53,480 --> 00:08:55,720 I just accepted the fact that it wasn't, 214 00:08:55,720 --> 00:08:57,840 for me, it wasn't a moral choice. 215 00:08:57,840 --> 00:08:59,000 It wasn't a lifestyle. 216 00:08:59,000 --> 00:09:01,600 Yachting and golfing is a lifestyle. 217 00:09:01,600 --> 00:09:03,460 And it's just the way that I was made. 218 00:09:03,460 --> 00:09:05,440 And I didn't like it, but I accepted it. 219 00:09:05,440 --> 00:09:08,660 So when I got to AA and they said, 220 00:09:08,660 --> 00:09:11,300 "Hey, God's gonna solve your drinking problem," 221 00:09:11,300 --> 00:09:13,640 I was like, he did a horrible job on the gay project. 222 00:09:13,640 --> 00:09:15,000 But I was like, I was so desperate. 223 00:09:15,000 --> 00:09:16,160 I was just gonna go with it. 224 00:09:16,160 --> 00:09:18,960 And when Richard told me what to do, go home and pray, 225 00:09:18,960 --> 00:09:19,880 I just did it. 226 00:09:19,880 --> 00:09:24,400 And anyway, if anybody in the room has a problem with God, 227 00:09:24,400 --> 00:09:26,840 higher power, universal intelligence, 228 00:09:26,840 --> 00:09:28,760 I'm happy to report to you 229 00:09:28,760 --> 00:09:31,120 that some people use the group itself, 230 00:09:31,120 --> 00:09:33,320 the group of drunks as their higher power. 231 00:09:33,320 --> 00:09:35,000 I've known bona fide atheists 232 00:09:35,000 --> 00:09:37,760 that have believed there is no God for sure, 233 00:09:37,760 --> 00:09:40,120 which some days seems arguable around, you know, 234 00:09:40,120 --> 00:09:42,760 at every point in human history, 235 00:09:42,760 --> 00:09:46,720 but stayed so over 30 years as an atheist in AA. 236 00:09:46,720 --> 00:09:47,760 I think it's harder. 237 00:09:47,760 --> 00:09:49,800 You know, I like my spirituality 238 00:09:49,800 --> 00:09:52,160 and I like having a relationship, you know, with God. 239 00:09:52,160 --> 00:09:54,720 And I have a theory about God, 240 00:09:54,720 --> 00:09:57,760 which is I think of life as a bicycle wheel. 241 00:09:57,760 --> 00:10:00,540 And I think of the hub as God. 242 00:10:00,540 --> 00:10:04,640 And I think of every spoke that's going to that hub 243 00:10:04,640 --> 00:10:08,980 as a different cultural or different way to the great seeking 244 00:10:08,980 --> 00:10:11,400 to explain the great mystery of old earth. 245 00:10:11,400 --> 00:10:13,760 And if I had been born into a Jewish family, 246 00:10:13,760 --> 00:10:14,580 I would be a Jew. 247 00:10:14,580 --> 00:10:17,160 If I'd been born into a, you know, an atheist family, 248 00:10:17,160 --> 00:10:19,120 I might be an atheist or at least an agnostic. 249 00:10:19,120 --> 00:10:21,920 If I was born into a Hindu family, I'd be a Hindu. 250 00:10:21,920 --> 00:10:23,440 And so I think, well, and then, you know, 251 00:10:23,440 --> 00:10:25,680 there's various religions that say they're the only way. 252 00:10:25,680 --> 00:10:26,520 I get it. 253 00:10:26,520 --> 00:10:27,480 That's what they feel. 254 00:10:27,480 --> 00:10:29,480 And that's that, I don't fight with that. 255 00:10:29,480 --> 00:10:33,280 But what I do know is for me, 256 00:10:33,280 --> 00:10:35,760 I, that my church, the Lutheran church, 257 00:10:35,760 --> 00:10:37,620 they're still not too hot on the, you know, 258 00:10:37,620 --> 00:10:38,760 that liking guys thing. 259 00:10:38,760 --> 00:10:43,760 So I, you know, for me, this is my community in AA. 260 00:10:43,760 --> 00:10:44,940 And by the way, 261 00:10:44,940 --> 00:10:47,160 that issue is just such a small part of my being. 262 00:10:47,160 --> 00:10:49,640 It's like, I don't know, especially at 64, 263 00:10:49,640 --> 00:10:52,280 it's that much of my being, but it, you know, 264 00:10:52,280 --> 00:10:53,120 it's just there. 265 00:10:53,120 --> 00:10:58,120 And the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous are designed 266 00:10:58,640 --> 00:11:00,680 to get us connected to God. 267 00:11:00,680 --> 00:11:03,140 It's designed to get us connected to God 268 00:11:03,140 --> 00:11:05,920 so that we can get peace and comfort from God, 269 00:11:05,920 --> 00:11:08,780 instead of having to numb the miserable dis-ease 270 00:11:08,780 --> 00:11:12,160 of being us in this dimension, in these vessels. 271 00:11:12,160 --> 00:11:16,160 And that's what it's all about, the 12 steps. 272 00:11:16,160 --> 00:11:19,720 And so I'd like to talk about the 12 steps 273 00:11:19,720 --> 00:11:22,000 and my experience with them. 274 00:11:22,000 --> 00:11:24,960 One would think that at, you know, 24 years of sobriety, 275 00:11:24,960 --> 00:11:26,080 I would know them all by heart. 276 00:11:26,080 --> 00:11:28,600 And I do, I can recite them, but if I recite them, 277 00:11:28,600 --> 00:11:30,180 I don't, I just, I do it by rote. 278 00:11:30,180 --> 00:11:33,660 So it's okay if I borrow this, okay, good. 279 00:11:33,660 --> 00:11:34,760 Oh, you know, one of the things 280 00:11:34,760 --> 00:11:36,480 before I go through the steps, I like to tell people, 281 00:11:36,480 --> 00:11:38,040 especially newcomers, they look at this book 282 00:11:38,040 --> 00:11:41,040 and they're like, oh man, I like reading, you know? 283 00:11:41,040 --> 00:11:43,360 And I said, well, I got good news for you. 284 00:11:43,360 --> 00:11:46,520 The program of Alcoholics Anonymous 285 00:11:46,520 --> 00:11:48,580 is in the first 164 pages. 286 00:11:48,580 --> 00:11:50,480 So this is what we have to worry about. 287 00:11:50,480 --> 00:11:52,680 This is just, this was said as a how-to manual 288 00:11:52,680 --> 00:11:54,020 to people all over the country. 289 00:11:54,020 --> 00:11:56,400 Then eventually the world, and these are people speaking, 290 00:11:56,400 --> 00:11:58,640 just like I'm speaking to you with my verbal voice, 291 00:11:58,640 --> 00:12:00,960 but these are speakers that are in print. 292 00:12:00,960 --> 00:12:04,360 And then the 12 steps that get us connected 293 00:12:04,360 --> 00:12:07,240 to our higher power so that we can be at ease 294 00:12:07,240 --> 00:12:10,360 instead of in dis-ease are located right there. 295 00:12:10,360 --> 00:12:14,020 And if I had to make a choice on only one part of the book 296 00:12:14,020 --> 00:12:17,120 that I could use to help somebody get connected 297 00:12:17,120 --> 00:12:20,000 and, you know, become not only absent, 298 00:12:20,000 --> 00:12:23,400 absent is just not drinking, sobriety is having tools 299 00:12:23,400 --> 00:12:25,940 to deal with the anxiety and the angst of living life. 300 00:12:25,940 --> 00:12:27,600 I could do it right there with that. 301 00:12:27,600 --> 00:12:30,120 And that seems to be, to make it, you know, 302 00:12:30,120 --> 00:12:31,860 a lot more manageable. 303 00:12:31,860 --> 00:12:36,080 So step one, admitted we are powerless over alcohol 304 00:12:36,080 --> 00:12:38,320 and our life had become unmanageable. 305 00:12:38,320 --> 00:12:41,240 So my sponsor had me make a list. 306 00:12:41,240 --> 00:12:42,520 And before we had smartphones, 307 00:12:42,520 --> 00:12:43,900 we made a list on a piece of paper. 308 00:12:43,900 --> 00:12:45,940 And he said, write down every rotten thing 309 00:12:45,940 --> 00:12:50,120 that has happened to you as a result of your addiction. 310 00:12:50,120 --> 00:12:51,740 And go back as far as you can. 311 00:12:51,740 --> 00:12:53,080 And it doesn't have to be perfect. 312 00:12:53,080 --> 00:12:54,320 It doesn't have to be chronological, 313 00:12:54,320 --> 00:12:56,560 but put down how these things 314 00:12:56,560 --> 00:12:58,240 have made your life unmanageable. 315 00:12:58,240 --> 00:13:00,080 So I started writing my list. 316 00:13:00,080 --> 00:13:02,200 And so these are some of the top ones. 317 00:13:02,200 --> 00:13:04,280 I had a friend of mine that I was using with 318 00:13:04,280 --> 00:13:07,120 who overdosed in my presence and he died before me 319 00:13:07,120 --> 00:13:09,440 and I couldn't bring him back with CPR. 320 00:13:09,440 --> 00:13:12,960 That's my number one, you know, horrible thing. 321 00:13:12,960 --> 00:13:13,840 God bless him. 322 00:13:13,840 --> 00:13:15,920 He never made it obviously to the program. 323 00:13:15,920 --> 00:13:19,160 I went to law school at the age of 22, 324 00:13:19,160 --> 00:13:21,920 but I was busy coming out and drinking. 325 00:13:21,920 --> 00:13:22,800 I wasn't coming out. 326 00:13:22,800 --> 00:13:23,680 I was just accepting. 327 00:13:23,680 --> 00:13:24,720 I was still in the closet. 328 00:13:24,720 --> 00:13:28,560 And you know, law school was getting in the way of drinking. 329 00:13:28,560 --> 00:13:30,320 And I knew that I'd fell behind. 330 00:13:30,320 --> 00:13:33,800 I knew, you know, if I stayed, I wasn't gonna do well. 331 00:13:33,800 --> 00:13:35,440 And the thing you do if you're not gonna do well 332 00:13:35,440 --> 00:13:37,400 is you quit so you can't fail, right? 333 00:13:37,400 --> 00:13:39,280 Quit so nobody can see you fail. 334 00:13:39,280 --> 00:13:41,280 And I went bankrupt. 335 00:13:41,280 --> 00:13:43,600 Later on, I became HIV positive. 336 00:13:43,600 --> 00:13:46,680 I became HIV positive at a time 337 00:13:46,680 --> 00:13:49,880 that it was right at the cusp of taking like a pill 338 00:13:49,880 --> 00:13:51,040 to keep you alive. 339 00:13:51,040 --> 00:13:54,000 And so I've been kept alive by pill for 30 years. 340 00:13:54,000 --> 00:13:58,120 I never ever expected to make it to my age. 341 00:13:58,120 --> 00:13:59,320 I got fired from jobs. 342 00:13:59,320 --> 00:14:01,800 I, you know, got a DUI. 343 00:14:01,800 --> 00:14:02,840 So you get the idea. 344 00:14:02,840 --> 00:14:03,840 So I made that list. 345 00:14:03,840 --> 00:14:08,320 And he said to me, listen, if you ever feel like drinking, 346 00:14:08,320 --> 00:14:10,520 in addition to calling other people in AA 347 00:14:10,520 --> 00:14:13,000 and obviously praying first, 348 00:14:13,000 --> 00:14:15,960 I want you to look at that list and ask yourself, 349 00:14:15,960 --> 00:14:17,920 do I wanna repeat something that's like on this list 350 00:14:17,920 --> 00:14:19,320 or add something even worse to it? 351 00:14:19,320 --> 00:14:22,000 And I have met people in AA who have killed people. 352 00:14:22,000 --> 00:14:23,240 You know, they were the drunk driver 353 00:14:23,240 --> 00:14:24,200 and they hit them and they killed them. 354 00:14:24,200 --> 00:14:26,240 And they served sometimes decades and they got out. 355 00:14:26,240 --> 00:14:29,360 And you know, it's not fun, right? 356 00:14:29,360 --> 00:14:31,320 So that's how I did my step one. 357 00:14:31,320 --> 00:14:33,240 It didn't take too long to accept it. 358 00:14:33,240 --> 00:14:36,520 But I wanna say this about my audit period of AA. 359 00:14:36,520 --> 00:14:39,360 When I started having trouble, I had a Cadillac, 360 00:14:39,360 --> 00:14:40,840 I had a house in the Hills. 361 00:14:40,840 --> 00:14:43,400 I had a car phone when it was literally a car phone 362 00:14:43,400 --> 00:14:45,240 that cost a dollar a minute, you know. 363 00:14:45,240 --> 00:14:49,600 I had $1,200 a month phone bills like in 1985 or something. 364 00:14:49,600 --> 00:14:53,240 And, you know, I had a job and, you know, 365 00:14:53,240 --> 00:14:55,320 I thought of alcoholics as, you know, 366 00:14:55,320 --> 00:14:57,600 living in Skid Row or under a bridge or something like that. 367 00:14:57,600 --> 00:14:58,440 And I didn't have any. 368 00:14:58,440 --> 00:14:59,720 So I had the imposter syndrome. 369 00:14:59,720 --> 00:15:01,120 Like I'm not really an alcoholic. 370 00:15:01,120 --> 00:15:02,320 If I'm not really an alcoholic, 371 00:15:02,320 --> 00:15:03,880 then I couldn't have all this stuff. 372 00:15:03,880 --> 00:15:06,600 And if somebody had just explained the tradition, 373 00:15:06,600 --> 00:15:08,600 the third tradition, that the only requirement 374 00:15:08,600 --> 00:15:11,480 for membership in AA is a desire to stop drinking, 375 00:15:11,480 --> 00:15:14,040 I would have got in sooner and I qualified at 20. 376 00:15:14,040 --> 00:15:17,280 And, you know, if I'd gotten sober at 20 instead of 40, 377 00:15:17,280 --> 00:15:18,800 well, the world would have been a far different place, 378 00:15:18,800 --> 00:15:20,040 I think, you know. 379 00:15:20,040 --> 00:15:23,680 But anyway, it turned out being okay, just the way it is. 380 00:15:23,680 --> 00:15:25,560 I came to the belief that a power greater than ourselves 381 00:15:25,560 --> 00:15:26,600 could restore sanity. 382 00:15:26,600 --> 00:15:28,520 You know, I said, I said, I just, 383 00:15:28,520 --> 00:15:31,400 I'm gonna try it 'cause I'm desperate and at work. 384 00:15:31,400 --> 00:15:33,600 Three, made a decision to turn our will and our lives 385 00:15:33,600 --> 00:15:35,560 over the care of God as we understood Him. 386 00:15:35,560 --> 00:15:37,320 Well, doing it my way was not working 387 00:15:37,320 --> 00:15:38,960 and that was demonstrable. 388 00:15:38,960 --> 00:15:40,760 So I did that. 389 00:15:40,760 --> 00:15:44,160 And then four, made a searching and fearless moral inventory 390 00:15:44,160 --> 00:15:45,000 of themselves. 391 00:15:45,000 --> 00:15:47,520 Well, my goodness gracious, that one took me a little time. 392 00:15:47,520 --> 00:15:49,640 And it took me time 'cause I was reading the book 393 00:15:49,640 --> 00:15:52,440 and the columns and Mrs. Brown and all this stuff. 394 00:15:52,440 --> 00:15:55,240 And I was like, I don't know how to write this in the book 395 00:15:55,240 --> 00:15:56,800 and where would I draw the lines 396 00:15:56,800 --> 00:16:00,160 and, you know, some typical like perfectionist fashion. 397 00:16:00,160 --> 00:16:01,780 I was like, I just procrastinated. 398 00:16:01,780 --> 00:16:05,160 And then I finally found something on the internet 399 00:16:05,160 --> 00:16:07,720 and I ran this through my sponsor, which was, you know, 400 00:16:07,720 --> 00:16:09,960 resentment, so we have our resentment inventory, 401 00:16:09,960 --> 00:16:11,980 our fear and our sexual inventory. 402 00:16:11,980 --> 00:16:14,480 And so there was a spreadsheet for each one 403 00:16:14,480 --> 00:16:16,440 and you could just print it out and write in it. 404 00:16:16,440 --> 00:16:17,380 Well, it was pretty good. 405 00:16:17,380 --> 00:16:20,200 So I, by the way, I typed in a manual typewriter 406 00:16:20,200 --> 00:16:21,560 earlier in my life, right? 407 00:16:21,560 --> 00:16:24,520 ASDF JKL semicolon. 408 00:16:24,520 --> 00:16:27,000 And so I started working on that. 409 00:16:27,000 --> 00:16:28,740 You know, who did I resent? 410 00:16:28,740 --> 00:16:29,880 What happened? 411 00:16:29,880 --> 00:16:31,080 What did it affect? 412 00:16:31,080 --> 00:16:32,820 And then the dastardly thing about like, 413 00:16:32,820 --> 00:16:33,940 what was my part in it? 414 00:16:33,940 --> 00:16:37,120 Well, I will tell you that my entire four step, 415 00:16:37,120 --> 00:16:39,280 when I go back to, when I went back to take a look 416 00:16:39,280 --> 00:16:42,320 at like how much elapsed time it took to do this four step, 417 00:16:42,320 --> 00:16:43,960 which was, it was pretty thorough. 418 00:16:43,960 --> 00:16:46,180 I wrote a lot, but you know, 419 00:16:46,180 --> 00:16:48,000 it was probably eight hours of writing, 420 00:16:48,000 --> 00:16:49,960 checking boxes and writing a couple of words. 421 00:16:49,960 --> 00:16:51,440 And it took me four months to do it. 422 00:16:51,440 --> 00:16:54,280 So if anybody has not done the four step 423 00:16:54,280 --> 00:16:56,440 and you're trepidatious about it, 424 00:16:56,440 --> 00:16:58,800 please get my number and I'd like to talk you through it. 425 00:16:58,800 --> 00:17:00,360 And I always encourage people just to go sit 426 00:17:00,360 --> 00:17:02,180 with a fellow alcoholic and just write it. 427 00:17:02,180 --> 00:17:03,120 They don't have to talk to each other, 428 00:17:03,120 --> 00:17:04,760 but just be in their presence while they're writing 429 00:17:04,760 --> 00:17:06,240 'cause it could be an uncomfortable thing. 430 00:17:06,240 --> 00:17:08,280 And it was very, very annoying to find out 431 00:17:08,280 --> 00:17:10,600 that I had thought that I had been evicted my whole life 432 00:17:10,600 --> 00:17:12,100 and mostly I was the perpetrator. 433 00:17:12,100 --> 00:17:14,080 I'm the guy that put myself up on the railroad tracks 434 00:17:14,080 --> 00:17:16,900 to get hit and no wonder I had a resentment, you know? 435 00:17:16,900 --> 00:17:19,720 So that's what happened with the four step. 436 00:17:19,720 --> 00:17:22,140 And then of course I read my four step. 437 00:17:22,140 --> 00:17:24,360 I did five, six and seven in an afternoon 438 00:17:24,360 --> 00:17:28,400 with a very great sponsor who was a very patient man. 439 00:17:28,400 --> 00:17:31,900 And I read everything to him for my four step. 440 00:17:31,900 --> 00:17:35,880 And he was very helpful at identifying patterns 441 00:17:35,880 --> 00:17:37,500 of character defects. 442 00:17:37,500 --> 00:17:39,960 By the way, he also had me write a list of my assets too, 443 00:17:39,960 --> 00:17:42,400 so I wouldn't jump from a tall building. 444 00:17:42,400 --> 00:17:46,640 And so I read it to him and then the six and seven step, 445 00:17:46,640 --> 00:17:49,840 I actually read them for somebody that's new. 446 00:17:49,840 --> 00:17:51,320 We did the moral inventory. 447 00:17:51,320 --> 00:17:53,080 Five is we admitted to God to ourselves 448 00:17:53,080 --> 00:17:54,120 and to another human being, 449 00:17:54,120 --> 00:17:56,180 which usually is just sponsored, but doesn't have to be, 450 00:17:56,180 --> 00:17:57,540 the exact nature of our wrongs. 451 00:17:57,540 --> 00:17:59,400 And then six were entirely God, 452 00:17:59,400 --> 00:18:02,960 ready to have God remove all these defects of character. 453 00:18:02,960 --> 00:18:04,640 That's an idea, it's not an action. 454 00:18:04,640 --> 00:18:06,560 But he went for a run for about an hour 455 00:18:06,560 --> 00:18:09,320 while I made sure that my cement was good 456 00:18:09,320 --> 00:18:11,880 and I had enough mortar and all that stuff. 457 00:18:11,880 --> 00:18:14,860 And then when he got back, we got on our knees 458 00:18:14,860 --> 00:18:16,680 and I did the seven step prayer with him. 459 00:18:16,680 --> 00:18:21,680 And that day was a transformative experience of relief. 460 00:18:21,680 --> 00:18:25,140 I mean, it was like I was Atlas 461 00:18:25,140 --> 00:18:28,040 and I got the world off my shoulders. 462 00:18:28,040 --> 00:18:31,360 And then he had me actually burn my four step. 463 00:18:31,360 --> 00:18:33,840 And I made the mistake of burning it 464 00:18:33,840 --> 00:18:35,620 like in my bathroom over a toilet 465 00:18:35,620 --> 00:18:39,580 and thinking that was a safe, don't do that. 466 00:18:39,580 --> 00:18:41,640 I didn't burn anything down, but I almost did. 467 00:18:41,640 --> 00:18:43,100 And then eight is we made a list 468 00:18:43,100 --> 00:18:45,160 of all persons we harmed, people we had harmed 469 00:18:45,160 --> 00:18:47,920 and became willing to make amends to them all. 470 00:18:47,920 --> 00:18:49,880 Well, I was very upset about that 471 00:18:49,880 --> 00:18:52,560 because they were on my four step, 472 00:18:52,560 --> 00:18:53,820 but I could remember them. 473 00:18:53,820 --> 00:18:57,320 And, oh, by the way, we're getting on here. 474 00:18:57,320 --> 00:19:00,440 I made the list and one of the people on my list 475 00:19:00,440 --> 00:19:02,560 was my friend who overdosed and died. 476 00:19:02,560 --> 00:19:04,560 And I went to the cemetery 477 00:19:04,560 --> 00:19:06,360 and it turns out the name that I knew him by 478 00:19:06,360 --> 00:19:07,520 was not his legal name. 479 00:19:07,520 --> 00:19:10,200 So I couldn't find his actual grave site 480 00:19:10,200 --> 00:19:13,120 but I went to a grave site of somebody that had his name 481 00:19:13,120 --> 00:19:16,560 and I asked them if they would please be my proxy 482 00:19:16,560 --> 00:19:19,320 and get that message to him and that worked. 483 00:19:19,320 --> 00:19:22,040 So I made that list. 484 00:19:22,040 --> 00:19:24,200 When I made the list, I didn't put down 485 00:19:24,200 --> 00:19:26,960 like somebody that I kicked in the sandbox 486 00:19:26,960 --> 00:19:27,960 when I was five. 487 00:19:27,960 --> 00:19:32,760 For me, I wrote down people that I harmed 488 00:19:32,760 --> 00:19:34,560 that I knew was a result of my drinking. 489 00:19:34,560 --> 00:19:35,640 It was very specific. 490 00:19:35,640 --> 00:19:38,840 And I had some financial events too 491 00:19:38,840 --> 00:19:41,520 because I was the best little boy in the world. 492 00:19:41,520 --> 00:19:43,200 I was never tardy. 493 00:19:43,200 --> 00:19:44,920 I always was a good student, 494 00:19:44,920 --> 00:19:48,160 but I also at an early part of my life 495 00:19:48,160 --> 00:19:51,640 was upset with somebody and I stole from them like money, 496 00:19:51,640 --> 00:19:52,640 like quite a bit of it. 497 00:19:52,640 --> 00:19:55,640 And there wasn't a way for me to make a direct amend on that 498 00:19:55,640 --> 00:19:58,260 because I had a co-conspirator that would have been hurt. 499 00:19:58,260 --> 00:20:01,520 And so what I did was I took that money that I stole 500 00:20:01,520 --> 00:20:04,600 and I put it to a sister entity and I donated 501 00:20:04,600 --> 00:20:07,400 so that I got all the money back to the institution. 502 00:20:07,400 --> 00:20:10,240 And when I sought out to do my ninth step 503 00:20:10,240 --> 00:20:14,640 is we make direct amends as such people wherever possible, 504 00:20:14,640 --> 00:20:17,560 except when to do so would injure them or others, 505 00:20:17,560 --> 00:20:18,840 like my co-conspirator. 506 00:20:18,840 --> 00:20:24,000 I was able to make direct amends to almost everybody 507 00:20:24,000 --> 00:20:25,200 on that list. 508 00:20:25,200 --> 00:20:28,860 And so I went to them and I told them what I was doing 509 00:20:28,860 --> 00:20:30,840 and I'd been sober for a bit 510 00:20:30,840 --> 00:20:32,880 and I was part of this program of Alcoholics Anonymous 511 00:20:32,880 --> 00:20:36,760 and part of it is making an amend, which is not an apology. 512 00:20:36,760 --> 00:20:39,320 I didn't know for a long time 513 00:20:39,320 --> 00:20:41,680 that making amends is not saying I'm sorry 514 00:20:41,680 --> 00:20:43,580 because most alcoholics sorry 515 00:20:43,580 --> 00:20:46,160 is not a really very valuable currency, right? 516 00:20:46,160 --> 00:20:49,200 I mean, you apologize and then you repeat the same behavior 517 00:20:49,200 --> 00:20:50,760 over and over, never making a change. 518 00:20:50,760 --> 00:20:53,560 So, but my favorite and I didn't, 519 00:20:53,560 --> 00:20:55,360 no one threw me out of their office. 520 00:20:55,360 --> 00:20:56,540 Some people were surprised. 521 00:20:56,540 --> 00:20:59,240 They didn't even know that I had done this thing to them, 522 00:20:59,240 --> 00:21:01,740 but I went to my mom and my stepdad 523 00:21:01,740 --> 00:21:04,400 and my mom was a black belt Avalon. 524 00:21:04,400 --> 00:21:07,080 And when she would pick me up from my problems 525 00:21:07,080 --> 00:21:10,760 and in the emergency rooms and when we'd be driving home, 526 00:21:10,760 --> 00:21:15,400 she would say, "You might wanna think about stopping that." 527 00:21:15,400 --> 00:21:18,560 And that was it, that was it. 528 00:21:18,560 --> 00:21:22,560 And so I told my mom and Daryl 529 00:21:22,560 --> 00:21:24,720 about the various situations 530 00:21:24,720 --> 00:21:28,400 and when I had to borrow money and when I lied 531 00:21:28,400 --> 00:21:31,600 and I said, these are the things that I did in my amend 532 00:21:31,600 --> 00:21:34,920 is not to do any of these kinds of things again. 533 00:21:34,920 --> 00:21:36,200 I mentioned that I'm in real estate. 534 00:21:36,200 --> 00:21:38,160 Well, we do a lease and it could be a lease 535 00:21:38,160 --> 00:21:39,440 that's 10 years long or something. 536 00:21:39,440 --> 00:21:41,320 And we really try hard to think of everything 537 00:21:41,320 --> 00:21:42,780 that could come up. 538 00:21:42,780 --> 00:21:45,500 And sometimes something comes up we didn't expect. 539 00:21:45,500 --> 00:21:48,200 Well, you amend the lease, you add to it 540 00:21:48,200 --> 00:21:50,120 or you modify something that's already in it. 541 00:21:50,120 --> 00:21:52,460 So an amend is changing your behavior. 542 00:21:52,460 --> 00:21:55,200 And so I told that to them, I said, you know, 543 00:21:55,200 --> 00:21:56,880 and I asked them also if there was anything else 544 00:21:56,880 --> 00:21:58,920 I could do to make it right besides the things 545 00:21:58,920 --> 00:21:59,880 that I had told them. 546 00:21:59,880 --> 00:22:02,740 And the best reaction ever, they looked at each other, 547 00:22:02,740 --> 00:22:04,360 they shrugged and they went, "No, we're good. 548 00:22:04,360 --> 00:22:05,200 "What's your lunch?" 549 00:22:05,200 --> 00:22:06,020 That was it. 550 00:22:06,020 --> 00:22:07,140 And that was the biggest amend that I made. 551 00:22:07,140 --> 00:22:08,560 So I was lucky. 552 00:22:08,560 --> 00:22:10,060 Some people do get thrown out of offices 553 00:22:10,060 --> 00:22:12,160 or people refuse to speak to them. 554 00:22:12,160 --> 00:22:14,900 And so they never have the opportunity to make the amend. 555 00:22:14,900 --> 00:22:16,960 And clearly that's not great, 556 00:22:16,960 --> 00:22:18,780 but at least you've made the attempt 557 00:22:18,780 --> 00:22:22,160 or you've made the actual amend and you need to move forward 558 00:22:22,160 --> 00:22:23,960 'cause we clean our sides of the street. 559 00:22:23,960 --> 00:22:28,160 Often I found that people did their own step to me too 560 00:22:28,160 --> 00:22:31,020 during that process, but it's not required. 561 00:22:31,020 --> 00:22:33,640 10, we continue to take personal inventory 562 00:22:33,640 --> 00:22:35,420 and when we were wrong promptly admitted it. 563 00:22:35,420 --> 00:22:37,900 I love step 10 and I'll tell you why I like it. 564 00:22:37,900 --> 00:22:42,300 I love step 10 because it demands self-governance 565 00:22:42,300 --> 00:22:44,180 of my behavior from me. 566 00:22:44,180 --> 00:22:49,060 And my biggest character defect is I'm not the smartest guy 567 00:22:49,060 --> 00:22:50,700 in the world, I'm not the dullest, 568 00:22:50,700 --> 00:22:53,060 but I'm somewhere in between and I'm impatient 569 00:22:53,060 --> 00:22:55,820 when people don't get it as quickly as I do. 570 00:22:55,820 --> 00:22:58,420 And it usually comes out in the tonality of my voice 571 00:22:58,420 --> 00:23:00,060 and when I get frustrated. 572 00:23:00,060 --> 00:23:03,820 And luckily for at least over 20 years now, 573 00:23:03,820 --> 00:23:05,920 I'm pretty darn good about catching myself 574 00:23:05,920 --> 00:23:07,800 when I feel myself getting out of my lane 575 00:23:07,800 --> 00:23:10,140 and about to hit the guard, well, hit the person. 576 00:23:10,140 --> 00:23:12,500 And I catch it because guess what? 577 00:23:12,500 --> 00:23:13,980 I don't like making amends. 578 00:23:13,980 --> 00:23:14,940 I don't like making it. 579 00:23:14,940 --> 00:23:17,140 And so I check myself and I check my behavior 580 00:23:17,140 --> 00:23:19,780 and I check my tone and then I don't have to make one. 581 00:23:19,780 --> 00:23:23,380 And it's a really nice way to live 582 00:23:23,380 --> 00:23:25,940 'cause I work to treat people the way 583 00:23:25,940 --> 00:23:27,580 that I would like to be treated, 584 00:23:27,580 --> 00:23:30,020 but I work at a report that I'm not perfect 585 00:23:30,020 --> 00:23:31,460 and that's annoying. 586 00:23:31,460 --> 00:23:34,140 And sometimes I get angry. 587 00:23:34,140 --> 00:23:37,780 They say that anger and resentment is the dubious luxury 588 00:23:37,780 --> 00:23:40,340 of normal men and women and people. 589 00:23:40,340 --> 00:23:42,140 And boy, ain't that the truth. 590 00:23:42,140 --> 00:23:45,420 More people drink over resentment and broken hearts 591 00:23:45,420 --> 00:23:46,700 than anything else. 592 00:23:46,700 --> 00:23:47,580 And I don't know about you, 593 00:23:47,580 --> 00:23:50,620 but actually I didn't need a reason to drink. 594 00:23:50,620 --> 00:23:54,300 I didn't need a specific circumstantial reason, 595 00:23:54,300 --> 00:23:57,980 but the circumstantial reasons accelerated my drinking plan. 596 00:23:57,980 --> 00:23:59,260 By the way, speaking about beer, 597 00:23:59,260 --> 00:24:02,380 I would go every night on the way home from work. 598 00:24:02,380 --> 00:24:03,700 And by the way, I was the kind of drunk 599 00:24:03,700 --> 00:24:06,260 that could get to work before anybody, get his work done, 600 00:24:06,260 --> 00:24:08,280 stay later than everybody, go home, 601 00:24:08,280 --> 00:24:10,820 drink at least a 12-pack and do it again tomorrow. 602 00:24:10,820 --> 00:24:15,160 So I was able to do that. 603 00:24:15,160 --> 00:24:19,820 And I was one of those quote unquote functioning alcoholics. 604 00:24:19,820 --> 00:24:23,980 And I like to tell people that this country had prohibition 605 00:24:23,980 --> 00:24:26,060 from 1919 to 1933. 606 00:24:26,060 --> 00:24:28,680 And the reason that we passed constitutional amendments, 607 00:24:28,680 --> 00:24:30,020 which is not easy to do, 608 00:24:30,020 --> 00:24:32,920 is because alcohol was killing people all over this country. 609 00:24:32,920 --> 00:24:35,420 It was ruining families and we outlawed it. 610 00:24:35,420 --> 00:24:37,360 We couldn't control it and it went to the black market. 611 00:24:37,360 --> 00:24:40,300 So we just brought it back and taxed it and marketed it 612 00:24:40,300 --> 00:24:42,140 as something that you needed to do to have fun. 613 00:24:42,140 --> 00:24:45,300 And, you know, I don't know what the percentage 614 00:24:45,300 --> 00:24:47,180 of functioning alcoholics is in America, 615 00:24:47,180 --> 00:24:50,860 but in my experience, I'd say it's 50%, you know, 616 00:24:50,860 --> 00:24:52,460 of people who get up and make it, you know, 617 00:24:52,460 --> 00:24:54,700 make it into work and show up. 618 00:24:54,700 --> 00:24:57,540 You know, one of the, I see the time is getting there, 619 00:24:57,540 --> 00:25:00,980 but one of the things that we do in life is, 620 00:25:00,980 --> 00:25:02,060 at least when I was growing up, 621 00:25:02,060 --> 00:25:04,540 is I was taught to respect authority, go to school, 622 00:25:04,540 --> 00:25:05,980 be a good little boy. 623 00:25:05,980 --> 00:25:08,020 You know, then I was the first kid in my family 624 00:25:08,020 --> 00:25:09,860 to have opportunity to go to university, 625 00:25:09,860 --> 00:25:12,380 all my families and trades, which is great 626 00:25:12,380 --> 00:25:14,100 'cause there's a beginning and a middle and the end. 627 00:25:14,100 --> 00:25:16,180 Every day, it's something that you actually accomplish. 628 00:25:16,180 --> 00:25:19,420 And, you know, and then we might go to college 629 00:25:19,420 --> 00:25:21,940 and then we start incurring obligations, 630 00:25:21,940 --> 00:25:25,300 like rent and a car payment or a mortgage or kids 631 00:25:25,300 --> 00:25:26,260 in a private school. 632 00:25:26,260 --> 00:25:29,100 And one day people wake up and go, oh my God, 633 00:25:29,100 --> 00:25:30,940 I hate my job and I can't quit. 634 00:25:30,940 --> 00:25:32,500 You know, including attorneys that are making 635 00:25:32,500 --> 00:25:34,860 a million dollars a year to start to, you know, 636 00:25:34,860 --> 00:25:36,900 have a $25,000 a year mortgage payment, 637 00:25:36,900 --> 00:25:38,820 two kids in private school at 60 grand each 638 00:25:38,820 --> 00:25:41,060 and the pooled person and the au pair 639 00:25:41,060 --> 00:25:42,260 and the, it goes on and on. 640 00:25:42,260 --> 00:25:44,540 So I like everything that money can buy, 641 00:25:44,540 --> 00:25:46,780 but it's not always great. 642 00:25:46,780 --> 00:25:48,340 When you don't have money, you work about getting it. 643 00:25:48,340 --> 00:25:49,980 Once you get it, you worry about losing it. 644 00:25:49,980 --> 00:25:50,900 So there you go. 645 00:25:50,900 --> 00:25:53,020 Okay, sought through prayer and meditation 646 00:25:53,020 --> 00:25:54,980 to improve our, that is number 11, 647 00:25:54,980 --> 00:25:56,180 sought through prayer and meditation 648 00:25:56,180 --> 00:25:57,740 to improve our conscious contact with God 649 00:25:57,740 --> 00:25:59,480 as we understood in praying only for knowledge 650 00:25:59,480 --> 00:26:01,460 and as well for us and the power to carry that out. 651 00:26:01,460 --> 00:26:04,660 And, you know, prayer for me is talking to God 652 00:26:04,660 --> 00:26:06,680 and meditation is getting quiet enough 653 00:26:06,680 --> 00:26:08,180 so I could hear the response. 654 00:26:08,180 --> 00:26:09,980 So what that means is, you know, 655 00:26:09,980 --> 00:26:12,420 I can't be worrying and doing this 656 00:26:12,420 --> 00:26:14,340 and either regretting or whatever. 657 00:26:14,340 --> 00:26:15,180 I have to get quiet. 658 00:26:15,180 --> 00:26:16,740 And I used to be under the misimpression 659 00:26:16,740 --> 00:26:18,620 that meditation was not thinking, 660 00:26:18,620 --> 00:26:21,080 not having a thought, which is, it's impossible. 661 00:26:21,080 --> 00:26:23,660 So what it's about is just what I do 662 00:26:23,660 --> 00:26:25,620 is I can't control the thought that comes into my head, 663 00:26:25,620 --> 00:26:26,940 but I can manage it once it's there. 664 00:26:26,940 --> 00:26:29,800 I could, you know, send it to its room for 20 minutes. 665 00:26:29,800 --> 00:26:31,600 And if it's really important, we'll come back 666 00:26:31,600 --> 00:26:33,020 and tell me about itself. 667 00:26:33,020 --> 00:26:35,260 And I do it through breathing. 668 00:26:35,260 --> 00:26:37,100 So when I meditate, I close my eyes 669 00:26:37,100 --> 00:26:39,460 and I breathe in and as I take my breath in, 670 00:26:39,460 --> 00:26:41,160 I say, God is, and I hold it. 671 00:26:41,160 --> 00:26:43,460 And as I breathe out and I say, I am. 672 00:26:43,460 --> 00:26:44,780 God is, I am. 673 00:26:44,780 --> 00:26:47,740 And sometimes I'll add a little leg to a triangle, 674 00:26:47,740 --> 00:26:50,820 which is God is, I am part of God. 675 00:26:50,820 --> 00:26:52,620 And some days I get really sassy 676 00:26:52,620 --> 00:26:55,260 and I go, God is, I am God. 677 00:26:55,260 --> 00:26:56,860 But that seems a little much. 678 00:26:56,860 --> 00:26:59,380 So I kind of cut back on that lens. 679 00:26:59,380 --> 00:27:00,660 All right, all right. 680 00:27:00,660 --> 00:27:02,860 And now we make it to 12, my favorite step, 681 00:27:02,860 --> 00:27:04,740 which is having had a spiritual awakening 682 00:27:04,740 --> 00:27:05,660 as a result of these steps, 683 00:27:05,660 --> 00:27:07,380 we tried to carry this message to alcoholics 684 00:27:07,380 --> 00:27:09,820 and to practice these principles in all our affairs. 685 00:27:09,820 --> 00:27:11,500 So I'm getting to do that with you now. 686 00:27:11,500 --> 00:27:13,180 I do it with people in the community. 687 00:27:13,180 --> 00:27:16,320 I sponsor quite a few people. 688 00:27:16,320 --> 00:27:19,420 I use the principles of AA in every aspect of my life. 689 00:27:19,420 --> 00:27:22,060 And during the pandemic, I was like, 690 00:27:22,060 --> 00:27:23,660 how many people are participating 691 00:27:23,660 --> 00:27:25,620 in the program of AA around the world? 692 00:27:25,620 --> 00:27:29,300 Well, in 2022, the office in New York 693 00:27:29,300 --> 00:27:31,300 estimated it to be 2 million people. 694 00:27:31,300 --> 00:27:32,780 That seems awfully low. 695 00:27:32,780 --> 00:27:33,740 So let's say it's 20. 696 00:27:33,740 --> 00:27:35,500 Let's say they were off by a factor of 10. 697 00:27:35,500 --> 00:27:37,620 If you have a calculator that has enough places for it, 698 00:27:37,620 --> 00:27:39,720 you divide 20 million by 8 billion, 699 00:27:39,720 --> 00:27:44,720 we are 0.0000101% of the world population 700 00:27:44,720 --> 00:27:48,280 that has this design for living that we have 701 00:27:48,280 --> 00:27:49,940 that puts us into the fourth dimension. 702 00:27:49,940 --> 00:27:51,340 And I think that's pretty special. 703 00:27:51,340 --> 00:27:56,340 And I really appreciate the opportunity to be here with you 704 00:27:56,340 --> 00:28:02,660 and Alcoholics Anonymous is having its 90th anniversary 705 00:28:04,260 --> 00:28:06,100 up in Vancouver. 706 00:28:06,100 --> 00:28:08,060 And I went to the 75th anniversary. 707 00:28:08,060 --> 00:28:09,740 I'm looking at my times, five minutes, 708 00:28:09,740 --> 00:28:10,820 and I'm gonna wait for that one. 709 00:28:10,820 --> 00:28:12,940 But I went to the one when I was 75 years old 710 00:28:12,940 --> 00:28:16,540 in San Antonio and Texas. 711 00:28:16,540 --> 00:28:20,540 And it was magical because to hear everybody doing, 712 00:28:20,540 --> 00:28:23,700 everybody like 17,000 people in a stadium reciting 713 00:28:23,700 --> 00:28:26,180 of the Lord's Prayer or the Serenity Prayer. 714 00:28:26,180 --> 00:28:29,780 And it sounds like one voice, pretty neat stuff. 715 00:28:29,780 --> 00:28:32,740 I asked the people in the hotels and the bars 716 00:28:32,740 --> 00:28:34,660 and the restaurants, they said, "What was it like 717 00:28:34,660 --> 00:28:36,920 "having people that don't drink alcohol in your city 718 00:28:36,920 --> 00:28:38,460 "for like this week?" 719 00:28:38,460 --> 00:28:40,900 And they're like, "It was fantastic. 720 00:28:40,900 --> 00:28:42,640 "You guys don't drink, but you spend money 721 00:28:42,640 --> 00:28:44,260 "on everything else and you tip really well 722 00:28:44,260 --> 00:28:45,700 "and we wish you were here every week." 723 00:28:45,700 --> 00:28:50,220 So anyway, with that, I wanna thank you, Nathan, 724 00:28:50,220 --> 00:28:51,820 again for inviting me out. 725 00:28:51,820 --> 00:28:55,600 And I told you my number is Harold Bastian in the phone book. 726 00:28:55,600 --> 00:29:00,300 But I'll give you my cell phone, you have it, 727 00:29:00,300 --> 00:29:03,700 which is 213-440-0242. 728 00:29:03,700 --> 00:29:06,820 And I always tell people, you can call me 24/7 729 00:29:06,820 --> 00:29:08,660 on that number because I'd rather talk to you 730 00:29:08,660 --> 00:29:10,340 and get woken up at three in the morning 731 00:29:10,340 --> 00:29:12,620 than talk to you three days after you relapse. 732 00:29:12,620 --> 00:29:13,740 And if you're calling me at three in the morning, 733 00:29:13,740 --> 00:29:16,740 I'm not answering 213-440-0242. 734 00:29:16,740 --> 00:29:19,980 Then call 621-365-7300 'cause that's the landline. 735 00:29:19,980 --> 00:29:22,740 I can't sleep through it and it'll ring until I pick it up. 736 00:29:22,740 --> 00:29:25,540 So thanks for letting me be of service. 737 00:29:25,540 --> 00:29:28,300 I hope you didn't see too much of Rosacea with that camera. 738 00:29:28,300 --> 00:29:29,340 It was way too close.