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Welcome to the Miracle Path podcast.
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I am your co-host, Kylie, and we have a very special episode.
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Our Julie is being a mom right now.
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Addie is six, six weeks old today.
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So we are going to invite you to listen.
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I have a very, very special guest with me.
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And she is one of my spiritual advisors.
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She is a dear friend, a fellow sister in Christ, and she's my sponsor.
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And before we get started, just wanted to introduce you to Kim.
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Hi.
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Thank you so much for being here and just uh coming to together to have this conversation.
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And before we get into the meet, which is would love to hear about your spiritual journey when God entered the chat for you, and want to talk about our work together in regards with the 12 steps and kind of lift the veil on some of the meat and the heavy lifting that we did together with your experience.
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And you know, you've been in the program and same as me.
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And I'm just excited for this conversation.
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But I want to share with the guests, and it's going to be fun to hear your perspective on it because I share this story all the time on how we met.
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And it was, I was probably in like six to eight months of sobriety.
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And I was going into the meetings, and I just knew that it was time for me to do the step work, the 12 steps.
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And I was at the time I was sober and I was feeling really good.
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There wasn't any cravings or anything like that.
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I wasn't struggling, but I was struggling with like dealing with being sober, like dealing with all of the feelings and a lot of guilt and shame from my past.
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And so I knew the 12 steps were the right thing.
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And I remember the week that I decided I just felt called to.
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I was like, okay, this is the week I'm going to like put myself out there in the meetings and try to find a sponsor.
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And so I had two meetings on my schedule, and both were like in the afternoon during my lunch hour.
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So wait, were those the first meetings you ever went to?
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No.
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Okay.
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No.
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And it was interesting because it was, I think it was on either a Monday or Tuesday.
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And so during the week.
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And so before I walked into the meeting, I just said I said a prayer and I said, God, just like show me that my sponsor is gonna be, is gonna be in this room.
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I'm ready.
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I'm ready for her and I'm ready to do this work.
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But you know, perhaps somebody in the room has my mom's name, and then I'll know that I need to put myself out there and and seek a sponsor.
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Yeah.
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And so I get into the room and I'm like 10 minutes early, and I sit down, there's nobody next to me.
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And so like five minutes come it rolling in, and the room starts getting full.
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And so I immediately felt like, okay, this is it.
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I'm feeling it.
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And the meeting starts.
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There's a woman to my right of me, and there's a woman to the left of me.
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And so we all introduce ourselves.
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So I go, hi, my name's Kylie.
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And then to the left of me, Kim goes, Hi, my name's Kim.
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And at that moment, I was just because that's your mom's name.
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Yeah.
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Right.
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Yeah, that's my mom's name.
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And it just blew me away.
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It was hysterical because in my head, immediately I was like, God, that's hilarious, but like, there's no way that she's gonna be my sponsor.
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Like, there's no way, like, that's just too close to home.
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And so as the meeting went on, I raised my hand and I shared my story and I shared how I had this profound experience where I knew that Christ removed my cravings from me.
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And typically in these rooms, like it's it's very higher power and vague, and it's not towards any religion, which I think is wonderful.
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It it just is wonderful.
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And you know, that was the first time I was I shared my story, and it felt so freeing to just finally just say it out loud in front of everybody.
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And as the meeting went on, it was a great meeting.
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And after you like came up to me right next to me, and and you correct me if I'm wrong, but you were like, you know, honestly, I loved what you said, and I loved that you said Jesus, and I had similar experience.
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And I was like, wow, this is crazy.
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And so you and we agreed that we would meet for lunch, and so we ended up meeting for lunch, and still in my head, I'm like, God, like, no, this can't be it, it's it's just too too much, and so we meet for lunch, and Kim is just we we meet, and you're like, okay, tell me your story.
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And so I'm like, okay.
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And so I I kind of start from as as early as I can remember, and then I get to the part in in my childhood as a teenager, when I was 18, my mom passed by suicide.
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And so I'm sharing this to Kim.
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And as soon as I said that, Kim grabs my hand and she said, What did you say?
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And I said, Yeah, my mom passed by suicide.
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And and Kim said, minded too.
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And I'm like getting emotional thinking about it because it it's like those moments where like time just stops and it's shocking and it's beautiful, and it's just I just never experienced anything like that.
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And I remember feeling I was at, you know, faith level, I was at a level, you know, maybe four or five.
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I didn't know there was a number ranking, but I know but but it just spiked up to certainty, like off the charts.
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And I just never talked to somebody or met somebody that experienced that and outside of my siblings.
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And so that was a moment for me that I just finally felt seen and heard and understood in in a very unique and traumatic way.
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And it it just completely changed my life.
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And I was like, Can you be my sponsor?
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And so yeah, I just love that story just because it um it just it just shows how much love we can receive from God and how guided we are.
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And you know, I took that aligned action to do the work and to be free and the affirmations I received just from that and just to continue sobriety for me.
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And so, yeah, I just want to thank you for oh so I remember pretty much that way, but there was one other component was you were wearing a baseball cap that said Portland, and it had the sign that when you're driving, I lived in Portland for 12 years.
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And when you drive across one of the bridges, there's this big Portland sign, you know, the one with the deer.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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And that's on your head, I think.
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Anyway, it was so that was yet another connector.
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Um, and I went to that meeting wanting to, I I love to sponsor, I never sponsor more than one person at a time.
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And um, being relatively new to Louisville, I'm not immersed in the culture, you know, or the even the AA cultures quite as much.
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And I wasn't going to a ton of meetings.
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Um, and I don't know that I'd ever gone to that meeting before.
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So there were all kinds of things, but isn't it funny how uh, as in funny, interesting, how um we accept so many things that are beyond our understanding and seem, you know, if you think about like sound waves that travel and I can talk to someone in another country, and I well, you know, those are sound waves, and there's the internet, whatever that means, and there's satellites, and I'm just like, well, yeah, you know, science, right?
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But when God shows up in these ways, you know, or something, even if you prefer to call it something let's say spiritual, you know, when when there's forces and energies that align and we're like, huh, really?
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Do you think that really could be, you know, our culture of the last oh hundred or so years, right, has led us to be, we're fact-driven.
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We want the evidence, man.
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Yeah, you know, we want to be, want to see all that proof lined up.
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But the fact is that if you just if you just open your awareness, you start to, you know, and and there has to be a willingness to um to sort of look heavenward, whichever direction that may be.
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Absolutely.
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No, that's such a good point.
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And you know, I think when we continue this path of choosing your awareness to the wonder and the mysterious path that you can go when you're not trying to control the circumstances and the details and hows and spend all that energy when you're just like, okay, I know I'm being led by something so powerful and so good and so loving.
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I'm gonna just let that unfold.
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That's it exactly.
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And for me, it also has especially since uh um I came to having a faith so late in life, um, that certainty is something that I I could it took a long time before I could even plant my flag.
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And I pull that flag up sometimes and go, well, maybe, you know, um in some regards.
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But if I just don't worry about trying to achieve something, and I just can try to just pay attention to what is, just the way I think about what you said about like all the different things that happened in the meeting to kind of connect us.
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And you had even, let's call it, prayed for it, right?
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You know, you had set an intention, that's prayer, right?
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It's all prayer, you know, whenever we reach out of ourselves into the great bigness of life, right?
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Um, and yet we I think that we just don't want to be afraid, we don't trust ourselves, we don't trust a power greater than ourselves, you know, we don't know how to navigate that, and it takes time.
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Yeah, yeah, it does.
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And you mentioned that it it took some time for you.
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I'm still in that time.
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Right.
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No, and I mean it's a journey.
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It's a journey.
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I think it's a journey for life, you know, but but some things become clearer, you know, like being clear for myself that I'm on the right path for me, you know, that's not something that's uncertain for me anymore, you know.
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Yeah, but but discarding discarding mindsets that aren't helpful, you know, or or having a deeper awareness.
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I mean, uh God draws you in, draws me in, you know, and um it's just learning how to trust God more and more.
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Totally.
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And I want to go into that and learn a little bit more about your story and whatever you're you know, inspired to share with us.
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Um I was raised as an atheist.
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My parents did not believe in God, and I was taught to not believe in God.
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Um the so I I you know from my early days, the idea that if I wanted to get something done, if I wanted to, you know, that I had to count on, you know, it wasn't gonna be God.
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And so as a little kid, um, you know, then who's gonna be the people I'm gonna look to?
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My parents, of course, you know, family.
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And then my parents divorced when I was 12.
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And my mom uh was an alcoholic and her alcoholism just bloomed and she she never sought treatment, and in the end, it led to her taking her life many, many years later, but still.
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Um, but I quickly saw that.
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Um, I mean, talk about feeling alone in the world, you know, when your parents, you know, that was the end of my parenting at the age of 12.
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I was really kind of on my own because my dad was off being a single guy, kind of, you know.
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Um, and so my searching started almost immediately.
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Um, I never was in any way lent towards Christianity.
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It wasn't a part of the of what I had.
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I was born in California, grew up in LA.
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Um not that they don't have God there, but it just wasn't what was happening in my life.
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Sure.
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And um so in junior, I was seeking.
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I was seeking.
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And in junior high, um, there was a Buddhism that was around called Nish and Shoshu Buddhism, and they were doing a lot of recruiting, and Namyoho Ringekyo, anyway, was a big deal in the 70s.
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Um and then in high school I was a Hare Krishna.
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I literally went to school in Asari with the tea luck on my forehead and all that.
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I didn't know that about you.
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Yeah.
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Um, and then later um I entered um what we would now call a cult, but it was a benign cult, you know, there was nothing terrible happened to me anyway, um, with a guru and all that.
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All of the time I was looking for answers.
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And in each situation of those three, um I got to a point, I was just wasn't feeling it, you know, what the what I thought I was supposed to feel, a connection or a sense or God entering my life.
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I couldn't, I it wasn't happening for me.
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And when I would go to the people who were in charge, you know, were the spiritual leaders of all, you know, what um I the problem was me.
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I wasn't chanting enough.
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It was Maya, the world, you know, and and I whatever I was doing, I just needed to do it harder or more of, you know.
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Um, but I was doing my best, whatever that was.
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Yeah.
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And then so this is all before I'm 25, by the way.
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So at about 25, I got to the point where I just said, God, looking kind of heavenward, you know, meet me halfway, I'm done.
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You know, you know where I am.
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If if you, you know, if you want to hang out with me, if you want something going on with me.
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I don't remember my exact words, but it was really like, I'm tired of putting all this effort out and not getting anything in return.
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It wasn't that I said, you know, I'm done with God.
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I was just done searching.
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And um, I was in a relationship with the man who would become my husband, and we got on with life, and we moved to New York, and I really left all that spiritual seeking behind.
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Um, I still, you know, I was into crystals and I do little meditations, you know.
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I mean, I love the woo-woo, and and you know, and um, so there was, but I didn't think of it, yeah, it was more like personal growth than than a divine being.
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I didn't connect with that, um, nor did I try to or wish to.
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And um, and then life continued, and life had some very serious ups and downs.
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And I'll just share very briefly that we lost our son when he was 14.
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Um, and he was killed by a car walking across the street in the wrong place in the wrong time.
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Um, and he died from his injury, his head injury.
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Um But that went on, you know, life went on.
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I mean, I'm I'm not getting into that because that's not what we're talking about today.
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Um, but even that wasn't enough to really anchor me into a faith tradition.
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Although my husband was a non-practicing Jew, Danny had been bar mitzvah, and we were really grateful to have Judaism and to be able to sit Shiva and have an approach to how to how to handle this catastrophe in our life, you know.
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And we contemplated, um, we were still living in New York, it was right after Danny had died, and we contemplated um me converting and that we'd become like more active Jews.
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And when we moved to Portland, we actually scouted out some some synagogues, but nothing really resonated, and that just kind of faded away.
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So that was still a good that was 2000.
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And um it'd be another full on 10 years or more before I would even come to something like a faith.
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So okay, so all this life is going on, and there's some good things, and there's healing and uh, you know, recovering from bereaving, being bereaved.
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Um, I wasn't drinking alcoholically at that time, although I certainly was drinking a lot off and on, and I always had, um, but I loved it, and I always had a good time.
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Yeah, you know, it wasn't a problem for me, except you know, when I overindulged from time to time, but everybody I knew did that too.
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So anyway, um, I had started a small management, my own management consulting business, and um I was doing a lot of time in my car and driving around, you know, and out of the blue, I mean, literally out of the blue, out of nowhere, I cannot find a single thing to remember what was a catalyst for this, but I started talking to God in the car, and I didn't have an idea.
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Again, it was in no way was a Christianity.
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I mean, I was a hippie, I was a liberal, everything I grew up knowing about Christianity from you know, movies.
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I mean, they just all seem like a bunch of haters, you know.
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I mean, it's like, and you know, even today they can seem that way, depending on who you're listening to.
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Um, so it never even occurred to me.
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But just kind of lifting my eyes heavenward, because that's kind of what we do.
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I was just, it's like, you know, God, if you're out there, remember me, here I am.
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Um, I would say I I prayed, I just called it God talk, but I and I was out loud, which we had Bluetooth then back in the olden days.
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So it was like you could, you know, had thing in your era, you could talk out loud in your car and not when you're all the only person in the car and not be weird.
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Now it's commonplace, right?
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Right.
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Right.
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So um, and I just started, you know, are there books I should read?
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If there are, bring them to me.
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Are there people I should meet?
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Um, you know, if there's something I should be seeing, I I'd never read the Bible, but I did say remove the scales from my eyes.
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So it must have entered into my consciousness in some way.
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And that's exactly what happened.
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Um, I was doing a lot of networking.
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Um, these two women that I met as friends, they were both Christians in a different sort of way.
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And I was full of questions.
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I started asking and talking about it.
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They weren't like trying to convert me.
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I was like, hey, what is this?
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You know, tell me about it.
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I was curious, you know.
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And it just continued to grow.
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And um, I started to, a friend asked me, we were in a bar, and she said, I've got something for you if you'd be willing to take it.
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Would you take a Bible from me?
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Because she had was telling me something about her kid the day before.
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And and I was like, I wish I had that kind of faith.
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Because I'd always been envious, you know, when you see these evangelicals or people and they're talking about, I'm never alone because Jesus is always with me, or I know I can get through anything because I have Jesus, and I'm like, damn, I want that, you know, who wouldn't, right?
00:21:24.160 --> 00:21:35.759
Um, so uh yeah, so it was it was it took a while for me to um find my way to it.
00:21:35.920 --> 00:21:43.920
And it was also problematic in my home because although my husband is not a practicing Jew, he's a cultural Jew.
00:21:44.240 --> 00:21:52.880
And he had a lot of um feelings about Christians just because of the persecution of Jews and his perspective.
00:21:53.759 --> 00:21:57.440
Um I started going uh to a church.
00:21:57.599 --> 00:22:07.599
Uh he he's a musician and he had a A standing gig on Sunday evenings, and he would go to his gig and I would go to the Sunday service and be back before he knew that I had been there.
00:22:07.920 --> 00:22:12.400
Um so I I didn't feel comfortable telling him about it, you know.
00:22:12.720 --> 00:22:18.880
And then it just it just kind of it just started to come in more and more.
00:22:18.960 --> 00:22:24.960
Um I started to get this sense of that that how can I put it?
00:22:25.039 --> 00:22:25.759
I feel like I'm rambling.
00:22:25.839 --> 00:22:26.160
I'm sorry.
00:22:26.480 --> 00:22:27.279
No, you're not at all.
00:22:27.440 --> 00:22:28.079
Okay, no.
00:22:28.480 --> 00:22:39.759
Um having uh lost my son Jewish, you know, this idea that Jesus is the only way, you know, that was a sticking point.
00:22:40.240 --> 00:22:42.400
The you know, this idea that God has a plan.
00:22:42.480 --> 00:22:44.799
This was all this, you know, stuff I had heard, right?
00:22:44.880 --> 00:22:46.640
Just kind of in the atmosphere.
00:22:46.799 --> 00:22:47.119
Right.
00:22:47.279 --> 00:22:51.200
Um, and I had not in any way spent much time in the Bible at all.
00:22:51.359 --> 00:22:56.640
I couldn't get into it, whatever, you know, so um at that point.
00:22:57.039 --> 00:23:04.720
Um and I just kind of it my my not objections, but my questions were kind of softened.
00:23:04.880 --> 00:23:12.319
I had a friend, he was my spiritual mentor there, um, uh a pastor at the church that I started to go to.
00:23:12.480 --> 00:23:16.799
And I was like, how can God be in charge of everything or have a plan for everything?
00:23:16.880 --> 00:23:22.720
And my beautiful son is killed when he could have just had a broken leg or whatever, you know.
00:23:23.279 --> 00:23:39.200
And he helped me break down that idea that God is at the engineer board controlling everything, you know, that um he he didn't I mean, obviously, who has answers for this entirely, you know, but he just talked a little bit more about it.
00:23:39.279 --> 00:23:47.359
It allowed me to enter in soon enough to put my questions and my fears to the side that I could continue to take some steps forward.
00:23:48.480 --> 00:23:53.200
And one day, one evening, I was at a service, um, a church service.
00:23:54.240 --> 00:23:55.920
And the lights were sort of dimmed.
00:23:56.160 --> 00:24:08.640
And it was my friend who was giving the sermon, and um he was had this easel and a you know, a big board, and he was drawing this kind of circle, and he was talking about the cycle of spiritual formation.
00:24:09.039 --> 00:24:17.200
And he he said, So first you ask Jesus to come into your life, that authorizes the Holy Spirit to come in.
00:24:17.599 --> 00:24:29.759
And that idea that I needed to take a step forward to get the good stuff, as it were, you know, that I had to say yes in some way was to me revolutionary.
00:24:29.920 --> 00:24:33.200
You know, I had never really, I was kept like, well, when am I gonna get it?
00:24:33.279 --> 00:24:34.079
When am I get it?
00:24:34.160 --> 00:24:40.000
But you know, it's sort of like you're never gonna know how delicious that ice cream is unless you take a bite, right?
00:24:40.160 --> 00:24:43.440
You know, I mean you've gotta lift your spoon up to your mouth.
00:24:43.839 --> 00:24:59.759
And so there in that service, I'm we were standing, I think we might have been singing, um, and I was by myself, and I'm wrestling in my mind about all this, and I'm you know, so Jesus, you know, like what about all the Buddhists?
00:24:59.920 --> 00:25:01.839
And what about the Hindus?
00:25:01.920 --> 00:25:03.519
And what about the Jews?
00:25:03.680 --> 00:25:04.640
What about Danny?
00:25:04.799 --> 00:25:07.119
What about all those, what about all those other people?
00:25:07.279 --> 00:25:09.440
You know, how do they fit into all of this?
00:25:09.759 --> 00:25:11.920
Billions and billions of people.
00:25:12.319 --> 00:25:19.200
And I didn't hear him speak it, but the message that I very clearly got was let's just put a pin in that.
00:25:19.279 --> 00:25:21.519
Why don't we just focus on you and me right now?
00:25:22.000 --> 00:25:27.519
And that was enough for me to just let all of that anxiety about what if, what if, what if.
00:25:27.920 --> 00:25:33.200
Because if God was okay with it, and I get I don't whatever that was all then.
00:25:33.440 --> 00:25:38.400
Um, and so I just in that moment, quietly to myself, I just said yes.
00:25:38.559 --> 00:25:39.359
That's all I did.
00:25:39.440 --> 00:25:40.799
I just said yes.
00:25:41.359 --> 00:25:46.000
And um, and then it just that was the beginning of it for me.
00:25:46.160 --> 00:25:46.799
Yeah.
00:25:48.000 --> 00:25:49.519
Thank you so much for sharing.
00:25:49.599 --> 00:25:53.920
Now you should write a book that is amazing.
00:25:54.079 --> 00:26:01.680
And the fact that you started so young on were you kind of like pressured into that spiritual journey as not at all.
00:26:01.920 --> 00:26:05.519
Okay, so you know to go through that weirdo.
00:26:06.240 --> 00:26:14.880
Okay, okay, no, and and I, you know, the honesty of hey, I'm not getting anything, I'm not feeling anything.
00:26:15.039 --> 00:26:17.119
Like, if you want me, come and get me.
00:26:17.279 --> 00:26:17.759
Yeah.
00:26:18.000 --> 00:26:27.759
And I mean, I just love that because I think there's so much fear involved in spirituality, and it's because we think that we're being judged.
00:26:28.000 --> 00:26:34.160
And and it's like, to me, I it's all for me personally, it's about relationship.
00:26:34.240 --> 00:26:40.720
And you mentioned that so beautifully is that we have to make a step forward.
00:26:40.799 --> 00:26:45.519
Yeah, we have to invite it in, and whatever that means to you.
00:26:46.319 --> 00:26:57.759
Well, and that's what's so beautiful, even you know, and it it overlaps perfectly with the 12 steps in AA, because the third step is that you make a decision.
00:26:58.160 --> 00:27:00.400
Yeah, you come to believe.
00:27:00.720 --> 00:27:17.440
And um, God doesn't, you know, I think that the other thing that can be such a stumbling block is that there's so many people around, and there's so much been written in all faiths um that tell you what it's supposed to look like.
00:27:17.599 --> 00:27:17.839
Right.
00:27:18.160 --> 00:27:25.440
What God looks like, and what that relationship and the and this is this is the way, do it this way, this is the right way, you know.
00:27:26.000 --> 00:27:30.240
And I don't know that anybody can do that for anybody.
00:27:30.400 --> 00:27:36.960
You know, why why does one person leave is led to, you know, as you know, I I lived in Morocco for five years.
00:27:37.119 --> 00:27:42.480
Um, after I became a a believer, and for a long time I didn't want even want to say that I was a Christian.
00:27:42.559 --> 00:27:44.640
I'd be I'm a Christian, but not like that, you know.
00:27:44.880 --> 00:27:48.160
I'm a follower of Jesus, but that sounded so sanctimonious, you know.
00:27:49.680 --> 00:27:50.880
I struggle with that too.
00:27:51.039 --> 00:27:52.079
You know, it's like, what do we say?
00:27:52.640 --> 00:27:53.200
I love Jesus.
00:27:53.279 --> 00:27:54.160
Okay, there you go.
00:27:54.240 --> 00:27:55.440
That's a good one.
00:27:56.480 --> 00:28:08.319
But I knew people there, I got to have friends there who were um beautiful human beings, devout, faithful women who prayed to Allah.
00:28:08.640 --> 00:28:09.680
Does that not count?
00:28:09.839 --> 00:28:13.200
You know, so but thankfully I don't have to have a judgment about that.
00:28:13.440 --> 00:28:14.480
Right, right.
00:28:15.039 --> 00:28:16.559
No, that's so true.
00:28:16.880 --> 00:28:22.319
Yeah, and I loved how you bridged the the AA and the step work.
00:28:23.119 --> 00:28:26.799
Did you want to add anything else on in that Morocco trip?
00:28:27.119 --> 00:28:28.799
Not really, no, we don't have to do that.
00:28:28.960 --> 00:28:30.000
Well, next next episode.
00:28:30.160 --> 00:28:30.400
Okay.
00:28:31.920 --> 00:28:40.880
So so yeah, I wanted to first off, I want to read off the steps just to give the listeners just some context.
00:28:41.119 --> 00:28:41.359
Sure.
00:28:41.920 --> 00:28:45.359
Because, you know, they may not be there.
00:28:45.839 --> 00:28:49.599
Yeah, I mean, I'm I feel blessed that I do know it.
00:28:50.720 --> 00:28:53.119
So I'm gonna read off the 12 steps.
00:28:54.240 --> 00:28:59.920
Number one, we admitted we were powerless over alcohol, that our lives had become unmanageable.
00:29:00.160 --> 00:29:05.200
Number two, came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
00:29:05.440 --> 00:29:13.039
Number three, made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him.
00:29:13.680 --> 00:29:18.240
Four, made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
00:29:18.480 --> 00:29:25.279
Five, admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
00:29:25.599 --> 00:29:32.160
Six, we were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
00:29:32.480 --> 00:29:36.160
Seven, humbly ask him to remove our shortcomings.
00:29:36.559 --> 00:29:44.079
Eight, made a list of all people, all persons we have harmed and become willing to make amends to them all.
00:29:44.319 --> 00:29:52.720
Nine, made direct amends to such people whenever possible, except to do so would injure them or others.
00:29:52.960 --> 00:29:53.440
10.
00:29:53.599 --> 00:29:59.039
Continue to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.
00:29:59.279 --> 00:30:12.319
11 sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood him, praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out.
00:30:12.559 --> 00:30:25.839
12 having a having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in our affairs.
00:30:27.200 --> 00:30:27.599
It's a lot.
00:30:27.839 --> 00:30:29.759
It's a mouthful, it's heavy.
00:30:30.480 --> 00:30:34.000
But you know, we we dove into this.
00:30:35.359 --> 00:30:49.200
So to me, um the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, which is how I got sober and stayed so stay sober, stay in recovery.
00:30:49.599 --> 00:31:02.720
Um it's it's all about these 12 steps because drinking is just a symptom of our let's call it our spiritual disease.
00:31:03.599 --> 00:31:17.680
Um and um the program of AA takes you, you know, it allowed me to um clean house, stop drinking, which leveled a playing field, you know.
00:31:17.759 --> 00:31:21.200
Finally, you know, I wasn't doing all the things that were keeping me from that.
00:31:21.279 --> 00:31:31.119
But that's just for me anyway, and you know, I know that there are people who've been able to get sober and maintain a happy sobriety, a healthy sobriety without AA.
00:31:31.200 --> 00:31:33.359
And I wish, I mean, that's wonderful.
00:31:33.680 --> 00:31:37.039
But I was led to AA, and that's what worked for me.
00:31:37.119 --> 00:31:52.160
I actually had tried to moderate my drinking in the past, you know, but I just was I'm a real alcoholic, and for a real alcoholic like me, I needed something that would, you know, it's it's like a high colonic for your psych, you know, to be an AA.
00:31:52.799 --> 00:31:59.279
So um, yeah, those steps are just so important, and they're they really are a new way of living.
00:31:59.599 --> 00:32:03.359
And um, I'm not sure where you want to go with talking about that.
00:32:03.599 --> 00:32:06.079
Yeah, no, I mean you said it's a new way of living.
00:32:06.240 --> 00:32:23.119
Like I felt like I finally got guidance on how to approach life with a lot of forgiveness and a lot of mercy and with tolerance.
00:32:23.920 --> 00:32:27.759
And I felt like it was a protocol, like a life protocol.
00:32:28.160 --> 00:32:37.279
And to me, I just I see how it's changed, you know, doing the step work, how it's changed my all of my relationships.
00:32:37.599 --> 00:32:49.680
It's changed my perspective, it's opened the door to more miracles in my life and more blessings.
00:32:49.839 --> 00:32:55.279
And I'm just like, oh my gosh, like I'm so grateful that I couldn't drink like a normal person.
00:32:55.839 --> 00:32:59.359
And that I, yeah, I'm just so grateful for it.
00:33:00.079 --> 00:33:02.559
It's I mean glad that you were an alcoholic.
00:33:03.359 --> 00:33:04.960
I mean, what what a gift.
00:33:05.279 --> 00:33:05.839
Thank you.
00:33:06.079 --> 00:33:08.960
Because now I'm not ingesting poison in my body.
00:33:09.279 --> 00:33:19.680
And also I think that man, I just I just wish people had more like access to this in a way.
00:33:20.160 --> 00:33:20.559
Sure.
00:33:20.799 --> 00:33:24.640
And more community, because that's a huge part of AA.
00:33:24.720 --> 00:33:33.200
And and I've been, I'm a part of a a sober community that's online, and that one is is like mind, body, soul.
00:33:33.440 --> 00:33:41.680
And you know, the the two people that that lead that that created that community are are also sober.
00:33:42.400 --> 00:33:46.319
One went through the program, and then the other one is a health coach.
00:33:46.400 --> 00:33:48.480
So she quit drinking from a health perspective.
00:33:49.119 --> 00:33:52.799
And so yeah, I've I feel like I needed all things.
00:33:53.839 --> 00:33:59.200
And yeah, I just like the step work though, forever changed my life.
00:33:59.279 --> 00:33:59.599
Yeah.
00:34:00.079 --> 00:34:12.559
And I wanted just to share more on that and kind of lift the veil on some of these steps to be more specific on how it changed my life.
00:34:12.880 --> 00:34:21.360
And for me, I think the step four making made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
00:34:21.760 --> 00:34:29.440
And so when we met, we were kind of your your way of sponsoring somebody, it's like fast and furious.
00:34:29.599 --> 00:34:34.400
Let's get through the steps, but it has to be thorough and we have to dedicate time.
00:34:34.639 --> 00:34:40.320
And luckily, we were able to do it in person and and spend that time together.
00:34:40.559 --> 00:34:50.079
And I think for for me, I had so many resentments in my life and some that I didn't even know until I was asked to write it down.
00:34:51.039 --> 00:35:04.079
And a part of that process is to write, you know, the cause, the harm, um, how it affected me, like personally, whether it's like relationship-wise or financially.
00:35:04.960 --> 00:35:10.079
And then the last part was identifying your part that you played in it.
00:35:10.400 --> 00:35:16.000
And that to me was challenging for some.
00:35:16.239 --> 00:35:21.679
Like, you know, with the suicide and my mom, like that's that was hard to chew on.
00:35:21.840 --> 00:35:39.679
And and luckily talking it to you about it, it just I felt so blessed and so lucky to have you through that process and and to go through all of those feelings that are attached to something that that our society is like no one talks about it.
00:35:39.840 --> 00:35:43.760
And it's like the it's it's a huge problem in our society.
00:35:44.559 --> 00:35:47.039
Um, our children are dying.
00:35:47.519 --> 00:36:01.840
And yeah, that's a whole nother topic, but but yeah, seeing my part and how how I viewed this resentment was life-changing for me.
00:36:02.559 --> 00:36:10.960
So one thing I I want to, you know, the the thing about AA and these 12 steps is that it's a spiritual program of recovery.
00:36:11.840 --> 00:36:31.840
It is not a boot camp where it's all about, I mean, we have work that we need to do, um, but uh so much of what we're doing is clearing the way for our higher power to come in and be that life-sustaining force.
00:36:32.079 --> 00:37:05.199
Um when you talk about your part, not so much that you I mean, what and it gets too I think too complicated to try to touch base on entirely in a you know in the time that we have today, but um when when anger, resentment, fear, or dishonesty rule our lives, and that can manifest like so you didn't have any role to play in your mom taking her life.
00:37:05.519 --> 00:37:08.960
You know, that was not in any way you had a part in that.
00:37:09.760 --> 00:37:26.000
But it's when we're holding on to a resentment and we're just we're required to kind of step back and look at it, it doesn't mean that we lose our grief, that we don't mourn the loss of someone beloved, that we can't um hate the fact that it happened, right?
00:37:26.159 --> 00:37:27.039
All those things.
00:37:27.679 --> 00:37:35.119
Um but but a resentment requires us to carry it around with us all the time, even if we're not aware of it, you know.
00:37:35.199 --> 00:37:41.280
As I've said this, but it's like getting used to walking around the little pieces of glass in your shoe all the time.
00:37:41.440 --> 00:37:43.679
You just think that's how it's supposed to feel, you know.
00:37:44.000 --> 00:37:55.599
We don't even like you said, it wasn't even until you started to think about it that you realized that you were you had amassed all of this emotional toxic stuff that was a part of your everyday psyche.
00:37:56.000 --> 00:38:01.519
So this all sounds kind of simplistic when we talk about it this way, because as you said, you know, you did hard work.
00:38:02.320 --> 00:38:05.760
And remember, there's 12 steps.
00:38:06.320 --> 00:38:27.519
So, you know, and and I think that the gift of being an alcoholic, of being brought to our knees is that that for some people, like you and me, it wasn't until we were entirely humbled when we had we our our intelligence, our capabilities, you know, we're both very capable women, you know.
00:38:27.679 --> 00:38:35.599
Um our our good life, all the good things that we have going on for us, we had a problem we could not overcome on our own.
00:38:35.760 --> 00:38:39.119
And we, you know, I had reached out to other other ways to do it.
00:38:39.199 --> 00:38:43.920
I tried to moderate it myself, and more and more, and I was a very high-functioning drunk.
00:38:44.079 --> 00:38:47.360
I mean, I had a great job, I, you know, things were good.
00:38:47.599 --> 00:38:48.639
All was good.
00:38:48.880 --> 00:38:51.679
Um, and nobody in my life thought that I was an alcoholic.
00:38:51.760 --> 00:38:53.199
That's how functioning I was.
00:38:53.440 --> 00:38:58.239
But the misery, the desperation was happening in my head, in my heart, you know.
00:38:58.400 --> 00:39:04.239
Um, but these steps in such a gentle way, and it's true, we can move fast.
00:39:04.400 --> 00:39:12.719
I've also been sometimes I work with somebody, you know, and and we slow it way down because there's just too much there to go too fast, you know.
00:39:13.039 --> 00:39:13.360
Sure.
00:39:13.599 --> 00:39:15.199
But they build on each other.
00:39:15.360 --> 00:39:23.920
And the so the first three steps, you know, yes, I'm a drunk, maybe there's a higher power that can do something about it.
00:39:24.159 --> 00:39:29.440
Um, I guess I'll, you know, I'll I'll turn my will and my life over to the God of my understanding.
00:39:29.519 --> 00:39:30.079
And you do that.
00:39:30.239 --> 00:39:30.639
I did that.
00:39:30.719 --> 00:39:31.840
I'm like, yeah, whatever.
00:39:31.920 --> 00:39:34.239
You know, I just want to not be in pain anymore.
00:39:34.400 --> 00:39:34.719
Yeah.
00:39:34.960 --> 00:39:40.320
Um, and then you just jump right into the work, and they say that faith without works is dead.
00:39:40.400 --> 00:39:46.320
And you find that in a lot of traditions, including Christian, be doers of the word, not just hearers.
00:39:46.559 --> 00:39:46.800
Right.
00:39:46.960 --> 00:39:54.960
You know, so yeah, it lays a foundation that I mean, I just I was at a meeting before I came here, and it was just so beautiful.
00:39:55.119 --> 00:40:10.000
I mean, there's people who have decades of sobriety and um and talk about even today how these steps and this fellowship and this way of living help them to live happier lives where they're not torn up inside.
00:40:10.159 --> 00:40:14.559
I mean, these days, you know, our world, our country is in turmoil.
00:40:14.639 --> 00:40:16.800
Yeah, how do you find a balance with that?
00:40:16.960 --> 00:40:21.840
You know, and these steps have allowed me to find a way and I don't have to drink over it.
00:40:22.079 --> 00:40:23.599
Yeah, uh, so beautifully.
00:40:24.320 --> 00:40:26.000
Yeah, no, amen to that.
00:40:26.079 --> 00:40:43.440
And I think what I love about this approach is that, you know, you can take time and and write your resentments down, but I love that we are asked to do it with somebody and to release it in a way and read it and share it.
00:40:43.519 --> 00:40:44.719
And something happens.
00:40:44.880 --> 00:40:45.360
That's right.
00:40:45.519 --> 00:40:49.920
Something happens to your heart, something it just is way less heavy.
00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:51.440
It's like lifted from you.
00:40:51.599 --> 00:40:55.280
Like it is because you've also shared it with God.
00:40:55.519 --> 00:40:55.760
Yeah.
00:40:55.920 --> 00:40:56.159
Right.
00:40:56.320 --> 00:41:03.599
Even though they're, you know, and and many people have no idea who God may be.
00:41:03.760 --> 00:41:07.840
You know, they may have the God of their childhood and they've completely rejected that.
00:41:07.920 --> 00:41:18.800
They don't want any part of whatever that tradition was that for them perhaps was toxic or even traumatic, you know, um, the faith traditions that they grew up in.
00:41:19.039 --> 00:41:24.239
And so they're finding their way back, and that's fine.
00:41:24.320 --> 00:41:29.360
You know, it doesn't, it doesn't have to be focused in one particular way or another, you know.
00:41:30.320 --> 00:41:32.960
You God doesn't have an identity crisis.
00:41:33.039 --> 00:41:35.760
I don't think God is waiting for us to say the words just right.
00:41:35.920 --> 00:41:36.079
Right.
00:41:36.239 --> 00:41:37.119
You know, now you get it.
00:41:37.360 --> 00:41:37.440
Right.
00:41:37.679 --> 00:41:38.559
Okay, come on in.
00:41:39.440 --> 00:41:39.599
Right.
00:41:39.760 --> 00:41:40.079
Yeah.
00:41:40.239 --> 00:41:40.480
Yeah.
00:41:40.800 --> 00:41:43.199
No, it's no, that's such a good point.
00:41:43.440 --> 00:41:50.400
And I think what really helped me too was the listing all the persons I've harmed.
00:41:51.840 --> 00:42:05.920
And when I tell you when I wrote apologies to people that I knew, like if I apologize to them, it's not they're they're gonna know that it's not like a selfish act that I'm just like trying to relieve myself only.
00:42:06.480 --> 00:42:18.000
And so that practice and me having a conversation with my father and my siblings, I was the oldest child and I beat them up a lot as a kid.
00:42:18.320 --> 00:42:21.039
And I was I was carrying that.
00:42:21.360 --> 00:42:34.079
And to have the opportunity to write that out and be guided with with God and with fellows and sponsors and to apologize.
00:42:34.719 --> 00:42:37.119
It was like a newfound drug.
00:42:37.599 --> 00:42:48.239
I was like, whoa, the feeling after, like, of course, like right before I wanted to puke, I was sweating, like all those things that you get right before you take that aligned action.
00:42:48.480 --> 00:42:50.239
But then the release of that all.
00:42:50.480 --> 00:42:51.760
Oh my gosh.
00:42:52.719 --> 00:42:54.320
And you know, I had the same thing.
00:42:54.480 --> 00:42:59.119
I was a mean older sister, and um, I beat up my little brother a lot.
00:42:59.199 --> 00:43:08.559
And it it wasn't until I got sober that I even became aware that that was a harm that I had done.
00:43:08.639 --> 00:43:25.760
You know, I mean, I had always justified it that, you know, I would say that, you know, we had our dad was gone, our mom was a wreck and a drunk, and we were my analogy was we were like two wet cats in a bag together, as if there was no nothing else that could have been done but that, you know.
00:43:26.000 --> 00:43:38.480
But then just wanting to, you know, it's just it's just a way of taking responsibility for actions because until we do, we don't even realize it, but we're carrying that around with us.
00:43:38.559 --> 00:43:40.320
It's like a chain around our ankle.
00:43:40.400 --> 00:43:41.199
We don't even know.
00:43:41.280 --> 00:43:41.440
Yeah.
00:43:41.679 --> 00:43:44.320
And I I I was living in Morocco at the time.
00:43:44.480 --> 00:43:49.840
Um, and I wrote to my little brother, um, who's, you know, old.
00:43:50.400 --> 00:43:58.400
And I just, you know, I just said, I know, at a time when you needed a big sister and somebody to take care of you, I was the opposite of that.
00:43:58.559 --> 00:43:59.440
And I really regret.
00:44:00.400 --> 00:44:01.280
Explain myself.
00:44:01.360 --> 00:44:02.559
I didn't rationalize.
00:44:02.639 --> 00:44:04.239
I just said, I'm just sorry.
00:44:04.400 --> 00:44:07.760
I'm really sorry that I couldn't be there for you and I wasn't more loving.
00:44:07.920 --> 00:44:11.039
And he responded back to me immediately.
00:44:11.280 --> 00:44:15.280
And I mean, we're not close, but there's no hostility between us, you know.
00:44:15.360 --> 00:44:18.639
And it's just what a lift that is to have all of that.
00:44:19.039 --> 00:44:25.519
And it's just, it's very um, it's mystical what happens.
00:44:25.679 --> 00:44:27.039
I mean, these steps are concrete.
00:44:27.119 --> 00:44:28.559
You just read them on paper.
00:44:28.719 --> 00:44:29.840
It sounds like, yeah.
00:44:30.000 --> 00:44:37.280
And and coming from, you know, people who are listening who've never heard it before, it can sound like, what, you know, and I can appreciate that.
00:44:37.440 --> 00:44:42.000
Um, and that's why it's always good that you do these steps with a sponsor.
00:44:42.079 --> 00:44:47.920
I I I make it like like a Sherpa on a journey, somebody who knows the path and can walk alongside you.
00:44:48.000 --> 00:44:48.239
Yes.
00:44:48.400 --> 00:44:53.840
They're not they're not on the pilgrimage for you, they're just helping, you know, as you go along.
00:44:54.719 --> 00:44:59.679
And um, and they deepen, you know, and you use them for a lifetime, you know.
00:44:59.760 --> 00:45:02.400
I haven't thrown any of those spiritual tools away.
00:45:02.480 --> 00:45:05.440
I use them all the time, my goodness, regularly.
00:45:05.760 --> 00:45:06.079
Yeah.
00:45:06.239 --> 00:45:08.400
And and that's the thing, that's a part of the program.
00:45:08.480 --> 00:45:15.679
It's like now I know how to deal with resentments and I can sense when one is about to happen.
00:45:16.559 --> 00:45:26.159
And, you know, I have you, I've I've called you several times and just be like, hey, I'm struggling with something and I need like to release it, and I can't find my part.
00:45:26.320 --> 00:45:30.159
I can't see where how I deserved this, right?
00:45:30.320 --> 00:45:30.800
Right.
00:45:31.119 --> 00:45:36.880
And it's just, yeah, it's it's and it's and and who's to say you did deserve it?
00:45:37.039 --> 00:45:38.800
That's not that's not the language, is it?
00:45:38.880 --> 00:45:39.039
Right.
00:45:39.199 --> 00:45:41.119
No, I mean, who deserves bad times?
00:45:41.280 --> 00:45:49.119
You didn't deserve it, but at the same time, life on life's terms is a strong AA sentiment, right?
00:45:49.519 --> 00:45:51.360
You know, I mean, here it is.
00:45:51.519 --> 00:45:54.239
So how we respond to it is everything, right?
00:45:54.719 --> 00:45:55.599
And how you see it.
00:45:55.760 --> 00:46:01.280
I mean, I love in the in in it in the big book, they say that, you know, this is a spiritually sick person.
00:46:01.519 --> 00:46:04.639
Like, please help me not be angry at women.
00:46:05.119 --> 00:46:17.840
Yeah, when some yeah, when somebody has, you know, I mean, and for people who have been terribly harmed, you know, um, there has to be just a lot of gentleness and grace with that, you know.
00:46:18.159 --> 00:46:38.880
I mean, and sometimes when we get to that part of like my part, sometimes it can just be, especially if it's many years in the past, you know, kind of just assessing that this is in the past and I can have all kinds of feelings about it, but do would I like it to not have a grip on me in the same way?
00:46:39.039 --> 00:46:40.639
So then they give us tools.
00:46:41.039 --> 00:46:42.000
Oh my gosh, yeah.
00:46:42.159 --> 00:46:50.639
And a big part of and we'll we'll wrap this up quick, but I think a big part for me is like I allowed this type of behavior.
00:46:50.960 --> 00:46:56.719
Like I I handed people over the keys to my heart, and I had no boundaries.
00:46:56.960 --> 00:46:58.320
And that's my part.
00:46:58.480 --> 00:47:00.719
Like, I allowed this to happen, right?
00:47:00.960 --> 00:47:08.239
And and you know, people we we think that people can read our minds, even like our partners, and it's like we don't have that power, yeah.
00:47:08.800 --> 00:47:19.440
And so yeah, this this the steps just but and you know, another big one, of course, is fear, yeah, another part of the fourth step, right?
00:47:19.760 --> 00:47:30.480
And the whole thing about this way of living is that we've decided somebody else gets to be in charge of our life.
00:47:31.039 --> 00:47:39.519
God, the God of your understanding, the higher power of your understanding, and people you know come to that in a variety of different ways.
00:47:39.840 --> 00:47:44.320
But when my self-will isn't the thing that's driving me forward every day.
00:47:44.480 --> 00:47:49.760
I mean, believe me, it is, but I check myself, you know, and I try to realign it, you know.
00:47:50.239 --> 00:48:00.159
Um, I was I fell victim to so, I mean, I was beating myself about it, but I was I had a credit card scam happen to me and it gripped recently.
00:48:00.239 --> 00:48:03.280
Um and I called my sponsor because I was freaking out.
00:48:03.360 --> 00:48:14.320
And what I was mostly afraid about was um not so much the money, but telling my husband that I, you know, and she helped me, and then I did the next right thing.
00:48:14.400 --> 00:48:21.840
And I'm happy to say that my bank supported that I was the victim of impersonation fraud and they credited me back the money and all that.
00:48:22.079 --> 00:48:32.480
But I was in, you know, at the moment that it happened, I was at a at the symphony and I was wedging out, you know, and I just started praying, help me, help me, help me.
00:48:32.559 --> 00:48:34.639
You know, it's nothing specific, just like, yeah.
00:48:34.880 --> 00:48:37.840
And I got advice, I got leading, you know.
00:48:37.920 --> 00:48:41.840
I mean, spirituality is often shows up in really concrete ways, you know.
00:48:42.079 --> 00:48:48.480
And by the time my husband came home and I told him about it, it already had these answers because I had been led to the right steps to do.
00:48:48.559 --> 00:48:50.639
And he was like, Babe, how could you be so dumb?
00:48:50.800 --> 00:48:51.760
And I said, I don't know.
00:48:51.920 --> 00:48:53.760
And that was the end of it, you know.
00:48:55.519 --> 00:48:59.119
Yeah, no, I mean, that's the thing, life just continues to happen.
00:48:59.440 --> 00:49:06.400
Yeah, and this program and the steps just helped me learn how to be tolerant.
00:49:06.559 --> 00:49:06.960
Yeah.
00:49:07.199 --> 00:49:10.960
And I'm constantly reminded that I am not in control.
00:49:11.440 --> 00:49:11.599
Right.
00:49:11.760 --> 00:49:12.800
And I don't want to be.
00:49:13.039 --> 00:49:14.000
No, no.
00:49:14.159 --> 00:49:16.800
Well, and you know, and and and that there's help.
00:49:17.039 --> 00:49:24.079
I mean, I I I am lucky enough that I have not struggled with sobriety.
00:49:24.159 --> 00:49:26.960
It, you know, it was really just kind of graced to me.
00:49:27.039 --> 00:49:28.480
Yeah, I did the work.
00:49:28.639 --> 00:49:34.559
Um, and um, but the desire to drink was really profoundly lifted from me.
00:49:34.719 --> 00:49:41.840
Um, I'll just share briefly, I don't know if we're running out of time, but um that that the second wave for me was my eating disorder.
00:49:42.239 --> 00:49:47.840
And that, I mean, I was sober, but my eating disorder came into my life like a hurricane.
00:49:48.159 --> 00:49:55.760
And it was later and with 12-step program um that used the big book and only the big book.
00:49:55.840 --> 00:49:57.679
It didn't use any additional literature.
00:49:57.840 --> 00:50:01.360
And so I kind of second, in fact, that's when my for the eating disorder.
00:50:01.519 --> 00:50:04.079
For the eating disorder, yeah, my compulsive overeating.
00:50:04.320 --> 00:50:06.480
Um, and that was lifted from me.
00:50:06.639 --> 00:50:14.480
But that's when I did like the deeper dive about making an amends to my brother and a few other things that I hadn't, you know, they weren't so front and center, you know.
00:50:15.199 --> 00:50:22.239
Um but that it just keeps uh I'm not afraid that I'm gonna drink now.
00:50:22.400 --> 00:50:38.880
I mean, I've just found a way of living that it's the same thing of like when you make decisions to maybe uh move more or eat better or love better people, you know, if you've been loving people or have people in your life that aren't good for you or whatever it is, you know.
00:50:38.960 --> 00:50:43.519
I mean, it's just it's just the way I live now and it's so interwoven.
00:50:43.599 --> 00:50:45.119
And you're finding that too, aren't you?
00:50:45.360 --> 00:50:47.199
Even just two years in and yeah, yeah.
00:50:47.360 --> 00:50:48.559
It'll be three years in May.
00:50:48.800 --> 00:50:49.760
Right, yeah, yeah.
00:50:50.639 --> 00:50:55.280
And it just becomes, you know, I don't have to consciously say, well, I'm you know, I'm doing step work.
00:50:55.440 --> 00:51:04.960
I just naturally am because my go-to is to, you know, I only indulge my nonsense for so long before I pull myself up and go, okay, girl, let's fly right here.
00:51:05.599 --> 00:51:06.480
Right, right.
00:51:06.960 --> 00:51:17.280
Well, I'm so grateful that you had had the time and the vulnerability, and I just really appreciate it.
00:51:17.519 --> 00:51:22.159
And hopefully we can continue this conversation.
00:51:22.400 --> 00:51:23.360
I'm here for you.
00:51:23.760 --> 00:51:28.079
I love being here with you and talking about the stuff is not hard for me.
00:51:28.159 --> 00:51:38.480
And, you know, I mean, to the extent that it can help somebody who's hearing either in their in their halting walk with God or or even thinking, is there a room for that?
00:51:38.639 --> 00:51:51.519
Or maybe they're struggling with an eating disorder or drinking or drugs or whatever it may be, you know, that that there's help out there, and you know, that's all we want to do is just, you know, people don't have to walk alone.
00:51:51.840 --> 00:51:52.880
Right, exactly.
00:51:53.119 --> 00:51:53.679
Exactly.
00:51:53.920 --> 00:51:57.679
Well, on that note, on that note, uh, thank you all.
00:51:57.760 --> 00:52:08.559
If you guys have continued to listen, we love you, and uh, we just um pray so much peace and miracles to unfold in your life, and we will see you next time.
00:00:02.240 --> 00:00:05.280
Welcome to the Miracle Path podcast.
00:00:05.440 --> 00:00:10.400
I am your co-host, Kylie, and we have a very special episode.
00:00:10.640 --> 00:00:14.720
Our Julie is being a mom right now.
00:00:15.039 --> 00:00:18.320
Addie is six, six weeks old today.
00:00:18.640 --> 00:00:24.160
So we are going to invite you to listen.
00:00:24.399 --> 00:00:29.600
I have a very, very special guest with me.
00:00:30.480 --> 00:00:35.200
And she is one of my spiritual advisors.
00:00:36.159 --> 00:00:42.640
She is a dear friend, a fellow sister in Christ, and she's my sponsor.
00:00:43.200 --> 00:00:49.280
And before we get started, just wanted to introduce you to Kim.
00:00:49.920 --> 00:00:50.240
Hi.
00:00:51.920 --> 00:00:59.600
Thank you so much for being here and just uh coming to together to have this conversation.
00:00:59.840 --> 00:01:24.959
And before we get into the meet, which is would love to hear about your spiritual journey when God entered the chat for you, and want to talk about our work together in regards with the 12 steps and kind of lift the veil on some of the meat and the heavy lifting that we did together with your experience.
00:01:25.439 --> 00:01:29.519
And you know, you've been in the program and same as me.
00:01:29.680 --> 00:01:32.239
And I'm just excited for this conversation.
00:01:32.480 --> 00:01:40.799
But I want to share with the guests, and it's going to be fun to hear your perspective on it because I share this story all the time on how we met.
00:01:41.519 --> 00:01:48.319
And it was, I was probably in like six to eight months of sobriety.
00:01:48.799 --> 00:01:59.920
And I was going into the meetings, and I just knew that it was time for me to do the step work, the 12 steps.
00:02:00.799 --> 00:02:09.919
And I was at the time I was sober and I was feeling really good.
00:02:10.080 --> 00:02:13.280
There wasn't any cravings or anything like that.
00:02:13.439 --> 00:02:26.080
I wasn't struggling, but I was struggling with like dealing with being sober, like dealing with all of the feelings and a lot of guilt and shame from my past.
00:02:26.639 --> 00:02:30.000
And so I knew the 12 steps were the right thing.
00:02:30.719 --> 00:02:36.240
And I remember the week that I decided I just felt called to.
00:02:36.319 --> 00:02:43.520
I was like, okay, this is the week I'm going to like put myself out there in the meetings and try to find a sponsor.
00:02:44.159 --> 00:02:50.080
And so I had two meetings on my schedule, and both were like in the afternoon during my lunch hour.
00:02:50.400 --> 00:02:52.719
So wait, were those the first meetings you ever went to?
00:02:52.879 --> 00:02:53.039
No.
00:02:53.199 --> 00:02:53.439
Okay.
00:02:53.680 --> 00:02:54.000
No.
00:02:54.719 --> 00:03:00.000
And it was interesting because it was, I think it was on either a Monday or Tuesday.
00:03:00.240 --> 00:03:02.159
And so during the week.
00:03:02.479 --> 00:03:15.280
And so before I walked into the meeting, I just said I said a prayer and I said, God, just like show me that my sponsor is gonna be, is gonna be in this room.
00:03:15.439 --> 00:03:16.319
I'm ready.
00:03:16.560 --> 00:03:19.759
I'm ready for her and I'm ready to do this work.
00:03:20.080 --> 00:03:30.960
But you know, perhaps somebody in the room has my mom's name, and then I'll know that I need to put myself out there and and seek a sponsor.
00:03:31.120 --> 00:03:31.439
Yeah.
00:03:31.759 --> 00:03:39.280
And so I get into the room and I'm like 10 minutes early, and I sit down, there's nobody next to me.
00:03:39.599 --> 00:03:44.400
And so like five minutes come it rolling in, and the room starts getting full.
00:03:44.560 --> 00:03:48.560
And so I immediately felt like, okay, this is it.
00:03:48.800 --> 00:03:50.240
I'm feeling it.
00:03:50.800 --> 00:03:52.960
And the meeting starts.
00:03:53.120 --> 00:03:57.199
There's a woman to my right of me, and there's a woman to the left of me.
00:03:57.520 --> 00:03:59.759
And so we all introduce ourselves.
00:03:59.840 --> 00:04:01.680
So I go, hi, my name's Kylie.
00:04:03.199 --> 00:04:09.280
And then to the left of me, Kim goes, Hi, my name's Kim.
00:04:10.560 --> 00:04:16.160
And at that moment, I was just because that's your mom's name.
00:04:16.319 --> 00:04:16.560
Yeah.
00:04:16.720 --> 00:04:16.959
Right.
00:04:17.120 --> 00:04:18.720
Yeah, that's my mom's name.
00:04:18.879 --> 00:04:21.839
And it just blew me away.
00:04:22.240 --> 00:04:32.319
It was hysterical because in my head, immediately I was like, God, that's hilarious, but like, there's no way that she's gonna be my sponsor.
00:04:32.560 --> 00:04:35.759
Like, there's no way, like, that's just too close to home.
00:04:36.079 --> 00:04:51.600
And so as the meeting went on, I raised my hand and I shared my story and I shared how I had this profound experience where I knew that Christ removed my cravings from me.
00:04:51.839 --> 00:05:01.519
And typically in these rooms, like it's it's very higher power and vague, and it's not towards any religion, which I think is wonderful.
00:05:01.759 --> 00:05:04.000
It it just is wonderful.
00:05:04.480 --> 00:05:17.199
And you know, that was the first time I was I shared my story, and it felt so freeing to just finally just say it out loud in front of everybody.
00:05:17.839 --> 00:05:21.839
And as the meeting went on, it was a great meeting.
00:05:22.160 --> 00:05:42.000
And after you like came up to me right next to me, and and you correct me if I'm wrong, but you were like, you know, honestly, I loved what you said, and I loved that you said Jesus, and I had similar experience.
00:05:42.480 --> 00:05:44.720
And I was like, wow, this is crazy.
00:05:44.879 --> 00:06:11.600
And so you and we agreed that we would meet for lunch, and so we ended up meeting for lunch, and still in my head, I'm like, God, like, no, this can't be it, it's it's just too too much, and so we meet for lunch, and Kim is just we we meet, and you're like, okay, tell me your story.
00:06:11.759 --> 00:06:13.120
And so I'm like, okay.
00:06:13.600 --> 00:06:27.439
And so I I kind of start from as as early as I can remember, and then I get to the part in in my childhood as a teenager, when I was 18, my mom passed by suicide.
00:06:27.519 --> 00:06:29.360
And so I'm sharing this to Kim.
00:06:29.519 --> 00:06:33.439
And as soon as I said that, Kim grabs my hand and she said, What did you say?
00:06:33.600 --> 00:06:36.000
And I said, Yeah, my mom passed by suicide.
00:06:36.079 --> 00:06:39.360
And and Kim said, minded too.
00:06:40.720 --> 00:06:58.399
And I'm like getting emotional thinking about it because it it's like those moments where like time just stops and it's shocking and it's beautiful, and it's just I just never experienced anything like that.
00:06:58.800 --> 00:07:08.240
And I remember feeling I was at, you know, faith level, I was at a level, you know, maybe four or five.
00:07:08.560 --> 00:07:17.519
I didn't know there was a number ranking, but I know but but it just spiked up to certainty, like off the charts.
00:07:18.480 --> 00:07:29.199
And I just never talked to somebody or met somebody that experienced that and outside of my siblings.
00:07:29.279 --> 00:07:40.319
And so that was a moment for me that I just finally felt seen and heard and understood in in a very unique and traumatic way.
00:07:41.519 --> 00:07:45.759
And it it just completely changed my life.
00:07:45.920 --> 00:07:48.639
And I was like, Can you be my sponsor?
00:07:51.360 --> 00:08:06.639
And so yeah, I just love that story just because it um it just it just shows how much love we can receive from God and how guided we are.
00:08:07.519 --> 00:08:22.399
And you know, I took that aligned action to do the work and to be free and the affirmations I received just from that and just to continue sobriety for me.
00:08:22.639 --> 00:08:40.000
And so, yeah, I just want to thank you for oh so I remember pretty much that way, but there was one other component was you were wearing a baseball cap that said Portland, and it had the sign that when you're driving, I lived in Portland for 12 years.
00:08:40.480 --> 00:08:45.039
And when you drive across one of the bridges, there's this big Portland sign, you know, the one with the deer.
00:08:45.200 --> 00:08:45.919
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:08:46.000 --> 00:08:47.279
And that's on your head, I think.
00:08:47.440 --> 00:08:50.960
Anyway, it was so that was yet another connector.
00:08:51.279 --> 00:09:01.600
Um, and I went to that meeting wanting to, I I love to sponsor, I never sponsor more than one person at a time.
00:09:02.000 --> 00:09:10.399
And um, being relatively new to Louisville, I'm not immersed in the culture, you know, or the even the AA cultures quite as much.
00:09:10.559 --> 00:09:13.120
And I wasn't going to a ton of meetings.
00:09:13.279 --> 00:09:16.799
Um, and I don't know that I'd ever gone to that meeting before.
00:09:18.399 --> 00:09:46.399
So there were all kinds of things, but isn't it funny how uh, as in funny, interesting, how um we accept so many things that are beyond our understanding and seem, you know, if you think about like sound waves that travel and I can talk to someone in another country, and I well, you know, those are sound waves, and there's the internet, whatever that means, and there's satellites, and I'm just like, well, yeah, you know, science, right?
00:09:46.720 --> 00:09:58.559
But when God shows up in these ways, you know, or something, even if you prefer to call it something let's say spiritual, you know, when when there's forces and energies that align and we're like, huh, really?
00:09:58.720 --> 00:10:07.039
Do you think that really could be, you know, our culture of the last oh hundred or so years, right, has led us to be, we're fact-driven.
00:10:07.120 --> 00:10:08.399
We want the evidence, man.
00:10:08.480 --> 00:10:11.759
Yeah, you know, we want to be, want to see all that proof lined up.
00:10:11.919 --> 00:10:23.919
But the fact is that if you just if you just open your awareness, you start to, you know, and and there has to be a willingness to um to sort of look heavenward, whichever direction that may be.
00:10:24.559 --> 00:10:25.440
Absolutely.
00:10:25.679 --> 00:10:27.279
No, that's such a good point.
00:10:27.519 --> 00:10:55.200
And you know, I think when we continue this path of choosing your awareness to the wonder and the mysterious path that you can go when you're not trying to control the circumstances and the details and hows and spend all that energy when you're just like, okay, I know I'm being led by something so powerful and so good and so loving.
00:10:55.519 --> 00:10:58.320
I'm gonna just let that unfold.
00:10:58.480 --> 00:10:59.759
That's it exactly.
00:11:00.000 --> 00:11:18.559
And for me, it also has especially since uh um I came to having a faith so late in life, um, that certainty is something that I I could it took a long time before I could even plant my flag.
00:11:18.639 --> 00:11:24.720
And I pull that flag up sometimes and go, well, maybe, you know, um in some regards.
00:11:25.039 --> 00:11:40.080
But if I just don't worry about trying to achieve something, and I just can try to just pay attention to what is, just the way I think about what you said about like all the different things that happened in the meeting to kind of connect us.
00:11:40.240 --> 00:11:43.600
And you had even, let's call it, prayed for it, right?
00:11:43.919 --> 00:11:47.120
You know, you had set an intention, that's prayer, right?
00:11:47.200 --> 00:11:52.879
It's all prayer, you know, whenever we reach out of ourselves into the great bigness of life, right?
00:11:53.519 --> 00:12:09.279
Um, and yet we I think that we just don't want to be afraid, we don't trust ourselves, we don't trust a power greater than ourselves, you know, we don't know how to navigate that, and it takes time.
00:12:09.519 --> 00:12:10.720
Yeah, yeah, it does.
00:12:10.799 --> 00:12:13.120
And you mentioned that it it took some time for you.
00:12:13.519 --> 00:12:15.279
I'm still in that time.
00:12:15.679 --> 00:12:15.840
Right.
00:12:16.000 --> 00:12:17.360
No, and I mean it's a journey.
00:12:17.600 --> 00:12:18.159
It's a journey.
00:12:18.320 --> 00:12:32.159
I think it's a journey for life, you know, but but some things become clearer, you know, like being clear for myself that I'm on the right path for me, you know, that's not something that's uncertain for me anymore, you know.
00:12:32.320 --> 00:12:40.559
Yeah, but but discarding discarding mindsets that aren't helpful, you know, or or having a deeper awareness.
00:12:40.720 --> 00:12:48.240
I mean, uh God draws you in, draws me in, you know, and um it's just learning how to trust God more and more.
00:12:49.120 --> 00:12:49.759
Totally.
00:12:50.159 --> 00:13:00.320
And I want to go into that and learn a little bit more about your story and whatever you're you know, inspired to share with us.
00:13:00.720 --> 00:13:05.600
Um I was raised as an atheist.
00:13:06.320 --> 00:13:11.120
My parents did not believe in God, and I was taught to not believe in God.
00:13:12.000 --> 00:13:24.399
Um the so I I you know from my early days, the idea that if I wanted to get something done, if I wanted to, you know, that I had to count on, you know, it wasn't gonna be God.
00:13:25.039 --> 00:13:32.320
And so as a little kid, um, you know, then who's gonna be the people I'm gonna look to?
00:13:32.480 --> 00:13:34.799
My parents, of course, you know, family.
00:13:35.039 --> 00:13:37.600
And then my parents divorced when I was 12.
00:13:37.759 --> 00:13:50.080
And my mom uh was an alcoholic and her alcoholism just bloomed and she she never sought treatment, and in the end, it led to her taking her life many, many years later, but still.
00:13:50.320 --> 00:13:53.200
Um, but I quickly saw that.
00:13:53.279 --> 00:14:01.039
Um, I mean, talk about feeling alone in the world, you know, when your parents, you know, that was the end of my parenting at the age of 12.
00:14:01.120 --> 00:14:06.000
I was really kind of on my own because my dad was off being a single guy, kind of, you know.
00:14:06.240 --> 00:14:10.320
Um, and so my searching started almost immediately.
00:14:10.559 --> 00:14:14.480
Um, I never was in any way lent towards Christianity.
00:14:14.559 --> 00:14:15.919
It wasn't a part of the of what I had.
00:14:16.559 --> 00:14:18.879
I was born in California, grew up in LA.
00:14:19.120 --> 00:14:25.360
Um not that they don't have God there, but it just wasn't what was happening in my life.
00:14:25.600 --> 00:14:26.000
Sure.
00:14:26.320 --> 00:14:33.600
And um so in junior, I was seeking.
00:14:33.759 --> 00:14:34.559
I was seeking.
00:14:34.639 --> 00:14:47.279
And in junior high, um, there was a Buddhism that was around called Nish and Shoshu Buddhism, and they were doing a lot of recruiting, and Namyoho Ringekyo, anyway, was a big deal in the 70s.
00:14:47.440 --> 00:14:51.120
Um and then in high school I was a Hare Krishna.
00:14:51.360 --> 00:14:56.960
I literally went to school in Asari with the tea luck on my forehead and all that.
00:14:57.279 --> 00:14:58.240
I didn't know that about you.
00:14:58.559 --> 00:14:59.120
Yeah.
00:14:59.360 --> 00:15:12.480
Um, and then later um I entered um what we would now call a cult, but it was a benign cult, you know, there was nothing terrible happened to me anyway, um, with a guru and all that.
00:15:12.720 --> 00:15:14.960
All of the time I was looking for answers.
00:15:15.039 --> 00:15:28.080
And in each situation of those three, um I got to a point, I was just wasn't feeling it, you know, what the what I thought I was supposed to feel, a connection or a sense or God entering my life.
00:15:28.240 --> 00:15:30.320
I couldn't, I it wasn't happening for me.
00:15:30.480 --> 00:15:38.720
And when I would go to the people who were in charge, you know, were the spiritual leaders of all, you know, what um I the problem was me.
00:15:38.879 --> 00:15:40.799
I wasn't chanting enough.
00:15:40.960 --> 00:15:49.200
It was Maya, the world, you know, and and I whatever I was doing, I just needed to do it harder or more of, you know.
00:15:49.440 --> 00:15:52.399
Um, but I was doing my best, whatever that was.
00:15:52.480 --> 00:15:52.799
Yeah.
00:15:52.960 --> 00:15:56.399
And then so this is all before I'm 25, by the way.
00:15:56.559 --> 00:16:10.000
So at about 25, I got to the point where I just said, God, looking kind of heavenward, you know, meet me halfway, I'm done.
00:16:10.159 --> 00:16:11.600
You know, you know where I am.
00:16:11.759 --> 00:16:16.080
If if you, you know, if you want to hang out with me, if you want something going on with me.
00:16:16.159 --> 00:16:21.600
I don't remember my exact words, but it was really like, I'm tired of putting all this effort out and not getting anything in return.
00:16:21.759 --> 00:16:26.320
It wasn't that I said, you know, I'm done with God.
00:16:26.480 --> 00:16:27.919
I was just done searching.
00:16:28.159 --> 00:16:40.320
And um, I was in a relationship with the man who would become my husband, and we got on with life, and we moved to New York, and I really left all that spiritual seeking behind.
00:16:40.799 --> 00:16:46.159
Um, I still, you know, I was into crystals and I do little meditations, you know.
00:16:46.240 --> 00:16:55.679
I mean, I love the woo-woo, and and you know, and um, so there was, but I didn't think of it, yeah, it was more like personal growth than than a divine being.
00:16:55.840 --> 00:16:59.519
I didn't connect with that, um, nor did I try to or wish to.
00:17:01.279 --> 00:17:07.359
And um, and then life continued, and life had some very serious ups and downs.
00:17:07.440 --> 00:17:11.440
And I'll just share very briefly that we lost our son when he was 14.
00:17:11.759 --> 00:17:16.880
Um, and he was killed by a car walking across the street in the wrong place in the wrong time.
00:17:17.359 --> 00:17:20.880
Um, and he died from his injury, his head injury.
00:17:21.519 --> 00:17:25.680
Um But that went on, you know, life went on.
00:17:25.759 --> 00:17:30.559
I mean, I'm I'm not getting into that because that's not what we're talking about today.
00:17:30.960 --> 00:17:36.400
Um, but even that wasn't enough to really anchor me into a faith tradition.
00:17:36.799 --> 00:17:52.240
Although my husband was a non-practicing Jew, Danny had been bar mitzvah, and we were really grateful to have Judaism and to be able to sit Shiva and have an approach to how to how to handle this catastrophe in our life, you know.
00:17:52.640 --> 00:18:03.359
And we contemplated, um, we were still living in New York, it was right after Danny had died, and we contemplated um me converting and that we'd become like more active Jews.
00:18:03.519 --> 00:18:10.559
And when we moved to Portland, we actually scouted out some some synagogues, but nothing really resonated, and that just kind of faded away.
00:18:11.039 --> 00:18:16.799
So that was still a good that was 2000.
00:18:19.519 --> 00:18:26.079
And um it'd be another full on 10 years or more before I would even come to something like a faith.
00:18:26.240 --> 00:18:34.160
So okay, so all this life is going on, and there's some good things, and there's healing and uh, you know, recovering from bereaving, being bereaved.
00:18:34.240 --> 00:18:45.279
Um, I wasn't drinking alcoholically at that time, although I certainly was drinking a lot off and on, and I always had, um, but I loved it, and I always had a good time.
00:18:45.680 --> 00:18:53.519
Yeah, you know, it wasn't a problem for me, except you know, when I overindulged from time to time, but everybody I knew did that too.
00:18:53.599 --> 00:19:22.160
So anyway, um, I had started a small management, my own management consulting business, and um I was doing a lot of time in my car and driving around, you know, and out of the blue, I mean, literally out of the blue, out of nowhere, I cannot find a single thing to remember what was a catalyst for this, but I started talking to God in the car, and I didn't have an idea.
00:19:22.319 --> 00:19:25.440
Again, it was in no way was a Christianity.
00:19:25.599 --> 00:19:33.599
I mean, I was a hippie, I was a liberal, everything I grew up knowing about Christianity from you know, movies.
00:19:33.680 --> 00:19:36.240
I mean, they just all seem like a bunch of haters, you know.
00:19:36.480 --> 00:19:42.480
I mean, it's like, and you know, even today they can seem that way, depending on who you're listening to.
00:19:42.960 --> 00:19:45.359
Um, so it never even occurred to me.
00:19:45.599 --> 00:19:49.359
But just kind of lifting my eyes heavenward, because that's kind of what we do.
00:19:49.519 --> 00:19:54.480
I was just, it's like, you know, God, if you're out there, remember me, here I am.
00:19:54.799 --> 00:20:03.440
Um, I would say I I prayed, I just called it God talk, but I and I was out loud, which we had Bluetooth then back in the olden days.
00:20:03.519 --> 00:20:09.200
So it was like you could, you know, had thing in your era, you could talk out loud in your car and not when you're all the only person in the car and not be weird.
00:20:09.279 --> 00:20:10.400
Now it's commonplace, right?
00:20:10.640 --> 00:20:10.880
Right.
00:20:11.039 --> 00:20:11.200
Right.
00:20:11.279 --> 00:20:18.160
So um, and I just started, you know, are there books I should read?
00:20:18.319 --> 00:20:20.079
If there are, bring them to me.
00:20:20.160 --> 00:20:22.000
Are there people I should meet?
00:20:22.160 --> 00:20:28.799
Um, you know, if there's something I should be seeing, I I'd never read the Bible, but I did say remove the scales from my eyes.
00:20:28.880 --> 00:20:31.680
So it must have entered into my consciousness in some way.
00:20:31.839 --> 00:20:33.599
And that's exactly what happened.
00:20:33.680 --> 00:20:35.839
Um, I was doing a lot of networking.
00:20:36.160 --> 00:20:43.359
Um, these two women that I met as friends, they were both Christians in a different sort of way.
00:20:43.440 --> 00:20:44.799
And I was full of questions.
00:20:44.880 --> 00:20:46.559
I started asking and talking about it.
00:20:46.640 --> 00:20:48.640
They weren't like trying to convert me.
00:20:48.799 --> 00:20:50.240
I was like, hey, what is this?
00:20:50.319 --> 00:20:51.440
You know, tell me about it.
00:20:51.519 --> 00:20:53.119
I was curious, you know.
00:20:53.440 --> 00:20:55.680
And it just continued to grow.
00:20:56.000 --> 00:21:03.200
And um, I started to, a friend asked me, we were in a bar, and she said, I've got something for you if you'd be willing to take it.
00:21:03.519 --> 00:21:04.799
Would you take a Bible from me?
00:21:05.039 --> 00:21:08.160
Because she had was telling me something about her kid the day before.
00:21:08.240 --> 00:21:10.880
And and I was like, I wish I had that kind of faith.
00:21:10.960 --> 00:21:23.440
Because I'd always been envious, you know, when you see these evangelicals or people and they're talking about, I'm never alone because Jesus is always with me, or I know I can get through anything because I have Jesus, and I'm like, damn, I want that, you know, who wouldn't, right?
00:21:24.160 --> 00:21:35.759
Um, so uh yeah, so it was it was it took a while for me to um find my way to it.
00:21:35.920 --> 00:21:43.920
And it was also problematic in my home because although my husband is not a practicing Jew, he's a cultural Jew.
00:21:44.240 --> 00:21:52.880
And he had a lot of um feelings about Christians just because of the persecution of Jews and his perspective.
00:21:53.759 --> 00:21:57.440
Um I started going uh to a church.
00:21:57.599 --> 00:22:07.599
Uh he he's a musician and he had a A standing gig on Sunday evenings, and he would go to his gig and I would go to the Sunday service and be back before he knew that I had been there.
00:22:07.920 --> 00:22:12.400
Um so I I didn't feel comfortable telling him about it, you know.
00:22:12.720 --> 00:22:18.880
And then it just it just kind of it just started to come in more and more.
00:22:18.960 --> 00:22:24.960
Um I started to get this sense of that that how can I put it?
00:22:25.039 --> 00:22:25.759
I feel like I'm rambling.
00:22:25.839 --> 00:22:26.160
I'm sorry.
00:22:26.480 --> 00:22:27.279
No, you're not at all.
00:22:27.440 --> 00:22:28.079
Okay, no.
00:22:28.480 --> 00:22:39.759
Um having uh lost my son Jewish, you know, this idea that Jesus is the only way, you know, that was a sticking point.
00:22:40.240 --> 00:22:42.400
The you know, this idea that God has a plan.
00:22:42.480 --> 00:22:44.799
This was all this, you know, stuff I had heard, right?
00:22:44.880 --> 00:22:46.640
Just kind of in the atmosphere.
00:22:46.799 --> 00:22:47.119
Right.
00:22:47.279 --> 00:22:51.200
Um, and I had not in any way spent much time in the Bible at all.
00:22:51.359 --> 00:22:56.640
I couldn't get into it, whatever, you know, so um at that point.
00:22:57.039 --> 00:23:04.720
Um and I just kind of it my my not objections, but my questions were kind of softened.
00:23:04.880 --> 00:23:12.319
I had a friend, he was my spiritual mentor there, um, uh a pastor at the church that I started to go to.
00:23:12.480 --> 00:23:16.799
And I was like, how can God be in charge of everything or have a plan for everything?
00:23:16.880 --> 00:23:22.720
And my beautiful son is killed when he could have just had a broken leg or whatever, you know.
00:23:23.279 --> 00:23:39.200
And he helped me break down that idea that God is at the engineer board controlling everything, you know, that um he he didn't I mean, obviously, who has answers for this entirely, you know, but he just talked a little bit more about it.
00:23:39.279 --> 00:23:47.359
It allowed me to enter in soon enough to put my questions and my fears to the side that I could continue to take some steps forward.
00:23:48.480 --> 00:23:53.200
And one day, one evening, I was at a service, um, a church service.
00:23:54.240 --> 00:23:55.920
And the lights were sort of dimmed.
00:23:56.160 --> 00:24:08.640
And it was my friend who was giving the sermon, and um he was had this easel and a you know, a big board, and he was drawing this kind of circle, and he was talking about the cycle of spiritual formation.
00:24:09.039 --> 00:24:17.200
And he he said, So first you ask Jesus to come into your life, that authorizes the Holy Spirit to come in.
00:24:17.599 --> 00:24:29.759
And that idea that I needed to take a step forward to get the good stuff, as it were, you know, that I had to say yes in some way was to me revolutionary.
00:24:29.920 --> 00:24:33.200
You know, I had never really, I was kept like, well, when am I gonna get it?
00:24:33.279 --> 00:24:34.079
When am I get it?
00:24:34.160 --> 00:24:40.000
But you know, it's sort of like you're never gonna know how delicious that ice cream is unless you take a bite, right?
00:24:40.160 --> 00:24:43.440
You know, I mean you've gotta lift your spoon up to your mouth.
00:24:43.839 --> 00:24:59.759
And so there in that service, I'm we were standing, I think we might have been singing, um, and I was by myself, and I'm wrestling in my mind about all this, and I'm you know, so Jesus, you know, like what about all the Buddhists?
00:24:59.920 --> 00:25:01.839
And what about the Hindus?
00:25:01.920 --> 00:25:03.519
And what about the Jews?
00:25:03.680 --> 00:25:04.640
What about Danny?
00:25:04.799 --> 00:25:07.119
What about all those, what about all those other people?
00:25:07.279 --> 00:25:09.440
You know, how do they fit into all of this?
00:25:09.759 --> 00:25:11.920
Billions and billions of people.
00:25:12.319 --> 00:25:19.200
And I didn't hear him speak it, but the message that I very clearly got was let's just put a pin in that.
00:25:19.279 --> 00:25:21.519
Why don't we just focus on you and me right now?
00:25:22.000 --> 00:25:27.519
And that was enough for me to just let all of that anxiety about what if, what if, what if.
00:25:27.920 --> 00:25:33.200
Because if God was okay with it, and I get I don't whatever that was all then.
00:25:33.440 --> 00:25:38.400
Um, and so I just in that moment, quietly to myself, I just said yes.
00:25:38.559 --> 00:25:39.359
That's all I did.
00:25:39.440 --> 00:25:40.799
I just said yes.
00:25:41.359 --> 00:25:46.000
And um, and then it just that was the beginning of it for me.
00:25:46.160 --> 00:25:46.799
Yeah.
00:25:48.000 --> 00:25:49.519
Thank you so much for sharing.
00:25:49.599 --> 00:25:53.920
Now you should write a book that is amazing.
00:25:54.079 --> 00:26:01.680
And the fact that you started so young on were you kind of like pressured into that spiritual journey as not at all.
00:26:01.920 --> 00:26:05.519
Okay, so you know to go through that weirdo.
00:26:06.240 --> 00:26:14.880
Okay, okay, no, and and I, you know, the honesty of hey, I'm not getting anything, I'm not feeling anything.
00:26:15.039 --> 00:26:17.119
Like, if you want me, come and get me.
00:26:17.279 --> 00:26:17.759
Yeah.
00:26:18.000 --> 00:26:27.759
And I mean, I just love that because I think there's so much fear involved in spirituality, and it's because we think that we're being judged.
00:26:28.000 --> 00:26:34.160
And and it's like, to me, I it's all for me personally, it's about relationship.
00:26:34.240 --> 00:26:40.720
And you mentioned that so beautifully is that we have to make a step forward.
00:26:40.799 --> 00:26:45.519
Yeah, we have to invite it in, and whatever that means to you.
00:26:46.319 --> 00:26:57.759
Well, and that's what's so beautiful, even you know, and it it overlaps perfectly with the 12 steps in AA, because the third step is that you make a decision.
00:26:58.160 --> 00:27:00.400
Yeah, you come to believe.
00:27:00.720 --> 00:27:17.440
And um, God doesn't, you know, I think that the other thing that can be such a stumbling block is that there's so many people around, and there's so much been written in all faiths um that tell you what it's supposed to look like.
00:27:17.599 --> 00:27:17.839
Right.
00:27:18.160 --> 00:27:25.440
What God looks like, and what that relationship and the and this is this is the way, do it this way, this is the right way, you know.
00:27:26.000 --> 00:27:30.240
And I don't know that anybody can do that for anybody.
00:27:30.400 --> 00:27:36.960
You know, why why does one person leave is led to, you know, as you know, I I lived in Morocco for five years.
00:27:37.119 --> 00:27:42.480
Um, after I became a a believer, and for a long time I didn't want even want to say that I was a Christian.
00:27:42.559 --> 00:27:44.640
I'd be I'm a Christian, but not like that, you know.
00:27:44.880 --> 00:27:48.160
I'm a follower of Jesus, but that sounded so sanctimonious, you know.
00:27:49.680 --> 00:27:50.880
I struggle with that too.
00:27:51.039 --> 00:27:52.079
You know, it's like, what do we say?
00:27:52.640 --> 00:27:53.200
I love Jesus.
00:27:53.279 --> 00:27:54.160
Okay, there you go.
00:27:54.240 --> 00:27:55.440
That's a good one.
00:27:56.480 --> 00:28:08.319
But I knew people there, I got to have friends there who were um beautiful human beings, devout, faithful women who prayed to Allah.
00:28:08.640 --> 00:28:09.680
Does that not count?
00:28:09.839 --> 00:28:13.200
You know, so but thankfully I don't have to have a judgment about that.
00:28:13.440 --> 00:28:14.480
Right, right.
00:28:15.039 --> 00:28:16.559
No, that's so true.
00:28:16.880 --> 00:28:22.319
Yeah, and I loved how you bridged the the AA and the step work.
00:28:23.119 --> 00:28:26.799
Did you want to add anything else on in that Morocco trip?
00:28:27.119 --> 00:28:28.799
Not really, no, we don't have to do that.
00:28:28.960 --> 00:28:30.000
Well, next next episode.
00:28:30.160 --> 00:28:30.400
Okay.
00:28:31.920 --> 00:28:40.880
So so yeah, I wanted to first off, I want to read off the steps just to give the listeners just some context.
00:28:41.119 --> 00:28:41.359
Sure.
00:28:41.920 --> 00:28:45.359
Because, you know, they may not be there.
00:28:45.839 --> 00:28:49.599
Yeah, I mean, I'm I feel blessed that I do know it.
00:28:50.720 --> 00:28:53.119
So I'm gonna read off the 12 steps.
00:28:54.240 --> 00:28:59.920
Number one, we admitted we were powerless over alcohol, that our lives had become unmanageable.
00:29:00.160 --> 00:29:05.200
Number two, came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
00:29:05.440 --> 00:29:13.039
Number three, made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him.
00:29:13.680 --> 00:29:18.240
Four, made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
00:29:18.480 --> 00:29:25.279
Five, admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
00:29:25.599 --> 00:29:32.160
Six, we were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
00:29:32.480 --> 00:29:36.160
Seven, humbly ask him to remove our shortcomings.
00:29:36.559 --> 00:29:44.079
Eight, made a list of all people, all persons we have harmed and become willing to make amends to them all.
00:29:44.319 --> 00:29:52.720
Nine, made direct amends to such people whenever possible, except to do so would injure them or others.
00:29:52.960 --> 00:29:53.440
10.
00:29:53.599 --> 00:29:59.039
Continue to take personal inventory and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.
00:29:59.279 --> 00:30:12.319
11 sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood him, praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out.
00:30:12.559 --> 00:30:25.839
12 having a having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics and to practice these principles in our affairs.
00:30:27.200 --> 00:30:27.599
It's a lot.
00:30:27.839 --> 00:30:29.759
It's a mouthful, it's heavy.
00:30:30.480 --> 00:30:34.000
But you know, we we dove into this.
00:30:35.359 --> 00:30:49.200
So to me, um the program of Alcoholics Anonymous, which is how I got sober and stayed so stay sober, stay in recovery.
00:30:49.599 --> 00:31:02.720
Um it's it's all about these 12 steps because drinking is just a symptom of our let's call it our spiritual disease.
00:31:03.599 --> 00:31:17.680
Um and um the program of AA takes you, you know, it allowed me to um clean house, stop drinking, which leveled a playing field, you know.
00:31:17.759 --> 00:31:21.200
Finally, you know, I wasn't doing all the things that were keeping me from that.
00:31:21.279 --> 00:31:31.119
But that's just for me anyway, and you know, I know that there are people who've been able to get sober and maintain a happy sobriety, a healthy sobriety without AA.
00:31:31.200 --> 00:31:33.359
And I wish, I mean, that's wonderful.
00:31:33.680 --> 00:31:37.039
But I was led to AA, and that's what worked for me.
00:31:37.119 --> 00:31:52.160
I actually had tried to moderate my drinking in the past, you know, but I just was I'm a real alcoholic, and for a real alcoholic like me, I needed something that would, you know, it's it's like a high colonic for your psych, you know, to be an AA.
00:31:52.799 --> 00:31:59.279
So um, yeah, those steps are just so important, and they're they really are a new way of living.
00:31:59.599 --> 00:32:03.359
And um, I'm not sure where you want to go with talking about that.
00:32:03.599 --> 00:32:06.079
Yeah, no, I mean you said it's a new way of living.
00:32:06.240 --> 00:32:23.119
Like I felt like I finally got guidance on how to approach life with a lot of forgiveness and a lot of mercy and with tolerance.
00:32:23.920 --> 00:32:27.759
And I felt like it was a protocol, like a life protocol.
00:32:28.160 --> 00:32:37.279
And to me, I just I see how it's changed, you know, doing the step work, how it's changed my all of my relationships.
00:32:37.599 --> 00:32:49.680
It's changed my perspective, it's opened the door to more miracles in my life and more blessings.
00:32:49.839 --> 00:32:55.279
And I'm just like, oh my gosh, like I'm so grateful that I couldn't drink like a normal person.
00:32:55.839 --> 00:32:59.359
And that I, yeah, I'm just so grateful for it.
00:33:00.079 --> 00:33:02.559
It's I mean glad that you were an alcoholic.
00:33:03.359 --> 00:33:04.960
I mean, what what a gift.
00:33:05.279 --> 00:33:05.839
Thank you.
00:33:06.079 --> 00:33:08.960
Because now I'm not ingesting poison in my body.
00:33:09.279 --> 00:33:19.680
And also I think that man, I just I just wish people had more like access to this in a way.
00:33:20.160 --> 00:33:20.559
Sure.
00:33:20.799 --> 00:33:24.640
And more community, because that's a huge part of AA.
00:33:24.720 --> 00:33:33.200
And and I've been, I'm a part of a a sober community that's online, and that one is is like mind, body, soul.
00:33:33.440 --> 00:33:41.680
And you know, the the two people that that lead that that created that community are are also sober.
00:33:42.400 --> 00:33:46.319
One went through the program, and then the other one is a health coach.
00:33:46.400 --> 00:33:48.480
So she quit drinking from a health perspective.
00:33:49.119 --> 00:33:52.799
And so yeah, I've I feel like I needed all things.
00:33:53.839 --> 00:33:59.200
And yeah, I just like the step work though, forever changed my life.
00:33:59.279 --> 00:33:59.599
Yeah.
00:34:00.079 --> 00:34:12.559
And I wanted just to share more on that and kind of lift the veil on some of these steps to be more specific on how it changed my life.
00:34:12.880 --> 00:34:21.360
And for me, I think the step four making made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
00:34:21.760 --> 00:34:29.440
And so when we met, we were kind of your your way of sponsoring somebody, it's like fast and furious.
00:34:29.599 --> 00:34:34.400
Let's get through the steps, but it has to be thorough and we have to dedicate time.
00:34:34.639 --> 00:34:40.320
And luckily, we were able to do it in person and and spend that time together.
00:34:40.559 --> 00:34:50.079
And I think for for me, I had so many resentments in my life and some that I didn't even know until I was asked to write it down.
00:34:51.039 --> 00:35:04.079
And a part of that process is to write, you know, the cause, the harm, um, how it affected me, like personally, whether it's like relationship-wise or financially.
00:35:04.960 --> 00:35:10.079
And then the last part was identifying your part that you played in it.
00:35:10.400 --> 00:35:16.000
And that to me was challenging for some.
00:35:16.239 --> 00:35:21.679
Like, you know, with the suicide and my mom, like that's that was hard to chew on.
00:35:21.840 --> 00:35:39.679
And and luckily talking it to you about it, it just I felt so blessed and so lucky to have you through that process and and to go through all of those feelings that are attached to something that that our society is like no one talks about it.
00:35:39.840 --> 00:35:43.760
And it's like the it's it's a huge problem in our society.
00:35:44.559 --> 00:35:47.039
Um, our children are dying.
00:35:47.519 --> 00:36:01.840
And yeah, that's a whole nother topic, but but yeah, seeing my part and how how I viewed this resentment was life-changing for me.
00:36:02.559 --> 00:36:10.960
So one thing I I want to, you know, the the thing about AA and these 12 steps is that it's a spiritual program of recovery.
00:36:11.840 --> 00:36:31.840
It is not a boot camp where it's all about, I mean, we have work that we need to do, um, but uh so much of what we're doing is clearing the way for our higher power to come in and be that life-sustaining force.
00:36:32.079 --> 00:37:05.199
Um when you talk about your part, not so much that you I mean, what and it gets too I think too complicated to try to touch base on entirely in a you know in the time that we have today, but um when when anger, resentment, fear, or dishonesty rule our lives, and that can manifest like so you didn't have any role to play in your mom taking her life.
00:37:05.519 --> 00:37:08.960
You know, that was not in any way you had a part in that.
00:37:09.760 --> 00:37:26.000
But it's when we're holding on to a resentment and we're just we're required to kind of step back and look at it, it doesn't mean that we lose our grief, that we don't mourn the loss of someone beloved, that we can't um hate the fact that it happened, right?
00:37:26.159 --> 00:37:27.039
All those things.
00:37:27.679 --> 00:37:35.119
Um but but a resentment requires us to carry it around with us all the time, even if we're not aware of it, you know.
00:37:35.199 --> 00:37:41.280
As I've said this, but it's like getting used to walking around the little pieces of glass in your shoe all the time.
00:37:41.440 --> 00:37:43.679
You just think that's how it's supposed to feel, you know.
00:37:44.000 --> 00:37:55.599
We don't even like you said, it wasn't even until you started to think about it that you realized that you were you had amassed all of this emotional toxic stuff that was a part of your everyday psyche.
00:37:56.000 --> 00:38:01.519
So this all sounds kind of simplistic when we talk about it this way, because as you said, you know, you did hard work.
00:38:02.320 --> 00:38:05.760
And remember, there's 12 steps.
00:38:06.320 --> 00:38:27.519
So, you know, and and I think that the gift of being an alcoholic, of being brought to our knees is that that for some people, like you and me, it wasn't until we were entirely humbled when we had we our our intelligence, our capabilities, you know, we're both very capable women, you know.
00:38:27.679 --> 00:38:35.599
Um our our good life, all the good things that we have going on for us, we had a problem we could not overcome on our own.
00:38:35.760 --> 00:38:39.119
And we, you know, I had reached out to other other ways to do it.
00:38:39.199 --> 00:38:43.920
I tried to moderate it myself, and more and more, and I was a very high-functioning drunk.
00:38:44.079 --> 00:38:47.360
I mean, I had a great job, I, you know, things were good.
00:38:47.599 --> 00:38:48.639
All was good.
00:38:48.880 --> 00:38:51.679
Um, and nobody in my life thought that I was an alcoholic.
00:38:51.760 --> 00:38:53.199
That's how functioning I was.
00:38:53.440 --> 00:38:58.239
But the misery, the desperation was happening in my head, in my heart, you know.
00:38:58.400 --> 00:39:04.239
Um, but these steps in such a gentle way, and it's true, we can move fast.
00:39:04.400 --> 00:39:12.719
I've also been sometimes I work with somebody, you know, and and we slow it way down because there's just too much there to go too fast, you know.
00:39:13.039 --> 00:39:13.360
Sure.
00:39:13.599 --> 00:39:15.199
But they build on each other.
00:39:15.360 --> 00:39:23.920
And the so the first three steps, you know, yes, I'm a drunk, maybe there's a higher power that can do something about it.
00:39:24.159 --> 00:39:29.440
Um, I guess I'll, you know, I'll I'll turn my will and my life over to the God of my understanding.
00:39:29.519 --> 00:39:30.079
And you do that.
00:39:30.239 --> 00:39:30.639
I did that.
00:39:30.719 --> 00:39:31.840
I'm like, yeah, whatever.
00:39:31.920 --> 00:39:34.239
You know, I just want to not be in pain anymore.
00:39:34.400 --> 00:39:34.719
Yeah.
00:39:34.960 --> 00:39:40.320
Um, and then you just jump right into the work, and they say that faith without works is dead.
00:39:40.400 --> 00:39:46.320
And you find that in a lot of traditions, including Christian, be doers of the word, not just hearers.
00:39:46.559 --> 00:39:46.800
Right.
00:39:46.960 --> 00:39:54.960
You know, so yeah, it lays a foundation that I mean, I just I was at a meeting before I came here, and it was just so beautiful.
00:39:55.119 --> 00:40:10.000
I mean, there's people who have decades of sobriety and um and talk about even today how these steps and this fellowship and this way of living help them to live happier lives where they're not torn up inside.
00:40:10.159 --> 00:40:14.559
I mean, these days, you know, our world, our country is in turmoil.
00:40:14.639 --> 00:40:16.800
Yeah, how do you find a balance with that?
00:40:16.960 --> 00:40:21.840
You know, and these steps have allowed me to find a way and I don't have to drink over it.
00:40:22.079 --> 00:40:23.599
Yeah, uh, so beautifully.
00:40:24.320 --> 00:40:26.000
Yeah, no, amen to that.
00:40:26.079 --> 00:40:43.440
And I think what I love about this approach is that, you know, you can take time and and write your resentments down, but I love that we are asked to do it with somebody and to release it in a way and read it and share it.
00:40:43.519 --> 00:40:44.719
And something happens.
00:40:44.880 --> 00:40:45.360
That's right.
00:40:45.519 --> 00:40:49.920
Something happens to your heart, something it just is way less heavy.
00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:51.440
It's like lifted from you.
00:40:51.599 --> 00:40:55.280
Like it is because you've also shared it with God.
00:40:55.519 --> 00:40:55.760
Yeah.
00:40:55.920 --> 00:40:56.159
Right.
00:40:56.320 --> 00:41:03.599
Even though they're, you know, and and many people have no idea who God may be.
00:41:03.760 --> 00:41:07.840
You know, they may have the God of their childhood and they've completely rejected that.
00:41:07.920 --> 00:41:18.800
They don't want any part of whatever that tradition was that for them perhaps was toxic or even traumatic, you know, um, the faith traditions that they grew up in.
00:41:19.039 --> 00:41:24.239
And so they're finding their way back, and that's fine.
00:41:24.320 --> 00:41:29.360
You know, it doesn't, it doesn't have to be focused in one particular way or another, you know.
00:41:30.320 --> 00:41:32.960
You God doesn't have an identity crisis.
00:41:33.039 --> 00:41:35.760
I don't think God is waiting for us to say the words just right.
00:41:35.920 --> 00:41:36.079
Right.
00:41:36.239 --> 00:41:37.119
You know, now you get it.
00:41:37.360 --> 00:41:37.440
Right.
00:41:37.679 --> 00:41:38.559
Okay, come on in.
00:41:39.440 --> 00:41:39.599
Right.
00:41:39.760 --> 00:41:40.079
Yeah.
00:41:40.239 --> 00:41:40.480
Yeah.
00:41:40.800 --> 00:41:43.199
No, it's no, that's such a good point.
00:41:43.440 --> 00:41:50.400
And I think what really helped me too was the listing all the persons I've harmed.
00:41:51.840 --> 00:42:05.920
And when I tell you when I wrote apologies to people that I knew, like if I apologize to them, it's not they're they're gonna know that it's not like a selfish act that I'm just like trying to relieve myself only.
00:42:06.480 --> 00:42:18.000
And so that practice and me having a conversation with my father and my siblings, I was the oldest child and I beat them up a lot as a kid.
00:42:18.320 --> 00:42:21.039
And I was I was carrying that.
00:42:21.360 --> 00:42:34.079
And to have the opportunity to write that out and be guided with with God and with fellows and sponsors and to apologize.
00:42:34.719 --> 00:42:37.119
It was like a newfound drug.
00:42:37.599 --> 00:42:48.239
I was like, whoa, the feeling after, like, of course, like right before I wanted to puke, I was sweating, like all those things that you get right before you take that aligned action.
00:42:48.480 --> 00:42:50.239
But then the release of that all.
00:42:50.480 --> 00:42:51.760
Oh my gosh.
00:42:52.719 --> 00:42:54.320
And you know, I had the same thing.
00:42:54.480 --> 00:42:59.119
I was a mean older sister, and um, I beat up my little brother a lot.
00:42:59.199 --> 00:43:08.559
And it it wasn't until I got sober that I even became aware that that was a harm that I had done.
00:43:08.639 --> 00:43:25.760
You know, I mean, I had always justified it that, you know, I would say that, you know, we had our dad was gone, our mom was a wreck and a drunk, and we were my analogy was we were like two wet cats in a bag together, as if there was no nothing else that could have been done but that, you know.
00:43:26.000 --> 00:43:38.480
But then just wanting to, you know, it's just it's just a way of taking responsibility for actions because until we do, we don't even realize it, but we're carrying that around with us.
00:43:38.559 --> 00:43:40.320
It's like a chain around our ankle.
00:43:40.400 --> 00:43:41.199
We don't even know.
00:43:41.280 --> 00:43:41.440
Yeah.
00:43:41.679 --> 00:43:44.320
And I I I was living in Morocco at the time.
00:43:44.480 --> 00:43:49.840
Um, and I wrote to my little brother, um, who's, you know, old.
00:43:50.400 --> 00:43:58.400
And I just, you know, I just said, I know, at a time when you needed a big sister and somebody to take care of you, I was the opposite of that.
00:43:58.559 --> 00:43:59.440
And I really regret.
00:44:00.400 --> 00:44:01.280
Explain myself.
00:44:01.360 --> 00:44:02.559
I didn't rationalize.
00:44:02.639 --> 00:44:04.239
I just said, I'm just sorry.
00:44:04.400 --> 00:44:07.760
I'm really sorry that I couldn't be there for you and I wasn't more loving.
00:44:07.920 --> 00:44:11.039
And he responded back to me immediately.
00:44:11.280 --> 00:44:15.280
And I mean, we're not close, but there's no hostility between us, you know.
00:44:15.360 --> 00:44:18.639
And it's just what a lift that is to have all of that.
00:44:19.039 --> 00:44:25.519
And it's just, it's very um, it's mystical what happens.
00:44:25.679 --> 00:44:27.039
I mean, these steps are concrete.
00:44:27.119 --> 00:44:28.559
You just read them on paper.
00:44:28.719 --> 00:44:29.840
It sounds like, yeah.
00:44:30.000 --> 00:44:37.280
And and coming from, you know, people who are listening who've never heard it before, it can sound like, what, you know, and I can appreciate that.
00:44:37.440 --> 00:44:42.000
Um, and that's why it's always good that you do these steps with a sponsor.
00:44:42.079 --> 00:44:47.920
I I I make it like like a Sherpa on a journey, somebody who knows the path and can walk alongside you.
00:44:48.000 --> 00:44:48.239
Yes.
00:44:48.400 --> 00:44:53.840
They're not they're not on the pilgrimage for you, they're just helping, you know, as you go along.
00:44:54.719 --> 00:44:59.679
And um, and they deepen, you know, and you use them for a lifetime, you know.
00:44:59.760 --> 00:45:02.400
I haven't thrown any of those spiritual tools away.
00:45:02.480 --> 00:45:05.440
I use them all the time, my goodness, regularly.
00:45:05.760 --> 00:45:06.079
Yeah.
00:45:06.239 --> 00:45:08.400
And and that's the thing, that's a part of the program.
00:45:08.480 --> 00:45:15.679
It's like now I know how to deal with resentments and I can sense when one is about to happen.
00:45:16.559 --> 00:45:26.159
And, you know, I have you, I've I've called you several times and just be like, hey, I'm struggling with something and I need like to release it, and I can't find my part.
00:45:26.320 --> 00:45:30.159
I can't see where how I deserved this, right?
00:45:30.320 --> 00:45:30.800
Right.
00:45:31.119 --> 00:45:36.880
And it's just, yeah, it's it's and it's and and who's to say you did deserve it?
00:45:37.039 --> 00:45:38.800
That's not that's not the language, is it?
00:45:38.880 --> 00:45:39.039
Right.
00:45:39.199 --> 00:45:41.119
No, I mean, who deserves bad times?
00:45:41.280 --> 00:45:49.119
You didn't deserve it, but at the same time, life on life's terms is a strong AA sentiment, right?
00:45:49.519 --> 00:45:51.360
You know, I mean, here it is.
00:45:51.519 --> 00:45:54.239
So how we respond to it is everything, right?
00:45:54.719 --> 00:45:55.599
And how you see it.
00:45:55.760 --> 00:46:01.280
I mean, I love in the in in it in the big book, they say that, you know, this is a spiritually sick person.
00:46:01.519 --> 00:46:04.639
Like, please help me not be angry at women.
00:46:05.119 --> 00:46:17.840
Yeah, when some yeah, when somebody has, you know, I mean, and for people who have been terribly harmed, you know, um, there has to be just a lot of gentleness and grace with that, you know.
00:46:18.159 --> 00:46:38.880
I mean, and sometimes when we get to that part of like my part, sometimes it can just be, especially if it's many years in the past, you know, kind of just assessing that this is in the past and I can have all kinds of feelings about it, but do would I like it to not have a grip on me in the same way?
00:46:39.039 --> 00:46:40.639
So then they give us tools.
00:46:41.039 --> 00:46:42.000
Oh my gosh, yeah.
00:46:42.159 --> 00:46:50.639
And a big part of and we'll we'll wrap this up quick, but I think a big part for me is like I allowed this type of behavior.
00:46:50.960 --> 00:46:56.719
Like I I handed people over the keys to my heart, and I had no boundaries.
00:46:56.960 --> 00:46:58.320
And that's my part.
00:46:58.480 --> 00:47:00.719
Like, I allowed this to happen, right?
00:47:00.960 --> 00:47:08.239
And and you know, people we we think that people can read our minds, even like our partners, and it's like we don't have that power, yeah.
00:47:08.800 --> 00:47:19.440
And so yeah, this this the steps just but and you know, another big one, of course, is fear, yeah, another part of the fourth step, right?
00:47:19.760 --> 00:47:30.480
And the whole thing about this way of living is that we've decided somebody else gets to be in charge of our life.
00:47:31.039 --> 00:47:39.519
God, the God of your understanding, the higher power of your understanding, and people you know come to that in a variety of different ways.
00:47:39.840 --> 00:47:44.320
But when my self-will isn't the thing that's driving me forward every day.
00:47:44.480 --> 00:47:49.760
I mean, believe me, it is, but I check myself, you know, and I try to realign it, you know.
00:47:50.239 --> 00:48:00.159
Um, I was I fell victim to so, I mean, I was beating myself about it, but I was I had a credit card scam happen to me and it gripped recently.
00:48:00.239 --> 00:48:03.280
Um and I called my sponsor because I was freaking out.
00:48:03.360 --> 00:48:14.320
And what I was mostly afraid about was um not so much the money, but telling my husband that I, you know, and she helped me, and then I did the next right thing.
00:48:14.400 --> 00:48:21.840
And I'm happy to say that my bank supported that I was the victim of impersonation fraud and they credited me back the money and all that.
00:48:22.079 --> 00:48:32.480
But I was in, you know, at the moment that it happened, I was at a at the symphony and I was wedging out, you know, and I just started praying, help me, help me, help me.
00:48:32.559 --> 00:48:34.639
You know, it's nothing specific, just like, yeah.
00:48:34.880 --> 00:48:37.840
And I got advice, I got leading, you know.
00:48:37.920 --> 00:48:41.840
I mean, spirituality is often shows up in really concrete ways, you know.
00:48:42.079 --> 00:48:48.480
And by the time my husband came home and I told him about it, it already had these answers because I had been led to the right steps to do.
00:48:48.559 --> 00:48:50.639
And he was like, Babe, how could you be so dumb?
00:48:50.800 --> 00:48:51.760
And I said, I don't know.
00:48:51.920 --> 00:48:53.760
And that was the end of it, you know.
00:48:55.519 --> 00:48:59.119
Yeah, no, I mean, that's the thing, life just continues to happen.
00:48:59.440 --> 00:49:06.400
Yeah, and this program and the steps just helped me learn how to be tolerant.
00:49:06.559 --> 00:49:06.960
Yeah.
00:49:07.199 --> 00:49:10.960
And I'm constantly reminded that I am not in control.
00:49:11.440 --> 00:49:11.599
Right.
00:49:11.760 --> 00:49:12.800
And I don't want to be.
00:49:13.039 --> 00:49:14.000
No, no.
00:49:14.159 --> 00:49:16.800
Well, and you know, and and and that there's help.
00:49:17.039 --> 00:49:24.079
I mean, I I I am lucky enough that I have not struggled with sobriety.
00:49:24.159 --> 00:49:26.960
It, you know, it was really just kind of graced to me.
00:49:27.039 --> 00:49:28.480
Yeah, I did the work.
00:49:28.639 --> 00:49:34.559
Um, and um, but the desire to drink was really profoundly lifted from me.
00:49:34.719 --> 00:49:41.840
Um, I'll just share briefly, I don't know if we're running out of time, but um that that the second wave for me was my eating disorder.
00:49:42.239 --> 00:49:47.840
And that, I mean, I was sober, but my eating disorder came into my life like a hurricane.
00:49:48.159 --> 00:49:55.760
And it was later and with 12-step program um that used the big book and only the big book.
00:49:55.840 --> 00:49:57.679
It didn't use any additional literature.
00:49:57.840 --> 00:50:01.360
And so I kind of second, in fact, that's when my for the eating disorder.
00:50:01.519 --> 00:50:04.079
For the eating disorder, yeah, my compulsive overeating.
00:50:04.320 --> 00:50:06.480
Um, and that was lifted from me.
00:50:06.639 --> 00:50:14.480
But that's when I did like the deeper dive about making an amends to my brother and a few other things that I hadn't, you know, they weren't so front and center, you know.
00:50:15.199 --> 00:50:22.239
Um but that it just keeps uh I'm not afraid that I'm gonna drink now.
00:50:22.400 --> 00:50:38.880
I mean, I've just found a way of living that it's the same thing of like when you make decisions to maybe uh move more or eat better or love better people, you know, if you've been loving people or have people in your life that aren't good for you or whatever it is, you know.
00:50:38.960 --> 00:50:43.519
I mean, it's just it's just the way I live now and it's so interwoven.
00:50:43.599 --> 00:50:45.119
And you're finding that too, aren't you?
00:50:45.360 --> 00:50:47.199
Even just two years in and yeah, yeah.
00:50:47.360 --> 00:50:48.559
It'll be three years in May.
00:50:48.800 --> 00:50:49.760
Right, yeah, yeah.
00:50:50.639 --> 00:50:55.280
And it just becomes, you know, I don't have to consciously say, well, I'm you know, I'm doing step work.
00:50:55.440 --> 00:51:04.960
I just naturally am because my go-to is to, you know, I only indulge my nonsense for so long before I pull myself up and go, okay, girl, let's fly right here.
00:51:05.599 --> 00:51:06.480
Right, right.
00:51:06.960 --> 00:51:17.280
Well, I'm so grateful that you had had the time and the vulnerability, and I just really appreciate it.
00:51:17.519 --> 00:51:22.159
And hopefully we can continue this conversation.
00:51:22.400 --> 00:51:23.360
I'm here for you.
00:51:23.760 --> 00:51:28.079
I love being here with you and talking about the stuff is not hard for me.
00:51:28.159 --> 00:51:38.480
And, you know, I mean, to the extent that it can help somebody who's hearing either in their in their halting walk with God or or even thinking, is there a room for that?
00:51:38.639 --> 00:51:51.519
Or maybe they're struggling with an eating disorder or drinking or drugs or whatever it may be, you know, that that there's help out there, and you know, that's all we want to do is just, you know, people don't have to walk alone.
00:51:51.840 --> 00:51:52.880
Right, exactly.
00:51:53.119 --> 00:51:53.679
Exactly.
00:51:53.920 --> 00:51:57.679
Well, on that note, on that note, uh, thank you all.
00:51:57.760 --> 00:52:08.559
If you guys have continued to listen, we love you, and uh, we just um pray so much peace and miracles to unfold in your life, and we will see you next time.
