Recovery Unfiltered
Taking recovery discussion to a different level. Bringing comedy and the lighter side of sober living along with educating non-alcoholics and alcoholics. Hear real stories unfiltered.
Recovery Unfiltered
What Happens When Guilt Drives Your Amends?
Larry and Rob explore the concept that relapse is not about external triggers but rather a reflection of one's spiritual fitness and how thoroughly they've worked on their recovery.
• Discussing a member who relapsed and questioned whether to make amends again
• Sharing stories of transformation, particularly focusing on Nathan's physical and spiritual growth
• Examining the Big Book's guidance on spiritual fitness and the alcoholic mind
• Exploring when making amends might cause more harm than good
• Diving into a powerful story about someone who made unnecessary amends that destroyed their marriage
• Highlighting the importance of motives in recovery actions
• Addressing pornography addiction and other destructive behaviors that affect relationships
• Emphasizing the promise that spiritual fitness leads to freedom from alcohol obsession
• Clarifying that recovery is about taking responsibility rather than blaming external circumstances
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Ready to go to work? Yeah, go ahead, lay it down, kid, you sit on the toilet, don't you Use that as your meditation?
Speaker 2:Not my wife, not your wife, nor anybody listening to this podcast has eaten a shit sandwich we didn't have a hand in making.
Speaker 1:Welcome to Recovery Unfiltered. I'm Larry. I'm an alcoholic.
Speaker 2:I am Rob. I am also an alcoholic. We are not professionals. There are no letters after our names. We know very little. However, you will hear the word.
Speaker 1:God and a four letter word in the same sentence, you will also be offended. So if you are easily offended, just pass us by. This podcast is not for you. Our opinions are just that. If you don't agree with what we're saying, that's okay. We're going to love you anyways. We are not in any way affiliated with AA.
Speaker 2:So sit back, grab a beverage of your choice and get ready.
Speaker 1:Let's go, Hello Robert.
Speaker 2:Hey, what happened happened I just. We just got back from webster's, uh, and the shit sandwich came up webster's dictionary.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's about what I had, the restaurant, it's not bad.
Speaker 2:It's not as good as you remember, did it create a shit sandwich. It's gonna. It's gonna create something. Just hold on, we might take a break.
Speaker 1:That's funny, but I don't eat a lot of that, though.
Speaker 2:The closest thing to fast food that I know in and out is fast food. I get that, but I don't it's not fast food.
Speaker 1:I don't classify it as that.
Speaker 2:That's the only I don't mean I haven't had anything since before cancer. I haven't had no mcdonald's, or so we're talking like five in and out I'll eat that that's not fast food.
Speaker 1:Exactly that is the best freaking hamburger you can get in, a quick and in the cheapest.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, I love, we love it.
Speaker 1:You know how you could. I always use them from an analogy. You know why. You know why in and out burger is successful and are cheap? Cause they do one fucking thing, and they do it to perfection.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, their menu is small perfection. They just have a very limited menu, and this is what we do.
Speaker 1:That's the you may, that's, then you do it to perfection, yeah, so, yeah, that's, uh, uh. So we're recording on a monday, actually we're recording on a tuesday our schedule that are kind of whacked out because the memorial, uh, we are. We tuesday, tuesday night, or tuesday after our meeting, and last night nathan come walking in. Who?
Speaker 2:nathan's been on the phone.
Speaker 1:Sorry, our Monday night meeting was last night and Nathan come walking in last night and he looks fucking amazing dude. I can't get over that guy. Watching his transition is incredible and transformation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that transformation is just incredible, hey and if you don't got to see, because we got to go watch him grapple, Because me and him, he and I Right Came in in April. So we're what a month in. We're like four weeks into this Right, and I didn't. I did not compete Him, Jason, why did you not compete?
Speaker 1:I was shape.
Speaker 2:I wanted to make sure all my ducks in a row. There you go, bullshit Anyway. It was bullshit Anyway, but Nathan had to go.
Speaker 1:Let me ask you he got pushed and, man, it was beautiful. Did you happen to watch the class you would have been in, or the weights? I watched every class but did you watch the one you would have been in? Yeah, you should have won.
Speaker 2:I wouldn't have broke a sweat.
Speaker 1:Were you in Jason's? Because when I talked to Eric about it he said Jason shouldn't have broke a sweat either. He didn't.
Speaker 2:No, because it's not fair for me and Jason to compete against each other. We wouldn't do that anyway, right.
Speaker 1:Would you have been in his same class?
Speaker 2:No, jason's, heavier Jason was in 205s, I would be 168s. Oh you're way smaller. Yeah, would you have lost to go down? Yeah, well, I walk. I mean, when I wake up in the morning I'm 178 gotcha every day. Okay, you know throughout the day of what I eat and drink I usually right. I don't get much above 182, right with clothes on right. Yeah, I'd go down to 68 because I don't you can lose that quick, huh yeah, just water, shit, that is true.
Speaker 1:Sweat is true, that is true. So I also another kind of update. I talked to remember a while back we had Rachel Berry on Dr Berry.
Speaker 2:Yeah, isn't she a? Not yet.
Speaker 1:So I reached out to her today because she's been on my mind a lot right and I'm like, well, I want to get her back on.
Speaker 1:And so I reached out to her today just trying to figure out where she's at. As far as her my email, or my text to her was. It was are you, dr barry yet? And she goes no, six more weeks. So she's got six more weeks and I said, okay, when you're doctor, you're coming on. She goes deal. And I said, but this time in studio. And she says deal. So that'd be awesome. I want her in here. So bad, because there's so much more from her podcast and we've had so much on since then that I would just love to get, and now we can actually call her a doctor and it's going to be awesome, yeah, so I want to get her in here.
Speaker 1:So, anyways, I wanted to go over a couple topics rob, we are, we, we are recording this to, we're going to get into memorial weekend, and and then then we have two more guests coming on in when we record next time. So this is our last one together. Next time we're going to record, we're going to have a couple of guests, so right, so, but I wanted to bring something up that we talked about last night, a couple of things that we're going to go over and just try to try to keep your temper to a minimum, a minimum. It try to keep your temper to a minimum, a minimum. It's not. It's not anger, it's passion. What did, uh, what did mike call it he?
Speaker 2:calls it um, um, damn it. Yeah, it's in the bible. What does the bible say?
Speaker 1:zealous, zealous, very zealous not a zealot no with a t zealous so which is fun, because I've said this multiple times that yeah, you guys do this shit just times?
Speaker 2:Yeah, do you guys do this shit? What Do you guys bring this shit up? Just to get a rise?
Speaker 1:I don't, I'm going to get a rise out of Rob Well you know what I always do is I will, every once in a while, I'll look at Doug and go watch this, watch this. He was triggered.
Speaker 2:Just to see how, but that. But the Andrew thing was good. I'm glad he was there.
Speaker 1:No, and that's what I kind of want to go to right, Because when we got into that a few podcasts back, we talked about triggers and we went down that road and we kind of got into it a little bit with the same guy that he's talking about triggers and he's, he went out, he tried to do some experimenting. Again he went out trying to see if he could survive went out trying to see if he could survive, right and uh, he realized that the alcohol was treating him the same way as it did before.
Speaker 2:He realized there was no trigger.
Speaker 1:He drank because he was alcoholic right and not spiritually fit right, so he came in find roy rogers horse this time go fucking figure so he came in last night and, uh, he was there, the top, you know, we were basically reading through uh into action and I think he, he, when we were talking about the amends, you know he was, he stopped and one of the things he said it was he brought up.
Speaker 1:Well, how do you make you know, because he's obviously done this a couple times and his thing was well, I've already made my amends to all the people that I've, you know these last two times that I've went out, I I didn't do anything to anybody, so do I go back and make the same amends all over again? And I think you made a very valid point and I was thinking it and I think, doug, I think multiple, there's multiple, multiple people in a thing, the same thing. And well, motherfucker, obviously you didn't get to the bottom of the problem, right, you didn't get to the bottom of the problem right, you didn't get to the bottom of something, so how?
Speaker 1:free, do you want? To be right? And well, I think. What kind of triggered that was this? We have that word, we have. No, that's not where I wanted to go. Um, that's not where I wanted to go. This is another subject. But what, um, what, that part, right, there is what? And I'm we, we stayed on that for quite a while, right?
Speaker 2:well, we went to 102 about having an alcoholic mind, because it brings that up twice on page uh right, uh 42, I believe. And then page 101 talks about you know, you can't shield a man from drinking. You can't, you can't move away from it. It's, it's everywhere. If a man can't handle certain situations, he still has an alcoholic mind. There's something wrong with his spiritual status, which is a fact, and we've seen that. I mean the beautiful thing about our little test subjects in our, our, our Monday night meeting. There's people of different. You got Scott with 30 plus years, pat with 30 plus years, me in the middle, doug with 21s, john with 21.
Speaker 1:Right, there's a lot of sobriety in that room.
Speaker 2:But then younger guys too, and look at Gabriel going out Right and then coming back in. Okay, Gabe, walk us through it, and it's identical with the book Same thing, same thing, and he's disappeared again. Andrew, walk us through it, it's exactly what.
Speaker 1:So it just drives home how accurate, right our basic text is and it goes back to another thing I've said and one of the things that's roughest thing for me to say is and I may have talked about it on the podcast already and if I have, I apologize, but it's true and it's hard- to hear.
Speaker 2:If it's true, don't ever apologize, because they need to hear.
Speaker 1:No, and I know but some people judge us by some of the words we say I love to be dressed shit, you know there. You know there was a gentleman just passed away and he hung himself here a while back and sober living.
Speaker 1:Yes, I wasn't going to. Yes, he was in sober living when it happened and he hung himself. And I was talking to one of the guys that knew him very well and my response was you know, listen, this is going to be very hard for you to hear, but understand this. Some of us have to die so other of us may live. I mean remember being told that when I was fairly new into sobriety, I'm like, well, that's a fucked up thing to say I remember ripping and we've talked about this because I chewed out an old-timer at the oakton meeting.
Speaker 2:His name was uh, well, he's dead now. Praise night, no, stop it rob, rob it okay, I'm, I'm, I just I just backed up. I shouldn't say that right.
Speaker 1:Forgive me, lord he's a.
Speaker 2:He was a dick. He was an old, dry dick sorry he was and he had the same share. Every time you're going to hear about his ex-wife. The two ex-wives the one that got the retirement is to half his retirement, then the second ex-wife I don't care if the topic was love. You're going to hear about these two women. One got the house, one got half the retirement. That's all you're going to hear from Frank, but one time he said that there was a person whose friend died or killed themselves, and he said that to this newcomer.
Speaker 1:Well, some of us got to live Newcomer and that's bullshit.
Speaker 2:None of us have to die. No, we don't have to, we choose to. Is it going to happen? Right, it seems to Right, but just the way he said it, well, some of us like it's acceptable.
Speaker 1:Don't accept that bullshit.
Speaker 2:It doesn't have to happen either.
Speaker 1:No, it's not. It sucks, but I get what you're saying, but it's some of us. I, I know this. We were close. Yes, sir, I mean when I see somebody else go out, not even go out and do any damage, they just go out and come right back in and everything you know. They're right back where they were, they didn't lose anything. But they go out and they come back in and seeing that broke look on their face, right it reminds me why I'm not going to fucking do it. Do it right. I don't want to fucking do that again.
Speaker 2:I don't know if I can make it back again. Quite honestly, I don't have. I'm sure I got another drunk in me, but I don't have another, no, and I say that all the time.
Speaker 1:Listen, I walk around with all these fucking tattoos on me because and I you know why I do all this it's insurance for me, because if I fucking do all this, motherfucker, I ain't gonna go drink again. Because if I go to drink I gotta look down at this fucking arm and I gotta go.
Speaker 2:What the fuck really pay some money to get that date change.
Speaker 1:You ain't fucking lying and I ain't doing it right. Not today, not today, all right. It's like we said this morning that the the bills, what they ever put. Dude, what you put, deja vu. Oh my god, I fucking died laughing. That was fucking, fucking groundhog day again for the same guy byron, I fucking love you, but you don't read our fucking group text. Read the motherfucker before you start posting. God bless it, but put the can down, jeet. Stop start reading, stop, damn it don't double text damn it.
Speaker 1:That was that. Your response this morning was fucking hilarious, but anyways, yeah, we gotta see. I mean it for me when I see it.
Speaker 2:It just, you know it reminds me, but it doesn't have to happen. But it's going to happen because you know that's just the way things are, that's humans are right, yeah and they're like scouts, right, that's what we call them, right?
Speaker 1:you know they come back in with everyone stuck in their ass.
Speaker 2:Hey, it still don't work, right. Alcohol still fucking you up. I'll stay sober then.
Speaker 1:Thank you for that information but they make it back, right, some of them don't, right? That's what I, that's what I told andrew last night. I go, we're just glad to hear you're back, you're just glad you're back. You're gonna take some shit from us, just like poor aaron does, right? Yeah, we love that, we love you. You, prick, stop doing it. But if we didn't love you we wouldn't even know. No, no, you know, that's what I, you know, I love fucking aaron to death. But, god damn it, dude, fuck, come on, you know, and I, I love that guy to death and everything I want, everything I have I'd give to him to to make sure he doesn't do that again. But anyways, that that was something I wanted to talk about but again we are.
Speaker 2:We have such a big the meeting now, our monday night group is what? 20 giving? There was 22 of us there last night and that's not even a fold up. No, no, but it's such a big enough testing pool. I hate to say it that way, but you don't know a thousand percent.
Speaker 1:There's a meetings that aren't that big, no, but the beautiful thing is every, every experience.
Speaker 2:We've had the good ones, right, and the bad ones. I wouldn't say the bad experiences, but the learning ones. You know, these guys go back out and they drink when they were doing everything. We tell you, we go right to the book oh, here's where you were, oh, and then they see it, and it just not only does it drive home that our basic text is true, but hopefully they glean a little bit more, they gain a little bit more trust in these words hey, you know, and next time they're not, they're watching someone else do it right.
Speaker 1:Hey, I've already learned that lesson because I trust what's in here now anyways, that's a little bit of something I wanted to talk about and cover last night. Like I said, we we try to drop every week, so sometimes we just throw topics in and that's basically what we're doing and the other thing. So, oh, wait a minute, I wanted to read this. This is what you were talking about. If you have been successful in solving your own domestic problems, tell the newcom newcomers. Blah, blah, blah, blah. That's not what. Uh, no, it's right here. Uh, assume we are spiritually fit, we can do all sorts of yep.
Speaker 1:We're going right at the bottom of 100, 100, 101. Yeah, assuming we are spiritually fit, we can do all sorts of things Alcohol People have said. We must not go where liquor is served. We must not have in our homes. We must shun friends who drink. We must avoid moving pictures which show drinking scenes. We must not go into bars. Our friends must hide their bottles if we go to their house. We must think. We must mustn't think or be reminded about alcohol at all. Our experience shows that this is not necessarily so. We meet all these conditions every day. An alcoholic who cannot meet them still has an alcoholic mind.
Speaker 2:Finish the next sentence.
Speaker 1:There is something wrong with his spiritual status. His only chance has an alcoholic mind. There is something the matter with his spiritual status. His only chance of sobriety would be someplace like the Greenland ice cap. Alcoholic mind. There is something the matter with his spiritual status. His only chance of sobriety would be someplace like the Greenland ice cap. And even there in Eskimo might turn up with a bottle of Scott and ruin everything. Right, that's so. That's where we got into last night with with Andrew. Right, we were talking about that. It's like cause, that's obvious, right, well.
Speaker 1:I mean we, we stay spiritually right, there's something wrong with your spiritual status, right, and if you feel like I mean you don't have, you haven't, but it's good. Basically, what he was saying last night is I haven't had any contact with anybody. Yeah, I haven't.
Speaker 2:I know resentment's the number one offender, but I really had didn't hurt anybody. Okay then, but you've been walking on it because of what he's been sharing this which we saw coming right when you brought the trigger bullshit in the meeting, right? That's why the look I had on my face.
Speaker 2:And then, what four weeks later he was out, not due to what he said, he was right, not, you know his little trigger. He never tripped over that. He just went and drank, just drank, left a fucking meeting of alcoholics, went and got a bottle. Right, there's something wrong with your spiritual status.
Speaker 1:You didn't do something, you didn't clean up something so that you know what does it say in the steps, if we let go absolute right, absolutely, the very bottom. If you let go absolute absolutely right, right here. Uh, at some of these we balked that we thought we could find an easier, softer way, but we could not. With all the earnestness, as our command, we beg of you to be fearless and thorough. From the very start, some of us had tried to hold onto our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Right, 100%, now. Okay, now would you read about the Greenland ice cap, you know, um, staying spiritually fit, something wrong with the spiritual fitness. What does that? What page does that take you right back to? Because now, where did bill first drive that home? Page 84, 85, you know, we're talking about the 10th step, where it says uh, oh, I'm gonna go back. I'm gonna start on page 85, where it says this is how we react so long as we keep in fit spiritual condition. Oh, shit, shit. How do we react? Let's find out.
Speaker 2:And we have ceased fighting anything or this is the 10th step anything or anyone, even alcohol. For by this time sanity will ever turn. We will seldom be interested in liquor, promise. If tempted, we recoil from it as if from a hot flame. We react sanely and normally, and we will find that this has happened automatically. We will see that our new attitude towards liquor has been given us without any thought or effort on our part. It just comes.
Speaker 2:We're not fighting it. This is the miracle of it. We are not fighting it, neither are we avoiding temptation. We feel as though we've been placed in a position of neutrality, safe and protected. We have not even sworn off Larry. Instead, the problem has been removed by God, it does not exist for us. We are neither cocky, prideful, nor are we afraid, fearful. This is our experience. This is how we react, so long as we keep in spit the fit spiritual condition, right. So if you're spiritually fit, that's how you should react right. And if you go above the two chapter, the two paragraphs above that, what I started will tell you how to to stay on a daily basis in fit spiritual condition.
Speaker 1:Right, it's simple, so I mean so either he didn't have a sponsor that explained that very well to him, or he didn't let go absolutely, or he didn't do it thorough and that's you know with my sponsor the other day, when we were going through his fifth step.
Speaker 1:I was like, okay, is that it? And we would talk for a little bit. The other day, when we were going through his fifth step, I was like, okay, is that it? And we would talk for a little bit. He's like, well, there is this other thing. Okay, is that it? No, there is this other thing. And then we would talk for a little while. Is that, it, is that it now? We remember then I'd go back and read that we got to let go, absolute right, this is it. How free do you want to be? Yeah, so obviously somebody didn't read him. You know, get him through that he decided he did.
Speaker 2:I would assume listening to him yeah, I've done the steps really well. He said last night.
Speaker 1:He said last night that he he needs to go back through him.
Speaker 2:He obviously didn't do him right yeah right, so I mean clean house I know a good sponsor his name is rob dude you need to walk him through. He's well. I've got derrick on Mondays and I've got-.
Speaker 1:Our audience has no fucking idea who we're talking about.
Speaker 2:Lauren going on Thursdays? No, but I do, I know, and they're both kind of right neck and neck, so I'm getting ready for a new one. I'm ready.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and they're killing it yeah. I mean I'm about done with Blake so anyways, but see, so no, anyways, but hey, but see, but here's, and here's the thing but I ain't taking another one unless god drops one of me.
Speaker 2:But but again, okay, remember I don't even remember the cat's name was. He'd come to our meeting once he came in struggling. Remember his dad I mean, I don't even remember the guy's name was. He was there. He was at the thursday meeting. This is maybe three months ago, two months ago, and his dad had the rooms he needs to get sober. He lives right in the apartments right by the room. I don't remember what that guy's name was.
Speaker 1:I don't either.
Speaker 2:Remember I know what I need to do. I need to work these.
Speaker 1:I know.
Speaker 2:But he left that meeting without a sponsor. He left our Monday meeting without a sponsor. All right, you know you don't want help, knows he needs to work his again. There's a media, there's Scott. I mean last night there was 12, 13 guys that could take him to the steps. Oh, easily Capable.
Speaker 1:Very capable, did he ask one of them? No, no. So how bad do you want to be free? How free do you want to be?
Speaker 2:And how bad do you want to be free?
Speaker 1:Right, everyone wants to be free, but are you willing to?
Speaker 2:humble yourself and say I need help.
Speaker 1:Just not done. No, get finished. All right, here we go. We have no right to save our own skin to another person Expense. Start that again. I interrupted. Sorry, it's all right, I should have said the page.
Speaker 2:But really emphasize, because listen to the language Bill uses. This is the first time he's going to mention this in a short. I mean we're talking about in a probably a six page. You know he's gonna mention it three times in three different ways because he wants to get this point.
Speaker 1:Well, that's why I'm trying to.
Speaker 2:I'm opening this up for you Emphasize it.
Speaker 1:I'm opening this up for you because you did an amazing job explaining this last night, and this is where it started. We have no right to save our own skin at another person's expense. Such parts of our story we tell to someone who will understand, yet be unaffected, the rule we must be hard on ourselves but always consider it of others, right.
Speaker 2:Now, what does he do? This is talking about amends, right. When we go, by the time you get to the ninth step, this is the first time your sponsor actually let you go out into the fucking world. Right, and you know and interact with people. Right, and some guys are prepared for that and ready to go because you've prepped them. Some guys you've got to hey hold on, and a lot of guys when they get in and you've got to know your guy's personality. Oh for sure, when they get into the fire, what are they going to do?
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:They're going to bring someone else's name involved, shit like that. And then what does Bill say on page if you go to, if it wasn't again, you've got to cover all this before you get to go out. Oh yeah, so Bill finds out on page 78. No, I'm sorry, not 78. It's 79. Usually this is what Five pages after what you read, right? Usually, however, other people are involved. Oh, we just heard.
Speaker 1:Okay go ahead Go ahead, all right.
Speaker 2:Therefore, we are not to be the hasty and foolish martyr who would needlessly sacrifice others to save himself from the alcoholic pit. Oh, then turn the page. Bill's want to hit you one more fucking time before I let you go out into the world, because you can do this is why I sparked you. Get it. Before taking drastic actions which may implicate another person, secure their consent. If we have obtained permission, have consulted with others asking God to help, and the drastic step indicated, we must not shrink, then okay, okay, now go. Because, right, we I've seen, I've seen and I've heard, but I've seen personally, which I shared that one story last night.
Speaker 2:People do so much damage right by going out and not being not being prepared for the night step, and it's so simple. That's why we don't say we're sorry, right, xyz, behavior was wrong, please forgive me. What can I do to make it right? And whether or not they forgive you has got. No, you're there to clean off your side of the street the best you can. That's all you need to say. Right, then you just take what they've got, but well, well, so-and-so did this and you've got to prepare them for that, because they can do. I've seen marriages get destroyed by a bad, by a faulty night step, Tell that story.
Speaker 1:Tell that story I mean there's no names involved, because it's true. I mean, listen, this subject came up right. This subject came up because-.
Speaker 2:I was asked to give an example because I've sponsored a lot of men. Here's the example. Thank, you. Go through the step. Uh, we'll just find that place in the book where it says you know if sex is involved. It says you know if there was uh, if there was a fair, do you do if the wife doesn't know about? The big book says do you tell her?
Speaker 2:not necessarily so, and it talks about certain talking about infidelity but this is, you know, the big book says not necessarily we don't, we don't bring it up if she knows, in a way that you've been wild in each situation, but the big big book's pretty specific on it. But this is what happened A gentleman had an affair on his wife. Right, it was a one-time deal, he didn't bring no diseases home, nothing like that. She didn't know about it. He got sober. We worked through the steps and I told him what the big book was about. We went through the book and what the book is clear on, that good, we went through the book and what the book is clear on, that Good he was about.
Speaker 2:And then, but they, and he goes well, rob, you know, because and I cause I have men who they have things like there there's, there's some things that I can't, I never could get to. My my parents are dead. There are certain things that some of us have to walk with right, have to walk with Right. You know, and God will give you the strength to walk with it. Don't fucking repeat the behavior. Right, god will give you the strength, but you have no right to hurt another human being. You know, to get the monkey off your back To save your soul. Yeah, so the guilt and the shame was eating this guy alive? Yeah, because he, and so he went After eight months. He was eight months sober yeah, he was eight months sober. Did right, right, but he made a decision based on guilt, fear and shame and remorse, not on truth.
Speaker 1:Right, not on faith.
Speaker 2:Okay, that's what he did. He was just because his pain was so much he had to give it to her.
Speaker 1:To give her the pain.
Speaker 2:So she tried, he did. Basically that's what he did I'm gonna pour this on you.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna pour this poison that's in me on you yeah because because he didn't, he didn't believe this and he didn't trust in god to let, because they I know men that are walking with some shit that this, then that makes this look like nothing right, and god gives them and they are amazing men of god today. So ever so. About six later. So he makes it a year and the wife. They try to work it out, but she eventually just can't.
Speaker 1:She can't get past it. No, can't get past it.
Speaker 2:They get divorced. He had two beautiful little girls. Still does. I don't know if he might be drunk now. Still is. I'm sure he is. I don't know he is. I hope he's sober. I don't think he is. Pray for him Doesn't matter. So after the divorce and they're working out, you know, and I'm still, he's still. He was still sober at the time but he made it by, I think, like a year and three months. The wife said this. I wish you hadn't told me. I mean in a lot stronger words. She says we were happy, right, you were sober. You know it happened. Okay.
Speaker 1:He would eventually went and got drunk. You didn't, but you no.
Speaker 2:What I just tell you. With that guilt? No, if you would have worked it the way you're supposed to work it, no, no, no. Him carrying that guilt, don't carry it. It's not yours to carry, no but he was carrying it Right, but that's my point. And he made a decision based on guilt, fear, shame, remorse. If he had kept holding that on.
Speaker 1:Well, it's fine Today. More than that, a lot more than that you don't need to say detail, but God gives them the strength to do that Because number one the behavior cannot repeat Right. I've talked to guys that if they said it out loud to some people they'd be in jail for a while.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Yeah, and I would never say this story, but the wife's reply was saying something Right, I wish you hadn't told me we were happy, because when I said these are her words, honey you didn't bring any diseases home to me. You know gratefully I didn't know. Sometimes ignorance is bliss. I wish you wouldn't have told me.
Speaker 1:Everything was good. Everything was good. He just couldn't get through his own shit.
Speaker 2:He just couldn't let it be good, Right, he let the pain and the guilt wear up in him. Okay, I'm going to pour this shit on you. That's where Bill writes we don't have the fucking right. Don't go to your mom, man. Mom, I really want you to. There's some things that even if my parents were alive, I would not tell them. They don't need to hear it. I'll walk with that. They don't need to know that. I'm not going to get the monkey off my and have that working in my mother's head.
Speaker 1:Right, won't do it no.
Speaker 2:I'll walk with it and my Lord will give me the strength.
Speaker 1:Right, that's what I'm talking about. I get it. I completely get it. Yeah, I think on my side, just in the thought process, because I thank God I never had to deal with that. No, hey, thank.
Speaker 2:God, thank God. Right, but there are men that deal with that, and then they deal with it well right right so you just hope and pray that you know that I would have right.
Speaker 1:God forbid that. I mean I I think that's my biggest hang up on that is I know what my guilt would be doing to me, but I also know how hard I worked to get rid of that stuff.
Speaker 2:How's your, how's your guilt from the way you lived your life before, I mean even?
Speaker 1:oh, it's gone. It's gone. Why wouldn't the other one? It's so. Why wouldn't God remove the other one? I mean, you hurt your wife right.
Speaker 2:Did you hurt your? You didn't hurt your wife. I did I hurt my wife too.
Speaker 1:Okay, I think there's levels of hurt. There may be, but it depends. But I mean, that's a whole different level of hurt.
Speaker 2:Maybe Right, you I?
Speaker 1:mean, I'm not defending what he did or didn't.
Speaker 2:Or didn't? He made a choice and his choice had consequences.
Speaker 1:Right, right and it's just. I think what I look at is like I can't judge. You know, we've had a guy, we've had guys come in. I'll still not forget this. We went up to Knights.
Speaker 2:Ferry Diane's reply. Sorry, we went up there and it was's ferry.
Speaker 1:We went up there and we um and it was a couple of days before, like a few weeks before Christmas hey, this old chap, come in After you get done.
Speaker 2:I want to. I want to follow up on something I'm going Well, go, okay, cause you'll forget, you old fucker. You're probably right. I've also seen this work in reverse. That's the story I just gave you, because right now, any woman listen to this podcast. Oh, he was right to tell her. He's right. I've also had not me, this is not me. This is a friend of mine. Female had the same thing, but the reverse. The wife had had an affair. She actually had two affairs going on at the same time. However, she ended him, she got sober, didn't bring nothing home to the husband and again, things were going great, things were going fantastic, but she, right, and the husband more or less said the same kind of thing. So so did I, because I, I can, I can hear people. Well, you see what he, he, she, he was right to do that now. Now it's reverse females. I've seen women do the same thing I don don't know, Should she Again?
Speaker 2:and each situation's different. I just showed him what was in the book, showed him what other men have done and shared with him, what some other men no names, but what they're walking with, and he's like, oh damn, exactly. So give it some time, let's pray about it. If God's clear, god will be clear, right, but not all the time do we become the martyr? Right, look at me.
Speaker 1:Right, because you, which you just did, yeah, what he did was and you're, and you're a thousand percent right he made himself feel better at the pain of somebody that's expensive, someone right, and that's that's not if your motives.
Speaker 2:If your motives are, because motives are everything with god and this motives are everything why are you doing what you're doing? Is it to ease your comfort?
Speaker 1:It's all it was. Is it to ease?
Speaker 2:your conscience.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Is it the right thing to do then?
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Are you doing it for truth? Are you doing it for what's right? I mean, there are circumstances where, yeah, hey, the utmost frankness is absolutely ready to happen, and there are times when it's not.
Speaker 1:Right, right Right. And that's what it talks about, number nine. Right, what I was getting at is, you know, I I think about stuff like this. Like Mike and Kim went through, you know, and Jason and Jason went through, you know, I was listening to him. We, like I said, we went into Knights Ferry and it was a little bit before Christmas, I think, and it was probably like a week before Christmas, and I'm thinking to myself, god bless you, how the fuck would I handle that?
Speaker 2:Exactly the way he did. Where should he be?
Speaker 1:I pray, I pray that Into the rooms around his men, and I get it. But I'm also saying the same thing is I don't know how I'd have reacted if I'd have had. You know, once again, we don't know how we're going to react until we're put into that situation. So I can't judge somebody. I don't want to.
Speaker 2:That's right, right.
Speaker 1:I and this is why because I know you well enough, rob, that you we're not judging that guy and what he did, no, what we feel his actions were wrong, but we didn't have to live in his shoes and we don't know what he would have done with that guilt. Hey, guilt kills people. Yes, guilt makes people hang themselves and drink them right to death.
Speaker 2:So guilt is a horrible fucking thing to live with.
Speaker 1:Remorse all how you deal with it correct is is of the utmost importance. Right, don't do any more damage than needed to somebody else. Yeah, right, and that, I think, is the biggest key coming out.
Speaker 2:I'm not saying every situation is cookie cutter, because it isn't for sure but I believe his was, I believe, I believe he handled it poorly because his motives are wrong right and I don't.
Speaker 1:I don't, once again not disagreeing with you. I don't know how I would have, I know how my guilt gets me. Even if I, even if I shrink one of my wife's shirts in the dryer because I wasn't supposed to dry it and I fold it and hide it, that would guilt me till I fucking had to pull it out. See, I fucking shrinked your shirt, you know I just I can't, I wouldn't even.
Speaker 2:I just show it, right? Hey, babe, look what I just did. I know I better find it. Did you just? Yeah, I did it, I did it. My guilt is fucking. I won't even feel it. I ain't got to feel no guilt.
Speaker 1:No, I probably would have done, that's probably would, but it ain't fucking another guy's wife or you know fucking around, it's just not that. I mean there's levels of that, there's levels, so I don't know how that I mean.
Speaker 2:My wife thinks pornography, if I, if I was to watch pornography, that that's cheating.
Speaker 1:I don't disagree with her, don't disagree with, I do, I don't watch it, but you know, but still, hey, okay, I do, uh, midget porn, just kidding, that's comedy, just kidding. Hey, that's comedy, just kidding.
Speaker 2:That's not, that's funny, there's no point, but we need to talk about that because a lot of the men I sponsored a lot of them.
Speaker 2:You're not one of them, but also struggle with that oh for sure, and that's something when I go through this you know when I especially after they get sober, when I go through the sex inventory, because that's one of the things I bring up hey, how are you with pornography, right? Is that? Well, shit robin, I'm kind of not. I'm working on, okay, then that's something. Then right, then we right, it's a great time just to just for anybody, turn the steps and let's start working a little bit of that, right, because that's poison. There's more stuff out there that's poison. Absolutely, that's as much poison as whiskey or drugs. Yeah, It'll destroy marriages.
Speaker 1:It'll destroy marriages.
Speaker 2:It'll destroy lives. It's terrible yeah.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, there's my we see.
Speaker 2:I've seen my public broadcast, but I've seen guys destroy their lives.
Speaker 1:I mean, yes, I've watched it, even when I was still drinking. I've just like did you cheat on him? No, what. What happened? I couldn't stop looking at porn. What the fuck?
Speaker 2:is wrong with you I mean, it's a, it's a, it's an addiction.
Speaker 1:It's crazy, I mean I'm sitting here drinking my probably 100th beard and judging him for looking at porn. The addiction's the same. Yeah, there's difference.
Speaker 2:It's just as destructive so is my alcohol and God's just as big Right. So tie him in if you can. That's just something to think about next time you sponsor someone. Right, ask him Right.
Speaker 1:Recovering on Filter Podcast at gmailcom. Rob anything else, Not that I can make it you done yelling at me?
Speaker 2:No, I didn't yell. Did I get in? No, no.
Speaker 1:I love getting you riled up, but I do. I still want to do a whole series of podcasts.
Speaker 2:Would I jump from page to page Just?
Speaker 1:when you go the way you flip from like Bill. You got such a grasp on how Bill writes and you remember that book so well. I want to do a whole series of a podcast where we just literally dig into that kind of stuff and just have you record it, because I think it's. I think it's very valuable and I love when you do it. It's hard to keep up with you, but if it's recorded people can go back and forth.
Speaker 2:Well, like the meetings, because we're going, it's just spontaneous because it is it's hard to say.
Speaker 2:Well, because in my, my mother's care, I'm just having me on page 77 here which, if you want to know for everybody, on the top of page 77 tells you what your purpose is and it's not just me and I'll tell you what it is. It says our real purpose, not our fake one. Our real purpose is to talk to the alcoholics and this is the way we're supposed to live. Our real purpose is to fit ourselves, to be of maximum service to God and the people about us. It's got nothing to do with us. All right, and if you want to go to page 102.
Speaker 1:Here we go See, this is what I love.
Speaker 2:We'll go to page 102, because Bill wants to drive something home to you, so he spreads it out just enough. And again, some of you want to say it's inspired. I don't know what you want to say, but what does it say on page 102? Your job you know that this is at the bottom third. Or says your job now, right, your job now is to be at the place where you may be. Of mac, there's a word here's how you know he's got the same thought maximum, right. He doesn't say services has helpfulness, but maximum is there. So you know he's touching.
Speaker 2:He's touching back on right, yeah, of maximum healthiness to others. So never hesitate to go anywhere. If you can be helpful, you should not hesitate to visit the most sordid spot on earth. Listen to that.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:On such an errand. Keep on the fiery line of life with these motives and God will keep you unharmed. That's a fucking promise, right, that's a promise better than anything in the night, step Right. Listen to that. Go to to any sort of spot with your motive, correct right of help and service that's with anything remorse help and service and god will keep you in harm.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely. That's a promise. Love it see. That's where I would love to do like a whole series of you grabbing, just like you're already digging at something else well, because every page, every margin has a number a page number so you can go back and see how these things tie in, because it's important.
Speaker 2:When Bill repeats something, or anybody, when the Bible repeats it, it's for effect, because and it's not just willy nilly it's because we have seen people. I have seen people. I know people have destroyed marriages, destroyed their lives, doing things for the wrong reasons not necessarily the wrong thing, but you did it with the wrong motive right the motive which is makes what makes it wrong right, absolutely so, and destroy things when you could be living a happy, joyous life right now, you fucking pussy there you go sorry, that's you cut that out.
Speaker 2:That's wrong, but that's again just you're good because I know, I mean I'm so grateful to God because I know guys walking with, walking with stuff, you know, and man, and they are the most used of. God but not that they're the most used men of God, that I know. He who loves much has been forgiven much right. He who loves little has been forgiven little Right.
Speaker 1:So trust me, atta boy, yeah, I love you, so keep you know, stay on the firing lines and God will keep you unharmed and don't ever make a decision based on fear, guilt, shame, remorse, If it's not truth, if it's not fact walk with it. Right, there you go. Recovery on filter podcast at gmailcom. That's recoveryonfilterpodcasts at gmailcom. We'll come back in a week If you're lucky. Thank you for joining us today. We hope you learned something today that will help you If you did not come back next week, and we'll try again.
Speaker 2:If you like what we heard, give us a five-star review. If you don't like what you heard, kiss my ass. I can't say that, can you? Anyway, if you don't like what you heard, go ahead and tell us that too. We'll see what we can improve. We probably won't change nothing, but do it anyway.
Speaker 1:Thanks, rob. Come back next week and hopefully something will be different and something will sink in. Take care, this has been Recovery Unfiltered. Thank you.