The Neurobiology of a Miracle: Understanding the Brains Role in Recovery | Gary K at City on a Hill DFW

Neurobiology of a Miracle: Understanding the Brain's Role in Recovery

Gary K's Journey: Two-Way Prayer, Addiction Recovery, and Brain Science Join Gary K, a national AA speaker, AA historian, and Hazelden published author, as he shares his powerful insights on addiction recovery, brain science, and the practice of two-way prayer. In this engaging talk, Gary discusses the ancient roots of two-way prayer, the neuroscience behind addiction, and the transformative steps he took to achieve sobriety.   Learn about the role of spirituality in recovery, how to manage addiction through daily practices, and the profound impact of helping others.   Want to bring Gary K to your next event? Call or Text Robert W at 616-489-0084 or visit Gary's website at www.garykrecovery.com for more information today!    #AddictionRecovery #TwoWayPrayer #BrainScience #AASpeaker #SpiritualAwakening #RecoveryJourney #Sobriety #GaryK

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
I practiced two-way prayer.
Yes sir. I've been doing that for years.
Oxford.
Yes.
It actually comes from first centuryChristian practices and uh, it's
been used for thousands of years.
You know, bill reallydidn't create anything.
He just put numbers on it.
Tools and principles havebeen around for centuries.

(00:21):
You know, life was two-way prayer.
Terry.
Two-way prayer.
So my prayer life, first of all,I wake up every morning with
anxiety every single morning.
I can't even tell you what I say'cause you'll all be offended.
Um, what comes out?
My mouth and my eyes open.
I go hurry.

(00:42):
And I have to pray my way outta bed.
It's the only way I can get out of bed.
And that's a gift.
Yes sir. That's a gift.
'cause it gets me connected.
I have to, or I'm in pain, youknow, I pray my way out bed.
And I have an aromatherapy machine.
I have this routine.
It's on a credenza right near my bed.

(01:03):
I hit that.
I put on some, uh, music, tell Alexa toplay, I don't know, Chopin or something.
And um, and I got the aromatherapy going.
And I have a chair in my room witha little table, little bistro table
next to it with a notebook and a pen.

(01:23):
And I'm in the altogether.
And I sit in the chair and I meet Godas the big book instructs us first,
uh, we read some spiritual literature.
Um, it says we relax and takeit easy because we don't want
stress to block the signal.
And in order to be effective intwo-way prayer, I must live in step 10.

(01:49):
'cause the first several roundsof steps removed all the garbage.
That was blocking me from God.
That removed steps four through nine,take that blockage away, and then
practicing step 10 on the daily.
I defy you to not change If you'repracticing that step every day.
It is a change agent.

(02:10):
It's a transformation step.
It is not a maintenancestep, it's a growth step.
So practicing that, uh, you know,
if you go home and you make chickentonight, I guarantee you when you
put that carcass in the trash can,you're gonna take that trash out.
'cause that's gonna smelland gnats are gonna come.

(02:31):
It's gonna be all nasty.
You're gonna take that trash out.
So, as Dr. Bob called it, house cleaning,his famous quote, uh, trust God, clean
house, help others, and the book refers.
To it as house cleaning.
So once we've cleaned the vesselout and we've removed the blockage,
that's blocking us from that powerthat is found deep down within

(02:53):
every man, woman, and child.
So we remove all that blockage.
We want to keep that vessel clean now.
So that's where step 10 comes in.
So if I'm doing that, the practice oftwo-way prayer is a phenomenal thing.
Um,
first I talk to God,

(03:15):
that's the prayer part.
That's where I'm doing the talking.
It says, sought throughprayer and meditation to
improve our conscious context.
So what am I meditating on?
I'm not trying to clear my mindof thoughts in two-way prayer.
I'm trying to listen to my thoughts.
I'm trying to hear whatmy brain is saying.
When I lived at the Abbey ofGethsemane, you had to take a vow of

(03:37):
silence, which I didn't do very well.
They eventually asked me to leave.
'cause I couldn't, I couldn'tstop talking a couple of times.
I know I'm going off on atangent a couple of times.
I hitchhiked from the top of themountain in Bardstown down into
Louisville so I could chain smoke andgo to an AA meeting and talk to people.

(04:01):
And I got caught coming back 'causeI'd take my caic off and put on
my Wagner college sweatshirt andmy jeans and grab some smokes and
off I went and I would hitchhike.
And they caught me comingback a couple of times.
But, um, yeah, in that monastery,in that silence for almost
three years, no conversation.

(04:24):
You learn to communicatewith people without talking.
I learned that there are threevoices in my head, three qualities
that chatter that's in your head.
First is what I call the shitty committee.
That's my anxiety, my fear, myself doubt, all of that is part

(04:44):
of the autonomic nervous system.
Those are not thoughts I'm creating.
Those are thoughts that arebeing broadcast by my brain.
Get high, eat, have sex,drink water, go to sleep.
Those are survival actions andliving in fight or flight, the
brain thinks it's protecting us.
So there's that voice and it'stelling me to do things all the time.

(05:09):
And as a neurobiologist, I knowtoday that those thoughts are part
of a complex system that involvesthe hippocampus, the basal ganglia,
and the parietal frontal lobe, whichare all memory areas associated
with action that sustains survival.

(05:31):
For instance, my hippocampus haslearned where to find food, how to
cook it, how to tell if it's spoiled.
It's learned certain foods thatmy body doesn't like, you know,
and that my taste buds don't like.
And it's collected all that information.
And the reason that it'sthere, it's job is to keep me

(05:52):
alive at 15 second intervals.
And to do that, it tellsme it's time to eat.
So two-way prayer quickly beforeI get into the neuroscience.
I'm glad you guys came back.
I have to tell you, my heartraced when you guys walked in.
I was so happy that you all made it here.

(06:13):
You're the most importantpeople in the room.
Yes.
So, um, two-way prayer.
So you clean out the vessel.
The big book says, in thinking about ourday, we think about the 24 hours ahead.

(06:33):
We may face indecision may, wemay not know which course to take.
Here we ask God for an intuitivethought, a divine idea, an
inspiration, or a decision.
And if we're asking for a decision, thatmeans we're gonna have a conversation.
Hence the two way prayer.

(06:56):
I'm, I'm in com.
I, I'm communing with God,expecting a conversation.
I'm an addict, so my lifeis completely unmanageable.
I will have alcoholic addicted thinkingtill I'm in my grave when I'm dead and
in my grave, I'll be a dead alcoholic.
My brain, my entire life will tellme things that are gonna create a

(07:20):
condition in my life that's gonnalead me back to the drinking drug.
And I don't care how many yearsyou have sober, so I gotta
keep, take care of my condition.
One of the most powerful ways to do it.
Remove the guilt, the, the thingsthat cause guilt, shame, remorse,
resentment, anger, and fear.
We learn to live in a way that doesn'tcause pain and suffering for other people.

(07:42):
Therefore, removing, eliminatingthe possibility of guilt, shame,
remorse, resentment, anger, and fear.
We deal with it immediatelybefore it has a chance to us.
And, uh, that reducescortisol levels in the brain.
I'll get to that in a second.
Um, before you guys came back in,they asked what two-way prayer was.
I was talking about thatearlier in my last talk.

(08:04):
I'm telling my story andin my history presentation.
Um, so two-way prayer was used by monksand aesthetics and contemplatives and
popes and, uh, you know, for centuries.
And the, the Oxford Groupresurrected this and Frank Bookman

(08:27):
kind of refined the procedure.
There's a quote from Reverend Dr. FrankBookman, who founded the Oxford Group.
That's where Bill Wilson got sober.
Before there was aa, a handful ofpeople got sober by following the
Oxford six spiritual procedures.
And those spiritual proceduresbecame the 12 steps.

(08:50):
So, um,
so what you do, you clean the vesselout and you practice listening.
And in the monastery, I heardmy autonomic nervous system.
That voice says, I hate you.
I hate me.
I hate life.

(09:11):
Who's gonna feed me?
Who's gonna hold me?
Who's gonna have sex with me?
Who's gonna employ me?
Who's gonna pay for me?
Who's gonna house me?
Who's gonna clothe me, me, me,me, me, me, me, me, me, me.
We cause that call, callthat the bondage of self.
And if I'm making decision basedon that voice I'm living in.
Yeah.
Therefore my brain is floodedwith cortisol and I will
not be able to stay sober.

(09:32):
So I clean out the vessel,lower the cortisol levels.
By doing that, then wepractice conscious contact.
The two strongest things wecan do to treat our addiction
is number one, help others.
Number two, pray and meditate.
No matter what you believe in or don'tbelieve in does not matter if you

(09:57):
take the action, you change how thebrain functions and the cortex starts
producing more glutamate, which weaddicts have a short of shortage of.
And I'll get to that in a second.
Um, so
we ask God for a divine ideaor a decision, an intuitive
thought, and then we listen.

(10:19):
Some days I just say, Hey God, Italked to God like he's my best friend.
'cause he is.
Yeah, he and I say he, 'causeI don't know what else to say.
I don't understand it,but I experience it.
It's a helpful tool.
Keeps me alive and opens doors, does allkinds of sort of magical things, you know?

(10:39):
Um, so two-way prayeris simply getting quiet.
First you relax and let all the stress go.
One technique, often used in two-wayprayer is what we call brain drain.
And you get your notebook that'snext to you and you write all
the garbage that's in your head.
When you first wake up, just writeall that shit out and it takes it

(11:03):
outta your head and onto the paper.
Okay?
That calms the brain down.
Then I do a little bit of breathingthat slows the brain down, and then I
say, okay, what do you got for me today?
What do you want me to do some days?
It's just that sometimesI have a decision to make.

(11:26):
Let's see.
I'm gonna go into this and now I know Igotta be done by five and I can definitely
tell the brain thing in 30 minutes.
So I love that you hadthat big clock back there.
Um,
I'll give you an example.
I just come outta the monastery.
I didn't know what to do with my life.
Wasn't sure whichdirection I was gonna go.

(11:49):
And uh, I started having really badterror errors about this producer.
I tried to beat to death witha chair after I puked on Little
Orphan Annie in a Broadway show.
And, um, I started having nightmaresabout him and I'd never made amends to
that man because I didn't want to go tothis producer being an actor say, oh,

(12:10):
I'm so sorry I did this 'cause he'lljust think I'm trying to get a job.
I wanted to be sure I was done withshow, but I didn't want anything from him
and I'd reached that point in my life.
And I was a priest.
I'm living in a monastery.
I used to be a crack corpsand now I'm a priest.
That's crazy.
It's crazy.

(12:31):
Thank you, God.
Whatever you are.
So, um,
I was having thesenightmares in my sponsor.
Father Edgar Wells said, well, it'stime to make amends to that guy.
So I called him up
and it was a very tenseconversation, and he said, well,

(12:54):
so you've been sober for years.
Why didn't you call me earlier?
I knew you were sober.
I heard from other people.
And what's taking you so long?
We worked together for 25years and I told him why.
And, and I said, can I meet you?
And he said, okay.
Tomorrow Kraft Diner, 10 30.
And he hung up the phone.
He didn't wait for me to say, am I free?

(13:14):
Yes.
Okay.
Yes.
No, that's a good time.
Bad time.
So I was there waitingfor him when he came in.
And he's about this tall.
So we, I'm sitting inthe booth in the diary.
He walks in and we're eye level andhe goes, oh, your eyes are brown.
I always thought they were red.
That was the first thing he said to me.

(13:35):
And he kept jabbing me.
Anyway, we had a long conversation.
There were a lot of tears and we endedup spending the entire day together.
I went to a rehearsal that hewas doing an off-Broadway show.
We went out to dinner and um,when I was beating him with
the chair, he was screaming, Ican't say what he actually said.
I'll tell you, I'll toneit down a little bit.
Um, I'm not your bleep beep friend.

(13:59):
It's show business, not show friends.
I'm not your beep beep friend.
So at the end of the night after thisamends, he walked me back to my apartment
building and I stuck my hand out, shakehis hand, and he goes, gimme a hug.
You big bleep bleep.
And uh, he looked up into myface and he had tears in his
eyes and he said, show friends.

(14:19):
And he had remembered that all those yearslater, you know, and let him off the hook.
So a couple days later he callsme up and he says, Gary, um, I'm
reading about this Amen's business,says, you should be willing to go
to any length and, and do anything.
Uh, so here's what I want you to do.
You really ruined me financiallyfor a long time when you

(14:42):
screwed up that ante gig.
And I would like you to go out on the roadand play the sheriff in the best little
whorehouse in Texas for a year and a half.
And I'm not gonna pay you.
I'll pay for your apartment,your phone, a food per diem, and
a hotel and transportation, butI'm not gonna give you a salary.
And I said, great.
Send the contract over.
And he was like, really?
So I went out and did it, went verywell and I stayed sober and did a, did

(15:06):
a good job and was kind to everybody.
Never had a, never presented one singleheadache to that management staff.
And, uh, worked hard.
I was real proud of it.
So we had, I had just gotten backto New York and I get a call from
him and he says, uh, I just got therights to do the revival of Footloose

(15:26):
on Broadway, and I would like you toplay Reverend Shaw 'cause now you're
a priest, you're a Broadway actor.
We can make a lot of hayout of that in the press.
And, uh, I said, wow, uh, Broadway.
He said, yeah, first there'sa national tour for a year.
I said, what's the tour pay?
And he said, 3,500 a week.
And I said, okay, that's good.

(15:47):
And what about the Broadway thing?
He said, 10 grand a week.
So I said, I'm gonna need to prayand meditate on this two-way prayer.
The book says, we may face indecision.
We may not know which course to take.
Later that same day, I got a phonecall from a man named Seth Rinus and
he said, I saw you do the sheriffat the Kodak Theater in Hollywood.

(16:08):
And, um, I representPrether Entertainment Group.
You saw Tom Prather in the document.
He said, I represent, uh, PratherEntertainment Group and we own dinner
theaters all over America, and we'regonna be doing a tour of the best
little whorehouse in Texas, and wewould like you to come play the sheriff.
I said, dinner theater.
I've never done dinner theater.
That's like, you sell roast beefand people are eating dinner

(16:30):
while you're trying to act.
And I, I just didn'tlike the idea of that.
And, and I said, what'd you pay?
And he said, $400 a week.
And I said, well, I couldn'teven pay for my apartment.
I'd have to have at least eight.
I could get my bills paid.
Have a hundred bucks a week.
Could you do that?
He says, okay, okay, we'll do it.
We've never paid anybodythat, but we really want you.

(16:50):
So I said, okay, I gotta pray andmeditate on this two-way prayer.
I may face indecision, notknow which course to take.
So I start doing my two-way prayer.
In my two-way prayer, Ihad an intuitive idea.
I suddenly realized that atheater is like a church.
The priest is the actor telling aparable about the human condition.

(17:12):
The chorus is the con or is the choir.
And the audience is the congregation.
And through ritual andstorytelling and song, we all
come together, one mind, one body.
We call that the body of Christ.
And I said, wow, that exists in a theater.
And I have never, I had never seen that.

(17:32):
I've never, I never got that idea before.
Now I see theater in acompletely different way.
That came to me in two-Way Prayer.
And what also happened in thetwo-way prayer, I kept seeing my
feet walking through flip flop andflip flops walking through the sand.
And the first leg of the tour wasof the DeSalle Whorehouse Dinner
Theater was in Fort Myers, Florida.

(17:55):
And I keep meditating every day, andI keep seeing the feet in flip flops,
and I'm asking God for a decision.
And by the end of the week, I hadmy decision, I'm going to Florida.
Broadway, I'm passing up Broadway 'causeGod's telling me to go to Florida.
Why?
I don't know.
First day I get to Florida, they tellme, uh, this woman named Nancy Stetson

(18:15):
from Florida Weekly magazine's coming.
It's on every news stand in Florida.
And uh, it's gonna be all overthe place and they're just
gonna do a little article.
And the community's not happy'cause we're doing a show that
has the word whorehouse in it.
And could you put a positive spin on that?
I said, how about this?
I'm a priest.
I just got out of the monastery.
And by watching this show,it's like a gospel lesson.

(18:37):
Jesus hung out with somevery undesirable people.
And through watching this show,you'll come to love your neighbor as
yourself, which we're commanded to do.
And you'll have less prejudice andyou'll understand and care for these
women and your heart will change.
And that's piety, that'sa warming of the heart.
And that might change you.
He said, oh, wow, that's perfect.

(18:58):
So Nancy Stetson shows up andshe's got this little digital
recorder and she sits it down.
She says, can I record this?
I say, sure.
She turns it on and she says toGary, Kay, tell me your story.
So I told her my story.
Then I puked on Annie and they shit on me.
And I went in, I was slamming dope.

(19:18):
Yeah.
I told the whole story all the way to themonastery, to the dinner theater and, and
listening to the feet in the flip flops.
And she just stared at me.
I probably talked for two hoursand she turned it off and she
said, can I print any of that?
And I said, print thewhole thing if you want.
Make a book out of it.
And um, she said, I'vebeen an Aon 40 years.
My husband died from alcoholism.

(19:39):
My son is lost right now.
We don't where he is.
Would you like to go to dinner?
And the two of us went out to dinner.
We're still friends to this day.
And this was many years ago.
And when the article came out, it wasfull page, you can Google it, Gary
Kimball, BELE Whorehouse, FloridaWeekly, and you'll see the cover.
And there I am as the sheriff andit's, the headline is, uh, actor

(19:59):
Gary Kimball from the monasteryto the whorehouse and back again.
And it turned into likethe whole magazine.
So it comes out on the newsstand.
I get a call from this old man and hesays, I, I Own Pray Entertainment Group.
And they told me I'm not allowed to go tomy own damn theaters 'cause I'm a drunk.
I'm not too happy about that.

(20:19):
I can't go to my own damn theater.
I own every bit of thisthing and you work for me.
And how dare you say you'rea crack who in a magazine?
He said, but I wasstrangely inspired by it.
And I see that you're an Episcopalpriest and we're Episcopalian.
My wife's a deacon.
Why do you come tochurch with it on Sunday?
So I put on my collar and my blackjacket and my crucifix, which I

(20:41):
rarely wear these days 'cause itseparates me from other people.
And I don't want that.
I'm just another boso on the bustrying not to drink and drug, trying
to get through life, you know.
So, um, Sunday I show up to church.
And I say to the usher,where's Tom Prather?
And he goes, that's thatguy sitting over there.

(21:02):
And he's like this in the view.
And I walk up and I go, Tom, father Gary.
And he goes, oh, andhe falls on the floor.
You just saw him in the documentary,that skinny little baldheaded man.
And uh, excuse me, he falls onthe floor and he starts cussing.
He says, let's get the hell outta here.
Let's go to Denny's.
Let's go to Denny's.

(21:24):
And I said, Tom, I don't spendany time talking to alcohol.
I don't waste my time with that.
If you can ever stay sober for acouple hours, you give me a call.
Well damn you.
I'll fire you.
I'm like, yeah, whatever.
And I went over and sat in another partof the church, watched the service,
and then got out of there as fast asI could when the service was over.
Tuesday morning, I get a call from TomPrather and he's not drunk, and he says,

(21:44):
Gary, I'm really sorry about Sunday.
Would you have lunch with me today?
I know it's your day off.
I checked with the theater.
Would you meet me atthe Edison Country Club?
I'd like to buy you lunch.
So now I know why I'm in Florida.
And I grab a big bookand uh, take it with me.
And I meet Tom and we talkabout alcoholism all day.

(22:04):
And I became his sponsorright then and there.
I said, I'm gonna sponsoryou and take two steps.
And, uh, that's what happened.
And he refused to go to a meeting'cause he was ashamed and he thought
people, well, people are gonna see me.
I said, Tom, if people in Fort Myerssee you walk into an AA meeting,
they're gonna hang a gold medal aroundyour neck and hire a brass band, huh?
Like an um, pa band to follow you around.

(22:26):
They'll be so happy.
I heard you had like 17 wrecksand you know, it'll be a safer
place to live with you in aa.
So he didn't like that.
But, uh,
I said, tell me your story.
And as he does, I go into my two-wayprayer meditation and I'm just
sitting there asking God, what's next?
What do I do?

(22:46):
And I what flashes before myeyes is an image of the poster of
Bill W, Dr. Bob, the opera show.
And I say, Tom, I know what to do.
We are gonna produce Bill W and Dr.
Bob in your theater.
I'm gonna direct, you're gonna co-direct,you've gotta read this book, this
big book so you know what it's about.

(23:07):
And we're gonna hire a castof 10 people in recovery.
And every day before rehearsal starts,we're gonna have an AA meeting and
that's gonna be your home group.
And you and I are gonnastart steps right away.
And if you ever show up drunk, I getto pick your bony old body up and
throw you out in the parking lot.
And he said, okay.
And that began, and wedid that production.
It sold out for weeks.
We started the national, we producedthe national tour of it, which

(23:30):
we took to the 75th InternationalAA Convention in San Antonio.
In 2010, uh, 65,000 people saw that show.
Um, they lined up down the block.
Uh, it was an extraordinary experience.
I became the Bill W guy.
I met a film crew from PBS whowanted to interview me, who ended
up following me around for 10years and made this documentary.

(23:52):
That's here.
Um, out of that, that same convention,I met Jody Clukey, who was marketing
director of, uh, Hazelden PublishingCompany, and they became my publisher
and I started writing books.
Um, then I wrote a play about Bill W andDr. Bob and Tom helped me produce it.
We did tour national tours of that foreight years and also took it abroad.

(24:12):
We took it to China, to South America,to Mexico, all over the place, Europe.
And uh, and I did that with Richard andtwo other actors after he disappeared.
Uh, and the point of this is,and then I went on Dr. Phil and
Ellen and the Today Show and DopeSick Nation and Intervention,
and this documentary happened.

(24:33):
I became Ambassador of Education forthe National Council on Alcoholism.
Um, I live in Florida today.
I never left.
Um, I am Director of Recovery Education.
I teach a 12 step programin a treatment center there.
And, uh, my son came down from Jersey.
To Florida to get sober.
And he did get clean for three yearsbefore he overdosed and died in 2018.

(24:55):
He was 26.
Um, my point is, all of thatcame from making the reason I'm
sitting here today with you.
The reason I know Suzanne, the reasonI've met all of you, is because I obeyed
the guidance from that two-way prayer.
Seeing the feet and flipflops walking through sand.
It all came from that.

(25:16):
I could have chosen Broadway andeverything would've went a different
direction, but I was listening to God.
So that's what you do.
As, as the guidance comes, yourmind starts talking to you.
You learn, tell the difference betweenmidbrain, the thoughts you're creating
here in the cortex and your Godvoice, which is the quietest voice.
Do you ever, when you're usingdrugs, did anybody have a little

(25:37):
voice that said, don't do it.
That's God talking to you andwe ignore it and we get into
all kinds of trouble, right?
It's always been there.
Well, we can remove theblockage with the steps.
That's the whole point of the steps.
That's the whole point of it,is to remove the blockage, to
establish that conscious contact.

(25:57):
That's the whole point of it.
And then to carry that guidance out,to go out and help other people.
That's the whole point.
And it works, and it'll blow yourmind when you start, you're like,
okay, I'll just talk to God.
I'll get an image in my head sometimesabout, I'll see my alarm clock.
It'll say 9:00 PM and thatmeans go to bed at nine o'clock.

(26:18):
And every time that happens at 3:00 AMI get a call from one of the hospitals.
The chaplain's not available.
Some addict is about to die,and his parents are there and
they need to talk to a priest.
And I'm on call.
And those are the nightsI get those calls.
It, it's that clear to me.
You know?
It helps me manage my unmanageable life.

(26:40):
So that's what two-way prayer is.
There's a, there's a website that'soperated by Father Bill Wigmore.
Who's got about 68 years in aa.
He is the world's leading expert inthe history of the Oxford Movement.
Uh, he was a teacher of mine in seminary.
He lives here in Texas now.
He lives in, uh, Houston.
And, um, do you happen to know him?

(27:01):
No.
And, uh, he owns and operates that site.
It's called two-way prayer.org.
There, there are videos on thereand explains step by step how to
do old school, two-way prayer.
The way the founders of AA did it whenwe had a success rate of 75 to, uh, 75%

(27:21):
permanent sobriety and something is lost.
When we stopped doing that, Frank Bookmansaid, when man listens, God speaks.
When man obeys God acts.
I kind of love that.
Alright, so I'm gonna do,yeah, it's cool stuff.

(27:43):
We all have this ability.
And our culture has justdrowned it, drowned it out.
We all have the ability.
It's deep down within everyman, woman, and child.
We walk around with it.
It isn't out there.
It's in here.
Doesn't matter where your,where your prayers are going to.
It matters where they're comingfrom and the God resides in us and

(28:08):
we walk around with that and we'veignored it or blocked it, but it's a
natural part of the human experience.
I never knew that until I came to aa.
Alright, let me start on this.
Um, I think that was importantto talk about for some reason.
You're welcome.
Two-way prayer.org.
So

(28:31):
I was addicted to alcohol, marijuana,opium hash morphine, ketamine,
Percocet Percodan, Vicodin.
Restoril.
LSD, Quaaludes Black Beauties,whippets Whip, ITG Goods.
Ivy, heroin, crack cocaine.
I went to 47 detoxes.
11 trips to jail.
Caught two felonies,seven suicide attempts.

(28:53):
Gestalt therapy, union therapy,Freudian therapy, shock therapy,
psychodynamics two, Anthony Robbins,fire walks, ayahuasca, puke,
purge, and 19 trips to treatment.
All of that took place overa period of about 12 years.

(29:13):
By the time I was a senior in highschool, I totaled 11 automobiles.
I killed two people in adrunk driving accident.
I maimed four other peoplewho never fully recovered.
I blew a kid's hand off with a shotgun.
David Gooding.
I lost two marriages.
One of them, uh, I was engaged and Ishot her up and she died in the bathtub.

(29:39):
Yeah.
I lost my property, my Broadwaycareer, my family, they wouldn't
talk to me for a long time.
Uh,
but everything was restored.
It was all restored.
It took time.
We didn't get sick overnight.
So I lost my family, my property,my bank account, my Broadway

(30:03):
career, my sanity, my legal freedom,my dignity, my self-respect,
my self-esteem, my self-love.
I lost all that.
It was a horrible, painful place to be.
And, uh, I told you before you, Idon't know if, remember if you heard
my last night out, I tried to murdera drug dealer and the gun jammed.

(30:27):
And then I ended up with a crack, sternand broken ribs, broken jaws, stab wounds.
They tried to scalp me, cut my face acrosstears, stuffed my mouth with crack pipes,
hit me in the face with a baseball bat,and then shit on me from head to toe.
That's where addiction took me.
I thought I was a bad person.

(30:48):
No one ever told me I had a disease.
I didn't know that
you can go on Facebook any day of theweek and see an argument happening.
Addiction's a choice.
If somebody's telling you it's achoice, they're telling you you're a
piece of shit and you're a bad person.
That's what they're telling you.

(31:09):
And that's out of ignorance'cause they don't understand it.
If you have certainsymptoms, you have a disease.
Major symptom number one, we use when wedon't want to, despite the consequences.
We tell ourselves we're gonna stop andwe can't stay stopped and we pick it up
anyway knowing it's gonna cause a problem.

(31:30):
The second major symptom is once I putit in my body, I can't stop using it.
It's very difficult to quit.
Show of hands, anybody got those symptoms?
If you got those symptoms,you have a disease that kills
more people than anything.
Addiction kills more peoplethan cancer, heart disease,

(31:51):
diabetes, and AIDS combined.
That's what we're dealing with here.
You can't throw a pill at it.
You can't take a scalpel to it.
It's too complex.
But there is a solution.
That's the good news.
There's a way to conquer this,to stop and stay stopped.

(32:12):
Until I had that solution, learnedthat solution, I couldn't stay stopped.
And on August 25th, I celebrated28 years clean and sober.
If I can do it, you can do it.
I never thought I'd be an oldman sober, sticking around,

(32:33):
couldn't have imagined that.
So what's going on with us?
What is this disease?
First of all, what is a disease?
Progressive.
A dis.
What's that?
Progressive.
It is progressive.
In order to be included in the diseaseclub, there must be a defect in an
organ, and that defect produces symptoms

(32:59):
in order to heal the disease.
You treat the defect.
Diabetes or diabetes?
Diabetes.
Diabetes.
My grandpa used to say thatdiabetes, I have diabetes.
Diabetes is a disease.

(33:21):
The pancreas stops producing insulin,so now you have a defect in an organ.
It produces the samesymptoms in every patient.
For a hundred years, they chasedthe symptoms and people died
in childhood from diabetes.

(33:42):
You go blind, you vision problems,dry mouth, sweaty, shaky, dizzy, uh,
neuropathy, peripheral neuropathy inthe hands, the feet, and the legs.
Whole bunch of horrible shit.
Then you go blind, then you have yourtoes cut off one at a time, and then
your whole feet, and then your legs.
If it's not treated well, welearn now to treat the defect.

(34:06):
Medicine used to always treatthe symptoms and people didn't,
most people didn't get well.
We treat the defect, you putinsulin back into the pancreas
and the symptoms go away.
Now, diabetes is a chronic disease,so it has to be treated every day.

(34:26):
You gotta watch your food intakeand your insulin every single day.
Addiction is a chronic disease, andthat's why at the age of 63, I've been
on major national television, Broadwaywritten books, done all kinds of shit on
the radio, traveling all over the world.

(34:47):
I go to a meeting every day.
I go every day.
Some people don't do that.
I needed it.
I was very sick.
I don't want to get sick again.
I'm not screwing around with my recovery.
I'm not taking a chance.
So I go every day.
I work my 10th step every day,work, my 11 step every day.
I have service commitments.
I have a home group, I have a sponsor.

(35:07):
Who knows?
He's my sponsor.
I have a grand sponsor who knows.
He's my grand sponsor and wishesI wouldn't call him so much.
I practice my program.
I also work my 11th step religiouslyevery morning on Awakening, as it says
in the book, I follow the directions.
There's this big fat blue book that'sgot directions solution for our problem.

(35:30):
It's clear cut.
It's specific and it's preciseand it works for anybody
that does it if you apply it.
So what's going on with us?
We addicts do not.
First of all, we got a bunch of defects.
Number one, we have faultyneurotransmitters, neuroreceptors

(35:51):
as well in the brain.
We addicts do not produce asufficient quantity and quality of
dopamine, epinephrine, and serotonin.
Those are neurotransmitters whichare needed to have a sense of
wellbeing and be present in life.
Dopamine, that's the big boy.

(36:13):
Dopamine is part of thebrain's reward system.
Anytime I take an action thatsustains life, I get dopamine.
The dopamine is producedby the nucleus accumbens.
I don't expect you to remember this.
I'm just want, I'm just gonnashow off and say some big words.

(36:36):
Uh, nucleus accumbens.
We have a faulty nucleus accumbensdoesn't produce enough dopamine.
Okay, so I have an area in my braincalled the amygdala, A-M-Y-G-D-A-L-A.
The amygdala does not have languageattached, so it doesn't think your

(36:58):
amygdala doesn't know you have a family,doesn't know you have kids, doesn't
know you have a job, doesn't knowyou go to school, doesn't know you're
supposed to wear clothes in public.
Uh, it doesn't know that whenGary smokes crack, I end up naked,
chained to a bed, wearing a clownmask in the middle of Times Square.
It doesn't know any of that'cause it doesn't have language
in that part of the brain.

(37:18):
Its job is to keep me aliveat 15 second intervals.
First thing it does, it forces me to.
When I breathe, I get dopamine.
The dopamine passesthrough the ventral menta.
The vt the pleasure, track it sorts out.
The neurotransmitter says,Ooh, wow, what he just did.
Lot of dopamine feels good.

(37:39):
It sends a signal to the hippocampusand says, remember this and repeat this.
Always.
And that's why we breathe all the time.
There is a permanent neuropathway in the brain that says,
breathe, breathe, breathe.
Question for everybody.
Can anyone, and I wantto hear your answer.
Can anyone hold your breath till you die?

(38:01):
Correct.
That's the amygdala doing its job.
It's gonna force you to breathe.
And you just took step one ina 12 step program, admitted we
were powerless over breathing.
It's the same mechanism in thebrain that forces you to breathe.
That forces us now to pick up the.

(38:26):
It forces us to breathe, to sleep,to eat, to drink water, to screw,
so the species can survive, and itforces us to protect ourselves in
fight or flight when we're in danger.
Basic jobs of the amygdala.

(38:46):
Now we addicts don'tproduce enough dopamine.
I have another question for you.
When you were growing up, did you everfeel like you didn't get the memo?
Yes, sir. Like, you don'tknow how to do life.
Everybody else seemsto know how to do life.
Can you relate to that?
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's a lack of neurotransmitters.
That's why you experienced that.
It was like, I'm in, I'm trapped ina box and the instructions are on the

(39:09):
outside of the box and I can't see them.
You know?
That's how I grew up.
That's still true for me today.
You know, I gotta ask for a lot ofhelp to get anything done in my life.
I just have to accept that.
You know, that's a conditionof my illness, of my addiction.

(39:29):
It centers in the mind.
The drugs and alcoholare not your problem.
The mind is the problem.
So, hello.
Um, anybody have any questions so far?
Yes.
So do you have any degrees?

(39:52):
Is this all No.
Oh, let me say that.
Let me say that.
Yeah.
I do have some degrees.
Um, I am not a doctor.
I usually give this disclaimer.
I am not a doctor.
Uh, this is my experience aftera quarter of century searching
for an answer to my problem.
I've studied neurobiology,I've taken copious seminars.

(40:14):
I've hung out with Dr. Al Mooney and JanetRobshaw, and sought out neurobiologists.
It's been an obsession of mine.
To understand what's going on in my brain.
So this is my cumulative knowledgeof what I've learned from all of my
studies so that I could understandaddiction, so I could stay well.

(40:35):
Yes.
Did you have any reservationsof getting sober?
Do I have any What?
Reservations sober.
Say it again.
Reservations of, ofgetting sober like fierce.
Not anymore.
Not anymore.
I did in the beginning for sure.
Yeah.
I thought it was a bunch of horse shit.

(40:55):
How's this possibly gonnaget me clean and sober?
But I just followed their, Idid what they told me to do.
I followed directions and it happened.
Yes.
Talk into
it.
Um, what was your, whatwas, how do they put it?
What's your favorite part of being sober?
Wow.
My favorite part of being sober.

(41:19):
Being able to give and receive love.
Being able to accept love, being ableto give love, being able to look.
I look at myself, I usedto shave in the shower.
Now I shave in front of themirror and I talk to myself.
I go, how you doing gk?
You're a pretty good guy.
I can't wait to brace this day.

(41:39):
I wonder how many peoplewe're gonna help today.
You're a good human being.
You know what I mean?
I can love myself.
Wow, you got your shit together.
Wow.
I love that.
But it's about being able tolove and my relationship to God.
For sure.
For sure.
Good question.
Waking up, not living in fear.

(42:02):
That sucks.
Living in fear.
Yes.
When do you know that?
Like I've, um, relapsed multi times overand over and over again, and I can't stop.
Like I could stop after I relapse.
I just go.
And I'll come back, but Iwant to never relapse again.

(42:22):
Okay.
When do I get enough?
I mean, I, I know I don't want to do dope.
Mm-hmm.
And you mean it, you wannastop and you mean it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And that's not bullshit.
You really mean it.
I really want, now I'm gonna explainwhy you can't stop another question.

(42:43):
I'm so glad you guys are here.
So like, when, now Iknow why I came to Texas.
Amen.
You know what I'm saying?
Amen.
I was wondering because thereweren't too many people here, and I
met some nice people, it was like,okay, where's the mission happening?
Who am I reaching?
And then you guys walked in, man.
Um, so what does lovefeel like being sober?

(43:05):
Like,
oh
man, is it?
'cause I know with my drug use, I don'tknow what real love feels like, you know?
No, you probably don't.
But.
But you will, I wanna know, andI will know what it feels like.
You'll, but, uh, what's,what's, well, she,

(43:26):
my sponsor, father Edgar had aChinese girlfriend, and she was
about 40 years younger than him.
And I said, are, are you in love with her?
And he said, oh, no, no, no.
Really?
No.
I love her.
You love her, but you'renot in love with her.

(43:48):
He said, Gary, when you fallin love, that's a sickness.
That means you think they havesomething that you don't have that
you need and you don't have it,and you have to take it from them.
And if they're doing the samething, eventually you commit
soul murder against each other.
None of this made any sense tome when he's telling me this.
And you take it and you takeit and you take till it's done.

(44:08):
And I said, okay, then what is love?
He said, you want for her what she wantsfor her, even if it doesn't include you.
It's a selfless kind of thing.
You know,
I can't even describe it.
There's a sense of peace.
There's no fear, there's no anxiety.
Connect to it.

(44:29):
Like, oh, she didn't callme, or, you know, whatever.
There's none of that.
It's just peace
and this feeling of rightness, you know?
I don't know.
Hard to describe, but it's differentthan what was happening when I
was, had a crack pipe in my mouth.
So when you're using, you're notchasing love, you're chasing a security.

(44:53):
Say that again.
When you're using, you're not chasinglove, you're chasing a sense of security.
I think when you're losing,you have no idea what love is.
You're incapable of it, andyou're not having relationships.
You're having a rela relapse and shit.
Did everybody get that?
You're not having a relationship.
You're having a relapse and shit.

(45:15):
And I'll explain why.
So somebody asked, yousaid, I don't understand.
Why can't I stay stopped?
Okay, so my brain doesn'tproduce enough neurotransmitters.
I don't have enough dopamine, and Ineed that to have a sense of wellbeing.
And, and I get a reward of dopamineevery time I do something that keeps me

(45:36):
alive, something that helps me survive.
And I get dopamine, andthe brain remembers that.
Now the hippocampus is lookingfor a way to make sure that I eat,
that I have sex, that I sleep,that there's water available.
It's, it's figuring all that out,how to create those conditions.
Let's keep you near a waterfountain and keep your parts

(45:59):
healthy and eat a hamburger.
You know, it learns how to do all that.
Now, in wee addicts, when I tookmy first drink of alcohol, there
was an abnormal flood of dopamine.
And it raced through the vt andthe VT said, what the hell is this?
Holy shit.
This is better than sex, better thanhamburgers, better than breathing,

(46:22):
better than water, better thansleeping better than protecting myself.
And a neuro pathway is carveddeep into the brain that
says, alcohol equals survival.
More important than air, food, or water.
If I, if I were able to leap off thisstage and land on you with my big fat

(46:46):
ass and knock you over backward, and I'msitting on your chest and I put a plastic
bag around your head and I duct tape it,what would you do to get that bag off?
What if you can't?
What if, what if I'm sitting on your arms?
You would do anything,wouldn't you punch you?
Would you?

(47:06):
Yeah.
Punch me.
Would you would, youmight have to kill me.
Because I'm trying to kill youand you're gonna go into fight or
flight and you're gonna try to killme because you have to breathe.
Right?
Well, now in your H hierarchy of survivalneeds in your brain, the drug is more
important than air, food, or water.
So what will you do to get the drug?

(47:28):
Anything.
Anything.
And that's why we behave the way we do.
It's survival.
We must have it.
That is not negotiable.
The brain demands it.
That's not a decision you're making.
That's not something you're choosing.
Your brain is choosing that for you.
Does that make sense?
That's cause of withdraw.

(47:49):
What's that?
That's cause of withdraw.
Yes.
More or less.
Yes.
Did you wanna ask?
So now the brain wants the drug morethan it wants air, food, or water.
So.
I am living my life and I love mymother, and I do something horrible

(48:11):
that really hurts her feelings.
I can see that she's really hurtand I feel terrible, and I'm
experiencing guilt and shame and fear.
Maybe she's gonna throwme outta the house.
Now.
Maybe I have resentment, guilt, shame,remorse, resentment, anger and fear.

(48:31):
Create a stress hormone called cortisol inthe brain, and the midbrain is irritated
by this cortisol, this stress hormone,because I feel guilt and it swells up in
size and it takes over running the brain.

(48:52):
The part of the brain that doesn't think,that doesn't understand consequence,
it doesn't understand morality.
It takes over the front of thebrain, the cortex, the prefrontal
cortex in this part of the brain.
Is where we make rational decisions,where we understand morality,

(49:13):
where we understand consequence.
It's where we choose ourfriends and our sex partners.
It's where a child experiences the lovefrom the parent and the parent experiences
the love, the child's love in return.
It is also where we processspirituality, being kind, being
honest, being forgiving, doingunselfish things to help other people.

(49:39):
Prayer and meditation.
That all comes, that's allprocessed in the front of the brain.
The front of your brain knowsyou're trying to be clean and sober.
The midbrain where the addictionmechanism is, doesn't have language, so
it doesn't know you're trying to be sober.
All it knows is get thedrug in order to survive.

(50:01):
So now I do some sketchy thing.
I tell a lie.
I steal from somebody.
My brain floods with cortisol.
The amygdala's irritated.
It demands relief.
The go-to is the drug, notfood, not water, not sex.
It's the drug.
It's says, get the drug.
That's the dominant neuro pathway.
Now, here's the midbrainback of the brain.

(50:23):
Here's the cortex that knowsI'm trying to be sober.
The amygdala does this.
It's called amygdala hijack.
Look it up.
Google addiction.
Amygdala hijack A-M-Y-G-D-L-A.
It hijacks the brain by dis communicating.
It cuts off communicationwith the rational mind.

(50:45):
At this point, glutamatelevels severely drop.
That's a chemical that we addicts havea shortage of also used by the cortex to
control the amygdala in simplified terms.
So when the amygdala disconnects fromthe cortex to cortex, fails to process,
all thoughts of not using are nowtrapped in this part of the brain.

(51:09):
All thoughts of the consequences.
I wrecked my car the last time I drank.
Those thoughts are trapped in thispart of the brain, and we can't go into
that part of the brain and think thosethoughts and the part of the brain that
doesn't think goes and gets the drug.
Then we come down, we say, howthe hell did that happen again?

(51:29):
I swore I wasn't gonna do it.
I swore I wasn't gonnado it, and you meant it.
But you don't have a choice.
When the amygdala hijacks the cortex,and it happens in a nanosecond.
When I experience guilt, shame,remorse, resentment, anger, fear.
When I win the lottery, when my houseburns to the ground, any twist of

(51:51):
emotion can cause amygdala hijack,and our solution will be the drug.
Because we don't have a new solution.
When, when you go to detox, yougo to treatment for a little bit
and you take away the solution.
If you don't replace it with anew solution, your brain's gonna
go back to the original solution.
And your solution is what drug?
Everything.

(52:12):
Everything.
Okay.
It's gonna go back to that.
Whatever's around.
And you're gonna get high guarantee it.
But
I got, I'm in the solution.
Like I'm You're in the solution.
Yeah.
What's that look like?
It's recovery and it's beautiful.
When you say recovery,what does that mean?
Um,
the big book, shit.

(52:33):
Two.
Okay.
And the big book.
What are you doing with the big book?
Do you just read it?
I know I'm doing the steps.
What step are you on?
Um, well I'm on, originally from my, um,rehab I did up to stay at three, but now
with my new sponsor, she's making me.
Um, call her for 30 days first andthen we're gonna start our steps again.

(52:57):
So
what step were you working last time you
relapsed?
Um, three.
Three?
Yes.
Okay.
Well that's why you relapsed.
That's right.
Because you're still sick.
Mm-hmm.
You don't have solution.
You just started.
Right.
The first three stepsare not working steps.
They're intellectual decisions that wemake based on education that we receive.

(53:20):
I go, I mean, I, um, I'm notworking the steps every night,
but I read the book every night.
Well, that's great.
Like I am, I'm doing it on my own.
I can't do it with my sponsor, butI do whatever I could do by myself
because I have to have a constant work.

(53:41):
You understand what I'm saying?
Like I need that constant.
Right.
Go to thing.
Do you understand what I mean?
Yes.
Reminder.
Reminder.
Like I, so I have to do the stepseven though I'm not working them.
'cause they say you can'twork them by yourself.
You have to work 'em with your sponsor.
Yes.
I work them on my own as much as I can.

(54:02):
Can't really do that, for instance.
Can't.
I know you can't, you
can't do a, you can't doa fifth step by yourself.
I know.
I know you can.
Because my sick mindcan't heal my sick mind.
Yes.
Yes sir.
Right.
We, we share that step aloudwith another person to avoid self
delusion, which we are masters of.
So that does simply doesn't work.

(54:24):
And there are things in stepfour that you're not gonna see.
I see people all the timedoing a step a month.
So you stay sick for another yearand you're probably gonna relapse.
That's why the pioneers did the stepsquickly and often, quickly and often.
Quickly and often stepsone, two, and three.
So I'm gonna give you one more example.

(54:47):
I went to, I was drinking, I wentto Merchant Cigar Bar in New York
City Summit, a huge Yankees fan.
And the Yankees all hang out there.
They all live in apartmentsaround there on Second Avenue.
And I met this crazy woman named Marsha.
And we got really hammered and I said,Hey, I've got morphine drip bags and
an IV drip machine, a whole lot ofcrack in my place in Times Square.

(55:09):
Let's go there and doall kinds of wild shit.
And she says, wow, sounds great.
So we did, and we did a lotof twisted things that night.
So we decided we shouldget married right away.
And uh, she moved all herstuff in the next day.
And that night we hada knockdown drag out.
She punched me, I punched her.
It was horrible.
Broke a lot of stuff, putmy fist through a wall.

(55:31):
Um, she tried to strangle me.
Boy, oh boy, that was lovethat really got me going.
You know, the sicker, the better.
Because I was sick.
That's what I liked, you know?
So I went out and raised hell in New Yorkand I got more hammered than I'd ever
been, and I ended up in jail that night.
Now, when that event occurred, myhippocampus is always trying to

(55:53):
figure out how to keep Gary High.
So it collected information.
It now knows that Marsha plusGary equals fight equals drugs
and alcohol equals survival.
So Marsha's now a deliverysystem for the drugs.
She's not a sex party, she's not agirlfriend, she's a relapse in shit.

(56:18):
She is a gateway to the drug in my brain.
So it wants to keep me around,Marsha, in this sick relationship
so we can keep fighting so Ican keep getting high capish.
So then when I do, I still am a humanbeing with somewhat of a conscience.
I have a little bit of moralityleft, and every time I punch her
or something, I feel horrible.

(56:38):
When I come down, and thatcreates guilt, shame, remorse,
resentment, anger, fear that createscortisol, irritates my amygdala.
Amygdala hijacks the rational mind.
The rational mind.
All thoughts of not usingare now trapped in the brain.
I can't go in and think thosethoughts, and I get high again.
Now, I've spent all mymoney, can't pay my rent.

(56:59):
That creates fear.
Fear creates cortisol.
Cortisol inflames the amygdala,amygdala, swells of in size, hijacks the
rational mind, and I go get high again.
Step three is a decision we make.
What changes?
The brain, the change agent, step fourthrough nine as a course of action.

(57:21):
Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
Removes the guilt, the shame,remorse, resentment, anger, and fear.
Therefore, lowering cortisol levels.
Step 10.
We learned to live in such a way thatwe're not creating new cortisol levels.
We stopped causing pain and suffering.

(57:41):
11 and 12, prayer and meditation,God contemplation, helping
other people changes how theneurons interact in the brain.
When I pray and meditate, I get tittyhard ons and goosebumps, and the hair
stands up on the back of my neck.
When that's happening, my neuronsare having a party in my brain.
And when that happens,right's happening right now.

(58:03):
See,
it's happening right now 'causeI'm talking truth and I'm talking
about God and the hair standingup on the back of my neck.
What's happening atthis moment in my brain?
My brain is now pumping outglutamate like nobody's business.
And my amygdala is relaxed and Iwill have no thoughts of using.

(58:25):
And that's what that program does for us.
That's how you treat it.
Where'd she go?
That's why you gottaget through it quickly.
You gotta get to the solutionpart, which is 11 and 12.
Until you stay, until you getthere at least up to nine,
you're not gonna get any relief.
If you do a four step and you openthat Pandora's box and say, look,

(58:46):
what a piece of shit I've been, oh myGod, look how I treated my loved ones.
You feel horrible about yourself.
What happens when you feel guilt?
It creates what?
Corti Cortisol.
Cortisol inflames the amygdala.
The amygdala increases in size.
It hijacks the cortex.
The cortex fails to processand you go get high again and
say, why'd that happen again?

(59:07):
I swore I wasn't gonna use, and thisis why self-will and self-knowledge
will not keep you clean and sober.
It might for periods of time.
But eventually the day will come.
Your amygdala will hijack your brain.
It is a progressive disease.
It will get worse, alwaysgets worse, never better.

(59:28):
It will continue to get worseeach time you pick up and on one
of those times, you're gonna getsome fentanyl and you're dead.
That's all there is to it.
Today, the fentanyl's in marijuana, inmedical marijuana, it's in dab pens.
It's in powder cocaine.
It's in crack.
It's in fake oxys, fake perks.
It's in blues, it's in everything.

(59:48):
Gary, let's do two more questions.
Let's do one right here.
Okay.
One question right here,and then one in the back.
Okay.
Later.
Do you guys, are youstarting to understand this?
Yes,
sir. Why we
can't stop ourselves from picking up?
Yes, sir. Okay.
What's your question?
No, I just wanted to say that,you know, my drug of choice was
fentanyl and you know, like, youknow, it's not good at all, but.

(01:00:13):
You know, whenever you said about how youtreat others, you know, whenever my family
tells me about how I looked and how, youknow, they see me and how I reacted to
them, I was in denial about it, you know?
And do you know what denial stands for?
Do you know what denial stands for?
Uh, yeah.
It's a What's a river in Egypt?

(01:00:34):
Nah, no, don't even know.
I'm lying.
Don't even know I'm lying.
Don't even know I'm lying.
Yeah.
The steps will break you out of that.
Denial.
Yeah.
And continue doing therapy.
That's an important therapy.
Also, reduce the cortisol levels.
Now if you're an alcoholic,once you put it in you.
So we have established, we nowunderstand why we can't stop

(01:00:57):
ourselves from picking it up.
Right.
Do we get that?
Yes.
We don't because of amygdala'sgonna hijack your rational mind
when you're under emotional stress.
Unless it's treated properlyand it hasn't been treated yet.
It hasn't been treated with you.
You've been up to step three.
It's not treated yet, so we're still sick.

(01:01:18):
So once I put it in me, if I'm analcoholic, I do not have a sufficient
quantity and quality of liver enzymesand amino acids, which are needed to
convert the ethanol molecule alcoholto break it down into a carbohydrate
fast enough for me to get rid of it.
So it breaks it down first, it convertsit from alcohol to acid, aldehyde

(01:01:41):
to di acidic acid to acetone, thensugar, water, and carbohydrate.
We, we fart and breathe and throughour skin, we get rid of the carbon
dioxide, the sugar's stored in thefat cells for energy for later.
And the, uh, uh, what's the other one?
Um, carbon dioxide, uh,carbohydrate sugar, water.

(01:02:06):
Yeah.
And the water.
We pee in sweat.
And poop and get rid of the water.
Now, in a normal person, this processhappens very quickly and in less than
an hour, they could take a second drink.
They also do not have the phenomenaof craving that only happens to
an alcoholic when as the, as theliver enzymes are breaking it down.

(01:02:28):
Mine, it happens so fast.
I drink one drink, I'm ready for tworight now, and I have to have it's demand.
It's not a negotiation.
I gotta have it.
That phenomenon of craving iscaused by a buildup of acetone.
It's an abnormal reactionin my body to the alcohol.
And that acetone is what createsthe phenomenon of craving.
It demands a second drinkand it demands a third drink.

(01:02:51):
It demands a fourth drink.
It demands a fifth drink.
The more you drink, theharder you crave with drugs.
It's called hyperalgesia in the brain.
There's a condition in the brainwhere for wee addicts, pain is
more acute than it should be.
And as the drug is leavingthe neuroreceptor, we have
immediate, immense emotional pain.

(01:03:11):
And that irritates the amygdala,fills up a cortisol and it
says, take another hit of crack.
Take another hit.
Take another hit.
And that's why we can't stop.
Once we start, we have a sort ofallergic reaction to these substances,
and we can't stop ourselves frompicking it up in the first place.
On our own power.
Spiritual action steps four throughnine, reduce the cortisol levels.

(01:03:35):
Step 10.
We learn how to live in a way we'renot creating more cortisol levels.
We keep that at a minimum, 11 and 12.
Treats the front of the brain,allows it to produce more glutamate.
It changes how the neurons interact.
Prayer, meditation, God, contemplation,doing service, helping other
people that suffer traveling toTexas to sit and talk to you guys.

(01:03:58):
You know that this shitall helps my brain.
It helps keep me sober.
28. Who else had a question?
I appreciate what you have to sayabout the, the process of the brain.
Um, can you speak maybe a littlebit more about what sugar?
Um, I'm, I'm a compulsiveeater, food addict.
Wow.
And, and I'm telling you, I justcan't, I just, I go to this church,

(01:04:21):
so I can't use the language that'sflying through my brain right now,
but I just cannot get clean with food.
And, you know, I gotta playwith that beast every day.
And, and it's, I'm just, um, I'm,I feel very, very defeated and,
uh, understand and I understand theprocess of the emotional buildup.

(01:04:42):
It just gets overwhelming.
Bam.
I'm back in there trying to medicate
and the overwhelmingcreates what in the brain?
Cortisol.
It's exactly the same.
Most drug addicts and alcoholics,when we put the drug and the alcohol
down, if we don't replace it withour spiritual solution, you're gonna
pick up masturbating, gambling porn,food shopping, hoarding something.

(01:05:07):
You will pick up a substitute and thatwill lead you back to the other drug.
And for food addict, it's exactlythe same as a crack addict.
That's a humbling thing to acceptthat and a really tough one.
'cause you have to walkthat tiger every day.
I believe me, I battle with the weight,with the food and the sugar myself.
Sugar is more addictive thancocaine and it needs to be

(01:05:31):
looked at as a drug like cocaine.
So have you worked steps?
I dropped off, um, I think step five.
It, the, just the emotions and, and I,I just, I've not gotten, gotten back.
That was as far as I got.
Okay.
And I just jumped off the cliff.

(01:05:51):
I hope you'll go back to that.
Yeah, do it quickly and often.
Thank you.
Thanks for coming today.
You're welcome.
It does work.
It will work.
Do you go to over years anonymousor eating disorders anonymous or?
I do.
I do.
And, um, I, I think I may just needto revisit, um, I'm connected to a
group where, uh, they, they want toput off working the steps until you are

(01:06:15):
clean and sober, you're clearheaded.
And some people will say, that's72 hours, and I'm just, I, I
can't get past the 72 hours.
I'm somebody that has to gofast through those steps.
And, um, um, I might just haveto really revisit, um, you know,
sponsorship on a, you know,rethinking, rethinking sponsorship.

(01:06:39):
Well, yeah, that was the firstthought that went through my head
when you were sharing that becauseyour sponsor's saying, let's see
if you can survive for 30 days.
Let's see how sick youcan be 30 days from now.
That's really what's going on.
You know, I'd like you tostay sick a while longer.

(01:06:59):
If you do a step a month, you're sickfor another year, we delay the step.
Okay?
I'm a physician.
This young man comes to me and hesays, I'm having all kinds of problems.
What's your problem?
He says, well, I have night sweats.
Huh?
I write that down.
Ah, look at the tongue.
He's got thrush.
He's got little white bumps.
I say, do these spread when you shave.

(01:07:20):
Yeah, they do.
You got little purple dots on your legs.
I said, Hmm, that's Zi sarcoma.
And his lymph glands are swollen andI already know what the problem is.
And I say, son, we're gonnahave to do some blood work.
And the blood work comes back and Isay, you have 51 CD four cells left.
You have full blown aids.

(01:07:42):
But don't worry, there's a solution.
There's these three pills.
There's a reverse transcriptase, aprotease inhibitor, and a retroviral.
And one's pink, and one'swhite and one's blue.
And you say, I don't take pink pills.
Take the ones that workand leave the rest.
They're just suggestions.

(01:08:05):
I'll tell you what, why don't I give youone pill now and six months, come back
and get another pill and guess what?
You're gonna be dead from AIDSin a few months and I should be
locked up in jail for malpractice.
And we who have worked the steps, it isincumbent upon us to get that newcomer,
grab them by the scruff of the neckand sit 'em down and say, here we go.
We're putting the tourniquet on you, son.

(01:08:27):
I believe that's our responsibility.
Why would I delay those medications?
And our solution is 11 and 12.
You gotta get to the, if you can'tget to the solution, you stay sick.
And then we wonder why are we relapsingand we can't get outta this labyrinth.
We're stuck in this labyrinth of insanityaround and around and around and around.

(01:08:52):
So yeah, if you gotta get anothersponsor, God bless that person for trying,
but I don't wanna cross your sponsor,but kind of, you know what I mean?
It's like, look, a life is at stake.
This is life and death.
Life and death.
Would you go to a doctor who won'tgive you the medication you need?

(01:09:12):
Right?
That's insanity to me.
That just sounds nuts when I hear that youshould be done with your steps in 30 days.
Not you gotta prove Rickby calling me every day.
You know, there's a pamphlet.
Written by Dr. Bob in theAkron group back in 1940.
It's called Manual for Alcoholics.
Look it up online.
Dr. Bob says you should callyour your, he calls 'em babies.

(01:09:35):
This baby's life is in your hands.
Call them every day.
Says the sponsors should callthem every day and they don't
know how to pick a sponsor.
They have social anxiety.
When you, when you told, somebody toldme, pick a sponsor has what you want.
I want your wife and your car.
That's what I want.

(01:09:56):
I don't know how to pick that.
So hopefully somebody's had a spiritualawakening and they go find the suffering
person and help them and sit 'em downand say, I'm gonna help you get well.
Are you willing to go to any length?
Do you want this?