How does one become an oldtimer? It is very simple. Stay sober one day at a time, and do not die. Everything else is detail.

My temptation is to go into great detail about the importance of Step work, the Higher Power, and the fellowship. I would love to shout from the rooftops about the spiritual awakenings I have had through recovery in SA; yet that was what Dr. Silkworth warned Bill W. not to do. From Language of the Heart, page 199:

“Finally, one day, Dr. Silkworth took me back down to my right size. Said he, ‘Bill, why don’t you quit talking so much about that bright light experience of yours, it sounds too crazy. Though I’m convinced that nothing but better morals will make alcoholics really well, I do think you have got the cart before the horse. The point is that alcoholics won’t buy all this moral exhortation until they convince themselves that they must. If I were you I’d go after them on the medical basis first. While it is never done any good for me to tell them how fatal their malady is, it might be a very different story if you, a formerly hopeless alcoholic, gave them the bad news. Because of this identification you naturally have with alcoholics, you might be able to penetrate where I can’t. Give them the medical business first, and give it to them hard. This might soften them up so they will accept the principles that will really get them well.’”

In what I have written below, I want to follow Dr. Silkworth’s recommendation: I will tell you the model of recovery that got me sober and keeps me sober, one day at a time. My disease made me a taker, not a giver. Through writing this article, I am trying to give back to the fellowship, instead of following my usual pattern of being a recipient of the many gifts you all have given me over the past 40 years.

Once a cucumber becomes a pickle, it can never go back to being a cucumber again. The Steps have one basic denominator. It is about powerlessness over lust. It is about the physical allergy accompanied by the mental obsession. If I forget for even one moment that I am allergic to lust, my 40 years of sobriety could instantly vanish. Each day, I need to remember that once I am allergic to lust, I will always be allergic to lust.

I was given a great gift when I came into the program. The gift was that I realized I was not “bad getting good,” but “sick getting well.” The rest of the Steps are built on the premise of the allergy model. I have witnessed hundreds and hundreds of people relapsing in this fellowship merely because they cannot let go of the “religious” model of being bad getting good. They continue to reject the allergy model. They refuse to let go of old ideas absolutely.

The AA book states on page 58, “Some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely.” l am so fortunate that I accepted the idea that my brain was not like the brains of other people. Our First Step does not mention acting out. The First Step does not mention masturbation, prostitution, or pornography. It only mentions lust. Lust for me is what goes on between my ears. My brain is where the disease lives. Lust for me is the motion pictures in my head. The trigger is not the problem. It is what I do in my mind with the trigger that causes the problem. The first thought “is on God,” as Jess would say. It was how I was made. The next thought is on me. It is the next thought that produces the phenomenon of craving, in my opinion.

It appears to me that most people come into this fellowship to stop acting out because of the negative consequences they get from acting out. Most people do not join SA to stop lusting. The only requirement for membership in our fellowship is a desire to stop lusting and become sexually sober. Most people stay on the outside looking in at this fellowship because they have not fully been prepared to stop lusting. They think not acting out is the only requirement. This is merely as I see it. I do not speak for SA as a whole.

Today is so different than it was 40 years ago. I do not have to lie, steal, or cheat. I have no secrets today. Through the fellowship, I have people in my life who can understand and accept me as I am. I have a God Who is so much bigger than the God I had prior to my joining SA. Today for me, God is even bigger than religion. God is no longer just outside of me in a dualist reality. It is in me as well. Today for me, God is like the ocean and I and other people are merely the waves of the Ocean. I am not the Ocean, but am totally composed of it. Since we are all waves composed of the same Ocean, we are all connected.

All my spiritual awakenings will be just words if I don’t stay sober from lust. When I get drunk on lust, there is nothing in my life but the next acting out. Let me forget that I am allergic to lust, and I am sure I would slowly return to my old thinking and eventually be back to the crazy life I used to live prior to this program. Today, through this program, I have a God who loves me unconditionally. There is nothing I could do to make God stop loving me. If I act out today, it is not God who would stop loving me. It is I who would not love me.

I want to thank the fellowship for always being there so that I can maintain, one day at a time, my sobriety for these past 40 years.

Thank you all.