Secular AA Global Speaker Tour - Jim Burwell AAF - May 3, 2026 (English Translation)

English Translation

May 2026: Secular AA's monthly world-tour of speaker meetings is hosted by the Jim Burwell Atheists, Agnostics, and Freethinkers Virtual Group. Our speakers this month are:

• Karla P.
• Edmundo P.
• Claudia S.

..with Pilar as emcee.

Following these talks is sharing from around our agnostic/atheist/freethinkers AA world. This is an open and welcoming meeting inviting others to share their thoughts about the speakers' shares and should be interesting for anyone, newcomer and long-timer alike (or just curious).

Next month's Secular AA Global Speaker Tour will be featuring the "We Agnostics of Santa Barbara, California" on Sunday, June 7th with simultaneous translation to Español at:

• 2 pm EST
• 1 pm CST
• 12 pm AZ
• 11 am PST
• 7 pm UK
• 6 am AEDT (Monday)

Everyone is welcome to join our monthly open/public secular AA meeting.

ZOOM ID 864 4074 0033
Passcode 121212
(CON TRADUCCIÓN SIMULTÁNEA INGLÉS<>ESPAÑOL)

For more info on secular AA including Zoom meetings, in-person meetings, and virtual gatherings, check out:
- https://aasecular.org
- secularAA@gmail.com

Secular AA is AA sobriety that is neither religious nor irreligious, focusing on the practical, humanist tools of Alcoholics Anonymous and borrowed from the wider recovery community. Secular AA is a growing subculture within AA, offering 100 agnostic/atheist/freethinkers AA meetings every day + regional events and the International Conference of Secular AA (ICSAA). More @ https://aasecular.org 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome everybody to the Global Speakers Tour from Secular A. We present groups, secular groups around the world every month. I am a sober alcoholic. My name is Margarita, like the drink, but without the alcohol. And I have a couple of announcements before we present the group, today's featured group, named the virtual Jim Burwell group. And I also want to thank the people who are helping with service today, especially Tony and Claudia.

SPEAKER_07 0:47

Well, thanks, Veronica, and welcome. And the first announcement is that we are thanking the interpreters so we can provide this English, Spanish, and vice versa. We are the same organization that grew from organizing international meetings of secular AA in different cities and virtually since 2014. We've been publishing more than 200 recordings since December 2020 in our virtual sessions and in person of the conferences of this monthly events in the World Tour of Speakers, which are to our housed in our website. You are going to check it out in the chat box if you want. Since 2020, the recordings have been heard from for people in the six continents approximately 45,000 times. And the last uh the second to last announcement is that our next Maine in presence meeting is going to be held in Phoenix, Arizona from November 13 to 15, 2026. The links for your subscription is $150. And the hotel reservations are going to be also posted in our chat box. And the first Sunday, next June 7, 2026, we're going to hold our next meeting, and we are going to be uh presenting the group Nosotros Diagnos Diagnostics, Us Diagnostics in our World Tour. We always have our meetings, these same meetings with interpretation, simultaneous interpretation, this same time in this same link. You are going to be informed about it in the chat box. Now I'm going to give the floor to Pilar from Spain, and she's from Jim Burguel AA Free Thinkers Group. She's going to describe the group, she's going to introduce the other three members. And I am based in Canada right now, but I am very encouraged to get Carla in Mexico and Edmundo in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. And Claudia is Equatorian in Colombia. They are going to be sharing their experiences for 15 minutes each, and then we'll be having open discussion for some people to then take the floor for two or three minutes. This meeting is 90 minutes long. Welcome all of you, and especially our virtual group. Please, Pilar, could you open your microphone at this point? Thanks. Thank you very much, Margarita. Thanks, everyone. Good afternoon. Good afternoon from Spain, ladies, gentlemen, and from the bottom of my heart, I thank this opportunity to participate in this world tour of speakers. My name is Pilar, and I've been telling you that I am located here in Denares, Spain, and I am the member of Alcoholic Anonymous since 1998, since the pandemic. We've had the opportunity of getting to know the virtual groups that has allowed me to then approach and discover the secular group groups. Today I have the honor to present the group, Jim Burwell. This is an agnostic thinkers, free thinkers group founded June 5, 2001, by many partners and also Mario mainly. We are an inclusive group, a safe space where we interact, mainly people from AA looking for a secular perspective with the 12-step program, along with people from other communities in the 12-step way, like uh people who would not have secular groups but from other fraternities. And this is how we may find our space. Our group is made up by members of many other nationalities that would then bring about enriching meetings when sharing experiences which are quite diverse, but always joined by the same purpose. In every meeting, we feel that more than our differences, we are joined by the essential, sincere desire of keeping ourselves sober and making unit. And with the inclusion sense, we practice the program for our recovery from a very wide perspective where every individual may be finding their own way to sobriety, always based on the mutual support basis, honesty, and personal commitment. And also, I'd like to express on behalf of those participating from the European continent our gratefulness for Jim Burwell that would be helding meetings in European time zone and that would then provide every means for our participation. Also, thanking people who are interpreting because what they do is essential for us to share with no language barrier whatsoever. Thanks for bringing about this space for us to encounter and being listened, for us to share who we are and how we live our recovery. It is also a way to keep on growing and to feel part of something that is greater than us. We are taking away with us with our experience, with our hope, and the reminder that we are not on our own in our way to recovery. And with this in mind, now I'd like to get started with our speaker's terms with our guests today. And to get started, we are going to listen to Carla P. Testimony. She's from Mexico, but now she's living in Connecticut. But now she's in Mexico because we are always traveling around. And whenever you are okay, Carla, please go ahead. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks, everyone. It is my pleasure to see you, Margarita, Tony, everyone. Thanks for inviting me. Thanks for giving me that chance to participate. I am Mexican, I am Carla. I am an alcoholic, and I am in the Jim Bergwell group of free thinkers, agnostics in Mexico. And as Pilar was saying, I am now based in Connecticut along with my husband, but today I'm in Mexico because I came to visit my family, and I'm very happy to be here. Mainly you'll be hearing some background noise that are characteristics of my city, but probably you won't be hearing them that much. I began like 15 years ago, because when I was a teenager along with my girlfriends, we were supposed not to consume alcohol because we were minors, but in our 15th birthday parties is traditional to have alcohol for adults. And I really enjoyed the flavor from the beginning. And I also like the effects of it because I was I was one who wanted to be perfect. I was that young girl that was always impeccable, always trying to have the best grades, always behaving pretty well at home. So whenever I experienced alcohol, and that's how I could free myself from those concerns, then I was not self-aware and I was extroverted. I became popular and fun. That's how I found an important, interesting way of being. When I turned 19, then the father of my children, who was who was dating me at that time, offered me another different substance, and I accepted it because I had many emotional things going on. I felt uh lonely, and then I hooked up on that substance because I could then drink even more without feeling drunk. Then we got married, and we kept those addictions as part of our relationship during eight years, and then I ended up in a hospital and then in an narcotics anonymous group, and I grew scared, and then I decided to leave that substance. But alcohol was a lifelong partner. I thought that there was no issues with alcohol, and I had eliminated, according to my thoughts, the other problem that was the other substance, and then I blamed the father of my children, and we got divorced, but I kept on drinking alcohol. And during this alcoholism, I always had many issues with my mother because I didn't cater to my children, I was leaving them with my mother, and she told me, You are an alcoholic, and I laughed. I told her, Well, you are overreacting, you're a party pooper, you are not letting me live my life, and I was a victim, a hundred percent victim. And then, since I didn't have the support of the father of my children, I was working at all times, and the rest of my time was used for alcohol consumption, and now many things are told by my children, and I have no memories of those events because I wasn't there. Some memories I do have would be about those days that when I was intoxicated with them in the car, family reunions when I was always drunk, and my daughter had to lead me to my bed because I couldn't do it on my own, and that's how it happened. My adulthood passed by like that, and then I remarried once again. I met my husband in Puerto Vallarta Beach. We fell in love, and after a year and a half, we decided that we were going to leave Mexico to move to the US and then get married and start a family. When I got to the US, I had no work, and then I just devoted myself to drink it up, all the alcohol in the country. And I sincerely thought that it was my destiny, it was my fate to drink all the time non-stop. And something happened. She got sick and then we went to rehab. And I remember that she called me up because now my children and our adults living here in Mexico, she called me up asking for help, and in that moment I was drunk. And as I could from there, I made all the arrangements so she could go to our rehab detox center, and I was very ashamed of myself because I was intoxicated as well. I was drinking nonstop every day, and I was sending my daughter to that detox center as well. And the only thing I could think of is that, well, no, I'll drink less. What I'll do to become a better mother is to drink less. Of course, that didn't happen, and I was using that as an excuse to consume even more, and it was craziness. And due to that, my husband told me, please look for a group for relatives because he could see me that I was depressed and drinking even more. I then looked for a group for relatives, and I heard about a girl talking about her alcoholic mother. She was sharing that experience, the mother being very embarrassed, embarrassed, embarrassing all the time. And then I identified myself with that alcoholic mother I was hearing about, and that opened my consciousness somehow, and it took me from there two more years to look for the right help in double A, because my husband said I'm going to stop drinking, and he was having some blood pressure issues, and then he stopped his drinking, but I got upset. How are you going to leave me drink alone and get drunk on my own? And that's when I thought that my thoughts were completely wrong. I was not worrying about his health, I was worrying about my egotistic consumption and that we were going to become a very bored couple, boring couple, and that I could not drink my shots in the nighttime. And then I realized that I needed another group because the 12-step group for relatives showed me the way. And then I got to a traditional group, and it was very difficult for me to get adapted because of the higher power topic, and I felt lost and hopeless because how am I going to recover if it is completely necessary to develop and build up a higher power? And then I felt discouraged, and then I looked for something different, and then I found Jim Burwell, and that's how I became pretty grateful for finding this group. This is where I found people who think like me, who have appreciated me, and that's what I can tell you about my onset in AA. It's been 10 months, but I can tell you that by now I don't want to drink any longer. Days after I stopped my drinking, my best friend died. I cried a lot, but I didn't drink. And then I feel quite aware that I don't want that life for me any longer, and that everything that has changed during these months has been pretty good for me, mainly because I really enjoy the fact that I am not embarrassed about myself anymore. I feel good about myself. I could speak to my children and tell them that I am now pertaining to this group and that there is a family disease, but that we can get our treatment. And I believe this is beautiful because now my daughter, who is sober now, are speaking that same language, both of us, she would have even more knowledge than me, I must confess. But it is beautiful to enjoy sobriety in a family because of the support given. And I always follow what the group tells me not to drink that first glass of alcohol, and I try to live it up every day, and I understand that I am suffering from a disease that I cannot drink normally, not even a little bit, but it's okay. Life goes on, and every day I get the gifts of life. I enjoy that. That's what I can share with you. I am very thankful because I had the opportunity of sharing, and thanks, Pilar. Thanks, everyone. Thanks to you, Carla. Thanks. Because of your experience, because what you've shared, your strength, your hope. Thanks. And now we can continue with our second speaker sharing testimony, and that is Edmundo. He is in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Please go ahead, Edmundo, and welcome. Good afternoon, ladies, gentlemen. My name is Edmundo. I've been benefited from the Alcoholic Anonymous groups. Right now I'm based in Tegucigalpa. It is 27 Celsius here, but I am enjoying this meeting as it should. Because at this point we've uh replaced the complaints, and we are now using celebration. In Alcoholic Anonymous, I've heard that we've been close, we've been on the brink of death. In my personal case, it was not just a metaphor, this was the real deal. The symptom is manifested in ways that we might be sharing as partners in the group, drinking since very young age and continuously touching bottom every day drinking, and I don't know if it's uh also known in your country the muaro that is a 45 alcohol degrees beverage, and I was having an eighth of guaro to then uh get to sleep. We begin our day 5 a.m. in the morning before going to work. I've been in very despicable environments and atmospheres and places where human life is not appreciated in its minimum portion. And my experience is kind of interesting, I guess, because I was working in a psychiatric national psychiatric chronic disease hospital, and there is an alcoholism unit for drug consumption as well, and my immediate manager is a very well-known doctor and also in charge of the groups facilitating recovery, and it is not therapy, and it is not to be mentioned like that, but I believe that it is psychotherapy at some point, and I was also responsible for those activities, and I was catering to internal. Patients that were 30 or 40 of them in those days, and I didn't understand what was going on with my life because I was still drinking. I was just when I left the hospital, I was straight getting drunk. And then I was told to get a group after a discussion I looked for, and I was attending a group called Serenity, Serenidad in Spanish. It was a traditional therapy group with uh orderly participation, no bad words, good harmony. But then I moved, I went to Gran Paso or Great Step group that was heavier in terms of its therapy, and that was a group where I was just sitting around, and someone could just throw you cold water out of a bucket, and then everyone was getting wet violently with insulting, with uh broken chairs and violence, and there was no option for me. I had to be in that group because I was not near from the other groups anyway. So this manifestation of the symptom of the disease, whenever when I was talking to psychologists and psychiatrists in those days, I began to understand a principle. The principle from a writer, a writer, Brazilian Antonio de Melo, and that is the about the internal world where in we know I understood that in my psychology jail, I am the prisoner and I am the gatekeeper as well. And then I began to see that if alcohol and the addiction was just a symptom, I needed the causes. And then I tracked them down when I also remember that my father was an alcoholic as well, with violence in the family, and uh that he was always against my mother's physical and psychological violence, and at some stage of my childhood and youth, I was thrown out of the house into the streets, and we went to my grandparents along with my mother, and we were sleeping on the floor with no resources, and I didn't understand that. And then I also understood that, in addition to frustration, resentment, fear, and pain, I was also empty in my existence, the self-blaming. We checked that during our group sessions, and I participated in groups that were very prone to reflect profoundly, and traditional criteria from AA emerged. We were also reading Viktor Frankl, we were reading logo therapy thesis, then Antonio de Melo and many other important authors with permanent reflection. We were then able to overcome not only the consumption, but also the bottom line, the body of the pain, as we were discussing yesterday. And this body of pain was made up by everything I've mentioned: the frustration, resentment, the pain, the fear, the lack of any life purpose, and that's how we've been walking through the process for some years now. I understand now that recovery has nothing to do with the age or your or the years you have in a group. That's why I focused my energy in studying the issue. And in also in Central American medical uh encounters, I attended, and there was a young boy who exposed the following: No, no one is denying death as much as addicts and alcoholics because they too want to die because of painful experiences not properly solved. That's how we began intense dialogues with other friends, favoring also chats with professional therapists and professionals, and that's how my life has passed by during these profiles, and I can check that now. The pain that I felt up to now, I believe that it is different. I was very resentful against my mother, not against my father. That is something to take note of, and the pain at this point is not there that much. Anthony de Melo is helping me understand that suffering is my own invention. Yes, pain is there and is focused, but overthinking and reinventing is in my mind. Resentment, especially, was against my mother. But then after my process, I've been overcoming that frustration, and also I know that my fears are the regular healthy ones that I guess are not obsessive or pathological, the regular ones that I could have because of circumstances, because of my family or myself. But I can happily say that now I enjoy my middle class household in Tegucigalpa. Let's say that I am one of those few who are still in the middle class because in Tegucigalpa you are rich or poor, but I've been told that resentment should not be tackling me for much time. And with jealousy, now I don't feel that that issue is not something of mine. Whenever I need to acknowledge my own craziness, I know that's the principle of healing and transcendence. Looking up in to my past, helping others, and with the AA people in hospitals, I've learned that it is always good to devote myself to service that is healing, my craziness that has helped me out with my recovery these last years. I've worked on also helping violent men, those who have been filed as violent men, and the service I've given to them has also founded more my recovery. And well, yes, this is what I could that I what I could think about sharing. We've been in these groups in Tegucigalpa, I've also rendered services, the basic ones, the from coordination, the secretary, the treasurer. I've been also the coffee boy and cleaning man. And as of the pandemic, the young people who are who have more audacity are staying in the in-person groups, and the older ones go to virtual groups. And I believe that eight months or a year now I've been joined this group and we are reflecting with proposals. We coordinate the Friday sessions, the topics we deal with are quite interesting in regards to the recovery process. This is what I can tell you about my life, and maybe the best is the plenary where we may be also discussing your most interesting topics. Thanks to those who have heard, and thanks to Pilar for taking the floor back. Yes, Edmundo, this is for us our pleasure, and for ending up our speakers, we've got Claudia. Claudia is well known because of the service she's rendering in this event. She's from Ecuador, but she's based in Colombia. Please go ahead, Claudia. Yes, thank you. Thank you for your service. Thanks, my dear partners. I'm Claudia, I'm an alcoholic. Thanks for joining us. And generally speaking, I would hardly share my history because I always think that I enjoy my privileges and I acknowledge them, and maybe I'm not useful because of that, but but pertaining to a community like this is giving me the chance to share strength, hope, and experience. And this is something useful for the newcomers and also for those who have been in the community for some time now. I am Claudia, and that is not my real name because of my trajectory in the community. I opted for using this name and protecting my privacy. And I got here in the community June 19th, 18th, 2009, 17 years over now, and I am from Ecuador, from a small village that is in the coastline and with very hot weather, where we've got much stigma surrounding drug consumption, but not that much over alcohol consumption. And I am the daughter of an alcoholic man and the granddaughter of an alcoholic man as well, and none of my siblings is an addict. I am the youngest of uh four, and my life has passed by always in a kind of strange way. I didn't know why in those days, and uh I could not work as the other children, and I was not filling up the expectations from my family either. So when I was very young, I remember that my first contact with alcohol. Um I knew that my father had many gatherings with people from work and those other family events involving work uh co-workers, and I remember that my father was my main caretaker, and I was my skin was darker, and that's why my sister and my mother mistreated me, but my father didn't, so I was very interested in catching his attention because my father was on my side, and in that father, and in that party they were serving beer, and my father was uh celebrating my beer drinking, and that was deeply recorded in my mind that I was being celebrated because of my drinking, and in that Christmas and the rest of the important family events, I remember that I was also drinking some alcohol because it was something that gave me a special role, and in some beach vacations, because we were constantly going there, we had I had a different contact with alcohol. It was the first time that I drank a spirit, a strong spirit, and uh it is called wado as well, this alcoholic beverage, and the reaction was immediate, different from beer, and I felt so relaxed and so good inside. That same year I drunk, I got drunk with a blackout, and then I always knew that I was going to pass out somehow, and I don't know if this was only my issue, but whenever a woman excessively consumes alcohol, it's because there are emotional issues. There are emotional issues, maybe she's depressed, she's anxious, and then they gave me some medicine when I turned 16 with psychologists and psychiatrists. My consumption made me feel very comfortable. I didn't need to be defensive against humiliations or criticism in my home, and I felt uh just uh free and happy and ready to be myself. So this only grew my consumption in my teenage years when I turned 20, and also when I grew up, I could then see that consumption increased. It increased because of uh drugs from the regular pharmacy, but also I was taking painkillers and then I began with uh this consumption even harder. And then my family saw when I was fourteen years old that I injected formal formal day in my and it was evident and they had to witness that, but the suicide attempts only increased over time, and I found like a twisted pleasure it gave me like every time I every time I tried to kill myself or attempt suicide, it gave me hope.

SPEAKER_03 39:38

And then it only diversified my way of trying to self-destruct me or myself. There was I couldn't find any other way. Uh I always tried to find a way of stop feeling the way I was feeling, and I didn't know how. The only thing I could do was keep doing what I already knew. I drank, I used drugs, pharmaceuticals, and when I couldn't bear it anymore, when that was not enough. Another suicidal attempt. And well life went on. I got to be twenty-three years old, I got married for the first time and my first husband, I found also uh a fellow user, and that marriage was chaos. We were very young. I was twenty-three, he was twenty-six. And it lasted why my body lasted because when had a little rupture, what determined me to leave was not the fact that we were using together or drugs, alcohol, rather it was that my liver stopped functioning, I had liver failure, and that scared me a lot. Um because I was a person who looked after my nutrition very much, my health. But well I I was having alcohol consumption drug use. Um I was uh bench drinking drugs, alcohol, as well as narcotics and the pseudo attempts had also done their share. So then I was able to leave that relationship because that liver failure and I was sober, but I was I it made no sense. I didn't think I could keep it up, it wasn't sustainable. I had heard about programs like twelve step programs, and I decided to look for information and I found auras, I found groups, and one of them was in Yahoo. Well a lot of people there seventeen years ago were saying that they were starting to say, or since then they were saying since then they were saying sobriety could not be reached in the virtual meetings. That was a lie. Well the truth is that since I was from a very small town, when I tried to go to a in-person meeting, there the only men there were four years old. I was twenty-eight, and I said no, uh I could be there. Um I felt very Uncomfortable. I didn't make any sense of it, and I felt vulnerable too. So I went back to my virtual meetings, and I remember when I got there, when I stopped drinking, I would only sleep. I didn't know any other way of how to avoid the desire to drink or use. So I slept, I took my liver medications, and then I slept. And that was what I did. When I found a virtual group, I was in the group, I slept. I did all the things that I had to do in my house, and I slept. And I had my session, my meeting. I was doing that for about nine months. One of the things that made me stay an alcoholic anonymous was that I didn't have any more money. I didn't feel like I could ask my mom for help. And I said, Well, this is it. This is a program. I don't have to pay anything. I have no other option. All resources had ended. I'm not talking about financial resources, but all the different ways available to try to find recovery. Being admitted, internship, medications, new treatments, innovations in medications, and even the religious piece. I thought of myself as a very religious person, very spiritual person. I wanted to stop being this thing that was in my life that was causing me so much suffering. Then I well, when I got there, I didn't understand either. I don't I didn't understand what they were saying. The only thing I could understand was related to were the stories being told. I read the steps and I didn't understand. I didn't understand the first paragraph, nor the second one, nor anything. My mind was too tired, clogged, wasted, burnt out. After treatment, I really I the usage and the consumption and didn't affect my liver only, but also my mental clarity. And I had to go through detox from all that. Well, little by little that was having an effect, and when I stopped drinking and not using drugs, I gradually began to see that there was a world beyond myself, and my pink cloud was wonderful. I stopped feeling sad. I felt so optimistic, and I thought finally, finally, I'm going to be able to be without harming myself so much because alcohol had become the entry door for every suicidal attempt. It wasn't only just asking myself, what did I do? Because I couldn't remember what I had done, but it was also waking up and realizing I was injured, harmed, or who knows what I had tried to do this time to harm myself. And it was then that I had to act on it. But it was only my vanity for my house that made me think things over because I had had deeper falls in the past in different stages of my life, and I hadn't done anything about it. I was just dragged on. I never thought I would reach the current age that I have. I'm 44, almost 45, and well, at that age, I thought by 40 I would be dead. Because that was actually what I wanted. So when I got to Alcoholic Anonymous, I had hope that I could have a sustainable recovery for myself, and also that it had structure. My life had none, no structure. I was an autopilot during my growth, my childhood, because of narcolepsy. I was like a corpse, just the body circulating. Around me in the exterior surroundings, things that perhaps my parents were trying to teach me with examples. I was not able to perceive all that. There wasn't any habits in me, no structure, a lifestyle, nothing. There was nothing. Everything was upside down. It was a mess. It was disorganized. I my life had no order, no upside, it was upside down. It was in the fellowship that I learned to live. I learned to smile even. I learned to relate to people, to treat people, and I learned to have fun without drinking, without using drugs, to relax without being drunk, to dream without drugs, to make friends without having to have uh drug use between us, and to see that perhaps I could have a future. When the pink cloud burst, and I think this happens to many people, it hit me in the face, straight in the face. The depression did. It was uh emotional relapse, it was a huge emotional relapse, and I entered voluntarily into a psychiatric program because I was having suicidal ideation again, and I admitted myself voluntarily to the psychiatric unit. During all this time, I the only thing I thought was as long as I'm sober, there's hope. Because my life was not worth it, it was fucked up entirely, and I said, Well, this is sobriety, this is it, there's nothing else. But I I couldn't understand with that that that was all there was. The only thing that gave me relief was to know that I wasn't harming harming the people around me, the people that I loved, and I wasn't affecting them with my behaviors. I was trying to be lovable. I repaired my relationship with my mother, with my sister, and I discovered many things about myself that the program taught me through the practice of the steps, but I couldn't stop feeling that huge depression, and that I wasn't fit for life. After that, I discovered that I had narcolepsy, and for a moment that worked, it gave me enthusiasm, but medications were not having an effect either because of my profound depression. So in this year, this year that I it was in this year that I decided that I had suffered enough. Years had gone by, twelve or thirteen years of sobriety, and I said, Well, I can't keep on like this. I was always asking if there was end-of-life assistance here in Colombia, but there wasn't. But I spoke to my husband back then, and I told him I can't go on. He knew all my attempts at trying to be well, and I said, I just can't do it. So it was during that week that I had agreed with him that I would talk to my family, so they would come here to Colombia and see if there was any legal issue with regards to this end of life, the session I had already taken. But just that week my elder brother passed away, and I feel that something happened that I would have never instinctively reacted like that. I think the program did this for me. And it was that I thought about their pain and not mine. I thought I can't do this to my family, I can't give them another death, and then I told myself I'm gonna give myself the last chance. I'm gonna try the program because Western medicine was not working for me. I had refused electroshock therapy because that was the practice where I was being treated, and they had recommended electroshock therapies, and there was nothing else. So I said, Well, I'm gonna try this once again, and if it doesn't work this time, that's it, that's the end. And suddenly, after so many, so many years of reading, studying the same thing over and over, that's why I think it's very important to try to observe learning, knowledge, practice all the steps from different perspectives because sometimes we read it in a robotic way and we don't find any meaning anymore in it. So I took a workshop and service workshop. I couldn't bear the religious piece anymore. They talked about the main objective, the main goal of the groups were helping the alcoholic who is still suffering. And it was at that time that many infinite number of things clicked. Thoughts like that my own thinking was my own worst enemy, and that it was consuming me, it was self-destructing me. That ability to think was exactly what was killing me, and it always led me to depression, and that perhaps this is what I needed, serving others, and that was exactly what I needed. I thought, and I started doing it, and well, now it's been 19 years of sobriety, almost four years without uh any depression, and all of this path became much easier because at that time it had become, and this is when I found the secular AA groups, and because trying to make a program fit with an alcohol atheist alcoholic is a huge work. It's burn a burnout, it's a drag, and it's just huge. Trying to translate constantly the terms, the higher power, and they can say whatever they want, but they say it very clearly it's not a higher power. When you say a higher power, you are referring to a deity because find that let's speak clearly. It is God. And I don't have a God. I know of that that was there. I couldn't assimilate it, I couldn't understand it. I was trying to uh stick with singularity and the power. It just no no. And one time during the pandemic, and there were many chats, diffusion chats, and there was an invitation from Jim Burwell, and I entered and I met Marito. I'm with Marito. He gave me a lot of information, and when I read it, I felt like the weight had been lifted, the whole world had been lifted from above me. Finally, I felt again the relief that I felt when I realized I didn't believe in a deity. I had the same sensation of relief. Simply the recovery, the learning, the processes, the tools began to flow. And it wasn't anymore that drag of trying to walk on irregular terrain that was so difficult for me. And well, I'm here sharing with you all very nervously and grateful for the opportunity. Thank you very much, and I'm sorry if I took too long. Thank you so much, I'm Margarita, sober alcoholic. And this was a powerful presentation of your experience strength and hope of this group. I'm very grateful. I know we have an open room for discussion and moderating, and I would like to start first because I'm very excited. I'm grateful for the three people who shared so honestly. I liked how Pilar said at the beginning we're not alone anymore, and we are here for you in a group. I don't know from what how many countries we're representing, but we're here together and we are supporting each other, identifying one with another. I identify with depression. I had the same thought that Claudia had that when somebody died in my family, I couldn't do the same. I couldn't take my own life and hurt them. That's what rescued me. I couldn't do that to my family. After losing my sister in love for her own suicide. The idea that I windu shared about recovery. It doesn't have to do with years. I've been here since I've just every day is a different struggle. I don't feel so much attraction to drinking, but I have to express my emotions and so life daily life. What Carla was saying about being ashamed. I felt so ashamed myself. I have memories with my children, and I have spoken with them since then, and they are very supportive in my sobriety and they know. Uh same way as Claudia to feel other people give me a purpose and pleasure and it helps my recovery a lot. Thank you. Thank you all in the group, Jim Burrell. And the mic goes to Pilar. Thank you, Margarita, for your words. Well, we start the QA or reflections. We have about three minutes per intervention. So the floor is open. Hello. My name is Amigo Paul. I belong to the group, uh, Jim Barwell's group. I'm very happy to join you today. Thank you, everybody. Claudia, Edmundo, Carla, Pilar, for conducting the session today. I I feel really happy to be able to participate with you all today. Unity, listening to you all, getting to know you a little bit better. I'm an alcoholic person too. I a little bit of what everybody's saying, it's incredible that so many people from so many countries are here and gather today sharing. I remember about what people were sharing at the beginning. I remember that when I joined the community, one of the first groups that I went to was Beyond Belief in Toronto. Although it's not my first language when I before, like many people I imagine started with uh regular groups. But when I found and I saw that there was this group, a secular double A in the listing in double A, I thought like, wow, it caught my attention. And I said, I have to join. That's not my language, but I have to join. Something was telling me that I should join, that that's where I belonged. And after that, that's when I met the group and I really liked it. And then I met this group, Jim Borwell's. And also when I knew that there was a group secular double A in Spanish, I thought like, wow, fantastic, knowing that there was one that we had uh I had that option. It was like I felt identified, like like Claudia said. Everything that was so difficult to assimilate and I couldn't progress, I couldn't make any progress because it was something that I wasn't accepting. It didn't make any sense to me, all the religious stuff. And when I knew that I could approach this in a way with so many ideology, I thought, well, yes, this is my tribe, this is where I belong. This is what makes sense to me. Well, since then I try to be all the time, I like the groups, uh also with a group in Toronto. Uh I and I always will join when I'm able to, and Jim Bowels and other secular groups. But very happy to be here with you all. Happy to be in unity, happy to be with you, happy 24, and thank you for all your sharing. Thank you, Paul, for your experience and your testimony. And I see more raised hands. We're we're gonna give the mic to Raquel, Judy, and Jack. I'll be naming you. Go ahead, Raquel, whenever you're ready. Good evening. I'm Raquel. I'm an alcoholic. I haven't drank today. I'm good, and I'm delighted. Very happy to listen to you all. And to be in this session, I have met these groups of three thinkers, agnostics, and just recently, and it has been precious for me because I have been in recovery since eighteen years ago in double A. I reached the bottom, I was in captivity, I was in prison. And I was in modules for mothers under the alcoholic, the inmate, the alcoholic underneath. And the truth is that I wasn't able to find, I was afraid when trying to speak and express myself. And I did feel free in the touches. I felt like there was an uh incoherence. I ended up being a different person in my life and in the meanings, the recovery meanings. It was difficult for me, uh, the way I felt and thought. And that couldn't be. That has nothing to do with me or with recovery or with freedom, authenticity. I am who I am. I feel brilliant right now. I feel really well. I'm happy being me. Also, I really like inclusivity because my father is an alcoholic and I went never went to recovery. I never made it that he I I never was able to help him uh recover. We've never been able to sit down and talk about this, and I was rejected by my family, but and we all received um mistreatment, uh bullying. I suffered a lot, really. And in different places I found a lot of support and peer support where I was able to work this macho attitudes, social macho attitudes, and learning how to build up healthy relationships and good relationships. And I don't understand a relationship where I'll be excluded because of the way I think or feel. That's not possible. I always heard that double A was for everyone. And really, that is my that is my desire that we can all recover from alcoholism, all the people who suffer from it. I stopped drinking just for today is the first step, but then you have different steps that I also have to give them, not dogmatically, not dogma of faith, no dogma of faith. I just need to experiment and to trial and make sure that the things that you're saying work out for me. I'm not just sitting down and expecting things to happen to me and change. And everything is gonna change just by sitting down. No, I'm a woman of action. I like to think, I'm a thinker, and well, I'm very grateful, very happy, and I will continue uh coming to this group, Jim Burwell's group. And that's all. Thank you. Thank you, Rachel, for your strength, your hope. And now Judith, when you're ready, Judith, thank you for being here.

SPEAKER_07 1:15:51

Thank you. Thanks everyone. Thanks to the female male speakers. I'm Judith, I'm an addict in general terms, and I am pretty thankful for having the chance of listening to you, and also the welcome that I've felt, and also how we are embraced by the 12-step programs, because it is about spiritual principles and following them, and uh not just for AA, but also for other different programs, and I'm also joining the program not feeling that I deserve it fully, but I always learn from everyone from the secular perspective, is what it has taken me to the top, and it's been for two years and a half that I was also with compulsive eaters, and I've been working the 12-step program there as well, and also when it comes to beliefs, I've had uh a very interesting issue. I'm the daughter of uh alcoholic parents, I could get to know the 12-step program since I was very young, but then I was denying everything in regards to programs later on because my mother relapsed and I blamed God. And uh of course, if everything is left to a God, they would never be able to recover. And there is something that is true, partially at least, in terms of my beliefs, uh, that I was in denial, but I was told the program is okay, it is the people who would fail. And I can tell you that it's been a struggle for these two years and a half for me, and I believe it is quite generous to get this information. I don't know if this is the reality for the rest of the groups, but those who are approaching from other different programs, I believe that we have more reasons to unite than to segregate. And I've also had issues on my own with alcohol at times, but I'm fearful because I really don't want to die. So I am thankful for my recovery, and because of my consumption and my addiction, I was in institutions, and I was brave enough in quotation marks to ask for help, and then they locked me in. I just wanted to get some detox treatment, but they decided to lock me in. I tried to commit suicide a couple of times, and my addiction is in food and relationships, but I need to be pretty alert, and sometimes I might be thinking about consuming other new substances, but uh the context around me is not favorable for that because where I'm coming from it was a risk, but now I feel that by joining groups I'm learning, and um I thank you from the bottom of my heart. I want to keep on working on the program and meetings, is uh swallowing my heart with love. Thank you. Thanks, thanks to you, Judith, because of your testimony. You know that you are always welcome in our group because you are an active participant, and now we are going to give the floor to Jack B. Please, Jack, turn on your mic when you are ready.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:47

Good afternoon. I'm hoping you can hear me. I'm going to be speaking in English. I hope that's okay. I don't know how to speak in Spanish. But this is my first time visiting uh this meeting in person. And I wanted to share some good news, but before I share some good news, I just wanted to say that the last anniversary that I had of sobriety last November, I got a medallion and it had an L on it. So if anybody knows Roman numerals, an L means fifty. And I celebrated fifty years of sobriety last November. And I've been an active member in traditional AA for fifty years. But the good news I want to share, and with the thanks of all of you folks in the secular world, I'm leaving my home group this week. And I am partnering with another fellow with forty-five years of sobriety, and we are starting the first secular meeting in Southeast Florida that we know of. Uh a week from Thursday will be our first meeting. We found a meeting hall. We got lots of support from the people who are giving us the meeting space. And um the fellow who is doing it with me is forty-five years sober, so between the two of us we have ninety-five years of sobriety. And we're both uh totally aware of the big missing piece that um many traditional AA groups are quiet about. Um I do some work in the field and I know that there's there are many people when I recommend that they try AA or I try rehab and they try intensive adaptation. And maybe you should try some support group meetings, and they I've heard this too many times. You mean AA? And what they'll say is, Oh, my husband went to AA two years ago, he'll never go back to AA. Because it's too religious. It's a religious program, isn't it? Uh no, it's not a religious program, but that's the perception. So my friend and I know the amount of people that are left outside the rooms. And we also know the people that are sitting in the rooms to stay very quiet about the fact that they do not work with a deity. They do not work with they do not work with uh religious or any dogmatic approach to uh their belief uh to stay sober. And the interesting thing is that when I came in, I was twenty years old, I just turned seventy. I was at the end of my life, at the age of twenty. I walked into an AA meeting and said, if this doesn't work, I'm putting a gun to my temple and I'm pulling the trigger because I couldn't live another day the way I was living, just in eight years of drinking and using. But the idea of uh I got married and I had a family and we were going to church all the time. Um and I don't have a problem with people who go to church. Good for you, that's good. I was a deacon in church, I was an elder in church, I was teaching Sunday school classes for many, many years. And probably about halfway through my sobriety maybe around 2000, I started to read books on philosophy. I started to read uh books about Buddhism, I started to read other things, you know, for how people move through life. Uh and then the pandemic hit. This is kind of my version of how we got to where we are this next week starting this group. The pandemic hit. We were all uh sent to our Zoom rooms for about a year. And as I was looking for Zoom rooms, I ran into secular AA, in which I many years in AA never heard of secular sobriety. But by this time I basically had deconstructed from my own religious faith, was not going to church for ten or fifteen years, uh and really just deconstructed from my whole belief in a religious connection with a with a higher power. And here comes the pandemic. And now I'm finding myself a few times sitting in secular meetings, which I never knew anything about. And I went, wow, this is a whole world I knew nothing about. I totally believe in it. I know how many people have come to AA and basically never come back. I know people who hide out in AA and never share that they really don't have a belief in a deity, but they'll just kind of And that was after a while with me, I spoke up about it. But I was okay in traditional AA, but when I found secular AA, I said, wow, this is really gonna help open the doors to many, many people, whether they're coming for the first time or whether they've been sitting in AA rooms for ten years looking for an alternative to where they can feel more comfortable. So the good news is that I've been listening to Margarita, I've been listening to Claudia, thank you both for your uh work in this part of the fellowship. Thank you, all the speakers. But um, I've listened on the podcast or the recorded versions, never been here in person. Uh and maybe we'll get in touch as our group gets growing, and maybe we'll say, hey, if you need three speakers, we'll join you. Um I want to just share my final. We finished the flyer for our meeting. Uh there's the name, the agnostics. Here's the information when we're meeting, but we put three quotes on the bottom from our founder Bill W. So we want to make sure that people who might have a problem with this, because some people do, because they don't really understand it. But I put three quotes on here from our founder, Bill W, and I thought it was important, and I'd like to share them with you. One comes from, and I have all the AA books. I've I'm a historian of AA, I really know a lot about it. Um, I've I've had uh you know archives, I've spoken at meetings all over the country and archives meetings and old timers meetings, and but here's three quotes that I think you'll all appreciate if you haven't heard them, um, and probably you have if you're in secular AA. But first one comes from AA Comes of Age, which is a popular AA approved book. It's from Bill W. It says, quote, our atheists and agnostics widened our gateway so that all who suffer might pass through regardless of their belief or lack of belief. Unquote. That's Bill W, the founder. Um the second one's kind of similar, but the third one is. And I think it's really interesting when I found this quote. I just started looking up all grapevines and all you know some of the materials that is coming out with now is important because um the book One Big Tent with twenty different people who wrote Greyvine articles that they're sober twenty, thirty, forty years and their agnostics for atheists. But this was a quote from Bill W. in a Grayvine article in 1961. It says, quote, in 80's first years, I all but ruined the whole undertaking. God, as I understood him, had to be for everybody. Sometimes my aggression was subtle, and sometimes it was crude. But either way, it was damaging. Perhaps fatally so to numbers of non-believers. Basically, if he had to do it all over again, would probably leave so much of the religious language out and just make it the third tradition. He's saying I all but ruined it because I was too aggressive with the it came right out of a religious in 1939. So anyway, I hope I didn't take too long, but I just want to thank all of you because your voices, your presence, and everything is responsible for this new group starting in Southeast Florida. Uh in Broward County. Um near Miami Fort Lauderdale, Boca Ratone. That's where we hang out. If you're down that way, somehow you gotta get in touch with me. So bless you all. Bless you all. There you go. Thank you much.

SPEAKER_07 1:29:44

Well, thank you, Jack. Thanks. Good luck. Good luck with uh your new foundation, and uh of course we are thanking another secular group within the double A community. And we still have a little bit of time. I'd like you to ask you to use your three-minute window for these last participations. Juan Leo, please open your microphone. Your turn is on. In addition to neurosis and alcoholism, I am too vain because of that, because of being deaf and also addict and alcoholic. But now I know that I should value myself equally to others. But by having this hearing impaired, I get pretty stressed and tense. But uh right now in Mexico we are celebrating May 5th, the Puebla battle, and we've got much alcohol running around because of these festivities. But uh I'd like to tell you also that I'm in a therapy group, direct therapy group, and it is against the disease, not the individual. But I'm not going to complain. I've learned not to make a drama out of things, but I would just like to inform that I really enjoy reading, and I also enjoy hearing the interpretation. I would really like to learn English. English is an important tool, undoubtedly. But hopefully, I won't be complaining or being a drama king, but I know that pain is necessary, suffering is optional. I've been in my group three years from the pandemic on I began in 2023. It's been three or four years in the program for me, but this is direct therapy group, and I wouldn't like to be too rational about it, but unfortunately, this is Latin American people, and in Mexico, we use a lot of bad words and double sense phrases. And tomorrow I'll be coordinating steps and on Wednesday the chapters, but there are many regularly. We've got like 23, 30, or 40 people, and with the special events, we may be gathering 50, but it's been like 20 or 31 regularly with us, and I believe that I've I've learned to have the positive factors, but we've got so much bad language and many insults to both men and women, and I'm not going to mention any bad words, any bad words, but the intentions is what is really backing up words. That's what one of my mentors told me. Don't pay much attention to the bad words, pay attention to the intention. The intention is the reality behind things. So it is my struggle because when I coordinate even for five years, and our testimony is given in 25 minutes, and we have to then study step one, for instance. And in my case, I can read 12, 11, and I understand them, but I also need to experience them because I am 60 years old and I've had a very long trajectory in neurosis and drugs, and I also enjoy art, so I'm not afraid of reading the third step because it is about uh giving out my life to a higher power, and I know that we then get uh hardships because of uh not being independent, and now that my mother died, I know that I cannot depend on my mother, and my mentor told me, well, you depend on your mother still, even though she died 20 years ago because she's still in your mind. But I'm going to be brief, I don't want to use more time. I am very happy to be with you, I'm very happy to learn, and I'd like to ask something, and uh there was a motorcycle, very noisy one in Mexico. Motorcycles are crazy. The bikers are out of this world, but well, that was a joke here in Mexico. There is no respect for pedestrians, and in Mexico we have much violence and lack of courtesy. I wouldn't like to speak wrong about Mexico because of the beauty of the country, but I need to tell you that the culture is uh pertaining to the third world, I would say. So we've got the serenity prayer. I cannot change the bikers being so disrespectful, and that's something I've learned. Not to be bitter and not to complain. No, I cannot hear it. There's no more audio. I think we've lost you. We cannot hear you anymore. The question is: I have a question. Agnostics, atheists, and free thinkers. I have some concepts learned from dianetics and other religions. So my question is, what are you what do you mean by free thinkers? And I'll adapt. Here in Mexico, we say if you go to a different village, learn from it and adapt to it. So flexibility is right there from me, and with the free thinking concept, I like it. And I know that double A is for alcoholics, drug addicts, and neurotics, but also for non-alcoholics. So this would be my questions. Thank you, and have happy 24 hours. Okay, thank you. Now we've got Jeff. Please, Jeff.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:27

Yes, hi. Hi Jeff, I'm an alcoholic. I'm here in Tulsa, Oklahoma. And if you're not familiar with the states, Oklahoma is in the Bible belt. And after 25 years of religious AA, I was ready to quit going. But I didn't want to give up, and I kept searching, and I found secular AA, and my recovery has blossomed. Uh my joy in AA has returned, and I need to thank you all for that. Uh thanks, Jack, for starting that meeting. One day I hope to get to visit it. And uh I thoroughly enjoyed our meeting today. Uh, I kept going back and forth between translation English and Spanish because I wanted to hear your beautiful language. So thank you guys. Thank the speakers and our translators very much. Bye-bye.

SPEAKER_07 1:39:25

Yes, thanks everyone. I am Margarita, and apparently we've reached the end of our meeting. I'd like to thank once again Jim Bergwell's group and also the interpreters. Fabio, Veronica, thanks to Tony and Claudia also, because of her support with the messages and chat. We have a fun way to close. We've got a very simple song that we use for closure, and probably I might be thanking you to open your microphones and sing along. I'll try to do it in Spanish, but if you want to do it in English and you know the lyrics, you can do it.

SPEAKER_05 1:40:23

If you're sober and you know your pickets, if you're happy and you know about your pants.

SPEAKER_07 1:40:44

That was great. Thank you. See you next time.

SPEAKER_03 1:40:49

Bye-bye.

SPEAKER_07 1:40:50

Thank you. Take care. Have a good one.

SPEAKER_04 1:40:55

Thanks. See you next time. I was continuing to look at the alcohol.

SPEAKER_03 2:19:51

That's what I'm looking for. I felt really uncomfortable. Um it didn't make any sense to me. So I felt a little slight continued in spiritual meetings. I remember that when I got there, I wasn't tweaking.

SPEAKER_06 2:28:54

Así que seguí en mis reuniones virtuales. Recuerdo que cuando llegué, yo solo dormía porque no sabía otra forma de cómo evitar las ganas de beber y de consumir, mía, tomaba mis medicinas para el tratamiento hepático y dormía. Y así encontré el grupo virtual, pues estaba en el grupo, dormía, hacía todas las cosas que tenía que hacer dentro de mi casa y dormía y reunió. Y así estuve como por niveau yeah. Una de las cuales me hizo quedarme en alcohólicos anonymous era porque ya no tenía dinero, no tenía la capacidad de pedirle a mi mamá ayuda, anda, bueno, esto is a programada, no tengo otra opción. Habían acabado todos los recursos, y no me refiero a los económicos, sino a todas las formas en las cuales existían para poder recuperarme. Entramiento, medicación, tratamientos innovadores, nuevas medicinas, hasta incluso el tema religioso espiritual. Yo era muy religiosa, muy supuestamente muy espiritual, porque yo quería dejar de ser esta cosa que había en mi vida que me causaba tanto sufrimiento. Entonces, no, llegué ahí, no entendía tampoco lo que le decía, solo las historias y las comprendía, pero me animé a leer los pasos y no entendía. No entendía ni el primer párrafo, ni el secondo, ni nada. Then the mente demasiado agotada, saturada, desgastada, porque the consum that you had not afectado, but my clarity mentality. And my nuclear rosa was maravillosa. Recuerdo que dejé de tener migrañas, recuerdo que dejé de estar triste, me sentía tan optimista, decía esto al fin, al fin voy a poder estar sin dañarme tanto, porque el alcohol of entrada for that intent of suicidio. I was at the day that I've ever had 44. And at this time I was that after 40 years, I was mutable, and this was what I did. And I think my life not structure. None of this I would perceive. Incluso a mí me parece muy sorprendente cuando escucho de los alcohólicos funcionales, porque yo jamás pude ser un alcohólica funcional. Yo tenía una vida sin pies de cabeza. Fue en la comunidad que yo aprendí a vivir, aprendí a sonreír, aprendí a tratar a la gente, aprendí a divertirme sin beber, sin consumir, a relajarme, sin estar alcoholizada, a soñar, sin estar drogada, a ser amigos, sin que viese por medio consumo, and that's a future. Well, you dije, esta es la sobriedad, no hay más. The only thing I dabby was saying that I was dañando las personas en mi entorno, las personas que amaba, tampoco las afectaba con my comportamientos. Trataba de ser amorosa, reparar my relation with my mother, with my hermana. Describí muchas cosas ofrece, que programas me enseñó a través de la practica de los pasos, pero no podía dejar de sentir esa depresión enorme y que