Sober Sunrise - AA Speaker Podcast

Chris L. spent four years sober in AA without taking the steps and almost died of untreated alcoholism — then a phone call, a big book, and three other desperate women changed everything. We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com Chris grew up with a mind that told her she was never enough and always too much, found alcohol at 14 and chased three minutes of bliss for the next 20 years through blackouts, broken bones, psych wards, and a string of marriages. At her worst she was hallucinating, questioning her four-year-old son each morning about what she'd done the night before, and choosing the bottle over feeding him. She got sober but spent four years white-knuckling it on fellowship alone until her mother died of the DTs and Chris hit bottom on her bedroom floor at four and a half years without a drink. Four women opened the Big Book to page one and started doing what it said — three of them are still sober. Today her teenage son asks the drunks to pray for his friends because he grew up watching his mom love strangers in her fellowship. Chris L. from Coshocton, OH speaking at the 19th Hiawathaland Get-Together - October 2007 Music: Deep by KaizanBlu

D.J. got busted with two felonies in a parking lot while lecturing his wife — court-ordered into AA, a no-nonsense sponsor and a moment in a 7-Eleven changed everything. We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com DJ grew up crawling out of his skin, moved from upstate New York to South Texas at 13, and found alcohol the first night out at a reservoir. It worked so well he never stopped — through 20 years of whiskey, meth, a rock and roll career, and a marriage he wrecked one broken promise at a time. He got arrested in an HEB parking lot with two felonies and a seven-year-expired license, still convinced his wife was the problem. Court-ordered into recovery and facing prison, he couldn't make it across town without three beers. A sponsor laid out the symptoms of alcoholism so clearly that DJ finally saw he was a time bomb — and 44 days into working the steps, he walked into a 7-Eleven and felt good in his own skin for the first time in his life without needing to change a thing. On the day he was getting evicted, he chaired a meeting instead of sharing his problems, and a newcomer handed him the exact solution he needed. D.J. S. from Ingram, TX speaking at the Lufkin Group's 56th anniversary in Lufkin, TX - June 4th-5th 2004 Music: Deep by KaizanBlu

The 12 Steps were written in 40 minutes on a cot under the stairs — but the ideas in them had been circulating for decades. This AA history talk traces every major passage in the Big Book back to the Oxford Group books Bill Wilson and the early members were actually reading. We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com Jay S. gives a deep dive into exactly where the Big Book came from, he traces specific passages from Alcoholics Anonymous back to Oxford Group literature that was on the bestseller lists in the 1920s and 30s, showing how books like "I Was a Pagan" and "For Sinners Only" and the teachings of Sam Shoemaker fed directly into the language Bill Wilson used. He walks through the night Lois Wilson stormed into the living room and told Bill he was going to get drunk because he'd forgotten the God that got him sober — and how Bill went to his cot under the stairs and wrote the 12 Steps in 40 minutes, stopping at 12 because it was good enough for the guy from Galilee. Along the way you get the real story of how the fellowship got its name from a wet brain at Bellevue who kept mumbling "anonymous alcoholics," and Sam Shoemaker's posthumous letter comparing the writing of the steps to Moses receiving the Ten Commandments. If you've ever wondered what the early members were actually reading and talking about, this is the talk. Jay S. from Redondo Beach, CA speaking on the topic of "How AA Really Started" at the 2000 South Bay Roundup - May 2000 Music: Deep by KaizanBlu

Keith L. is one of the funniest AA speakers you'll ever hear — but underneath the stories about mutant rosary beads and grocery store meltdowns is a man who begged God to save his premature daughter and was drunk in 12 hours. From a $11-a-week room to studying in Paris seven months sober, AA gave him everything. We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com Keith L. is one of the funniest AA speakers you'll ever hear — but underneath the stories about mutant rosary beads, grocery store meltdowns, and screaming at a Fulbright Scholar through jail glass is a man who begged God to save his premature daughter's life and was drunk in 12 hours. He grew up scared in a big Irish Catholic family, joined the Marines at 113 pounds, and drank his way through every opportunity he touched until he ended up on Skid Row in Washington D.C. with nothing left. An old man at the door of his first meeting promised he'd never have to drink again, and Keith took that promise and ran — through a disastrous first 12-step call, a sponsor who sent him to Paris at seven months sober, and a lipstick message on a bathroom mirror that changed his life. Today he carries Sister Victoria's prophecy from high school detention — that he'd go around the world telling God's children how much he loves them — and a 23-year chip buried with his mother. Keith L. from Wilmington, NC -  23rd Annual San Diego Spring Roundup in San Diego, CA - April 22nd 2000 Music: Deep by KaizanBlu

Sandy B. flew fighter jets in the Marine Corps with one hand on the ejection seat, built an entire world out of stories that weren't true, and spent 40-plus years in Alcoholics Anonymous learning that recovery isn't about adding anything — it's about dismantling everything you made up. ──────────────────────────────────────────────────── We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com ──────────────────────────────────────────────────── Sandy B. grew up terrified in a Connecticut Catholic church, convinced God was out to destroy him, and carried that fear straight through Yale, the Marine Corps, and a fighter pilot career that ended when withdrawal symptoms at 30,000 feet forced him to fake an oxygen emergency. Decades later, the radar operator from that final flight showed up at an AA meeting in Oxnard and told Sandy the real story — that his squadron loved him, fought to keep him flying, and never saw him the way he saw himself. That moment captures the whole point of Sandy's talk: we build an entire world out of stories we tell ourselves, live inside it like a bird in an egg, and then blame everyone else for how dark it is. Through the steps, that shell starts to crack and light gets in — but the real challenge is whether we're willing to come all the way out or just settle for a comfortable view. Sandy got sober in 1964 and spent over four decades proving that the program isn't about becoming a better version of yourself — it's about letting go of the version you made up in the first place. Sandy B. from Tampa, FL speaking at the 63rd anniversary of the Alexandria group in Alexandria, VA - November 28th 2007 ──────────────────────────────────────────────────── Music: Deep by KaizanBlu

Rick spent years trying to build his empire, control every outcome, and force life to go his way — until AA taught him that the things he needed most only showed up when he stopped chasing them. We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com Rick walked into AA after decades of big-shotism — buying houses to impress people, stealing anything he could get his hands on, and bulldozing through relationships to get what he wanted. He took and took until there was nothing left, not the business, not the house, not the wife and kids. In sobriety he discovered that every cliche he heard in meetings needed to be tested against the actual book, that sponsorship built on dependency was dangerous, and that spiritual growth had nothing to do with addition — it was about subtraction, letting go of what he wasn't so what he actually was could emerge. When he finally stopped forcing outcomes and focused on giving through 12-step work and meetings at the mission, jobs started showing up without him looking, cars appeared when he needed them, and raises came before he even started work. Rick's talk is a sharp, honest breakdown of how controlling your life is the biggest roadblock to recovery — and how the things worth having only come when you stop trying to grab them. Rick B. from Minneapolis, MN speaking on the topic of "Roadblocks to Recovery" at The Firing Line Group of Alcoholics Anonymous in Saint Paul, MN - January 1st 2009 Music: Deep by KaizanBlu

Vince spent three and a half years sober in AA without taking a single step, lost his medical license stealing Demerol, and ended up in an $11-a-week room before a prayer on his knees and a sponsor with an impossible bus route gave him his life back. We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com Vince came from a privileged Irish Catholic family in New Jersey, sailed through school on brains alone, and destroyed every opportunity he touched — four Jesuit prep schools, an Ivy League degree he walked away from, a Navy commission he tanked, and a brand-new medical career he blew up by stealing narcotics from his own emergency room. After his first AA meeting in 1965, he stayed sober for three and a half years without taking a single step and watched himself get sicker while everyone around him got better. The bottom finally came in a series of disasters so absurd they sound like fiction — fired from a drill press job, living above a casket room, stealing a hearse, and driving the wrong way down Pacific Coast Highway in a blackout. Sober again and living in an $11-a-week room in Costa Mesa, Vince got on his knees one night and said the only prayer he had. A sponsor put him on a bus up Wilshire Boulevard every day for eight months with nothing but an eight-dollar allowance and a story to tell, and on the day he finally gave up, he ran into the one man who could give him his career back. Today Vince carries a recovery built on the steps he once dismissed and a marriage he says he loves more than life itself. Vince Y. from Upland, CA at Orange County AA Convention, Costa Mesa, CA - March 3rd 2002 Music: Deep by KaizanBlu

Tom I. found Alcoholics Anonymous inside a Michigan penitentiary and built a recovery so powerful that the prison system hired him back — 44 years later he says this was his finest year yet. We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com Tom I. started drinking at 16 and tore through eight years of escalating chaos — demotions, firings, jails, blackouts, and a trail of overrated first impressions followed by spectacular self-destruction. It all came to a head when he struck and killed two people while driving in a blackout and woke up in jail not knowing what he'd done. Sentenced to 5 to 15 years in Michigan State Penitentiary, he walked in believing he'd never come out alive. A rookie social worker pointed him to the prison AA group, and a speaker named Shy Walker gave off something Tom had never encountered — a signal of life from a man who'd been where he was. Over three and a half years behind bars, Tom found the first power he ever believed in inside that group of 300 convicts, wrote his first inventory on the edge of his bunk, and conceded to his innermost self that he was an alcoholic. Two months after release he was back inside as a volunteer sponsor, then hired into the prison rehab system, and eventually offered the warden's chair — an ex-con running the institution. Now in his 44th year of sobriety, Tom says without a trace of cheerleader talk that this has been his finest year in AA. Tom I. from Southern Pines, NC speaking at the Edisto Roundup - April 7th 2001 Music: Deep by KaizanBlu

After three and a half years without a single drink, one sip at a party lit the fuse — and a football coach's long losing streak against alcohol finally brought him to Alcoholics Anonymous. We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com Larry V. spent 41 years in the football business while alcohol quietly destroyed everything on the other side of the scoreboard. After white-knuckling three and a half years of sobriety on pure willpower, one sip of a friend's drink at a party set off a phenomenon of craving that sent him into the worst stretch of his life — fired three times, a double hit and run, a shotgun in the family room, and total isolation in an apartment with a barf bucket by the bed. A random picture of a former Brooklyn Dodger in the sports section of a newspaper led him to make a phone call that connected him to a rehab in small-town Wisconsin, where he surrendered for the first time and hasn't had a drink since November 1975. Today Larry stays close to his home group, keeps in weekly contact with his sponsor, and carries AA meeting guides from all over the world — because the same energy he used to find the nearest bar, he now uses to find the nearest meeting. Larry V. from Cleveland, OH speaking at the Newburgh Group in Cleveland, OH - January 24th 2009 Music: Deep by KaizanBlu

Joe grew up hitchhiking to a criminally insane ward to visit his alcoholic father — and left those visits having decided he didn't need God, people, or anyone's help. We just launched our new Episodes page — search hundreds of AA speaker meetings by topic, speaker, or step ☀️  Sober-Sunrise.com Years of drinking, fighting, and four rounds of divorce later, he hit his knees on a couch Sunday morning and made a deal. What followed — a resentment prayer, a traffic light, and tulips he'd never really seen before — changed everything. One of the great old-timer talks on Big Book history, soul sickness, and what it actually means to let God run the show. Joe McC. from Tulsa, OK at the 19th Traditional Winter Holiday in Joplin, MO - December 10th-12th 1999 Music: Deep by KaizanBlu We spend a lot of time coming up with these descriptions & summaries, if you read these every day, drop a comment, or give it a thumbs up so we know these are being enjoyed! 🧡