Mother Earth, Father Sky, God & Me [Season 11, Episode 5]

Mother Earth, Father Sky, God & Me [Season 11, Episode 5]

How do people find strength in their journey to sobriety? This half-hour mix of story, humour and heartfelt honesty gives a vivid picture of what that can look like in Alcoholics Anonymous. The main chat centres on Ronnie from Muscle Shoals, Alabama, whose story "Mother Earth, Father Sky, God & Me" appears in the August Grapevine issue.

For Ronnie, alcohol started out as the perfect fix: “At the beginning, you know, it was because I was happy, I was sad, I was whatever it was I drank for.” Over time it stopped working, and he describes his emotions as a rubber band pulled tighter and tighter, even when he wasn’t drinking.

That tension – the “gift of desperation” – pushed him towards aa when a neighbour simply said, “I got a friend.” Ronnie talks about using drink to hide from feelings, finding himself more miserable when he quit without support, and then slowly learning to “quit being my own higher power.” At first the aa group became his higher power; years later, his spiritual life grew through prayer, meditation and long backpacking trips he now sees as week-long meditations.

He jokes that there are “two different worlds… a spiritual world and a material world,” and shares how morning readings and meetings help him stay more in the former than the latter. Hosts Don and Sam keep things light with their banter about fourth-step methods, from stone tablets to spreadsheets, offering practical reassurance that you don’t have to do it perfectly – you just have to start.

The episode also checks in from the Western Roundup Living Sober conference in San Francisco. Olis captures voices from the LGBTQ+ community, like Ronnie W., Pam and David B., who describe the event as warm, welcoming and life-changing for newcomers and old-timers alike. If you’ve ever wondered whether aa might feel like home, this mix of raw honesty, laughter and spiritual searching might be the nudge you need.