I doubt if there is anybody in this hall who really ever sought sobriety. I think we were trying to get away from drunkenness. I don't think we should despise the negative. I have a feeling that if I ever find myself in Heaven, it will be from backing away from Hell. At this point, Heaven seems as boring as sobriety does to an alcoholic ten minutes before he quits.
Experience is one of the ways.
It is mentioned in the Twelfth Step, and in the Second Step in another way. Now experience can be of two kinds. One kind is a sudden. Those are all in the valid pattern of Saul's sudden passive insight as he was struck from his horse on the road to Damascus. There are other types, probably dearer to God since they are commoner, and those are our routine active observations.