Yesterday I had an opportunity to spend some time reading the 12&12. Actually I had to laugh at myself for what I read. Imagine the opening line about separating the men from the boys. I had to laugh because of the category I thought I might fall into.
On and off over the years this Sixth Step keeps coming up now and then. All because at some moments, when the human condition takes over, I am once again exposed to some of these defects of character. Not close to what they once were, because I believe, or at least hope, that I have that desire to change. I think I got rid of that original thought of the word “never”. This one I’ll never give up?
I know one thing from the past was how easy it was to kind of pass over the Sixth and Seventh Steps, because of how brief they were in the BB. It was only when the 12&12 got into our hands that I and others became aware of the importance of these two Steps. One of the members at the meetings I regularly attend calls these two the forgotten Steps. And in some ways I understand where he’s coming from. How easy it is to pass them by. Going from Step Five to Eight and Nine like they’re not even there.
However I know how I need to think of how my sponsor and others would talk about these character defects and the need we all have to deal with them. If not to be able to eliminate them, to at least modify them. Interesting, when I think about them. I mean here I am having had a spiritual awakening. The restoration to sanity. Having been placed in a position of neutrality as far as alcohol is concerned. Freed of the bondage alcohol had over me. And then the rest of me, my character defects are in my face.
I don’t mean that I’m not grateful for what this program and my Higher Power has done for me. I know that by myself I didn’t have a chance. Left to my own devices I would have been dead by now from the way I drank. I couldn’t stop. Like the Doctor’s Opinion points out that alcoholics are as physically abnormal as they are mentally. So, it’s the disease itself which caused me and everyone else to enter into a spiritual way of life where our Higher Power can relieve us from the hold alcohol had over us.
On the other hand, having had this spiritual awakening I now have to face the fact that my character defects are part of being human and not my disease of alcoholism. Although there’s no doubt that this disease did have an effect on them. In most cases it magnified them. For instance the alcoholic suffers from some things like huge egos. The ego which wanted to control everything. And this brings about what Dr. Harry Tiebout talked about. Ego deflation in depth. Couple that with what often controls our defects, our emotions, and we have our hands full. I know I do.
I remember, having brushed through these two Steps, that I arrived at the Eighth and discovered that I had a lot of resentments I was going to have to face and make amends. And that drove me back to the 12&12 and Six and Seven. The realization that I was one of the “boys”. I had, with the help of my Higher Power, to begin to grow up. After all I was aware of what the BB said about resentments cutting us off from the sunlight of the spirit and the threat of drinking again. I know that I have seen this over and over. And that defect is the result of several others.
And Bill W. talked about the source of all of this in the Eighth Step in the 12&12, when he pointed out the emotional conflicts below the level of consciousness, which twisted and discolored our personalities for the worse and did damage to us. That stuff is still there and invisible until it drives our emotions to take over our thinking and actions. I can make decisions to rid myself of some of these, but there’s that stuff which is out of sight of my mind, which, when I’m disturbed can bring a lot of this junk back. That’s why my sponsor and those old timers told us that we had to learn how to place our intellects over our emotions. Not easy, but do-able, if I will keep on trying.
A very spiritual man told us that we’re still human. We’re not saints. And that’s what always makes me grateful for that Second Step. Came to believe. Whatever it is that makes sense to us. The spiritual way of life. Prayer and meditation. Hope and faith. Perseverance. Never quitting. Always hanging in and to keep on trying. All this that I learned from my sponsor and others.
Anyway I wanted to spend some time thinking and meditating on this subject today. How important it is to my sobriety. I know that I’m never to be surprised by my humanity. And what I’m so grateful for. The wonderful gifts I have been given in here. Happiness, peace of mind, serenity, and a new freedom I had never known. All of this is still there, if I will learn to back off and let my Higher Power do for me what I cannot do for myself.