One of the things I had to learn in here is that I often still don’t know what I need to know. Like my sponsor said to me early on : “You don’t know that you don’t know. You only think you do.” How true that is, as I have learned over and over again.
Over and over again in life, I have found I was angry at someone, whom I knew had done something. And then I finally came to realize that I needed to be angry at someone, in order to justify my doing wrong with someone else or myself. Sounds confusing, but the truth is that it is the truth. I had to learn to step back and let go of the others I was blaming. I was the one who was doing wrong. It took a long time to finally run across this and to step back and do something right for the first time.
It’s on page 90 in Step Ten, the spiritual axiom. I had to learn how I was the cause of a lot of things I was blaming others for. It took a long time for me to realize that. Not easy, but I learned it the hard way. I was angry at someone for what they said, but for the first time I suddenly learned it wasn’t him…it was me. I needed to blame someone for my lying to my daughter, and not have to correct it.
That was the first time I was awakened in taking responsibility for my actions. All of a sudden I was made conscious of wrong doing, and blaming others. I know I hear difficulties in others for their anger and blame. Do I tell them? Not always. Only if it is what I need to do and am conscious that they will be ready to learn. That’s because they are caught up in self torture, without knowing why. Like I was, they are resentful at someone, but it’s not the truth and it’s building anger within them, like it did myself.
And the axiom I came to believe was part of my being torn up by my negative emotions, which were still controlling my life. I had come to blame so many, and later learned that nearly all my resentments were untrue. It became what I needed. A spiritual awakening.