The Big One: The Twelve Steps by Larry
Ok, so in sobriety we have the twelve steps. The clear cut directions are in the Big Book. I love ‘How It Works” Chapter Five in the Big Book, the short version being; “It Works Just Fine”. Now this is not going to be a detailed non approved version of the steps by Larry. This is only my thoughts and experiences on working the steps in my life. From the stand point of when I first took the steps, to my experience in using them over the last 22 yrs, and the experiences of taking those I sponsored through them. This is from my experiences and memories and as such is not subject to debate. This is just the actions I took and the results of those actions. In Chapter Five of the Big Book, at the end of what is normally read in a meeting there is “God could and would if He were sought”. Now how do I know if this is true? Easily, two ways, the first is to read the stories in the back of the Big Book, where members write how they came to find a God of their own understanding, and the easiest way is just ask a member of AA who has taken all twelve steps.
Now through taking the steps the first time, all my actions were guided by my sponsor and the Big Book. Just because I read them on the wall or dabbled with them in the treatment center does not mean I had taken them. It was through working with my sponsor, who took me through the Big Book, page by page, and taking the actions contained therein that I took the steps. The sponsor who took me through the Big Book did not give me his opinion, or his personal beliefs, just this is what the Big Book says, “We did this” so this is what I must do. The Big Book tells me what actions to take, what the results will be and it also tells me what actions not to take, and what the results of those actions will be. Kind of simple, and when I first got sober, that is what I needed: simple. (still do, I can put myself into a dilemma by over thinking how I want my coffee.) So these are the twelve steps in the unabridged, unapproved version by Larry.-
Step One
"We admitted we were powerless over alcohol--that our lives had become unmanageable."
Step Two
"Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity."
Now the first step is asking me “Did I have problems when I drank? Did I have problems when I wasn’t drinking?” It is not asking me how many DUI”s I have, or do I live in a cardboard box. It is not asking did I beat the wife and kids or did bill collectors have my phone number on speed dial. The first step in how it actually reads is not even asking me if I am an alcoholic. These are questions only I can answer.
Step two is asking me simple, “Do I need help? Am I thinking with a soundness of mind (Bill’s definition of sanity) or do I need some outside help in that area? Again only a question I can answer.
Am I having problems and do I need help? Because in Chapter 5 of the Big Book, right after C. “God could and would if He were sought” comes the line, “Being convinced, we were at Step Three.” Well being convinced of what exactly? That I was an alcoholic of the type described in the first four chapters, and that “A. That we were alcoholic and could not manage our own lives, B. The probably no human power could have relieved our alcoholism, and C. That God could and would if He were sought.” So really the first two steps are idea’s, that in looking over my life and actions, am I convinced of them? There is no real action taken except introspection and thought. (No sacrificing chickens or dancing naked in circles…., just thought and reflection) But it does ask me to answer some questions. The first being, am I an alcoholic? Which in itself begs the question, what is an alcoholic? I have four questions I use, that help me.
1) Do I wonder if I am an alcoholic? I guess most normal people don’t worry about it. I wondered, because I did not have a clue as to what was going on in my life. I just knew that I was having a lot of problems in my life, and that drinking was my answer to those problems. Not that drinking solved the problems, but that by drinking I was able to live with the problems I was having.
2) Do I ever think of the second drink while drinking the first? After work when I would sit down to relax and have that first drink, and felt its effect on me. That “AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH” and I would feel my body relax, the knot in my stomach and shoulders loosen and feel myself coming back to “normal”, I would think, mmmmmm if this feels so good, I cannot wait for the second.
3) Can I guarantee my actions after the first drink? Did the plans I have for the day or the evening change once I sat down and had that first drink? Was I able to control how much I drank? Stopping when I wanted to? After the first drink, did I find myself drinking even though I had said I was only going to have one? Did I ever just change my mind when I was drinking, so that after the first one, to hell with it, might as well drink till I had my fill?
4) And, Can I look myself in the mirror, straight in the eye, and not flinch? At the end of my drinking I knew what I was doing was not right, but I could see no solution to the problems at hand. The only solution I knew was, that when I drank, I could at least cope, handle or escape and avoid looking at, those problems. So whenever I looked in the mirror it was like not being able to escape myself, and having to accept the person I was; not the person I wanted to be, or the person I thought I was, but the person I had become.
Lastly, this is going to sound kind of simple and silly, but why would I be looking for a solution if I didn’t think I had a problem? When I’d clean house of all the superficial b.s. and looked at myself, without the thoughts of everything else going on, but just seriously looked at myself, was I happy with the way my life was going and was I drinking well? To answer that question all I had to do was look at my last drunk, and the events leading up to that drunk. I was having financial problems due to not paying my bills, because I was spending my money on partying with my girlfriend, getting drunk, trying to impress her. At the same time, we, her and I, would get drunk, fight, and the cops would get called, and I would get asked to leave, and get shown the door. Now we did not have a lot in common except we both like to drink, and we both liked sex. It was not the foundation to a lasting relationship, and she finally had enough and kicked me out for good. I was now in financial difficulties, with a broken relationship, and the people I worked with had started to notice my drinking.
I have heard it said that the only thing worse for a drunk than bad luck is good luck. Well, with all this going on in my life, I got a promotion. At last, things were going to turn around, and I would be okay. For I thought success was the answer and that if you thought I was okay than I must be okay. So on the day of my promotion, I did what I always did when I got promoted and threw a promotion party. The more I drank, the more the thought came into my head, that I needed to go show that ungrateful girlfriend that I was a success and she didn’t know what she was missing. That obviously the problem in our relationship had been her fault, not mine, because I was okay, I had just gotten promoted, so naturally I was okay. On the way down to see her, I was pulled over by the police. It was not a pretty sight; being drunk, driving and having a beer can fall out from between my legs when I tried to get out of the car at the policeman’s request. When he shown his flashlight in my face and asked me what seemed to be the problem, the only answer I could come up with the truth, I am drunk. So the first step memories were still fresh when I walked in the doors.
When I came in the doors of AA it was not by choice. As a soldier, the Army frowns on DUI’s especially as you go up in rank, but my bosses thought enough of me that I should being given the chance. The treatment center I was sent to sent us (the patients) by bus, to AA every night. It was good in the aspect of at least I got out of the hospital, and got around some hot coffee and pretty ladies. Then through the course of sitting in the meetings, I came to realize, that the people in the meetings had drank like I had, had the same problems that I had, and yet had seemed to have found an answer to their living problems, that I was looking for. I came to believe that there was something in AA that could help me. I wasn’t yet fully convinced that I was an alcoholic that came in time, study and self examination. But the seed of the solution to my problem had been planted.
I do remember my first AA meeting, and I remember sitting between a married couple and after the meeting the wife turning to me and saying “I never had to live that way again if I chose not to.” In that sentence she threw the whole of my sobriety back into my lap. Sobriety was my choice. If I chose to drink, then fine, I could. If I chose to stay sober, then fine, there were some things I was going to need to do. I do believe that first day of sobriety was a gift (Grace?) from the God of my understanding, knowing that left to my own I would drink wither I wanted to or not. I was given that first day in order to be able to make a choice. I needed to make a decision, either sobriety or the life I had been living. It was not as easy as it would sound, for I was use to coping with life by drinking, and here I was being asked to try someone else way of living life over the way I was use too.
So I needed to make a decision, and once I made it, then what was I going to about it? You see, I had to make a decision, not just come to a conclusion. A decision requires action; while a conclusion is just a thought process. I came to many conclusions when I drank, like yes, I think I will have another, or maybe two even. So this leads me to Step Three.
Step Three
"Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him"
Now this sounds like it is going quickly time wise, but in reality it was at about a year and half sobriety that I was asked to make this decision. For until I got to Fort Polk, and started working the steps with my new sponsor, I had just been going to meetings, surrounding myself with the fellowship, talking the talk, but not taking any real action or living this way of life. I knew what I needed to do, and what I should be doing, but was still looking for a shortcut to my living problem. My brain was basically telling me, yes, I have a problem but no I did not need to take or do anything drastic about it. As was my normal, at that time, thinking, I was lying to myself and believing the lie.
So in short order, after going through the Big Book and 12X12 with my sponsor, this is what I learned about myself in Step One. I suffer from an illness or disease if you would. A mental obsession combined with a physical allergy to the body. (Sound familiar?) My mind sets me up to take the first drink, by all sorts of manners, like, its okay, this time it will be different, you can handle it, don’t worry, you need the relief and that first drink will give it to you. All sorts of ways, my mind is telling me to take that first drink. Once that first drink is in my system, that AAAAAHHHHH feeling hits and the allergy takes over. Not like breaking out in hives or sneezing but for me it is in developing a thirst, a thirst that I cannot quench. At the end of my drinking time, I do not think I ever stopped drinking willingly, but I passed out so my body could not ingest anymore. My mind and body were still thirsty, but my body could not handle any more of it in my system and I passed out, instead of going to sleep.
It is a strange illness, for it is not able to be diagnosed by modern medicine. It cannot be found in a sample of blood under a microscope or in a CAT scan. It is not like a cancer, in that it shows up on with a biopsy, but it does have symptoms and if left untreated will cause untold misery and pain and if lucky, death. It is treatable but not curable I found out. I can do something about it, but only I can take the actions, no one else can do it for me. When I came to find this out, absorb it into my being and believe it to be true I came to a very stark discovery, I was screwed. My mind was going to set me up and I was going to take a drink. I had two choices, really, to get sober, all the way sober or to go on drinking and to continue the downward slide, and if lucky come to an early death.
In going through Step Two, I came to realize that AA, the group, my sober friends, could help me to stay physically sober, but that I needed more if I were going to get mentally, emotionally or spiritually sober. This is a little twisted but true, what do you get when you take the booze out of a drunken asshole? An asshole. Being physically sober had changed me in many ways, but inside, I still was an immature little son of a bitch. I did not like that feeling, and I wanted to feel the way I felt others were feeling when I was in the meetings. The Big Book talks about the peace and ease that comes from taking the first drink, well, I wanted the peace and ease that came from not taking the first drink. I wanted the sense of security that comes from a sense of belief in something greater than myself, and was tired of living in fear. Fear of drinking, fear of living, fear of failure, I was full of fear and was tired of living that way. So then came Step Three, and making a decision.
Now in going through the Big Book and Step Three with my sponsor, I came to start to understand who I was and what I actions I was going to have to take to relieve me of this burden. These were not actions I relished in doing, for it meant in a way losing who I was or how I operated in life and replacing it with something I could only hope was better. I had to look deep inside me, beyond all the façade of what I had built up as my belief and get down to the very bottom of my belief and start to rebuild it the way it should and needed to be, not the way I wanted it to be. I had to find something I believed in, not with lip service but actually could, to the bone, believe in. My sponsor asked me a question, and it was, God either is or He is not, what was my choice to be? (at least that is how I remember it, dang pop quizzes) and he expected an answer. For if I believe God is, cool, all is going to work out, if I believe God is not, then I might as well give up, for this is not going to do me any good. Then we went over the Third Step Prayer. Now the Big Book gives me a very good suggestion before taking this prayer. It is: “We thought well before taking this step making sure we were ready; that we could at last abandon ourselves utterly to Him.”
For this was not some quick fix deal. This was not some sleight of hand, do it for awhile till the heat is off type thing. This was for me, something I was seriously going to do, to the best of my ability, one day at a time, for however long He gave me to do it, the never ending mortgage payment deal. This was the giving of me. It was perhaps for the first time, me being an adult, looking at something from an adult perspective and agreeing to the terms and actions contained therein.
So I am sitting with my sponsor on a Tuesday, going over the Third Step, and we say the Third Step Prayer together”
“God, I offer myself to Thee — to build with me and to do with me as Thou wilt. Relieve me of the bondage of self, that I may better do Thy will. Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of Thy Power, Thy Love, and Thy Way of life. May I do Thy will always!”
There was no great big light, no words in the air,, saying “Got It” there was just some peace and for me a feeling of having taken action. I went to the meeting after having met with my sponsor, and no one said,, oh you changed or oh, there is a glow about you, you must have taken the third step. For me, there were two things, one was a feeling of having taken an action on this way of life, for the first time, and two, a quiet understanding between this God of my limited understanding and me, that I was at least trying.
Now before I said this prayer and took this prayer with my sponsor I had to look at what I was asking for. What did this prayer mean to me? This is what I came up with at that time: God, I offer myself to Thee (I was offering my service and actions, all of me, unreserved 24 hours a day to this God of my understanding, a private, personal contract) to build with me and to do with me as Thou wilt.(not changing what I wanted changed, but giving me unto Him to use as He saw fit) Relieve me of the bondage of self (I am tired of always being the boss, running my show) that I may better do Thy will (ouch, not so I feel better, but so I will better be able to see and do Your will) Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help (take away my difficulties, not so I have an easy life, but so that I can tell those I would help of Your love and strength) of Thy Power, Thy Love, and Thy Way of life (His not mine, the good I do I don’t, the Father doeth the work, I had to remember who was the boss now, and to give all the credit to where it belonged) May I do Thy will always!” (again not a fly by night deal but for the daily long haul) my job was now to C.) God could and would if He were sought. My job now was to seek.
It is now one of my favorite prayers, for it lets me extol the grace and love that I have found in this God of my understanding. Under all the daily calamities, problems, ego, self righteous anger, fear and personal loathing, under all the layers of day after day crap that I had built up, this God of my understanding stood waiting, patiently, like a father does, for his child to quit playing with his broken toy, and ask for help. No scorn, ridicule, disgust, or anger, just His loving touch, as if to say welcome home, it will be alright. The decision I made in the Third Step was, in a simple way, to take action on the rest of the steps, clearing and cleaning up the wreckage, so that I may be of use to Him, and the turning of my thoughts to how I may best be of service to those around me.
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