Overcoming Our Fears and Desires

"Since most of us are born with an abundance of natural desires, it isn't strange that we often let these far exceed their intended purposes. When they drive us blindly, or we willfully demand that they supply us with more satisfactions or pleasures than are possible or due us, that is the point at which we depart from the degree of perfection that God wishes for us here on earth. That is the measure of our character defects, or, if you wish, of our sins."

-- The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, page 65 --

Fear, we read at Step Seven in The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, is the "chief activator" of our defects of character. But what, we should ask, is the root of this self-centered fear? In Step Six, above, Bill W. suggests that the root cause of fear is desire - in this instance, otherwise natural desires that far exceed their natural bounds. Such overblown desires, he notes, are "the measure" of our character defects. That is, our blind desires create the mental room for our character defects to manifest and operate.

This is unsurprising, for if we look at the resentments list in our Step Four inventory we will see again and again that the action of others had impinged on our desires - our desires for security, for sex relationships, for personal relationships etc. These are (as Bill notes) natural desires; however, to the extent that we demand more security, more personal relationships, and more sex "than is possible or due to us," we create a fear that we will never have enough - enough security, enough money, enough friends, enough sex etc., etc., etc.

And just to the extent that these overblown desires manifest in fear, will we act act self-centeredly in response to them, trying vainly to satisfy and fulfill desires that are in all reality unquenchable. Chasing these desires we are, thus, stuck in a rut of our own making. "Living upon a basis of unsatisfied demands," we read, "we are in a state of continual disturbance and frustration. Therefore no peace was to be had unless we could find a means of reducing those demands." (Twelve and Twelve, page 76.)

How then do we go about reducing these demands? The answer it seems is, not surprisingly, right in the Steps. If we continue to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, we will experience a freedom from these desires gone wild.

Not convinced? Consider for a moment the propositions and promises we read concerning Step Three in the 'Big Book' of Alcoholics Anonymous (at pp. 62-63):

"(W)e decided that hereafter in this drama of life, God was going to be our Director. He is the Principal, we are His agents. He is the Father, and we are His children. Most good ideas are simple, and this concept was the keystone of the new and triumphant arch through which we passed to freedom."

"When we sincerely took this position, all sorts of remarkable things followed. We had a new Employer. Being all powerful, He provided what we needed, if we kept close to Him and performed His work well. Established on such a footing we became less and less interested in ourselves, our little plans and designs. More and more we became interested in seeing what we could contribute to life. As we felt new power flow in, as we enjoyed peace of mind, as we discovered we could face life successfully, as we became conscious of His presence, we began to lose our fear of today, tomorrow, and the hereafter. We were reborn." (Emphasis added.)

To the degree that we seek and perform God's will for us, rather than relying on our own narrow selves, life itself will provide what we need, but not necessarily what we want. Our choice then, is whether we rely on self-will or God's will. If we rely on God's will, not only will we find that we have what we "need," we are also promised that we will "lose our fear of today, tomorrow and the hereafter."

Thus, conscious faith in the efficacy of "a Power greater than ourselves" to provide what we need is the solution that removes the desires that underlie our fears. Thus in relying on the God of our understanding rather than our self-centered thinking, we are released from the cycle of fear and desire that activates our character defects. We are then, in effect, "reborn."

The 'Actor' and the New 'Director'

"If his arrangements would only stay put, if only people would do as he wished, the show would be great. Everybody, including himself, would be pleased. Life would be wonderful. In trying to make these arrangements our actor may sometimes be quite virtuous. He may be kind, considerate, patient, generous; even modest and self-sacrificing. On the other hand, he may be mean, egotistical, selfish and dishonest. But, as with most humans, he is more likely to have varied traits."

-- Alcoholics Anonymous, pages 60-61 --

The description of the individual as an actor is apt. Each of us has an array of characters that we play, all designed to get us what we want or think we need in a given situation, be it security, companionship, mental or emotional gratification, etc. Each of us is readily able to adopt the persona we think we need to project in order to get what we want in any given instance. And the more intense the situation, the more readily a person will adopt the seemingly required persona.

Indeed, the words "person"  and "persona" themselves are derived from the Greek word used for the masks worn by actors in the ancient ampitheatres. In this sense, as the author of the 'Big Book' notes, we are each like actors in a play - alcoholic, addict, and so-called 'normal' person alike. And each of us, as an "actor" is also a "hypocrite," as that is what the Greek word for an actor was.

Having made the admission of our "personal" powerlessness, the question then becomes: How do we get out of this all-too-human dilemma of being an ill-prepared actor who is compelled to try running the entire show?

The answer is once again humility. Just as being honest and telling the truth means that we do not have to remember what we say; so, too, being humble means we do not have to think about what persona we need to adopt in a given situation. Humility, thus gives us the ability to be who we are in our essence; not our smaller "self" or "ego," but our true Self, just one of the infinitely individualized aspects of God.

"This is the how and the why of it," we read at page 62 in Alcoholics Anonymous. "First of all we had to quit playing God. It didn't work. Next we decided that in this drama of life, God was going to be our Director. He is the Principal; we are His agents. He is the Father, and we are His children. Most good ideas are simple, and this concept was the keystone of the new and triumphant arch through which we passed to freedom."

"When we sincerely took such a position, all sorts of remarkable things followed. We had a new Employer. Being all powerful He provided what we needed if we kept close to Him and performed His work well. Established on such a footing we became less and less interested in ourselves, our little plans and designs. More and more we became interested in seeing what we could contribute to life. As we felt new power flow in, as we enjoyed peace of mind, as we discovered we could face life successfully, as we became conscious of His presence, we began to lose our fear of today, tomorrow, or the hereafter. We were reborn."

Powerful words. Yet, the idea of giving up the roles we have played to get what we want in order, in humility, to get what we need is a novel yet powerful idea. It is in surrendering - our personas, our directorship, and our lives as mere actors - that we win. And this is yet another of the great paradoxes of recovery that fly in the face of our old ideas and attitudes.

A Lesson in "Self-Will Run Riot"

"Most people try to live by self-propulsion. Each person is like an actor who wants to run the whole show; is forever trying to arrange the lights, the ballet, the scenery and the rest of the players in his own way. If his arrangements would only stay put, if only people would do as he wished, the show would be great. Everybody, including himself, would be pleased."

-- Alcoholics Anonymous, pages 60-61 --

Interestingly, in this description of the self-centered "actor" (at pp. 60-62), the writer of the 'Big Book' of Alcoholics Anonymous does not distinguish between alcoholic addicts and 'so-called' normal people. Quite the contrary. "(O)ur troubles," he notes generically, "are basically of our own making. They arise out of ourselves, and the alcoholic is an extreme case of self-will run riot, though he usually doesn't think so." (Emphasis added.)

The realization that the vast, vast majority of all people are self-centered is a most useful tool in our recovery. It is not that the typical self-centeredness of others justifies our self-centered behaviour, but rather, knowing this (and always keeping in mind that we are an "extreme case of self-will run riot"), it (a) helps explain why we so often find ourselves "in collision" with others, and (b) points to the dangers that our obsessive self-centeredness poses.

While others may argue in grocery store check-outs, lie to their boss, or act aggressively while driving in heavy traffic, etc., as non-alcoholic addicts they are not prone to go home and drink or drug themselves to death. Rather they will cope with their obsessive self-centeredness in any myriad of ways - watching television, going to the gym and working out excessively, chain-smoking, gambling or perhaps just consoling themselves in the love they have for their family and relaxing in their pool. The point is, that unchecked, the self-centeredness of the alcoholic addict, will always (or so it seems) lead back in one way or another to addiction.

I remember being warned in the earliest weeks of my sobriety not to let any other obsession - for women, for work, or for whatever - seep into my life. I also remember being told that anything I put in fromt of my sobriety I would lose. It was easy to follow this advice at first, or so it seemed. I was married with a good union job, a home and a year-old baby. And as I immersed myself in A.A., working the steps, working with my sponsor and helping others, I never thought that all I was warned against would happen to me.

With four years of sobriety under my belt, I was persuaded to go back to finish the university degree I had abandoned when I was out there "performing." Unknowingly, I had channelled my obsessive nature into something that conventional wisdom says is beneficial. My wife, my parents, my friends and family, even my employer were solidly behind me, and I excelled. Success bred more success, or so I thought. But, as the renowned economist, J. K. Galbratih famously observed, "the trouble with conventional wisdom is that it is usually wrong," and it would take another 10 years before I began to understand this bit of wisdom.

Just shy of ten years sober, having gone back and got not one but two college degrees, and having traded in my coveralls for a three-piece suit, I was working 12 to 14 hours on a typical day as I forged a new career in the law. Moving to a new town, it was all too easy to let what was left of my membership in A.A. lapse. Knowingly, I made the decision that I did not have the time to go to A.A., that spending what little time I had with my wife and two young daughters was far more important, and that - after all - I wasn't going to drink or drug again, etc. Little did I remember the advice that wiser old-timers had given me early in sobriety: don't swap one obsession for another, and never put anything ahead of your sobriety.

Five years later, with a failed marriage, a decimated career, and a botched suicide under my belt, I was brought back to A.A. by one of those old-timers, craving a drink or drug for release but too frightened to try.

With the help of a new sponsor who had drank after fifteen years sobriety, and was once again fifteen years sober, I went back through the Steps and became an active member of A.A. Another wizened old-timers took me back through my story (and his) and convincingly demonstrated to me how the problem of the alcoholic - at least this alcoholic - does, indeed, center in the mind, while another deeply spiritual old-timer taught me to meditate.

In time, and not without setbacks, I regained all that really mattered to me and more. Through the application of the Steps and daily work (not without backsliding) on the maintenance of my spiritual condition I have attained - however falteringly - to what Bill W. rightly called "a new state of consciousness and being."

Of course, there were amends to make, character defects to work on and many, many meetings to make. And, of course,  I regret that I put a lot of people through needless suffering. Yet, I cannot help but think that without the suffering I endured by turning my back on A.A., I likely would not have learned much about my nature or the nature of my fellow man. And I would certainly not have found the conscious contact I now have with a Higher Power that is far greater than my limited "self."

(One of my favourite speakers says that alcoholics in recovery are the luckiest people in the world; that most people go through life wondering simply if there is a God, while we in A.A. get to experience the effect that God has in our lives and the lives of others.)

Thankfully, I survived the ultimate lesson in how dangerous "self-will run riot" can be; and, if I can draw any lessons to pass on to others to save them from relapse back into addiction or worse it is this: (a) the problem of not only the alcoholic, but each of us, centers in the mind, and (b) that the alcoholic addict is extremely self-centered, and thus, if unchecked, is very dangerous to himself and others. For that reason, please - I beg you - don't let any other obsession seep into your life, and never, ever, put anyone or anything else before your sobriety.

Peace.

William James and 'The Varieties of Spritual Awakenings'

The "Spiritual Experience" appendix was added to the second edition of Alcoholics Anonymous in order to reassure recovering alcoholic addicts that a sudden, overwhelming and distinct spiritual awakening was not the only type of "vital spiritual experience" necessary to arrest their alcoholism. Great pains were taken to reassure alcoholic addicts that such experiences may be both progressive and dynamic, and need not be at once momentous and complete.

"Most of our experiences," we read in the "Spiritual Experience" appendix, "are what the psychologist William James calls "the educational variety" because they develop slowly over a period of time. Quite often friends of the newcomer are aware of the difference long before he is himself. He finally realizes that he has undergone a profound alteration in his reaction to life; that such change could hardly have been brought about by himself alone. What often takes place in a few months could seldom have been accomplished by years of self discipline."

In his classic work, "The Varieties of Religious Experience," William James does indeed note that the "religious experiences" he is dealing with - inner, spiritual experiences, rather than outer, religious practices - may develop slowly over time culminating in a higher state of consciousness above our ordinary, egoic self-consciousness. Yet, the pertinent message of his work, like the pertinent message behind the "Spiritual Experience" appendix, is that this new state of consciousness and being is most often unsuspected and cannot be attained by the mere exercise of self-will. ("We could wish to be moral," we read in the 'Big Book', at page 45, "we could wish to be philosophically comforted, in fact, we could will these things with all our might, but the needed power wasn't there. Our human resources, as marshalled by the will, were not sufficient; they failed utterly.")

"There is a state of mind, known to religious men, but to no others," James explains, "in which the will to assert ourselves and hold our own has been displaced by a willingness to close our mouths and be as nothing in the floods and waterspouts of God. In this state of mind what we most dreaded has become the habitation of our safety, and the hour of our moral death has turned into our spiritual birthday. The time for tension in our soul is over, and that of happy relaxation, of calm deep breathing, of an eternal present, with no discordant future to be anxious about has arrived. Fear is not held in abeyance as it is by mere morality, it is positively expunged and washed away."

"This enchantment," James observes, "coming as a gift when it does come - a gift of our organism, the physiologists will tell us, a gift of God's grace, the theologians say - is either there or not there for us, and there are persons who can no more become possessed by it than they can fall in love with a given woman by mere word of command. Religious feeling is thus an absolute addition to the Subject's range of life. It gives him a new sphere of power. When the outward battle is lost, and the outer world disowns him, it redeems and vivifies an interior world which otherwise would be an empty waste."

[Wm. James, "The Varieties of Religious Experience," pp. 47-48.]

The purpose of the 12 Steps is to lay the groundwork and prepare ourselves for such an awakening. We cannot will it, but we can take actions that make room for this shift in consciousness to occur. Indeed, looking back at the collective experience of A.A. members, Bill W. asserts in the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions that it is when  completing the 5th Step that many A.A.'s first "begin" to have a spiritual awakening.

Yet, whether the process is sudden or prolonged, the important point is that such an unexpected and unusual spiritual awakening is readily available in reality.

"With few exceptions," we are reassured, "our members find that they have tapped an unsuspected inner resource which they presently identify with their own conception of a Power greater than themselves."

"Most of us think this awareness of a Power greater than ourselves is the essence of spiritual experience. Our more religious members call it God-consciousness."

Such "God-consciousness," it is worth repeating, gives the alcoholic addict in recovery "a new sphere of power," and "(w)hen the outward battle is lost, and the outer world disowns him, (this new God-consciousness) redeems and vivifies an interior world which otherwise would be an empty waste."

"We find that no one need have difficulty with the program," we are once again reassured in the "Spiritual Experience" appendix; all that is necessary is that we maintain our "willingness, honesty and open-mindedness" as we work through the Steps preparing the ground for such an awakening.

The Use of Will Power and a Higher Power

An alcoholic addict who has progressed beyond a certain point in his or her addiction loses all will-power and cannot, it seems, stop and remain abstinent on their own. This loss of the power of the unaided will - which may remain effective with respect to other areas of his or her life, but is wholly non-existent when it comes to drinking and drugging - is the essence of alcoholic addiction.

The 'Big Book" of Alcoholics Anonymous states this plainly in the following paragraph (which is italicized in the 'Big Book' in order to emphasize its importance):

"The fact is that most alcoholics, for reasons yet obscure, have lost the power of choice in drink. Our so-called will power becomes practically nonexistent. We are unable at certain times, to bring into our consciousness with sufficient force the memory of the suffering and humiliation of even a week or a month ago. We are without defense against the first drink.

[Alcoholics Anonymous, page 24.]

Our being "without defense" against that first drink or hit of a drug, means that we cannot safely rely upon our ordinary will power, nor on all that we have learned in Alcoholics Anonymous (or any of its sister organizations). At such times, we need to be able to effect and maintain a conscious contact with "a Power greater than ourselves" in order not to act on the self-will that tells us it is okay to start the party rolling again. We must be able to attain to the higher part of our consciousness (what the more religious members of A.A. call "God-consciousness), and make our decisions about what to do from that level of consciousness, where the stressors and thoughts that lead us to want to drink and/or drug are absent. Without such conscious contact, we are "without defense," and we may well drink and/or drug again.

To admit just how powerless and defenseless we remain over alcohol initially goes against all we are taught.

Advertising makes it clear that we should: "Be an army of one! Take a licking and keep on ticking! Just do it!" Poor Charlie Brown tells himself, yet again, "You can do anything, as long as your grit your teeth!" Yet inevitably, time after time, Lucy pulls the football away just as he is about to kick it.

Thus, at page 22 in the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, we read:

"When first challenged to admit defeat, most of us revolted. We had approached A.A. expecting to be taught self-confidence. Then we had been told that so far as alcohol was concerned, self-confidence was no good whatever; in fact, it was a total liability. There was no such thing as personal conquest of the alcoholic compulsion by the unaided will."

So where, then, do we turn for someone or something to 'aid' our will power in order that we have a defense against the first drink or impulse to drug? The answer is that we turn to a Power greater than our unaided 'self,' to the "God of our own understanding," or to "the Great Reality deep down within us," which is discussed on page 55 of the 'Big Book.'

It is not that our will power is no good whatsoever. Quite the contrary. Rather, it is when we rely solely on the will power summoned by our ordinary egoic 'self'-consciousness that we are vulnerable. When we rely on the power of a will that has effectively been turned over to the care of a Power greater than our 'selves,' we become invested with a defense, and are no longer 'powerless' in the way we were when we were all on our own. Thus, in the Step Three essay in The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, we read:

"It is when we try to make our will conform with God's that we begin to use it rightly. To all of us, this was a most wonderful revelation. Our whole trouble had been the misuse of will power. We had tried to bombard our problem with it instead of attempting to bring it into agreement with God's intention for us. To make this increasingly possible is the purpose of A.A.'s Twelve Steps."

It is not that our will power is, per se, defective and thereby of no use in avoiding picking up a drink or taking a hit off of a crack pipe etc. It is trusting and acting only on the power of will that is based on our egoic, self-centered, self-consciousness thinking which provides us with "no defense." When we utilize our will power based upon and grounded in our higher, God-centered consciousness, we have an effective defense.

Therefore, just as alcoholism and addiction is progressive and fatal, so too we must seek - on a daily basis, and through meditation and prayer - to "improve our conscious contact with God." The secret to attaining and maintaining recovery from alcoholic addiction is, thus, a matter of changing (one day at a time) the ordinary state of our consciousness and being.

Carl Jung and Our Spiritual Imperative

Carl G. Jung (1875-1961)
(See: Jung and the birth of A.A.)

The alcoholic addict who is a student of the 12 Steps and their history will know that "the taproot" of what would become the whole 12 Step movement was the conversation that the great Swiss psychologist, Carl Jung, had with one of his patients, "a certain American businessman," named Rolland Hazard. In essence, Jung told Hazard that only a "vital spiritual experience" might relieve his alcoholism, and that was what he had been trying to provoke in Hazard.

Jung described the 'mechanics' of such a spiritual awakening in the following terms: "Ideas, emotions and attitudes which were once the guiding forces of the lives of these men are suddenly cast to one side, and a completely new set of conceptions and motives begin to dominate them." (That is old thoughts, their concomitant feelings and our habitual ways of thinking are replaced by new thoughts and drives.)

Hazard, of course, returned to the United States, joined the Oxford Group, and helped sober up Bill W.'s sponsor, Ebby T. Although, Hazard never joined Alcoholics Anonymous, he passed the six principles of the Oxford Group through Ebby to Bill, who further explained and clarified those principles in the 12 Steps. But it was not in the alcoholic alone that Jung detected a certain 'need for wholeness' that could only be brought about, in his view, by what he termed an authentic "religious experience."

In his invaluable little book, "The Undiscovered Self," Jung writes:

"Just as man, as a social being, cannot in the long run exist without a tie to the community, so the individual will never find the real justification for his existence, and his own spiritual and moral autonomy, anywhere except in an extramundane principle capable of relativizing the overpowering influence of external factors."

"The individual who is not anchored in God can offer no resistance on his own resources to the physical and moral blandishments of the world. For this he needs the evidence of the inner, transcendent experience which alone can protect him from the otherwise inevitable in the mass (of humanity)."

"Merely intellectual or even moral insight into the stultification and moral irresponsibility of the mass man is a negative recognition only and amounts to not much more than a wavering on the road to the atomization of the individual. It lacks the driving force of religious conviction, since it is merely rational."

For those who might balk at the terms "religious experience" and "religious conviction," please note that Jung is talking about what William James called "inner religion," and not the "outer religion" of dogma, doctrine, denominations and creeds. What is clear, however, is that in Jung's view all men and women are vulnerable to the temptations of a meaningless life, by the "physical and moral blandishments of the world," and it is not just alcoholics who Jung would see as 'at risk' of a meaningless life.

Of course, the alcoholic addict is particularly at risk since his or her 'blandishment of choice' will ultimately prove fatal due to the progressive nature of alcoholic addiction, but he or she is decidedly not alone in the vulnerability to getting sidetracked by the allure of money, sex, entertainment and so many other 'distractions' that our culture offers.

The essay on Step Three in the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions directly addresses this, when the author (Bill W.) discusses how "ordinary folks" are doing living a life that is driven by their 'self-will.'

"Should his own image in the mirror be too awful to contemplate (and it usually is)," Bill suggests, "he might first take a look at the results normal people are getting from self-sufficiency. Everywhere he sees people filled with anger and fear, society breaking up into warring fragments. Each fragment says to the others, "We are right and you are wrong." Every such pressure group, if it is strong enough, self-righteously imposes its will upon the rest. And everywhere the same thing is being done on an individual basis. The sum of all this mighty effort is less peace and less brotherhood than before. The philosophy of self-sufficiency is not paying off. Plainly enough, it is a bone-crushing juggernaut whose final achievement is ruin."

In his correspondence with Bill W., Carl Jung observed that "the evil principle prevailing in the world, leads the unrecognized spiritual need into perdition, if it is not counteracted either by a real religious insight or by the protective wall of human community."

The alcoholic addict in recovery is, thus, triply blessed. First, being on the short road to death by overindulgence, he or she typically 'wakes up' to his or her spiritual needs earlier than ordinary folks. Second, the 12 Steps provide the alcoholic with a tried and true path to "real religious insight." And, third, the sense of belonging he or she gets through membership in a 12 Step fellowship provides a very real "protective wall of human community." Alcoholic addicts in recovery are, thus, truly blessed, indeed.

Surrender Part II: Letting Go & Letting God

"When we became alcoholic, crushed by a self-imposed crisis we could not postpone or evade, we had to fearlessly face the proposition that either God is everything or else He is nothing. God either is or He isn't. What was our choice to be?

["Alcoholics Anonymous," page 53.]

Paris Peace Conference, 1919

The First World War (which was known as "the Great War," because it was assumed to be 'the war to end all wars') ended in an armistice or truce, and not a surrender. Afterwards, the representatives of 29 countries met in Pais and hammered out a number of treaties (the "Paris Peace Treaties") that imposed conditions on the defeated nations, including crippling war reparations, that virtually assured that the peace wouldn't last. It didn't.

During the course of the ensuing Second Word War, the leaders of the main Allied Powers met and decided their would only be one condition for ending the war, that being the "unconditional surrender" of the Axis Powers (principally Germany, Italy and Japan).

Japan's "Unconditional Surrender," 1945

It's been said, that Japan, in particular, as the last combatant to surrender, faced the toughest conditions of all in implementing its "unconditional surrender," Their emperor, considered a living God by the people of Japan, had to go on the radio (in itself unheard of) and admit defeat; all of Japan's weapons were then inventoried and turned over to its former enemies; a new constitution was written for it by the Allied Powers (including a provision that it would never rearm); and those leaders that had led Japan into war (who hadn't killed themselves) were tried and executed.

And what was the result? Aid flowed into Germany and Japan as part of the Marshall Plan, and within scant years, each was amongst the richest and most productive economies in the world, and they in turn became not only functioning democracies, but trusted and crucial allies of their former enemies.

Admitting complete defeat, and the unconditional surrender of the right to manage and care for one's own life, is, of course what is necessary for one to enjoy the full promise that the 12 Steps hold out to the newcomer.

"Who cares to admit complete defeat?"

"Who cares to admit complete defeat?," we read in the opening chapter of the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions. An admission of complete defeat, we read, is necessary because, "We perceive that it is only through utter defeat (that we are) able to take our first steps towards liberation and strength." Like Germany and Japan, we are asked to make an unconditional surrender, in order to access the help that A.A. and its sister programs so gladly offer. ("The war is over," as my first sponsor's sponsor so often said "And the good news is . . . you lost," he always added.)

Then, if we can answer this call for an "unconditional surrender" in the affirmative, we face a number of interrelated questions that are really a subset of that first and all-important questions as to whether we are completely defeated, have "hit bottom," and have admitted that we are "powerless over alcohol" and that "our lives have become unmanageable."

" . . . (F)ew people," we read, " will sincerely try to practice the A.A. Program unless they have hit botton. For practicing A.A.'s remaining eleven Steps means the adoption of attitudes and actions that almost no alcoholic who is still drinking can dream of taking. Who wishes to be honest and tolerant? Who wants to confess his faults to another and make restitution for harm done? Who cares anything about a Higher Power, let alone meditation and prayer? Who wants to sacrifice time and energy in trying to carry A.A.'s message to the next sufferer? No, the average alcoholic, self-centered in the extreme, doesn't care for this prospect - unless he has to do these things in order to stay alive himself."

If we can answer these questions in the affirmative, then we are truly in a position to finally let go of our old ideas and attitudes (our old thoughts and ways of thinking) in order to let that "unsuspected inner resource," which we all have, guide our thoughts and our actions.  (See the Spiritual Experience appendix.)

Yet a lifetime of desperately trying to manage the unmanageable - i.e., trying to manage life - is going to be a hard habit to kick. And, so, Step Three is all about the practice of letting go of our need to act upon the first fear-driven thoughts that pop into our heads, and in relying upon the deeper God-inspired thoughts of our higher consciousness to guide our words and actions.

"It is when we try to make our will conform with God's that we begin to use it rightly," we read in Step Three of the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions. "To all of us, this was a most wonderful revelation. Our whole trouble had been the misuse of will power. We had tried to bombard our problems with it instead of trying to bring it into agreement with God's intention for us. To make this increasingly possible is the purpose of A.A.'s Twelve Steps, and Step Three opens the door."

The "whole purpose of A.A.'s Twelve Steps" is to get us to exercise our will in conformity with God's will? That is a powerful statement. And, if God is indeed "everything" rather than "nothing," as we read at page 53 in the 'Big Book' of Alcoholics Anonymous, this must mean that we have to bring our will into conformity with the will of the Whole, with the will of "life" itself. That's a tall order. How is it possible?

Thankfully, each of us has a conscience - and are capable of being conscious of that conscience - and, therefore, each time we are about to say something or do something (or refrain from doing or saying something) that will bring us into conflict with the will of the Whole (or the will of God), we are capable of feeling the pangs of conscience. as expressed in our emotions .

In such instances, we will feel wounded pride, greedy, angry, lustful, gluttonous, envious, or tired and slothful, to utilize the range of emotions that go along with the "seven deadly sins" that are discussed later in the Twelve and Twelve. In short, we will again begin to suffer the pangs of "anxious apartness" that arises each time the "self" (or the"ego") feels threatened and seemingly needs to express itself in action or words. And that's where the rest of the "practice" of Step Three kicks in.

At the very end of Step Three in the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, we read that it is, indeed "easy to begin the practice" of Step Three," for it very much a spiritual practice which is every bit as important to our long-term recovery as is our meditation practice, or our practice of taking a daily inventory. It is through this Third Step "practice," that in each time of "emotional disturbance or indecision, we can pause, ask for silence, and in the stillness" recite the Serenity Prayer.

For it is only in the deeper, higher consciousness of the "God of our own understanding" that serenity is to be found. It is only in going to this deeper, higher consciousness, that we become able to display the "courage" to change the only "thing" that we can - that is, the level of our consciousness. And, it is only in knowing that there is within us each the lower, normal self-consciousness of the human ego, and the higher, deeper consciousness of God, that we begin to actually display "wisdom."

In short, it is in making our decisions about what to say or do (or not say or do) based on this higher, deeper God-consciousness that we begin the practice of "letting go" of our egoic, self-consciousness, and "letting (the) God" of our higher consciousness run the show.

Life is, in fact, unmanageable by our lower, egoic "selves;" and, yet, it requires no management when we are attuned in consciousness to the Higher Power of the Whole, the Ground of Being, or just simply, God. "The war is over," then. "And the good news is . . . you lost!"

Quieting the Mind: 'The Tao of the Doughnut Hole'

To lead a contented and purposeful life, the alcoholic addict in recovery is dependent upon a "spiritual awakening" - the opening up of a 'new' consciousness, beneath and above the internal dialogue of the 'ego,' or what we ordinarily thnk of as self-consciousness - as well as the daily maintenance of the 'spiritual condition' of what is really the 'renewed consciousness' of our fundamental innocence.

I call it a 'renewed,' or 'recovered' innocence  - the two words share a common meaning - because it is an innocence which we have experienced more or less often as children before the onset of the constant internal voice of the ego took firm hold. After all, it is fundamentally this "painful inner dialogue" and the accompanying discomfort of the 'existential pain' of unrelenting self-consciousness that the drink and/or the drugs relieved us of. "We loved the effect alcohol had on us" precisely because of the extemporaneous internal relief from the constant thinking and emotions which arise through our self-consciousness; relief from the sense of being an 'actor' on stage without his or her lines.

But if we are to let go of our "old ideas" and the attitudes that foster them, if we are truly able to admit the fundamental unmanageability of the whole of life by us and "turn our will and our lives over to the care of God" as we understand (or grasp to understand) God, what will become of us?

To accept that we are powerless to run our own lives goes against all the instincts of the ego and the 'lessons' we've learned in life. We have been taught, in a certain sense, that life is a problem to be figured out, and that we must somehow figure out how to figure it out.

Turning our 'will' (our decision-making about what we will do or say) and our 'lives' over to the care of an 'innermost reality' that we have - let's face it - very little understanding of goes against all the inner emotional pressure we face to 'appear' just like so-called 'normal people' and everybody else; that is, firmly in control of ourselves and confident in our inner core at all times. (Small wonder, then, that we so often hear how our fellow alcoholic addicts talking about having wished they felt like other people looked.)

So what is the result of this big, existential and fundamental challenge we face? Usually, unless we can truly "admit complete defeat," as it says in Step One of the "Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions," it is a profound reluctance to "Let Go and Let God," and an internal, reluctant dialogue and rationalization that goes much like this:

"Yes, respecting alcohol, I guess I have to be dependent upon A.A., but in all other matters I must still maintain my independence, Nothing is going to turn me into a nonentity. If I keep on turning my life and my will over to the care of Something or Somebody else what will become of me? I'll look like the hole in the doughnut."

("Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions," page 36.)

And this is the point. The hole is the essence of the doughnut. The rest is eaten, but the hole remains. In turning our will and our lives over to the care of a Power greater than ourselves and our egoic, self-centered thinking are we ready to trust (even on an experimental basis) that we can rely on the essence of our being?

In the great Taoist treatise, Lao Tzu's "Tao Te Ching," we read:

"The thirty spokes converge on one hub, but the usefulness of the cart is a function of the 'nothingness' inside the hub. We knead clay to shape a pot, but the usefulness of the clay pot is a function of the 'nothingness' inside it. We construct windows and doors to make a room, but the usefulness of the room is a function of the 'nothingness' inside it. Thus, it might be 'something' that we attain that provides function and value, but it is by the virtue of  'nothing' that we can put it to use." (Tao Te Ching, XI)

In a very real sense we construct our own mental prison that locks us into our alcoholic, self-centered and self-absorbed attitudes. "What will become of me? I'll be like the hole in the doughnut," the ego cries out. It is precisely this thinking that perpetuates alcoholic suffering, active or inactive.

"This," we read, "is the process by which instinct and logic seek to bolster egotism and frustrate spiritual development." To overcome this process, it is necessary to face and face down our instinctive fears of not being able to survive without trying to exert control over our world and the people in it, To overcome this process we need to slow down and quiet our logical processes that tell us we will find a solution that will take care of our illusory problems if we just give it enough thought.

And it is precisely here that the practice of Step Three needs to kick in. Every time we do not know what to do and our emotions are in overdrive we need to recognize, through the practice of self-examination, just what a perilous situation our egoic minds have once more put us into. Then, just as it says in the "Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions," we are able to pause, recenter on the essence of our being, and from the quiet and stillnes of that essence, simply say:

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference."

"Thy will, not mine be done."

There is only one thing we can "change" in an instant, and that is the level of our thinking. To know the fundamental difference between the  thoughts of the ego and our inner essence - between the doughnut and the doughnut hole - and to recognize that the function of the quiet void below the raucous 'noise' of the ego is to provide "serenity" and safe haven, is true "wisdom" that is indeed worthy of the Tao.

How NOT to Act via 'Self-Will'

The"Stream of Consciousness" versus "God-Consciousness"

"We found the Great Reality deep down within
us. In the last analysis it is only there He may
be found." (Alcoholics Anonymous, p. 55.)    

Knowing that "self" is none other than the ordinary human "ego" - what the psychologist, William James, termed the "stream of consciousness" - how do we refrain from acting (or "acting out") based on the thought stream that is coursing through our mind? How exactly can we be released from "the bondage of self"?

The key is in our ability to "respond" to whatever the situation is (implying a sober, second 'thought') rather than "reacting" to it (implying immediate, instinctive 'action' based on our first thoughts about the situation) Fortunately, the Twelve Steps give us several tools that help us do this, thereby allowing us to operate under the care and protection of a Power greater than our "selves" rather than under our own "steam."

First, and foremost, we have Step Three and the Serenity Prayer. In the "Big Book' of Alcoholics Anonymous' taking the Third Step for the first time is quite simple: You say the prayer, then pick up pen and start writing out your moral inventory. However, having gone through Steps Four to Step Nine, we are required to "practice" Step Three (as well as Step Ten) on a continuous basis: But how do we practice Step Three effectively, so that what we 'do' or 'say' (or 'don't do' or 'don't say') - i.e., the exercise of our will, or deciding faculty - is based on "God's will" rather than on the imperative drives and instincts of the ego and our egoic, 'self-will'?

Plan A: Step Three and the Serenity Prayer

In the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions (at pages 40-41) we read that each time we are emotionally disturbed or indecisive (i.e., we don't know what we should either 'say' or 'not say, or 'do' or 'not do'), we  can (if we so choose) "stop," "pause," ask for "quiet" and say the Serenity Prayer. (Of course, this means we need to 'stop' and pause' the raucous thoughts of the "ego' or "stream of consciousness" rather than slamming on the brakes when frustrated over the traffic on the freeway. We are always dealing in Step Three with the level of our consciousness - the "self," or ego-consciousness, versus the "innermost Self" or "God-consciousness,"as our "more religious members call it.")

To effectively "stop" and "pause" the ego (or what Bill elsewhere calls "that painful inner dialogue"), however, it is essential that we take periods of "quiet time" in the morning and evening in order to find the place of "quiet" within our consciousness (in this instance, God-consciousness) that we can then retreat to when our emotions are running wild or we just don't know what to say or do in the situation we are presented with. This is an absolutely essential component of "the daily maintenance" that we need to "maintain our spiritual condition."

Our instinctive emotions, if used effectively, can be a wonderful tool - a biological 'early warning device' - that allows us to know that our thinking (the "ideas" that drive our "feelings," and our" "attitude, or the habitual way we think and our thought patterns) has once again gone askew. To correct our ideas and attitude, and to rid ourselves of the toxic emotions that would otherwise cause us to "react" rather than "respond" to our circumstances, we consider and recite the Serenity Prayer.

First, we ask for the "serenity," which is really an affirmation and invocation of the presence of a "conscious contact" in our mind with a Power that is greater than our egoic selves - i.e., we invoke, or turn our mind, to our "higher, God-consciousness." To do so, we need "courage" in facing whatever our circumstances are at that moment. "Courage" - from the French "couer," meaning "heart" - is the process of "letting go" of our self-absorbed, ego-consciousness and "letting God," or the God-consciousness that is at the center, or 'heart' of our being, emerge so that we may "respond" with the right action, rather than "reacting" from the ego-powered and most-often misguided and fear-driven drives and instincts. Finally, the "wisdom," which we have already gained from the cumulative, day-after-day practice of the Twelve Steps (particularly Steps Three and Step Eleven) is simply the knowledge that there are, in essence, two "selves" - the narrow "self" which is the "ego," and the expansive, all-inclusive "Self" which is an integral part of, and acts as an agent of, "the God of our understanding." (After all, if God is truly "everything or nothing," we are a part of that Whole, in which "we live, and move, and have our being.").

Plan B: The Four Absolutes

While the Serenity Prayer is best suited to, and is essential for, the moments in life when we are emotional disturbed (i.e., consumed by 'fear-activated' pride, greed, anger, lust etc.), the little known Four Absolutes are immensely helpful when we really "do not know what to do" - when we are truly "indecisive." (Note: This is different from knowing what the right thing to do is - like promptly admitting when we are wrong - but not wanting to do it!)

The "Four Absolutes" at Dr. Bob's graveside.

Little known - as they were not included in A.A.'s early literature out of concern that the then-well known Four Absolutes would publicly identify A.A. with the Oxford Group - Bill, when asked why there was no reference to them in the 'Big Book' or Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, explained they were "implicit" in each of the 12 Steps.

In the "Co-Founders" pamphlet, Dr. Bob explains that when he did not know what to do he would run his ideas through the Four Absolutes (honesty, purity, unselfishness and love) and usually they would provide him with the answer of what to do - based on God's will and not his own. If still indecisive, he said, he would then run the potential scenarios past a friend that was better positioned to make such a decision. (Note to the A.A. "purist" - aside from the "Co-Founders" pamphlet, the Four Absolutes are discussed in "Doctor Bob and the Good Old-Timers," as well as in "Pass It On!," all of which are Conference-approved A.A. literature.)

The four Absolutes, themselves, are very easy to quickly and effectively use. In respect of 'Absolute Honesty' - the first of the Four Absolutes - one asks oneself, in respect of what one is about to 'say' or 'do' (or 'not say' or 'not do'), "Is it true or is it false?" In respect of Absolute Purity, one asks: "Is it right, or is it wrong?" In respect of Absolute Unselfishness, putting oneself and one's own interests out of the situation and completely out of mind, one asks: "How will this affect the other fellow?" And, in terms of Absolute Love, one asks: "Is it beautiful, or is it ugly?"

In the "Co-founders" pamphlet, which sets out the ever-practical and humble Dr. Bob's last major public talk, he says this (in part) about the history, application and usefulness of the Four Absolutes:

"The four absolutes, as we called them, were the only yardsticks we had before the Steps. I think the absolutes still hold good and can be extremely helpful. I have found at times that a question arises, and I want to do the right thing, but the answer is not obvious. Almost always, if I measure my decision carefully by the yardsticks of absolute honesty, absolute unselfishness, absolute purity, and absolute love, and [if] it checks up pretty well with those four, then my answer can't be very far out of the way. If, however, I do that and I'm still not satisfied with the answer, I usually consult with some friend whose judgment, in this particular case, would be very much better than mine. But usually the absolutes can help you to reach your own personal decision without bothering your friends."

 "Four Absolutes" pamphlets can still be purchased through the Cleveland District's Central Office (here), or can be downloaded from a number of independent websites (here and here).

[Reminder to myself: "Thy will, not mine, be done!"]

The Hole In the Doughnut . . . Or, Becoming Whole

Bill Wilson was a very good writer with a gift for to-the-point wording and suggestive imagery. The "juggernaut of self-will" (at page 38 of the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions) springs to mind. Like actions based on self-will, juggernauts - the massive battle ships built for the First World War - once underway take a great deal of power to stop and are enormously difficult to turn around.

My favorite of Bill's images, however, is that of the "doughnut hole." In his discussion of Step Three in the Twelve and Twelve (at page 36) Bill puts words in the mouth of a newcomer who is willing to turn his will and life over to the care of A.A. ("a Power greater than himself") insofar as it relates to alcohol. But that's it! In all other areas he clings to the notion that he must retain control.

"What will become of me? I'll look
like the hole in the doughnut"

 "Yes," the imaginary newcomer says, "respecting alcohol, I guess I have to be dependent upon A.A., but in all other matters I must still maintain my independence. Nothing is going to turn me into a non-entity. If I keep on turning my will and life over to the care of Something or Somebody else, what will become of me? I'll look like the hole in the doughnut."

The "hole in the doughnut" is my favorite image  because it shows not only the fear and insecurity of, in fact, turning one's will and life over to a still-mysterious "Higher Power" - even on an experimental basis - but it also shows how backwards our thinking can be. To the newcomer, the "hole in the doughnut" is just how it is described, a "non-entity." But, from a different perspective, the "hole" is the essence of the doughnut. A doughnut is hardly a doughnut without its hole.

At a deeper level, too, the struggle of the self-conscious, self-focused, self-centered alcoholic addict is to leave his or her egoic "self" behind in order to become part of the Whole. The nagging question - "What will become of me?" - can be either a compelling obsession to base all one's actions on the self-conscious thoughts coursing through the mind, or it can become the death rattle of the ego. Bill notes that the existential ("What will become of me?") question "is the process by which instinct and logic always seek to bolster egotism, and so frustrate spiritual development."

We hear much talk of fear at meetings and in the fellowship, but we hear far less talk about the flip-side of fear: desire. In Steps Four through Seven in the Twelve and Twelve, there is much discussion of desire, although Bill alternatively talks about it in terms of instincts, drives or desires. We all have "instincts" or "desires" for personal security, financial security, emotional security, sex and the society of our fellows etc., but a nagging sense of lack (or at least an often unrecognized sense that fulfillment of all of these desires is temporary at best) can drive us, as Bill notes, to blindly strive for more and more gratification of these demands of the ego without ever fully satisfying them. (As A.A. pioneer, Chuck C., so often noted, "It is divinely impossible to satisfy the human ego.")

Indeed, we are overtly and covertly taught or accultured to the sense that the fulfillment of these "instincts" is the primary purpose of life. Isn't "the American Dream" of marrriage, the house with the white picket fence, the 2.4 children and a comfortable retirement, not merely securing to oneself the fruits of these "universal" desires? But, as many (although perhaps not enough) people know, even when obtained these "rewards" for hard-work well done, diligence and good fortune are not sufficient in themselves to overcome the ego's insecurity and sense of wanting "something more."

". . . instinct and logic always
seek to bolster egotism . . ."

Indeed, it is in letting go of the ego's constant seeking and planning to get the "something more" or the "something else" that it always seems to need, that we find true purpose and happiness. Letting go of the relentless grinding of "instinct and logic" we are able to grow spiritually, and thus overcome "egotism." In doing so we reconnect with others, with life, and with "a Power greater than ourselves."

In letting go of "ego" and its "self-consciousness," we reconnect with a deeper God-consciousness and the "Essence" at the center of our being. In truth, we become that Essence - an essential part of the Whole - just as the doughnut hole is always the essence of the doughnut.