The Wisdom Of the 12 Steps of AA

[Shivani Devi]

First, let me say that I am not an alcoholic, but I do have a few persistent, bad habits I cannot seem to break and no amount of personal willpower is helping out there either.

Yeah, I am a smoker (about 3 packs a week) and often, I cant be bothered cooking for one, so I go out to the local Chinese place, or Subway, and I am an iced coffee addict and I usually go to bed at 2-3am only to wake up at 10 or 11am. I'm not regular in my spiritual practice either and I physically suffer...boy, do I suffer and I know my suffering is the direct result of poor lifestyle choices, but does it make any difference? Nope, none whatsoever.

Some of you may like to use this guideline for whatever it is that stands in the way of your spiritual progress, as it's a general 'cure-all' for most of the things associated with the ego, or any compulsive or impulsive actions and/or behaviours, like anger, frustration and the like:

Step 1: We admitted we were powerless over *insert bad habit*—that our lives had become unmanageable.

Step 2: Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

Step 3: Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

Step 4: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

Step 5: Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

Step 6: Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

Step 7: Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.

Step 8: Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

Step 9: Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

Step 10: Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

Step 11: Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.

Step 12: Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to others, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

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[Baile]

AA seems to work for many people so obviously lots of good in it. Personally and as I see it, the AA approach takes the same "negative prayer" approach common in religion: I'm a sinner, I'm imperfect, and only God can save me. That's no doubt why it works for many: it's easy to grasp, specifically because religion and religious modes of thinking are more familiar to the majority of people.

From my own experience, transforming poor habits and even addictions only requires Spirit understanding and self-empowerment: belief in one's self as a perfect being of Spirit; belief in one's ability to overcome any obstacle in life. It does though require connection with higher self wisdom, which I suppose one could equate to "God" in the AA version. But again, I always see Spirit as an aspect of me, myself. My higher self and I can achieve anything.

Also for me and very important: it's never about "wrong" (another negative prayer term), and only ever about transforming things in ways that will improve and make better. Taking every negative and turning it into its positive counterpart. This has everything to do with setting the proper intention. Example: instead of thinking "I want to quit smoking," thinking "I am a non-smoker." With the former, one is still struggling to quit, still trying to succeed, still susceptible to failure. With the latter, one has already quit, is finished with it completely, and is now on their way to health.

[7luminaries]

Necromancer & Baile, hello there!

First, Necro, this is a great thread. I think in the broad framework and outline of process, this is an extremely valuable tool for society at large and for many if not most individuals. And not just for societally-designated "addictions"...but as a tool or chart for spiritual growth. It seems to present a view of a traditional God, but that is easily remedied as we can each use the term or concept for Source with which we are most comfortable.

Also for you Baile...
I think you could (and I would, and many certainly have done)
simply substitute Higher Self or Divine Self or Spirit or whatever you like in place of the word "God". And then it is simply an outline of the process you undergo and commit to undergoing. To make it more of a clearly personal process within which you are aligning your daily mindset and actions with who you are at centre.

However, I do think that in order to get to a place where you say "hey I am a non-smoker, full stop", you clearly still had to start from a place where you freely acknowledge to self and others that "I am a smoker, and I don't like it" or "smoking is bad (for me and for others) and I'm ready to stop doing it and start doing healthier, more loving things (for self and others)."

To both of you...

There is pride and not shame in ownership...and it's a screwed up culture we live in that punishes us or shames us for taking ownership and growing into spiritual maturity...we should IMO reject that entire paradigm and allow ourselves to freely take ownership of where we've been, with pride in the doing. Perhaps we have done things we're not proud of, but we CAN be proud of taking ownership for those things, and for taking different decisions, and for seeking to make amends (reconciliation) where possible.
Those are good and noble things, and we need more of them in all of our lives...as modern culture tends to produce a huge deficit of these things in the individual, without conscious choices taken by him or her.

Certainly we are each free to use the buzzwords that speak to us, but there's no getting around the fact that we must first get clarity on what it is we want to change or stop doing. And we must freely and clearly admit what it is we want to change or stop doing. If we then choose to stress becoming the positive state of non-smoking, no problem. Once we first admit we have been a smoker and that's what needs changing. Otherwise, why even bother as it's not your problem?

Peace & blessings
7L

[Baile]

Originally Posted by 7luminaries

Also for you Baile...
I think you could (and I would, and many certainly have done)
simply substitute Higher Self or Divine Self or Spirit or whatever you like in place of the word "God".

I'm currently involved in a Christian forum discussion with someone who says God in his wrath is preparing to destroy the world for its sin, and that a person would have to be oblivious not to see the signs. So no, it's not about simply substituting. It's about identifying and consciously evolving a wiser, self-directed, Aquarian Age understanding of higher-self and Spirit/Creation.

[7luminaries]

Originally Posted by Baile

I'm currently involved in a Christian forum discussion with someone who says God in his wrath is preparing to destroy the world for its sin, and that a person would have to be oblivious not to see the signs. So no, it's not about simply substituting. It's about identifying and consciously evolving a wiser, self-directed, Aquarian Age understanding of higher-self and Spirit/Creation.

Baile, LOL...Well, I would say, for YOU, it is simply about substituting the term or concept, precisely BECAUSE you've come to a different place in your understanding.

For others, who cannot see God as Higher Self, the more traditional approach seeks to reach them where they are...and if they are where your discussion partner is at, it's a scary place and we owe them all the compassion we can muster

Keeping the focus on ownership, you understand that substituting Higher Self for a Deist God (out there somewhere) or an All-Father allows you to more clearly take ownership for where you are -- and with pride in the goodness and rightness of it -- whilst also acknowledging with humility and grace that you are not yet in full alignment (just like the rest of us).

Not everyone is there...so the language is phrased to allow the authority figure (of God/Higher Self) to guide them more truly on their path when they are at their weakest spiritually and otherwise and need support to weather the crisis of their day-to-day lives. It may be a bit more primitive and it may not speak to you or me, but if it sets folks on the course of right-alignment with Spirit, it's all to the good.

Personally, I think the 12 step approach with Higher Self or Source as the reference is still a powerful tool for our spiritual growth. We are not "above it"

Peace & blessings
7L

[7luminaries]

BTW Baile...have you asked your discussion partner (for lack of a better word :) what about considering it's just us? That we are the ones doing this to one another and to the earth? And that we've got no one else to blame but ourselves?

Also...if we're heading for destruction, does he acknowledge concrete changes would have to be made by us, just us, and no one else but us?

Just curious to see where his mindset is at...

If he doesn't accept his own hand in it...well you can certainly see the need for something, anything like a 12-step program that calls folks to accountability with themselves and those around them.

I'll admit...the arrogance of fingering God -- whilst failing to own that it's man's inhumanity to man and earth -- is astounding really, isn't it?
It's like his own wacky "get out of jail free" card.

Peace & blessings
7L

[Lynn]

Hello

Wow this brings back memories of AA and my EX and all those meetings that we were "court ordered" to attend. While I have seen some success stories from the meetings I too have seen some just go for the motions of going.

Addiction is something you have to first admit you have and second be willing to take to heart the path the change. A drink is always just one sip away, like smoking its one puff away for many to addiction again.

Meetings too can become the addiction that need to be around others to keep you in line. Where does it stop, what is that point where you do not need a meeting, this is what I never understood from the process.

I went to many of the counter to AA which is Al-anon for the family of one that abuses drink. Here I found that it was a lot of "you can help" in approach but unless the one with the issue wants the help its a loosing battle.

For some God is the aspect that they can not buy into, I know this was the case with my EX, and some can not change from that God image to get the program has a deeper level. Too God is a changing concept as we become more and more internationally diverse in places, so maybe the program has to evolve with the times in places ?

There is wisdom in the process only if your able to commit to the discipline. I would see many that were at the wrong meeting when I attended they had an issue....but did not see it.

There are so many things we can become addicted to....that we fail to see as an issue in our life path. I have to wonder at times "what is in the coffee" from some shops that makes you pay over $5.00 for a cup that in a blind taste test of the same one made at home tasting the same. Yet if its at home or in your office at work your not addicted to having to have it. Yet you are going to the store front ? I laugh at the line ups in the drive through for coffee....its coffee. Water and beans, cream and sugar at times.

Same with fast food its the same thing you can make at home.....there is now Big Mac Sauce in the stores....so make a fresh good quality burger....and smile. Yet there too we are addicted to that taste at times. Why ?

I personally used the 12 Steps to get off an Bridge Mix addiction I had, was so bad I hid it all over the house. I would go to a meeting and say I was addicted to that candy.....a it was like my booze that the ex abused. It worked I still have it from time to time....but not hidden everywhere now.


Lynn

[organic born]

Originally Posted by The Necromancer

Step 1: We admitted we were powerless over *insert bad habit*—that our lives had become unmanageable.

As I read through this list I find myself wanting to dismantle each step into a more conscious understanding of what's actually going on. The ignorance that underlie each point is almost breathtakingly naive.

For starters lets tackle this first one. Our lives are guaranteed to be unmanageable because the context we grew up in is dysfunctional to the core. Between the religious imagery we were raised in, the foods that we are being shoved into and then adapt to as "normal", the schools that we were forced to attend essentially robed us of the years that we could have been learning real stuff about finances, cooking, growing our own food, learning to work intelligently with each other (instead of being forced into sterile class rooms among other children who are trapped in the same way) and then the television that feeds us ideas about living that have little to do with what is specifically healthful and functional.

Then from this we create busy jobs where we move around products that we've been encouraged to buy that have little to no value other than tickle our fancy until the next item comes along. We were raised to be assembly line workers and then helplessly go along with wherever we're directed.

So our lives will feel empty because essentially what we're having to do to get by is a watered down version of what it is to be human. We're not approaching life as a comprehensive participant, we fill a slot on an assembly line that produces almost nothing of value while swimming through a chemically ladened environment with little nutrition to offset it.

So how is anyone expected to feel functional when we've all been reduced to being essentially drones? The "bad" habits that we find ourselves doing is a product of misdirection and a form of personal comfort in terms of stimulating our reward reflex and a feeling of "choice" within a lifestyle of choices that have little depth of value when viewed objectively.

This does not mean that "life" itself is devoid of value, and unlike the Step 1 mentioned above we are not really the authors of our own conundrum, we are simply the lifelong followers of what dysfunctional options that are offered us within the mindsets of those who surround us.

So we're off to a bad start if we begin this introspective journey by strictly blaming 'ourselves' for this situation that we find ourselves in. This entire culture embedded us into a host of options which are, by default, unmanageable in a holistic way. This entire culture is essentially unmanageable and we're just being drug along with it. Realizing this alone, through clear introspection, is empowering enough to move toward a more valued experience with "self"

[organic born]

Originally Posted by The Necromancer

Step 2: Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

Vomit! You "live" yourself, there is no power greater than your experience with self. The culture may influence our choices, and view of self, but the idea that someone big and "out-there", other than ourselves, will somehow save us from our own conundrum, when personal introspection will do just as well if fully directed, is to "formally believe" that we are indeed helpless. Vomit!

Regardless of who shows us what, we are still the focus of our own attention and direct ourselves based on our intimate conclusions. It's this reliance on the "outside forces" that "know more than we do" that's driving this train of dysfunction. We'll be using this idea of god to replace our parents, teachers, preachers, governments influence over our own view of self. Only this god will reflect what we currently think that this god is, and since we haven't cleaned out the cultures influence over our view of things then we'll likely be putting into this gods mouth the same stuff that the "authorities", that got us into this mess in the first place, are encouraging us to do.

Among these twelve steps is essentially a redirection to some god the same dysfunction that we're unable to overcome by using the current cultural paradigms. Only we'll be still applying these same cultural paradigms by now assigning some god the task of dong roughly the same thing. yuck!

[Shivani Devi]

Of course this will not be useful for anybody who doesn't believe in a Power or concept greater than their own ego-self or any kind of 'God of their own understanding' or any universal source or force whatsoever, but some of us do, including myself.

Of course it also won't be useful if they cannot admit their 'bad habit' or whatever difficulty they are self-inflicting is causing problems in their life and they'd like to change, but sheer willpower hasn't worked because they're still relying on the ego-self for that.

It also won't be useful for those who have no bad habits, or those who are still in full denial of them or happy having them.

If any of this makes you want to throw up and you don't like this whatsoever and what I post makes you nauseated that you feel physically ill, there's always an ignore feature on here. Thank you.