The Fifth Step and Powerlessness – Herb K – Workshop – Part 17 of 25 – Herb K.

Good morning, good afternoon, good evening wherever you are in the world. My name is Herbin I'm an alcoholic. Welcome to our Big Book Telephone Step Workshop. Please join me in a request for an open mind and an open heart with the prayer that I call the set-aside prayer God please set aside everything that I think I know about myself my brokenness my spiritual path and you for an open mind and a new experience of myself my broke in this my spiritual power and especially you Please join me in the Serenity Prayer 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 that's a prayer about reality isn't it what can I influence what can't I influence the one thing that we've become clear on is that I can't influence much outside of myself And I even need power to influence things in an effective way, inside of myself. I've used the image of a rocket launch. The first stage of a three-stage rocket launch based on Bill Wilson's rocketed into the fourth dimension comment in the on page 25 that first stage is actually an experience of not effective power with regard to our addiction and with regard to our life unmanageability and then a search a desperate search translated into a decision a simple decision a powerful decision a faith decision having no certitude no knowledge no feeling no emotion no experience empty thin dark insubstantial a decision nevertheless about power and step three a decision for our relationship with that which we made a decision about in step two and then take the actions that are the commitment in the prayer that is said in community in step three the actions of the second stage removing the obstacles in us to a connection to us especially to the power that is in us that is not us at times we may have some certitude about an experience of power sometimes we may even have a feeling that goes along with that certitude it's wonderful when it happens it's fleeting don't chase it we chase it away if we chase it embrace it lean into it gently don't seek it be surprised humbled and grateful for it as we investigate the exact nature of the underlying causes and conditions of our suffering and we look at instincts gone awry fight flight and freeze has translated into resentment and fear and dishonesty and secrets especially in our sexual relations we put it all down on paper and then we read it to somebody a minor discussion might ensue but I'm emphasizing that as I did in the comments on the fifth step where the person doing the fifth step does 90% of the talking when the person hearing the fifth step perhaps participates at a level of around 10% not that there's any rules but just guidelines concerning the proportionality it's not therapy but it will be therapeutic it's not a time for teaching but each person will learn it's about an experience of for the very first time at least in this journey reading out loud what you've spent weeks months and maybe even years writing about but you write it out in discrete moments as you accumulate them over a long period of time and then you sit and you read it out loud continuously and you hear it for the first time in its comprehensiveness and it has its way with us i recommend that the fifth step be done in one sitting but circumstances might prevent that once again no rules just suggestions at least a nice long sit one hour three hours five hours whatever it takes so that we hear it consecutively consistently out loud and our history washes over us. And we have an experience, a new experience of step one. Powerless. We cannot change our history and it couldn't have been any different. Any thought about coulda woulda shoulda is completely unhealthy and ineffective. It's a dark rabbit hole that has no healthy ending. just what is and we accept it humbly and we regret a lot of it and we take a look once we finish it back over our shoulder at steps one through five in a meditation to see if we've been diligent have we in fact been as open as we can be as honest as we are conscious of being I try to warn and help and support the perfectionists among us by saying you can't be perfect all we can do is the best we can realizing even that we cannot do the best that we can do and that's the best we can do we lean gently into this process no violence on ourselves no violence at all and in the sixth step we look underneath for the character defects that were formed by the instincts gone awry fight flight and frees the instincts manifesting in our emotions of anger and resentment and fear and anxiety and secrets and hiding and camouflage and dishonesty which corrupts our reactions and our behavior even our attitudes and our way of living our way of perceiving and our ways of reacting and we need to look at that corruption what are are character defects there's no assets here there's no assets by definition the character defect in fact in the way of life document i use the scientific terminology of personality disorder so that we get a real clear idea as to what the psychiatrist and the psychologists are talking about not that you have that in the severe sense of a character disorder that's diagnosable in the DSM. Diagnostic Statistical Manual. No, it may not be that severe but directionally it is absolutely there. I include the nine characteristics of narcissism not because everybody's a narcissist. No no no no. But because it really reflects The severity, potential severity of selfishness, self-centeredness that we saw is the unmanageability, is the spiritual malady, is the cancer of the soul that Bill talks about, that we're not cured of. I've made a distinction. The book actually makes the distinction. And I've explained it the best I can, the distinction between recovered and not cured. Recovered, I do believe, means the product of the first nine steps. We've been placed in a position of neutrality with regard to our addiction. That's the promise as we enter into the world of the Spirit in step 10. Placed in a Position of Neutrality. here the vocabulary it's passive it's a gift it's a grace we didn't earn it we didn t create it we cooperated with the suggestions and took the actions and there is some type of correlation between that but they're in the middle of it like the Sistine Chapel Michelangelo depicting the creation the hand of god reaching down to earth to create humans and the arm of a human being reaching up to be created and there's a space in between that space the x plus factor the mystery that's where the miracle takes place a gift our reaching through our willingness and our action God's intervention through grace and gift and unconditional love those are the terms I use to try to explain this mystery and it's the same dynamic in steps 6 and 7 It's another inventory. Step two was an inventory, an inventory of our belief about reality and power. Step four was an inventory of our instincts gone awry. Step six is an inventory how that instinct gone awry manifests in our behavior forming habits of behavior character defects and you may have five and you may have 50 and it doesn't make any difference they they have what you have i took my list of character defects i'm analytical as you already know and i tried to separate them out into family so that i could understand them more readily see their underlying cause and condition the exact nature of my character defects and they went into about i had maybe 40 or 50 character defects in 1988 as i saw it at that time and i distilled it down to 10 groupings and as i stayed in meditation over the next several days I distilled it down into four groupings, resentment, fear, dishonesty, and self-centeredness. And of course, Bill tells us that it really is about self-centredness, the underlying cause and conditions. This is the source of our suffering. the survival mechanism which is natural to us has been corrupted again I'll use that term in a way that's not healthy we haven't grown up we haven t matured we haven't seen reality as reality is we keep expecting reality to be what we want reality to be, to try to sculpt our own happiness and to ensure that even though it might mean unhappiness of other people. That was helpful to see that the book is absolutely correct. It's based on good physiology, biology, psychology as we've determined and talked about through steps four through six. And then there's the prayer, the second paragraph on page 76. It's just a prayer. He's assuming that he gives us a prayer that we pray the prayer. There's no direction there as to praying it with your sponsor or anybody else like it does in the third step it says we choose a spiritual person an advisor or a guide or a friend to pray the third-step prayer with this man said to me there's no instruction in the big book or the twelve and twelve concerning praying the seven-step prayer with anybody so you create your own seven step prayer and then when you're ready you pray which I did the general prayer I think I've described to you my overall experience with that but it's such a powerful transformational experience 1988 that I i'll give you a recap of it again i prayed the general prayer from the book i prayed this specific prayer from my own creation and the next day i was very clear that i still had that major character defense i was startled i went to my meeting a men's stag step study meeting crosstalk meeting on the book out of the steps and a man shared about being specific this was such a revelation to me my sponsor my step guide I had never heard it before be specific about your prayer in the seven step that was his experience I went home and in a couple days got on my knees and was ready to pray the prayer specifically I had to stop I wasn't I wasn't willing I realized I was still attached to I didn't want to change I didn't want to change my behavior. I didn't wanna change this character defect knowing that it was devastating, potentially going to interfere with my professional life, with my personal life and on page 70 Bill confirms in the big book on page seventy that it will in fact undermine my program but if I continue that behavior I will drink again we are not theorizing he says we're speaking from our own experience and I believed a book and I believe to my sponsor and I remembered that the sixth step is about willingness and it says if you're not willing you discover you're not willing bill knows us it's only extreme suffering that makes us willing he says if you're not willing pray for the willingness because your powerless to be willing my conclusion I prayed for the willingness I prayed this step 7 prayer specifically for the wilderness and for the change and I called the man who was my step guide related to him and he then said to me now stop the behavior making a critical distinction between the character defect over which I have no power and how it manifests in my behavior over which I am responsible. And he suggests that I pray the prayer every day, specifically, and that I call him every day and give him a specific report of my behavior. Within two days, as I recall, 48 hours maximum, the behavior went away. The changes stopped. The inclination didn't go away for two years. I called him every day for about a week. I was confirmed that the behavior had stuck. We agreed that I would talk to him once a week and then once a month as we were very clear about the inclination versus the behavior. The inclination after about two years went away. Prayer because I'm powerless, accountability because I am human. And I've said it before and I'll say it again because it's such a powerful formula. you really want to change something some conscious behavior some conscious attitude some conscious feeling that you have that is interfering with your happiness your contentment may the quality of your life the most powerful recommendation I can make is pray specifically for its change whatever the words are that it's about the intention not the words pray specifically for the change and talk to somebody specifically to be accountable for the behavior that comes from whatever it is that you want to be changed in the assignment for next week is another inventory step 8 let me just make sure what number it is step 8 assignment 21 another inventory use your fourth step and also then your memory of your history there may be things that you created harm about with people or institutions that are not on your fourth step not in your fifth step we'll talk about it read the material there's a lot of commentary in the big book 76 to 83 about steps 8 and 9 bill combines them here I'm not combining them but it's hard to keep them separate in a way although they're totally separate step eight is a list step nine is an action step eight isn't inventory you might even look up the word harm I use the word diminish because it helps me become more inclusive. Harm sounds very dramatic. I use the word diminish. I look at physical, emotional, intellectual, mental, financial, different areas. They're not all impacted but they're the lens through which I try to screen the impact of my behavior on other people that's the point we'll talk about that next week please join me in this or vanity prayer God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change courage to change the things i can and and wisdom to know the difference. Thanks everybody.