Humility vs. Humiliation in the 12 and 12 – George G.

Last week we did the fourth step. We were talking about the inventory part of the step, and I'd like to talk about the autonomous system, taking other groups as a whole. In the 12 and 12, it's the right to be wrong is what it's about. The fourth tradition is very important. Tradition being my inventory was my right to belong my whole life, and that I didn't realize that. the group can be long they can do anything they want to do even if it's not the right thing to do you know somebody asked me a couple weeks ago about the promises we read at the end of the meeting a lot of groups read the ninth step promise there are many other promises in this group I choose a vision for you because the group conscience gives me that choice as I sit in this chair I would like to read the 10-step promises but it's not part of group so we can form or die. So the fourth tradition, I can't be wrong and my inventory when I first did it was wrong. My whole, it was an immoral inventory so going from that point at the very end of the fourth step in the big book which says if you have already made a decision which is the third step in taking your inventory which is your fourth step of your growth to handicap you've made a good beginning that beginning that being so you are swallowed and digested some big chunks of truth about yourself I was sorry to say that a lot my sponsor said you sure are I couldn't admit I was wrong the W word was a tough one to come along to spit out when I got here but taking that inventory you know we come to that fifth step and the fifth tradition is to carry the message and if it wasn't for the people that carried the message to me I wouldn't have been willing to sit down with somebody and do that fifth step admit God to ourselves in another human being the exact nature of our wrongs you know we've been talking at the beginning of this meeting about the beginners classes that many many years ago and in some places in the United States they still have them that they still do and the beginner's class or in fact basic classes they call it says admitted to God to ourselves in another human being the exact nature of our wrong this step which is this step and described on pages 72 to 75 in a big book directions for taking this step are five on page seventy-five paragraph one lines one through four and paragraph two line one into and I'm going to read the directions that's been doing that when we decided who would hear our story would waste no time. We have written an inventory and we've prepared for a long talk. We explain to our partner what we are about to do and why we have to do it. He should realize that we are engaged upon a life and death errand. Most people approached in this way will be glad to help. They will be honored by our confidence. It says, we prock it up high, going to it, illuminating every twist of character and result cranny of the past. Once we have taken this step, withholding nothing we are delighted we can look the world in the eye that's a nice promise to be able to look the world back in the eyes because when I came in here I used to not look out I used to look down I never looked up I looked up and I was told if I stuck around long enough I would stop looking down and out and I would look in and up it made no sense but after my fifth step I made a lot of them I don't hear that very often in the rooms anymore but it's something that I hold on to very daily you know to me I've been through the steps a few times I'm going to give you some of my experience with the first step my first fifth step I've done more than once I believe you do the steps more than one so I'm not one of those that do them once and you're done with them I don' t believe there's a graduation and something in the twelfth step always reminds me having had a spiritual experiences the result of these steps it's all the first eleven we carry that message to the 11th step or 12 steps to others and practice it means I got to keep doing that first we work them then we start to do them then we thought to live them when you start living them long enough I was told that they become second nature some areas my life I still struggle with that step especially first five the fifth step to me will come and I always wondered why I had so much problem with it. Bob, when he was alive, and Larry also, both my first two sponsors, said to me best, we go to God for forgiveness. We go to ourselves for understanding. And we go another human being for humility. That's the real reason we do a fifth step. And I had a problem with that because my friends knew what I was about. I didn't want you guys to know what I wasn't about. God already knew who I was We weren't on talking terms, even in my fifth step. So I really, and for myself, it wasn't about me. It was about everybody else, how they affected me. Well, putting that fourth step down and putting it on paper, I started to wonder what I was going to do with it. And there's something in the big book that says it most. It says the reason we do this, the best reason first is if we don't do a fifth step, we're probably going to drink with you. That's it. And I have experiences with a couple of people I worked with that did one, two, three, four out the door. One, two ,three, four out the doorknob. And they kept relapsing and wanted to know why. There's a lot of things that the big book says and the 12 and 12 says that you can go to your sponsor. You don't have to go to your sponsors. Find somebody you trust. The thing is you have to do it. I depart in steps really from the big books into this one is because I like what the 12 and 12 says. And I've got it deeper when I got to that fifth step. The 12 and 11 hit me a lot harder than the big book did, although I did my steps through the big books the first time. I've heard different one-word meetings, and there we go with those one-words meetings about the principle of integrity or courage. I was told the principle is the step itself. Once I admit to God for myself in the middle of the meeting, the exact nature of my wrong that's the principle to go to somebody else to go to God and because it's your truth with myself honesty I learned in each step awareness I learned each step surrender I learned any step up to the fifth step so I was growing and I wasn't aware of it the fifth step was kind of hard because I actually had to sit down with somebody and tell them the whole See, I knew being I was a good dope fiend or a good alcoholist that if you got enough of my friends together each one of them would have a little bit of what was going on with me and put enough of them in the same room. They had the whole story already so I knew God already knew it was just doing that with one other human being that I was having difficulty with. So that word humility or humiliation to me that was the humiliation but the big book actually the 12 and 12 says it better than anything else because I had a lot of trouble with that word humility I knew a lot about humiliation that was a humiliation for me to sit with someone and tell them all my shit no other way of putting the word but all my garbage and cleaning it up and letting somebody know the truth about me scared me tremendous fear humility they told me is what I would gain out of it you know tough words to talk about especially with alcoholics because whenever we talk about humility nobody wants to talk abut it What is humility? Well, I had a problem with that word. I had a problem grabbing onto what it meant so my sponsor at the time told me to read page 58 and 12 and 12. It says, Humility a word often misunderstood. To those who have made progress in AA, it amounts to a clear recognition of what we really are followed by a sincere attempt to become what we could be. Real simple. If I know I'm acting like an idiot then I better stop acting like an idiot. And I was acting like a idiot for a long time. I was blaming everybody and it says in here a little later on that the reason we tell somebody people with long term why they relapse or short-term is that they thought they had humility when they had not. They thought they lost their egoism and their fear and their pride but they had now so that's just set as a key point in staying around there's some promises that are in here and I'm going to read some things out in 12 and 12. It says we have to quit living by ourselves with those tormenting ghosts of yesterday and it gets more urgent than ever. We have to talk to somebody about them. When I first got here, I had some secrets and I used to hear all the time I'm only as sick as my secret. I almost lost my sponsor over my secret that I didn't want to share with anybody and it's not for the rooms i have a sponsor to share certain things certain things do not belong in the room uh this is not a something ground it's not a few quality parties i was told but i had a sponsor that i needed to talk about an issue uh if i didn't clear that issue i never would have wrote my fourth step and if i'd been clear that if you i never was saved in this program there was a tremendous amount of guilt and shame and this devastation from my earlier childhood but it was something that i need to work through until i was willing to be honest with someone else about what was really going on in my life, to put that boogeyman, as they say, or that chain that I had out on the table, there was going to be no growth. And if there was no growth, there's going to be another drink or another drug. And I didn't want to do that anymore. I didn' t know how not to do this. It seems plain that the grace of God will not answer or expel a destructive obsession until willing to try this fifth step I had plenty of destructive obsessions it says for one thing we shall get rid of the terrible sense of isolation we always have to be amongst other people and not be apart from that isolation that I carried into these rooms even while I was here for a while the feeling of that I was so different and you guys really didn't understand you just didn't know what was going on in my head until I heard someone tell my story if you sit in the rooms long enough you will hear someone at least one person tell your story more likely you'll have many people tell different parts of your story when you stop trying to compare and start to identify that sense of isolation started to fall for me even though I didn't that was happening and I did that four step and it says either we We are shy and dared not draw near others, or we would have to be noisy good fellows craving attention and companionship. Never getting it, at least to our way of thinking, there was always that mysterious barrier that we could neither surmount or understand. That kept me stuck in stupid for a while. And I think it keeps me alive when I'm stuck in stupid. It says, you know, it tells us when we reached AA for the first time in our lives We stood among people who seemed to understand. That sense of belonging was tremendously exciting. The first time when I was in these rooms, I knew I was not alone. I was fighting everybody and everyone. The book tells me I'm going to do that. I didn't believe it. I didn' t even alcohol. And I could promise it a tenth step that we don't talk about. Sanity will be restored. I didn''t have sanity when I got here. And my thinking wasn' t sane at all. My attitudes were pretty wild and rotten. My mouth had a stunk and it was everybody else's fault. I was here because of what everybody did to me. As I went through the steps and I got to that point in that fourth step and I realized that it really wasn't everybody else. The problem wasn't the problem. The problem was my attitude to the problem and my attitude of the problem was that I needed an attitude adjustment and I had a sponsor who told me to put it on paper and my, you know, things would change. I didn't see how they were going to change but I knew if I didn' t put it on paper, I was not going to have a sponsor. That simple. He told me, if you do it, we'll find somebody who wants to do it in a way. So I did it. And I've got to share this before I go back to the book. I wrote my 28-page immoral inventory the first time. I didn't have a very moral inventory when I got here. And I had him in a loose piece of book and I went to the bottom line, the old bottom line on Veritas on a Saturday morning because I was meeting my sponsor to go over my four step. four-step I wouldn't admit that I was at that point because I was still afraid of what this process was and I there's an old timer in the room Mike I said to Mike you know I'm going to meet my sponsor today after the 10 o'clock in the morning meeting I'm gonna go over my four steps he said oh no you're not cuz you're gonna be doing a fifth step I all of a sudden got very afraid and I was scared to death and I started sweating and I got nervous and he says I said, what's the matter? He said, I want you to go out there and do this. Oh, no, pilot. Leave it to the old pilot. Let's go over to the window on the second floor. And he looked down and he said, have you seen any cops here? He said no. He said well, there were no cops in mine either. He said what are you so afraid of? I realized that there was nothing to be afraid of. There was something in my head that made me afraid to sit down with another person. Anyway, I met Larry that day and we sat at the Pompano Pompadour Parkway and the beach for five and a half hours that was a wonderful experience we talked about a lot of things there was a lot of things he was not capable of doing for me giving when it came to my children issues he was single he couldn't help me there so he made some suggestions He says, you know, if you don't have any experience in an area, you seek out someone who has experience in that area and you go to them with that part of your system. It doesn't all have to come from one person. I can tell you a story of somebody we know who had a jail experience and I was sponsoring him at the time and he came to me and I really have no jail experience. So it's really hard for me to try and give... I'm not a priest, so I can't give absolution. I'm no rabbi, so can't play with anybody. I'm just another drunk. And I have no experience in the area, so I suggested a few people for them to go to. Well, they grabbed this tremendous resentment from me for over a year because they thought I didn't care about them. And they did go where they were sent to and then they changed classes in the LA. They came back, they said, you know, I never realized how important it is now that there was class in town when you don't have experience not to make it up as you go along. and one of the reasons I continue to go through these steps is so I can learn more about my alcoholism so that fifth step to me was real important I have heard this step from women I've heard this step from people who have different sexual preferences or the same sexual preferences I've had I've read it's from divorcees from divorced married, single it really doesn't matter what it's about is to learn how to listen it was really good that I had somebody that really listened to me and was able to direct me in areas and it's 12 at 12 it says a bunch of things we saw for example that we lacked honesty intolerances that we would be said at times by attacks of self-pity or delusion of personal grandeur though now recognized our defects were still there something had to be done about them and we soon found out that we could neither wish them away or by ourselves see I knew I did some terrible things one of the first things I shared with somebody is that I had a friend of mine and I gave a gun and put a gun to his mouth. My gun blew his brains out and I was like two months sober and I felt terrible. I felt responsible and my sponsor said, fine, stop giving people your guns. Concept. That's a decision that when I meet my maker or wherever I'm going that's between God and I. I did a lot of things when I got here in the 6th and 7th stamp to not have the behaviors I had at the beginning with those kind of issues. That we'll talk about later. But that was one of the things that in my first death, I didn't know what to do with those things that I knew about myself that I didn' t want anybody to really know. It says, If all our lives we had been more or less fooled ourselves, self-delusion, I was in that area for a long time in my life, how can we now be so sure that we still weren't self-deceived? How can we be certain that we had made a true catalog of our defects and really admitted them even to ourselves because we were still bothered by fear, self-pity, hurt feelings. It was probable we couldn't appraise ourselves fairly at all. Too much guilt and remorse might cause us to dramatize and exaggerate our shortcomings or anger and hurt pride might be a smoke screen under which we are hiding some of our defects while we blamed others for them. Possibly too, we were so handicapped by many liabilities, great and small, we never knew we even had. You know, those were major things for me when I died here. I didn't know how to get out of that and I didn' t know how to practice that honesty with another human being. I did know I didn''t want to feel the way I was feeling and I also knew that... I heard it many times in the book says that if you don't do this then you'll drink. You know say quite that way because we're quite sure you're going to drink. And that scared me. So on fear, I trusted someone else. Even though I didn't trust them. But I was willing to do the process. I trusted the process, I didn' t trust the people, but I trusted a product. That was something intuitive that I know. Today I know that it works. And it says lacking, and it tells us there's a couple of difficulties, and it says, lacking both practice and humility, they deluded themselves that they were able to justify the most avid nonsense on the ground that it was God who had told them. It is worth noting that people of very high spiritual development always insist on checking with friends or spiritual advisors the guidance that they feel they have received from God. Surely then a novice will not lay himself open to the chance of making fools, perhaps traitors, tragic blunders in this fashion. My experience is all I have. My experience isthat every time I hear somebody say they are speaking directly to God I get nervous I hear God speaking to others but it was given to me and I like examples you know there's a guy in my Bob's here right now hi Bob Bob used to say to me when he was alive he used to say to me it's like going to the Indian reservation the guy goes in with a hundred dollar bill and fifty dollars and he puts fifty dollars in his pocket because he doesn't want to leave and goes into the craft tables and loses a hundred dollars and he's ready to get out of there in the bus and on his way out the door he hears God say don't leave it I'm in this head he's very neat God said go to the craft table and he plays the tape and he goes to the crap table well I'll put ten dollars down let me check with God he's talking to God back and forth and God says not this table and he walks around for ten minutes looking at each crap table and finally he hears God say this table okay okay I'll go and put ten dollar down no bet at all now he's having this conversation with God about betting it all and he says okay God I'll bet it all I said I'll put it down he says no wait for the dice to come around and he's really believing the thoughts of God and just as he's got the dice in his hand and he puts he says I'm going to put what number God seven and just as he lets go the dice in his gut say whoops I missed it now that's how my head works God does not speak to me not that way but he will speak to me through the people in this room and that was very important to me because my fifth step was a guiding thing no coincidence the way it worked out I found out on the day I did my fifth steps my father's birthday and my sponsor's birthday were the same day and I had a tremendous resentment towards my father for many years and it was you know and he was just like my father and I didn't see that when I first got here and there was a lot of things that went on in my fifth set that were wonderful One of the greatest things that happened to my fifth step, fear fell from me. And that's a promise. Fear fell from it. I looked at the world in a whole different light. I was away from that isolation that was promised in the fifth step. I did what I was told, go home, take that hour. We went out to dinner after I did my fifth steps, and it was a five-hour fifth step and I've done other fifth steps since then. I've been many fourth steps, I did full fourth steps and I have done other first steps. I did one on my children, because my sponsor wasn't capable of working that one with me. And I did it with someone that I have a lot of respect for. I went to an AWOL group, and they told us not to use our sponsor. And I had to do another fifth step when I did an AWol group, and I went with someone because my sponsored Bob was dying, and he suggested that I go to Ben Trostle, Ben Tate, if I remember well. And Ben was busy, so he sent me to Deion. So I got to do a fifth step on being a roadie for 20 years, because here was a man who worked in the rock and roll business who understand the road so I got to clear those issues up God constantly by me constantly doing steps put someone in my club and that's why I don't believe we do the steps just once and that is only my belief there are people I know who did the steps just once and they have done them we each travel a different journey but for this alcoholic I need to stay plugged in and staying plugged in means continuous work on the steps the real test of your situation is are you willing and confident to fully concede your full confidence in the one whom you will share your first accurate self-service. Even when you found that person, it frequently takes great resolution to approach him or her. No one ought to say that AA program requires no willpower because when you want to go to somebody to hear you off their step, you better believe it's the hardest thing you're going to do even if it's your sponsor because even though they already know you don't want to sit there and tell them and they already know I mean there's nothing my sponsor did not know about me but putting it all together at one time in one place in one sitting scared the hell out of me but when I did it it was a great deal and when I did it I can tell you that even though right after I did five six and seven was done almost immediately the way the book was said and then I went home and did what the book said and then we went back and formally whatever that means today because it's changed a lot formally worked at six and seven steps with exercise and things to do but actually when I did my fifth step I was red jumping step eight so it's six and seven directly after he asked me the questions that are in the book he asked me if I was willing to have the defense removed and we sat down and we did the seven step prayer together he then told me to go back and enjoy my fifth step for a little while and to just read the sixth step and the twelfth and twelfths and we'll talk about it in two weeks. And I had two weeks of... I thought I was getting a break. He told me to log my defects and then to find what the asset was opposite. But the inventory wasn't all negative because one of the things that I had to do in my inventory was put down some positive assets that I didn't have. so my suggestion that was given to me by my sponsor at the time was to go into the rooms to the people I didn't like and ask them what they saw good in me that was a tough assignment but I did I did whatever I was told to do because I didn' want to die and I didn''t even know that provided you hold nothing back your sensibility will amount from minute to minute the damned up emotions of years break out of their confinement the miraculous they miraculously vanish as soon as they are exposed you know we talk about promises that is a promise that is there but it's got to be it's gotta be given fully no holding back no secrets that's a tough one as the pain subsides the healing tranquility takes place and when humility and serenity are so combined something else with a great moment may occur the feeling of being one with God and man that's emerging from isolation through an open and honest hearing of our terrible burden of guilt brings us to a resting place where we may prepare ourselves for the following steps toward a full and meaningful sobriety just not drinking in enough anymore somewhere along these steps it talks about the joy of good living not the joy of living the joy of good life. Those terrible defects that I carried from my previous life, my life began the day I walked into alcohol. It's phenomenal. I don't believe that I had a good life until I started getting here and even when I was here I didn't think I was getting a good life. I thought you guys just didn't understand. But when I did the fifth step and I walked into my next meeting a bunch of people said welcome to AA and I knew what they meant. That fifth step is a pivotal point in my recovery, and I believe it is in anyone who sticks around for a long while of staying sober. Because without doing an honest fifth step, you're going to slip back into self-deception, and eventually people will slip back to self-despair. Drink. And to me, drink was to die. And I didn't want the old behavior because I just didn't wanna go back to the cardboard box. So whatever would keep me further away from that cardboard box, I was willing to do. And that's enough on the fifth step.