Step 3 and Self-Centeredness – Workshop – Part 4 of 4 – Bill L.

Hi everybody, my name is Bill Lashley and I'm a hawk. And I guess just to do kind of a review of last week. I'm sure that'll sound good on the tape. We did sort of an overview of how it works from the original manuscript, or rather match it up with the original transcript, and again you might have noticed some significant language changes. also uh we did most of step three i guess just to do a recap of step three um it begins in the middle of page 60 immediately following the abc in the big book the first highlight so to speak is being convinced we are at step three and the first requirement is that i can be that I be convinced that my life and on my will can hardly be a success and on that basis I am almost always in collision with something or somebody even though my motives are good and then it gets into a description of an actor trying to run the whole show and manipulate the people around them and personally I've never seen a better description of a self-centered person trying to play God I don't think we mentioned it last week but sometimes we refer to this person being the actor they have all these plans for the day and they have plans for the people around them and when the people don't act the way they want them to I like to call them script violators because I have this script in my head of how life's supposed to go and how the people are supposed to act around me of course no one else knows any of this and inevitably somebody doesn't act the way that I want them to so therefore they're a script violator because I have this script and they're supposed to follow along. Of course, they never got a script and never even knew of a script and of course, they have their own script. So, hence, we're in collision with others as they are in collision with us. Then the second part of the third step there is on page 62 after talking about selfishness, self-centeredness, that is the root of our troubles and then it's saying so our troubles we recover are making. It says that we must be rid of this selfishness above everything. I must be red of this selflessness. I must or it kills me. God makes that possible. And there often seems no way of entirely getting rid of self without God's aid. Neither could I reduce my self-centeredness much by wishing or trying on my own power. I had to have God's help. And then it goes into the essence of the decision that we're going to be making on the third step, which is I have to quit playing God simply because it didn't work. And that next I decide that hereafter in this drama of life, God is going to become my director. He is the principal, I am his agent. He is a father and we are his children. In the original manuscript, the next line said get that simple relationship straight. And then it goes into the third-step promises in the middle of the next page is a third step prayer but before the third step prayer there's some sort of a warning or something to consider before we actually do the third-step prayer where it says, we thought well before taking this step making sure we were ready that we could at last abandon which means to give up without the intent to ever take back ourselves utterly or completely to him it gives some instruction on perhaps how to do it and then there's a last point that we didn't touch upon yet which immediately follows that and we'll touch upon that tonight but those are sort of the four points the first requirement is that we be convinced that my life run on my will can hardly be a success the second point being in the bottom of page 62 where it talks about the actual essence of the third step which is God being the director he's the principal, he'sthe father We get some results for that. An affirmation of that decision on the bottom of page 62 is the third step prayer, which is sort of the third highlight, and then the last highlight, which starts at the bottom on page 63 and goes to the top of page 64. But we'll touch upon that as we go through. Did you read that last week? No. All right. This is something that's called the step three parable. I'll be honest with you, I don't remember where this is from sometimes it's hard to keep track of all the stuff that filters through my computer but like I said, this is called the step 3 parable step 3 has made a decision to turn our own lives over to the care of God as we understood him and this is the little parable a drunk is staggering along the street and he meets God God, I can't do this anymore, he says please, please, will you give me sobriety sobrietry isn't free, says God How much money have you got? The junk reaches into his pocket. Fifty bucks. I'll take it, says God. You're sober. The man stands up straight, drunk no more. It feels pretty good. Yeah, but, God? Yes. I know I gave you my money willingly, but you see, I need to get gas in my car. You have a car, God says? Well, yes. You didn't tell me that. I'll check the car also. But, God, wait. I'll tick the car. It's part of the price of your sobriety. But how will I get to work? You have a job. I'll take the job too. But God, how will I pay my mortgage? Mortgage? You have an apartment. A house? I'll pay that also. But God my family, how will it take care of them if I have no house and no job? God says to him gently and lovingly, in order to keep your sobriety you must give me these things. But I will let you drive my car so long as you remember it's my car. You can have the job but remember you're working it for me. It's my house but I will let you live in it. And as for your family, they are my family, but I will trust that you will take care of them. And for me, that's a pretty good sort of essence of the third step. Some people think this turning our will and our life over to God means we're going to end up selling flowers up at the airport or perhaps volunteer somewhere in some third world country. But I think the essence is captured in that parable of, you know, in looking at my job as something that God gave me and it's something that I need to take care of. That completely alters how I view my work and it completely alers how I behave there. I heard somebody say once that in developing a relationship with their higher power and in seeing their higher powers they no longer look at themselves as owning anything they only look at themself as being a caretaker of the things that they have and in reading that and internalizing it I found that that was really profound that the essence of life is that things come and go things change people come and get out of our lives but in each moment instead of looking at something as a possession but looking at it as a gift that perhaps a higher power has provided us with either temporarily or permanently I can take care of that as long as I have it and then when I no longer have it whatever all comes after that i can take care of that as well so i'm no longer attached to you know this is mine i can't part and i can be happy without it but i can see that life is constantly changing and things come into my life and as long as things are in my life currently i can do my best in taking care of and loving whatever is going on here and now and if it changes that's fine too because the lord will provide hi everyone i'm mike i'm an alcoholic i think where we left off last week was uh right at the third step prayer we uh we hopefully as a group made the decision on the bottom of page 62 i read over the promises on the top of page 63 so we're at this point where we've decided that we're the actor and we're going to let God be the director that we're going to be agents for God because he is the principal and that God is the father or as I like to say lately he isthe parenting one or God albeit it or whatever it is is the parenting one which means that this power is going to nourish me and protect me and do all those things that our best concept of parents would do. And also we find out on the top of 63 that this power, this God is going be our new employer and we get to be the employee. we get to go to work at this point having said that I don't think that there's any coincidence that we're now to be the employee and God's the employer and we need to get busy and go to work and I don' t think there's any coincidence that all the rest of the steps require action in the first two steps we've really, we've done unless you've done the first and second step exercise, we've really done very little work. We've came to a lot of conclusions. Even with the third step we didn't really take any action we just made a decision. So I think what we said last week we'd like to do since we gave out that third step exercise at this time Bill and myself would like to read what we wrote, our current third step prayer exercise. And then I guess at that point if anyone else feels moved to do so you don't have to but if you feel moved to do so, you may. We'll take the third step as a group and then after all that procrastination we'll get into four step inventory I guess I'll read mine first and then Bill can read his and keep in mind when the first time I did this exercise it wasn't like this but lately I've been having a shift so to speak in consciousness and in regards to what my concept of a higher power is or whatever, however you want to say that. So you may not be able to identify with this and that's okay. Even having done this third step prayer exercise a few times and I was thinking about it today and I said, you know what, it's just so much easier to just read the prayer out of the book although this is a good exercise and we have seen many people have huge spiritual experiences at this point I still really love the third step prayer out of the big book and again, I really believe that this book was divinely inspired and can you imagine a drunk like Bill Wilson putting together a prayer like this and then not even to mention the seventh step prayer so that's pretty incredible but here's my current third step prior dated May 1st, 2002 To my highest power, may I be willing to drop any resistance to doing a fearless and thorough inventory of my current life situation so I may admit my shortcomings to others and be willing that they are removed so I May clean up any wreckage of the past or present so I My live from a place outside of My mind according to Your will and help others. May I do the will of good always and make amends promptly when I don't. So be it. Lord, may it be of service. I give you my thinking, my actions, my motivation, even my heart and soul. Please do with me as you wish. Help me to help your children to more and more know you and your will in their lives. Thank you for that spark within us that is of you and help me to always be motivated by your promptings. May I be of service. Amen. Okay. How do we want to say the third step prayer? How do we want to do this? Circle right where we are on our knees sitting however you guys are comfortable doing that. You want to form a circle? God, I offer myself to thee to build with me and to do with me as thou wilt. Relieve me of the bondage of self that I may better do thy will. Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of thy love, thy love in thy way of life. May I do thy will always. Thank you, everyone. I don't know if everyone necessarily agrees with this, but I like to always mention the fact that there is no amen behind the third step prayer. I don'T know if that's coincidence or not, but there is an amen after the seventh step prayer, and I kind of like that because I heard someone say one time, and it made a lot of sense to me that if there is no amen at the end of the third step prayer, but there is one at the beginning of the second step, at the other end of a seven-step prayer, is it possible that all the actions that I'm going to be doing in between the third-step and the seventh-step is nothing more than just part of one big prayer? And I don't know if that's what the big book authors had intended or not, but I kind of like that. that gives me a nice, safe and protected feeling to know that this work that I'm doing and for that matter any actions that I take in my daily life is all part of one big prayer and I can live my life that way. So it says after we say the prayer we thought well before taking the step making sure we were ready that we could at last abandon ourselves utterly to Him. Do you think they meant utterly there? We found it very desirable to take this spiritual step with an understanding person, such as our wife, best friend, or spiritual advisor. And keep in mind this was written in... This book was published in 1939 where they didn't really have too many members of Alcoholics Anonymous and so at that time you're just going to take the third step with anybody that you possibly could and that's why it says, you know, with our wife or our best friend but I think the key points here is that we take this third step and we say the prayer with an understanding person I think nowadays we're really blessed that we have so many people in Alcoholics Anonymous and nowadays as we have so many people doing the steps as they are written in the big book I don't think it's that difficult to find a sponsor, so to speak that we can say this prayer with. But if we are somewhere on a Greenland ice cap or a merchant marine or something like that it says it is better to meet God alone than with one who might misunderstand like the captain of a boat who's drinking out of a vodka bottle or something. You might want to stay away from that guy. The wording was, of course, quite optional so long as we expressed the idea of voicing it without reservation and that's where we got the idea for writing our own third step prayer. You notice it says voicing It, so we need to say it out loud. This was only a beginning, though if honestly and humbly made an effect sometimes a very great one was felt at once and we have seen those type of experiences personally the first time and I would dare say each subsequent time that I've taken a third step I never really I've experienced these promises but I've never experienced the great big boom that I'm that I have seen others experience but I have had those booms in the middle of the subsequent steps I'm going to let Bill read the next paragraph because I know he loves it so much for me this is sort of the fourth point about step three and for me this is perhaps the most important one and it's perhaps the one that's the most missed in our fellowship it says next we launch out on the course of vigorous which means strenuous action the first step of which is a personal house cleaning which many of us never attempted and of course our efforts in the past to try to control our alcoholism and try to have a happy, useful, contented life probably fell short because of this we never did an inventory and then proceeded forward by asking for higher power to help us I like asking this question Is there anyone here in this room tonight that before you came to Alcoholics Anonymous and tried to work a spiritual program of action, did you attempt a personal house cleaning any time throughout your life? Is there any one sitting here tonight that was sitting in the bar and saying, hmm, I think taking an inventory of my life might be a good idea right now. So I think the book is correct when it says, the first step is a personal house cleaning which many of us had never attempted and then this next line is the one that I think is so important though our decision, which was a third step decision was a vital and crucial step it could have little permanent effect unless at once or immediately followed by a strenuous effort or intensely active effort to face and be rid of the things in ourselves which have been blocking us our liquor was but a symptom so we had to get down to causes and conditions Now, again, it's saying that though our decision, which is a third-step decision, is a vital and crucial step, it is very important. It will have little permanent effect unless we at once follow it up with some intensely active effort to face, and where we face these things is in 4, 5, and 6, and be rid of, and when we get rid of these things in 7, 8, and 9, the things in ourselves which have been blocking us. Our liquor was but a symptom, so we had to get down in causes and conditions. So in studying that paragraph, what we're being blocked from is the ability to turn our will and our life over to God in the first place. The third step is just a decision to do it. How we actually do it is by then doing four through nine. And then how we keep it turned over to a higher power going forward indefinitely is with 10, 11, and 12. If resentment is telling me what to do or fear is telling you what to Do or guilt and remorse over things I had done is telling Me what to DO and telling Me how to act and telling me how to think, then my higher power cannot be. So I need to find out what blocks me from actually surrendering to this higher power and trying to love in each moment to every single person at all times. I need the power of God to do that. I need it to find what blocks you from doing that. And coincidentally, the fourth step gets into resentment, it gets into fears, and it gets to harms and sex conduct. So again, this third step is not that we turn our own lives over to God. The third step means that we make a decision to turn our life over to god And how we actually do so is by doing four through nine. At this point, let's just quickly go through the packet for this week. The first four pages, again, compiled by someone who has entirely too much free time on their hands. It's entitled Some Thoughts on Step Four. The fifth page is a diagram of primary instincts of life, which creates self, which I'm sure Bill will go over. Page six, definitions of words used in step four. Page seven is the now famous resentment inventory prompt sheet. Eight and nine, resentment inventory. 9 is just a duplicate of 8 we have high hopes of this group we're hoping that you'll write on page 8 tonight and you can add page 9 for photocopies in the future 10, fermentory prompt sheet 11 and 12, fermentary 13 we added to it this morning if you're into it we bring a whole new dimension to AA, anal alcoholics 13 and 14 sex and harms inventory 15 which is probably one of the most underutilized or hardly ever talked about tools within inventory, and it's the future sex and relationship ideal. And the last page, double-sided, which is not numbered, is the soon-to-be well-renowned four-step tips. So if you have a lot of free time on your hands, feel free to peruse. I think the biggest compliment that Bill and I ever got after one of our big book weekends was, I don't know if Bill asked a gentleman or somebody had asked him, how'd you like it? And all the gentleman had to reply was entirely too much paper. So, you know, that's a pretty, I don'T know if it's a compliment or not, but it's something. so we had to get down the causes and conditions therefore we started upon a personal inventory this was step four I like how that's in italicized writing because he just got done saying that we need to start upon a personal imagery and this was step four possibly meaning if I'm going to use my good alcoholic interpretation that me taking other people's inventory is not step four. A personal inventory of the things within myself which are blocking me is step four and it says a business which takes no regular inventory usually goes broke and of course we see all throughout this book that Bill W. loves to use parables, He loves to draw analogies and tells us little stories that we may be familiar with in order to smash home a point. And in this case, he's going to explain to us what taking a commercial inventory is and he kind of does a little comparison between a commercial inventory or a business inventory in comparison or contrast to a personal inventory. And he says, taking a commercial inventory is a fact-finding and fact-facing process. And I'd also like to say that taking a personal inventory is a act-fining and fact facing process. Again, we're going to find the facts in step four. We're also going to begin to face them in step five. But we're really going to be faced with them in Step 5. the inventory process is an effort to discover truth about the stock and trade. Again, that's the commercial inventory. And also for the personal inventory, it's an effort of discovery. It's an attempt to discover the truth about my own stock and trades, about the stuff that's going on within me, the spiritual malady, let's say. One object is to disclose damage or unsaleable goods To get rid of them promptly and without regret If the owner of the business is to be successful He cannot fool himself about values And if we're going to be Successful in this business Of staying sober, happy, joyous and free We also cannot fool ourselves about values so he says we're going to do the same thing with our lives we took stock honestly honestly first we searched out the flaws in our makeup which caused our failure notice it doesn't say that we're gonna search out the assets which cause our success he says we searched out our flaws in our makeup which caused our failure. Being convinced that self manifested in various ways was what had defeated us, we considered its or self's, our self's common manifestations or if you will the common manifestations of self-will and the common demonstrations of self will that we're going to inventory are resentments, fears and harms to others with emphasis on our sexual conduct, or in many of our cases, our sexual misconduct. So he says the number one offender of these common manifestations of self-will is resentment. It, resentment, destroys more alcoholics than anything else. and I think that's a really awesome statement because he says resentment is going to kill more alcoholics than anything else you think it's possible he means even more than alcohol right because it's my spiritual condition or if you will my spiritual uncondition that ultimately is going to drive me back to the bottle spiritual unconditionally write that down, that's probably a new one I'm probably at this rate I'm going to have to go back to if it's not in the big book, it's not. It's a little bit more proper than it says on your sheet. I'm not a grammatical wizard. So where was I before? I was... In other words, if I'm resentful, I'm a dead duck. Also, I think it's interesting because it says that it's the number one offender that destroys more alcoholics than anything else. At first I took offense to that, but in looking at it a little bit more closely, if it destroys more alcoholic than anything else, that means it destroys alcoholics and alcohol. And if you think about it, alcohol will only destroy an alcoholic if they're still drinking. But resentment can destroy an alcoholic, whether they're drinking or not. So in seeing it that way, stealing it from somebody else who said that a couple years ago and sounding very good now in saying it, it's interesting in seeing just how important this resentment deal is. It probably is something that kills more alcoholics than even alcohol. And that's a pretty bold statement, and that puts a real heavy seriousness on this resentment do. From resentment stem all forms of spiritual dis-ease And I like to say that word like that And possibly put a hyphen in between the dis and the ease Because when I'm resentful When I'm experiencing this part of our spiritual malady I am in dis-elease And again, I think it would be really interesting that, and we'll be able to see this by writing resentment inventory, but if you kind of do a tree diagram and you put resentment at the top and I get this analogy from the word stem, if you put the word resentment atthe top and you draw lines coming down which perhaps are the branches, when you're done with your inventory, when your done with you four column resentment inventory you're going to be able to see all these things that stem from resentment and cause our spiritual decease. You know, they give you a sneak peek. They're going to look like selfishness, dishonesty, self-seeking and fear. And it's interesting because then in the fear inventory it talks about that fear is an evil and corroding threat. The fabric of our existence was shot through with it. So it also paints a pretty hideous picture of fear. And it is interesting in seeing thread kind of carries along and a stem kind of carries along. So not only are these things bad, but these things lead to other types of spiritual disease. So it's sort of a tip of the iceberg kind of thing where with resentment and fear that might be some of the obvious manifestation of what's going on but fear drove me to do lots of things like steal because I didn't make enough money and hurt people because I wasn't getting what I wanted and resentment got me to do things to people because I was pissed and I needed to get back at them. So it was just sort of the tip of the iceberg which led to many other things which we'll end up seeing in our inventories. For we have been not only mentally and physically ill, we have also been mentally ill We have been spiritually sick. When the spiritual malady is overcome, we straighten out mentally and physically. And I think over the past several weeks We've been referring to that statement quite often. And I guess this time is appropriate to smash home one of the, in addition to the four-step tips, I also at one time compiled four-stepped myths and stuff about the four steps that you don't read in the big book. Unfortunately, it's not kind enough to publish, so I kind of leave that on my computer. Maybe someday I'll edit. But one of the things that it says on there is that our book says that once a spiritual malady is overcome, we straighten out mentally and physically. And for a long time in the fellowship, I heard people say, well, wait to get well before you do your four-step. wait till you feel a little bit better before you do your fourth step and i kept waiting and waiting and waiting and i wasn't feeling any better until i had begun to do my fourth step so what i like to say is don't wait till your fear feel better to do your four-step begin your four steps so you begin so you can begin to feel better and you can go ahead with the rest of the process also in your packet on page five there it talks about the primary instincts of life which creates self. The 12 and 12 goes into more depth about this but the 12 and12 talks about that all humans have three primary instincts the social instinct, the security instinct and the sex instinct they're all God given, they're All Good all humans Have It but when these instincts are used selfishly or incorrectly they bring about problems for us and toward the bottom of that sheet it talks about the social instict brings about, when it's used incorrectly or selfishly it brings about resentment when the security instinct is used selfishly or incorrectly it brings out fear and when the sex instinct is using correctly it brings harm to others this inventory out of the big book which coincidentally deals with resentments, fears and harms isn't some surface random theory it focuses and directs upon the root of our problem which is our basic instincts being used incorrectly and that's where the resentment and the fear and the harms inventory comes from and that just a little sheet to kind of help with that and it kind of touches upon a couple other things but that's why now with getting into resentment it's going to get into the first inventory and I just wanted to touch upon the primary instincts because you know it's interesting in dealing with this inventory starting with the resentment one getting some information some of which I always knew, some of Which was very new to me and a very different perspective on the situation. It was strange how it transformed my life in seeing not only was my perspective on a situation that I had resentment toward perhaps incorrect, but in most cases I played a part in bringing about what had happened. And because I had never taken an inventory like this and because I'm not going to look at me, I am not the problem, I don't do anything wrong so it must be you and in looking at the fourth step and finally seeing me and looking at my part in this and trying to step back from the situation and from the person and trying to disregard them entirely and see what's the truth here and what's my part there was an amazing transformation and an amazing amount of freedom from hundreds of resentments that I had toward lots of people and places and things So, you know, just to kind of throw that out with the primary instincts and just to put a little plug that, you know, this four-step out of the big book is not some random kind of surface thing. This gets to the root of our troubles and has added a whole lot of freedom and a whole lot of peace to a whole Lotta people who have practiced and who have done a four-stepped this way. I just want to take a second to, you don't to turn to it and you pack it but referring to the four step tips um tip number two says during early sobriety i heard much negativity spoken about the fourth step that scared me no wonder why people are scared to do this vital step shouldn't we try to encourage new people to do this step which will put them on the path to freedom rather than discourage them from doing it by making negative comments and instilling fear in them just a thought and i have a little happy face next to it. The next line in the book says, In dealing with resentments, we set them on paper. Which brings me to tip number three. Does it correspond with the book as it goes along? I don't know. It was just like a... I'll study it. It was a big sickness when I wrote this. It just came out on the paper. But I bet you I could do a whole hour of talk on this. Emphasize the importance of writing the four-step inventory. There are a total of 17 references in the text portion of the big book that suggests our four steps should be written. The word written is used two times, pages 70 and 75. The word paper is mentioned three times, pages 64, 68, and 69. Some form of the word list is given 10 times. Again, anal alcoholics. Pages 13, 64, 65, 66, 67, twice, and also twice on page 70 and twice on 76. Page 67 says we placed our faults before us in black and white. And finally, page 65 gives us an example of a written inventory. Gee, I guess it's pretty important that we instruct our protégés to write their inventory. Mike had said that to me a couple months ago and the first time it went through my mind was he was up all night drinking way too much coffee a part of me wants to say that that was divinely and godly inspired but I don't even think I'd blame that one on God but I think you can clearly see now that in dealing with the resentments, we need to set them on paper. That kind of dispels the myth about, well, I can just do my inventory in my head and I can do my fifth step later on or I can call up my sponsor and do a fourth and a fifth over the phone or that I can go to the store and do... What was that one you were talking about? A friend of mine, or I was at a meeting one time I mean, this guy, there was a weekend kind of retreat and he had brought a four-step with him when he was going to do his fifth step there. But the person who was leading the retreat, this priest, he said that he was too busy that weekend, the priest was too busied that weekend to hear fifth steps or anything like that. He could talk to people for a half hour or 15 minutes, but he couldn't do some full-blown all-day thing because he had plenty of other stuff he needed to do not only prepare for his talks, But also, you know, you just didn't have time to do something like that. And there was a gentleman that was there and he was the one that brought his first step and was going to do his fifth step. And he thought the guy said that you shouldn't do fifth steps here. But what the priest was saying was that, you Know, that priest personally couldn't hear a fifth step in case anybody had plans like that So he had thrown that out at one of the breakout meetings that we had And, You know, we had said, No, the priest Was talking about himself, You Know, this would be a perfect place to do your fifth step and then as the meeting went along slowly but surely each person that went around started discouraging this guy from doing a fourth step or a fifth step and then one guy shares he goes, listen my sponsor told me, which is always an interesting lead in my sponsor taught me that the way you do a fourth and fifth step is that over the next couple years at meetings, you share bits and pieces about things that happened to you in the past and after a few years you'll have shared everything and you've now done your fourth and sixth step And you don't have to write it down. You don't share it with this one. And, you know, I'm just like sitting there and I'm pulling the hair out of my head. This guy is totally willing and totally wanting to do his fifth step. And the meeting is now dedicated to discouraging this guy, putting him down, and telling him that he's even doing it wrong. I mean, it was unbelievable to me. But, you Know, it's interesting because a few of us after the meeting kind of cornered the guy and said, Listen, not only should you do your fifth step here, but you should go do it now before anybody else talks to you. But, you know, it was just, you know, that was why I had added on the first page of our packet where it says the very first line. You know, if you choose to do your first step in your head and don't write it down, that's fine, but please don't call it AA because you can see, like Mike read, it says throughout that we're supposed to be writing this. And, you now, something I think that's important for me is in writing it and not just having it sit in my head. You know? These things were in my mind my whole life. maybe not all of them, maybe they all occurred more recently but all this stuff had been in my head but I never saw all of it in its full blown picture and I never realized all the people that I was pissed at and all the situations and all the things that happened and I can only really think of one or two things at any one time in my head but after I wrote it down and I saw this hideous picture of all the, just about everybody I'd ever met, I was upset with them for some reason or they had crossed me or they didn't live up to my expectation or I had an unrealistic expectation or they didn't act the way i wanted him to or it was just pathetic in its scope and in its you know picture that i really didn't see it until i got it all down and then i just saw it for what it was and when it was juste in my head it was it just seemed so small and insignificant bill said when he was at that meeting he uh he started pulling the hair out of his head i guess I guess I must have just been to more meetings like that, as you can tell. Well, anyway, is there anyone in this room that, and this isn't to put you in the spotlight or anything, this is just to help guise us because we really only have 15 minutes left for tonight as far as our discussion is concerned. Is there anyone here that has not written inventory, four-step inventory as described in the big book at least once? Okay, so everyone is... Okay, good, good. All right, then we can go home now. No, okay. So in dealing with resentments, we set them on paper. And here's the first instruction for the first column of inventory. And if you would kind of look at the sheets that Bill has provided on page eight in the packet. this first instruction is going to coincide with the first column instruction one column one we listed people institutions or principle principles with whom we were angry and a good example of people institutions and principles if you're if you're having a hard time of um coming up with names or if you feel as though that you've run out of names i don't know about you guys but this resentment inventory prompt sheet was pretty helpful to me in the beginning or uh even I'm pretty much aware of now when I have a resentment and who I'm resentful towards. So this prompt sheet is pretty helpful and sometimes when I think I'm done with my first column what I'll do is I'll refer to this and I'll just look down just to make sure that the examples on the sheet maybe they'll spark something else that may be deep-seated or buried and that my ego wants to neatly forget about. So on the sheet here it says, I listed people, institutions, and principles with whom I am angry, I am resentful at. This includes grudges, regrets, and those we're annoyed with, agitated by or that let us down at this point I think it would be a good idea to just give a brief definition of the word resentment it's on your inventory it's one of your step four definitions the word resent or the word recent comes from the latin word centuri which means to feel And when you put re in front of any word, that means again. So the word resent means to feel again. Now, that's not necessarily how the average person looks at the word resentment. Resentment is sort of viewed more as people that we're angry with. But I think there are subtler versions of the word resenment in that I'm not necessarily angry with certain people, but they basically annoy me. on an ongoing basis. And not only can we be free of anger or grudges or hatred that we have toward people, but we also can be free of minor agitation that people give toward us. So that's why if the word resent means to feel again, it could be negative feelings a lot less full-blown as anger or hate. We can also be free of little annoyances and little grudges that we might have toward people that cross our path regularly or even ones that don't cross our paths regularly I always hesitate to use the expression push your buttons because I don't necessarily see buttons as a valid complaint anymore because my comments of people that say that certain people push their buttons very often they're talking about family members And my comment to them is always that, you know, are they pushing your buttons or are you giving them buttons to push? That if a certain area isn't sensitive to me, those people can try to push my buttons all they want and I'm not going to react to it and I'M NOT GOING TO BE TWEAKED EMOTIONALLY BY THINGS THAT THEY DO. So again, I can't depend on them not doing certain things. All I can do is look at myself, try to get rid of those areas that are sensitive to me and i can either move the button or had no longer have the button and they'd no longer annoy me so you know i can't depend on them changing but i could change within myself also something that i found with resentment and with pushing buttons and with being annoyed and lately i've been doing a lot of uh i've been coming across a lot information about people around us being nearers for the stuff that's going on within us both positive and negative that's something that i just recently found was that it includes positive as well uh i always recently i kind of looked more at the negative stuff because that's the kind of stuff that we struggle with and try to bring relief to but um most often what i've found for myself and what i have seen in other people and asking them if this is true in those first two columns especially in the second column the things that usually people annoy us are the stuff that we struggle with ourselves and it's almost like today the people that annoy me I can almost thank them for pointing out something within me that if I could work on that then all of a sudden those people don't annoy me anymore you know what I mean like my mother has a controlling aspect to her well guess what she's showing within me the fact that sometimes I'm controlling you know that's the part that annoys me about her yet the reason why I see it in her is because that's something that I struggle with and if I can keep that in mind within just a few moments when I feel myself getting annoyed by something my mother's doing if I could step back and say wait a minute here this has nothing to do with her in the first place what part within me is this touching see what that is and within moments I can be free of that being annoyed toward her so I found some real use in seeing people as mirrors and in my marriage just ending I saw a whole bunch of stuff in there that I didn't see until I moved back to New Jersey that there was a lot of stuff that was going on in my wife and her family's house that I was living in that had nothing to do with them at all and that had a whole lot to do avec me. And now I'm seeing it, and I wish I saw it back then because that might have made a difference between what had happened between the two of us. So I just wanted to throw that out because especially with resentment, I've seen so often that it almost doesn't have anything to do WITH them most of the time they touch upon something within us and we see in them it's almost like if you can spot it, you got it you know what I mean it's kind of interesting or another way of saying that is if I can see it, I can be it if Ican see something within you that annoys me then I canbe that same thing just an explanation on the first column quite simply what i do with the first column in resentment inventory is i get quiet i say a prayer i always have that chain of the first three steps behind me and uh for me quite often it's a good idea just to do a brief review uh a prayerful review of the First Three Steps say the third step prayer uh say some type of pre-inventory prayer usually it's god please help me see the truth. Please help me to write down all the things which are currently blocking me. And dear God, please give me a list of names that need to be on this resentment inventory list. And I get quiet. I put the pen in the paper and I just let it flow and I trust what comes. Quite often a question will be asked of me, well how about if a name comes to me or comes to my mind but I'm not really certain that I have a resentment towards that person. And what I'll say to them is that I think it's a pretty good idea that you write down their name anyway and look at it like this how long is it going to take you to write four columns on one person you know, anywhere from three to five minutes, I think. And that's probably pretty generous. So even if you find out that you don't have a resentment towards this person, which means you're not going to be writing columns two, three, or four, but even ifyou just do some, quote, unnecessary writing, it's going tobe a lot better to have that on paper and just to be sure that you get it out there rather than keeping it within you. And it's a real resentment anyway, and it's something that's going to fester inside and drag your butt out and cause you to drink. So that's kind of a long, windy explanation for that question. But that really helps me. We write inventory from top to bottom. Um, some people, um, I've come across maybe one out of a lot of people, maybe one-out-of-a-hundred people that say that they're better able to write inventory from left to right. I've always found it, and the people who have taught me in AA have always instructed me to write an inventory from top to bottom, which means I do all the first column first. I list all the names of people, institutions and principles And then I go to the second column instruction And I write down all those things And I go through the third column instruction And I do all the third columns And I say the necessary prayers between the third and the fourth column And then i do all of the fourth columns And i think a good rationale for that is that the directions as they're given in the big book, there's a period after each sentence. And that's a good clue for me that when there's an end of thought, when there is a period, it means end of fought and usually stop. And if it's a direction, I can stop and do what it says contrary to what I've done my entire life. Whenever I read any spiritual books or self-help books and it would come to a direction I would always say oh that's probably a good thing to do in the future but I'm just going to read on I think what the book wants us to do at this point is to literally list people, institutions or principals with whom we're angry period, stop, end of sentence and we can do that first column a common question that's asked of me is well how do I know when the first column is done And the way I know when the first column is done is When I think I'm done with all the names of people, institutions and principles I stop, I pause, I say a prayer Dear God, please reveal to me any more names that may need to go on this list If anything else comes, I write it down If nothing else comes I trust that And it's time to move on with the next direction I often find it I always carry a notebook around with me anyway but for people that don't I find it helpful that maybe you want to carry around a little piece of paper or one of them little mini pads especially if it's your first or second time in inventory and you've got a lot of stuff to get rid of because these names I don't know about you guys but for me these names started popping up left and right like when I would go outside and the garbage man left my garbage cans halfway across the street or just things that come up like on a daily basis when I see Patty's writing already. Or when people at work, you know, the script violators, they aren't doing things like I think they should be doing. And, you know I'm not necessarily going to drag my inventory around the work so I can just write it on a little piece of paper and then when I go home and write that that night I can add it to my list and just because we may be done with the first column and if we're in the second, third or fourth column and another name pops into our mind we can always go back and add that to the bottom of the list so the second direction is in second column we asked ourselves why we were angry And again, while we're reading the directions and looking at our sheets, we can also follow along on page 65 because Bill gives us an example of the first three columns. So the first column he titles I'm resentful at. And the second column, just like on our sheets is called the cause. Again, we asked ourselves why we were angry. quite often when I'm angry at the person in column 1 I'll have more than one resentment so if you're looking at these sheets and by the way, let me just take this opportunity to say that if you are more comfortable writing inventory in a spiral notebook or just some other type of paper go for that You know, these sheets, God knows there are enough inventory sheets out there in the universe. We probably don't need any more. But these are usually helpful for people who have either never written inventory before or who have done it once or twice. And today I'm just comfortable with writing my inventory in a spiral notebook similar to this one, but that's because I know how to write inventory. People that, when I was brand new and I looked at these directions in the big book, even with Bill's example on 65, it just didn't really make a heck of a lot of sense to me. But when someone showed me a sheet like this and broke it up in columns and explained each one, it really, man, it did me such a great favor. It really helped me out a lot, and I was able to do my inventory on something like this. And again, we have two sheets there, so if you want to take notes on one and the other one is blank to make copies of. What I usually suggest that people do if they want to use these sheets is make ten copies of the resentment inventory, five copies of inferior inventory, and ten copies in the harm inventory. Since I'm a very sick alcoholic, I had a lot of resentments and I caused a lot. A lot of harm. we're not going to get into the fear are we going to finish the first two columns maybe three there's a prayer that I use that I sometimes pass along to people if you want to consider using this, that's great if you don't want to use it it's not in the big book it's just something that my first sponsor had passed along to me and I really loved it and I use it when I do inventory now if somebody wants to write this down this is the prayer that i pass along to people that I suggest that they say while they're doing inventory and when they begin doing inventory. Like Mike said, it's usually good to start with a third step prayer. You know, maybe pray and meditate a little bit and ask God to help you with this and start writing. This is the prayer that I use when I pass along to people. God, please help me with this. Comma. God, please help me with this, comma. show me what I need to know, period. Show me what I need you to do, period, period. Please protect me, comma. Please protect me, gamma. Your will, not mine, be done. Period. your will and not mine be done that's it simple, short, sweet beautiful capture of an inventory prayer definitely not in the big book but I like passing that along to people because it's just a neat little prayer and what I suggest that people do is to start as soon as they sit down to write for the first time that day or whatever whenever they sit down and do a session of writing I ask them to say that prayer and each time they come to another blank page I ask then to write the prayer across the top because it rejuvenates and continues along as you do the prayer so that's just something to pass along it's something that I do with people second column if I try to fit multiple resentments in each one of these blocks it's going to be chaos and this whole thing isn't going to make sense. So quite often what I like to do with the names that are really stuck in my head and the biggies like mom or dad or wifey-poo or husband or whatever, I usually just like to dedicate an entire sheet just to that one person. And if they really piss you off, that's why we've got double-sided sheets. and if you think of another one and maybe you've already done the first two columns or the first three columns, just put a line across the middle of that box and now you have two boxes there under that person's name or you can write on the back or you could put it on the side it's not rigid in how you can work this use it to fit your own needs but especially with people that are very close to us, we usually have multiple resentments toward them and you need to include all of that you shouldn't put it's interesting because i never noticed this until recently and again i got this from a tape it's not original to me on page 65 bill gives two examples of how to do the inventory the first mr brown inventory the second column has a bunch of different um reasons with a bunch of difference effects mine but then from there on the other three each he gives he kind of groups them where he gives a bunch of reasons but only a couple things that it affects mine so he sort of gives two ways of doing it there and for me i sort of like the first one because it draws out each individual one and then we can look at it as we go across so just interesting how he kind of i don't know if he just got lazy or if uh he wanted to give more than one example because you know i think that's the beauty of this book is that different people have different perspectives toward this. These sheets are ones that we use and that we're comfortable with. I've seen many different kinds of sheets. As a matter of fact, I collect four steps so if anybody has ones that perhaps I don't have. My favorite one is one from Minnesota. It's 300 and something questions that have to be answered. One of the questions is what was your parents' sex life like? Now why I would be aware of that I have no idea and why would it be on an inventory I have not idea and that's unimportant. Maybe it's some psychological way of approaching it or whatever, it doesn't really matter but that one for me was probably the most extreme one I've ever seen but it's interesting because it's just different people's perspective toward what it's saying and I don't know that some are better than others these are the ones that we're comfortable with the one that I'm not that I think is less effective than other ones I saw on the internet one time And since page 65 has three columns, their first step was three columns and nothing more. Now, I know who I'm resentful at. I know why I'm resentment at them, and I know how it affected me. So in writing an inventory with just those three columns I have learned nothing new. So I was really surprised. A very new person pointed that inventory out to me on the Internet, and I was really rather surprised because we were at a speaking commitment and we were talking about the four-column inventory and this person interrupted us and said, what are you talking about? It's only three columns. And then I went and got a big book and I showed him where the fourth column is. And the fourth colon for me is the saving grace of the resentment inventory. I mean it's finally changing the perspective and seeing what's our part in this. So it's the whole transition of what's going to be effective in doing this kind of an inventory. So I would like to suggest that that three-column inventory is less effective than perhaps the one we use or other four-columns inventories. The fourth column is where I finally get to take responsibility for myself. The fourth problem is where i finally quit pointing a finger and pointing a blame at other people. The fourth common is where, I finally begin to look at truth, you know? The fourth column is where I finally get to realize and write out and see the truth in a statement that my troubles are of my own making. So getting back to this second column, what I do with in column one, I number each name. If I have 50 names, 100 names, I remember them. And I like to do the first column on a separate piece of paper and then I transfer the names over to these sheets later on when I used to use these sheets. So I number the name, and for the second column, I letter each resentment. I'll give you an example. If I'm resentful at mom, mom is person or name number one in column one, And then I may have five separate resentments against mom. So it'll look like mom, number one, I asked myself why I was angry, the cause, A, hit me when I was a child. B, put me on the potty backwards. C, D, and E, and on and on like that. So what I'm personally comfortable with is I number each name and I letter each resentment and that whole half hour dissertation was for we ask ourselves why we're angry the third column and we're going to wrap it up with this and then goody goody we'll get another homework assignment in most cases it was found and this is instruction number three column three it wasfound that our self esteem our pocketbooks our ambitions our personal relationships including sex were hurt or threatened so we were sore we were burned up so, so far are they in the same order? no, I think they're in different orders than the sheets the third columns on the sheets are listed in a little bit different order than what's in the book, but we can just follow along. So far they've covered self-esteem, pocketbook, ambitions, personal relationships. Now he's going to kind of repeat himself, but we're going to get two brand new ones. And I like to call these the seven areas of self. So we've already touched on one, two, three, four. he's going to hit two more in this paragraph on our grudge list and so far that's all we have a two column inventory is nothing more than a grudge list or a three column inventory even that on our Grudge List we set opposite each name our injuries was it our self esteem mention that one our security that's new because pocketbook could be referred to as financial security but I like to add a word to this which comes from the 12 in 12 and call it emotional security and I'll give a definition of that in a second or our ambitions mention that one already or our personal relations mention that ones or sex that's a new one sex relations which have been interfered with so the third column are these areas of self which are hurt, threatened, or interfered with. I think that's three really good words that Bill uses there. And you'll notice that we've only covered six so far, but on the sheets we list seven. And you're going to see that the seventh one is pride, and we get that one from the lower right-hand corner on page 65, Bill's fourth example in the third column of his inventory where it says my wife misunderstands and nags, likes Brown wants house put in her name in this one he puts his pride was affected personal sex relations and security so we use pride for the seventh one seven areas of self, self esteem I think Bill uses a different one but the one that works for me, I like to think of self-esteem as what I think of myself. What I think about me. Did the person in column 1, when they did such and such in column 2, did that affect my viewpoint about myself? How I feel about myself. Pocketbook. That's just my money. that could be any property that I own that could money of a numeric value or it could be what's the word I'm looking for possessions these definitions are in step four definitions also and it's usually a good idea to take that sheet out and have it in front of you especially when you get to the third column because again in the third colon we should go top to bottom through all of them before going on to the next one and then the next one and the next one. So if we keep those definitions out, they sort of capture the essence of what we're driving at with the third column. And then we can keep that definition in mind as we go down the column to see if it was effective. Security. And again, emotional security is my general sense of well-being about myself. Ambitions. Ambitions are just my plans for the future. You know, it's what this person did to me. well, did that affect my plans for the future or what we wanted? Pride. And again, I think maybe the definitions on the sheet will differ a little bit. Let me just read that and then I'll give you my own. I don't know what it says. What's that? I don'T knOw wHat iKeS. Pride in excessive or unjustified opinion of oneself, either positive self-love or negative self-hate. an alcoholic's pride is usually based on how we think others view us and that's the definition that I like using it keeps it real simple for me thank you, you're so kind I am not resentful at you I just try to be thorough or anal as the case may be so pride is how I think you view me a little bit different than self-esteem because self-esteem is how I view myself or what I think of myself now I'm going from the outside and And pride is how I think you view me. And that definition of pride, how others view me, isn't necessarily a definition of pride, quote unquote, but most often for an alcoholic who's self-consumed, we get our pride from what people think of us. If you like me, I'm more proudful. Proudful? I'm not proudful, but if you don't like me I don't have that sense of pride. So it's not even necessarily a define of pride but most of the time it's pride. Most often an alcoholic that's self centered and all that, that's perhaps a little bit sick about stuff like that. How we look, where we get a lot of our pride from is what people think of us. One of my teachers, so to speak, who really helped me a lot with inventory a couple years ago and showed me some new outlooks on it, next to the word pride, he likes to put in parentheses the word ego. And I have found at times that that also helps me, although I think this is all about ego. So if that helps you, use it. Personal relationships is just how I interact with other people. And sex relations, I think that's pretty self-explanatory, and we usually have a lot of fun with that one. Why don't you explain that, Mike? Why don'T you? I don't have a Lot to say on sex relations these days. Welcome. Another thing.