Why the Third Step Decision Is Not the Prayer – Joe H.

I think that surrender is a process. And I think if you can't surrender to a conscience of a group, you can'T surrender to God. And I believe if you CAN'T surrender to someone else's way, submit to you can't surrender to God and I believe if somewhere in that process that's taken not on your terms you can surrender to a power greater than yourself but I think for me it was a process I surrendered to a group they didn't change because I came there I surrendered to their group conscience I shut up when they wanted me to shut up I shared when they want me to share I did what they wanted me to do and I didn't do what they didn' want me to do I submitted myself. Then within that group, I submitted my life to God. I submitted it myself to another human. And then I submitted to myself to a process on His terms. And somewhere in that process, I surrendered to a God of my own understanding. Would there really be any reason to decide to turn your life run on your will over if you were still convinced that your life run on Your will was successful? see they know who they're talking to here and they know they're talking to drunks and they don't know they know that drunks aren't going to do anything without a good reason now the first step was a pretty good reason now what's the reason I need to decide to turn my life run on my will over to the care of God because they want me to be convinced that my life run on My Will can hardly be successful and they give me this page and a half that Trevis started to read to show me if I'm not convinced of what happens when I try to run my life on my will. Even when my motives are good, even when trying to be kind, and even in my best moments, I'm a producer of confusion rather than harmony. So I'm an actor who wants to be a director who turns out to be a producer of confusion. Right? Full circle. An actor who wants to be the director who becomes the producer of confusion. Okay, I love the part here where it says, and I really had to get in touch with this as being my truth when I began to look at how my selfishness and self-centeredness had forced me to make decisions that would put me in all kinds of positions to be hurt and to hurt other people, even when I was trying to do the right thing you know because this the root is so deep in me that no matter how much i was trying to do something that i thought was good i would produce these results just like they said and so no longer could i say it was those people because i began to see that in every case for me it was me who had made a decision that had put me in that position so then they tell me that my troubles are of my own making and that was uh that was pretty hard for me to swallow for a long time because i i mean i really wanted to think that it was them but i was i came here thinking i was a pretty nice person i was kind and loving and caring i cared about everybody and um I'm like the guy that's been sober forever and he's on his deathbed, God forbid. And his wife is right there. And he looks up at his wife and he says, Honey, after all these years, I've realized something. And she says, What's that? And he says... Well, you were right there that time I got shot and you stood by me. And you were Right there that time I lost all our money in business and you Stood by me and you Were Right there that time I had a stroke and you stood by me. And you've always been right there and you've also always stood by me. And after all these years I've realized one thing. And she says, what's that? And he says, you're a frigging jinx. Anything to look at me, anything but look at me and my part. Selfishness, self-centeredness, that we think is the root of our trouble. They finally have gotten past the symptoms and they finally have mentioned the word root, the rootofmytrouble. Driven by a hundred forms of fear, you'll find that in your fear inventory, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity, we step on the toes of our fellows and they retaliate. Sometimes they hurt us seemingly without any reason, but we invariably find throughout our inventory that we have made decisions in the past which later placed us in a position to be hurt. I should read that again. That sometime in the past, we have made decisions based on self which later places us in the position to be hurt, so our troubles, we think, are basically of our own making. They, our troubles arise out of ourselves and the alcoholic is an extreme example of self-will run riot though he usually doesn't think so. That's what inventory is all about, right? Above everything, we alcoholics must be rid of this selfishness. Must I? I must or it will kill me. Do I believe selfishness can kill me? God will make that possible. And there often seems no way of entirely getting rid of self without his aid. Many of us have had moral and philosophical convictions galore, but we couldn't live up to them even though we would have liked to. Neither can we reduce our self-centeredness much by wishing or trying on our own power. We had to have God's help. Remember the question, just what do we mean by this? And just what did we do to decide to turn our will and our life over to the care of God? Well, here's exactly what they mean and exactly what to do. This is the how and the why of it. First question, why do I need to decide to turn my life, run on my will over tothecareofgod? Why? because I need to quit playing God. It doesn't work. And how do I play God? Running my life on my will, knowing how you should be, how they should be and how this should happen, how I should feel is running my life on my Will and that's playing God and it doesn't works. They just gave me a page and a half and as much as I hate that page and half up till today, you read it sometime in the singular putting I instead of we and you read that and it's about you running your life on your will and it does not work. And I'll tell you, I was a little pissed when they told me there was a requirement to take the third step because I'd been to a lot of meetings on the third steps and no one ever told me that in our book there is a requirement to take The Third Step. But for some reason I became convinced that my life run on my will cannot be a success. Then I had a good reason. So how? How do I decide to turn my will and my life over to the care of God? It says, next, and this is the third step decision. The third step position is not doing the prayer. The third-step decision is to decide that from hereafter in this drama of life, God is going to be your director. He is the principal. We are His agents. He is The Father. We are as children. Most good ideas are simple. And this concept is the keystone of the new and triumphant arch through which we'll pass to freedom. And here's another one of those stones. At the second step on page 47, we put the cornerstone in. The first stone in this spiritual structure. My willingness to believe that there is a power greater than myself. That was the corner stone. Now there's several more in place. And now all the way at the top of this structure, and I asked somebody one time, a bricklayer, what a keystone would be. He said that would be the stone all the way at the top of the arch that balances the whole thing is this decision, this keystone, this concept, which will... This keystone of a new and triumphant arch through which we'll pass to freedom is my decision that from hereafter I would like God to be the director and I would want I would love to be the actor who wants to quit running the whole show. I would let God be the principal and I was like I would be his agent and I'd like to be the child, and I would like God to be my father. Now, we have some interesting decisions to make here. One, I'd like to share with you what was shared with me when I made the third step decision. I love when I hear people say they take the first three steps every day. I do not make this decision every day, I make this position every day when I make the first decision when I have considered the first two proposals with another alcoholic that I trust, and I reaffirm it on a yearly basis. I do not make the third step decision every day. But I use the third step prayer all the time. The prayer is not the decision. Doing the prayer is NOT making the third-step decision. So what was shared with me at this decision, this third-stepped decision, was for me to try to find a quiet place where I had been at peace before in my life and see it in your head. And I remembered a mountaintop in Colorado where I had been at peace as a kid when I was a hippie on a commune. And I saw that place, and it was by a great crater lake outside of Boulder, Colorado. And I could see the picture in my head. And he said, try to be there for a few minutes. He said, then, try the picture of that place other than in your head. Try to be down in here. Try to be there with God and bring your conception of God into that place. He said, once you're there and you can bring your own conception of God into the world, bring your concept of God into that space with you. Make this decision and ask yourself what these six terms mean to you. God being the director, the principal, and the father. And me being the actor, the agent, and the child. Earlier on in the chapter of the agnostic it says, don't let any prejudice you have against spiritual terms that you'll read further on in this book keep you from honestly asking yourself what they mean to you? So, if we could stop the tape just for a second. Is there a way to do that? So, what would you like to do? What I would like each of you to do in your own way is this. I would like you to try to find a quiet place that you can see where you've been at peace, even if it's just a place that comes to you today. And I would like you to try to see that place up in your head. And sometimes it's hard to get to another place within yourself, but I'd like you to try to see that place somewhere deep down within you and be there for a couple minutes and bring your own conception of God into that place, however you see that at this point. And in that place I would like you each to consider what these terms mean to you. God being the director and me being the actor. What does that really mean to me? What does it really mean to me for God to be the director and me to be the actor? Convinced that my life run on my will is not a success and I would like to quit running the show. And what it really means for God To Be The Principal and for me to Be The Agent who would like To Serve God and for me to be the child and for God to be the father. Those ideas have changed. Those ideas have changed over the years just like when approached with the question God is everything or is nothing has changed. Everything when I was new is not the same as everything today. So I reaffirm this decision on a regular basis with another alcoholic and then we do the prayer and we here today did that prayer together the most eye-opening thing for me from this book about the third step was that the decision wasn't the prayer the prayer was an affirmation of a decision I already made and that there was a requirement to take this step that I really needed to be convinced that my life run on my will could hardly be a success and that I really needed to consider what that third step decision means to me and make that decision. I have decided that from hereafter in my life I would like God to be my director and I would like to be the actor who follows direction and I would like god to be my principal and I would like to be his agent and I would like god to be my father and I would like to be the child. Okay, and now they say that next we launched out on a course of vigorous action. And like Joe was saying, that's when I know that I have made, that I've turned, you know, that I'm going to do it again. That I've done the third step. When I have now launched out on a force of vigourous action, the first step of which is a personal house cleaning. which many of us had never attempted. And it tells us that though our decision, the third step, was a vital and crucial step, it could have little permanent effect unless at once, followed by a strenuous effort to face and be rid of the things in ourselves which had been blocking us because our liquor was but a symptom. So we had to get down to causes and conditions. from here on we're going to find out at each step they're going to tell us why we're doing it and the reason we're writing inventory is to face and be rid of the things in myself which have been blocking me from God, from myself from you to seek the truth about what's been blocking you. I think the greatest promise in that paragraph is that we're gonna do this inventory to face and be rid of. Not face and learn how to deal with. Not face so I have to cope with. Not face so I can work on. Face to be rid of. It's like the four-step story my sponsor told me. You send a little kid down into his room to clean his room and all he thinks he can do is move stuff around and rearrange it. He's going to think that cleaning his room is a terrible job. But if you send that same little kid down into his room to throw everything out that he doesn't want anymore for all new stuff, he will go down into that room and have a joyous experience. That's the way to go into inventory. The other neat thing is that there's no amen at the end of the third step prayer. And I asked my sponsor why? How come there's no amen but there is at the end of the seventh step prayer? And he said he believed and from my experience I believe there's no amen at the end of the third step prayer because everything from doing that prayer to the end of the seventh step is all part of one prayer and in that you're safe and protected whatever you see. and that there is no amen because it's all part of a prayer from the third step prayer to the end of the seventh. And I also think it's great that I'm writing this inventory to face truth and be rid of the things in myself which have been blocking me. You know, I was thinking about my first experience with doing the work as it's outlined in the book And, you know, I had no idea all the stuff that was inside me that was really blocking me from the sunlight of the Spirit. Blocking me not only from God, but from my real self. You know, I came here and was literally introduced to someone that I never knew existed. And it was me. Because I had all these old ideas. I had, you now... I mean, I wrote inventory the first time And I was so just amazed, amazed at what I discovered. And they say here that most of us have never attempted this. I had never attempted to be fearless and thorough, number one, and to really face for the first time all that stuff that they talked about. So they tell me here that we started upon a personal inventory. This was step four. and then they're going to tell me why. It says a business which takes no regular inventory usually goes broke. Taking a commercial inventory is a fact-finding Searching and a fact facing Fearless process. It is an effort to discover the truth about the stock in trade. One object is to disclose damaged 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 I really saw how, you know, the things that I believed had blocked me. They were not, they were no longer working, really. They were just unsellable. I mean, they needed to be thrown away. But I couldn't do that until I was willing to look at it. And they're telling me that we're going to do that in our lives. we're going to take stock honestly and for me that's truthful and moral it's not about looking at all the terrible, terrible things I did I'm going to do this honestly and morally you know and I love the fact that they give me specific instructions as to what I'm gonna do so it says first we searched out the flaws in our makeup which caused our failure and I'm gunna get to see that a lot of it actually in the third column but being convinced itself manifested in various ways with what had defeated us. We consider it as common manifestations. We consider the common manifestations of self. The common manifestations of self are resentment, dishonesty, selfishness, self-seeking, and fear. So what do they start with? Resentment is the number one offender. You know, and I don't know for me, before we go on, when I think of a resentment you know not only is it just my anger but it's anything that i can refill you know when i think of the word resentment if i whatever i can refill it might be envy jealousy it might b you know i don't know what yours is but resentment is the number one offender it destroys more alcoholics than anything else because from its stem all forms of spiritual disease. For we have not only, we have been not only mentally and physically ill, we have been spiritually sick. Now that's real interesting because they've covered the mental and physical illness in the first step, body and mind and then the spirit. So now they're finally saying we've not only been bodily and mentally ill, but we've been spiritually sick. And the idea that resentment is a spiritual sickness was a new idea to me because I thought it was just emotional and mental, because I think about it and I feel it. Now they're saying that resentment as a spiritual problem that blocks me off. But then they tell me that when the spiritual malady is overcome, we straighten out mentally and physically. And that was amazing to me. That doesn't mean when the spiritual malady is overcome, we can drink. No. That means when the spiritual malty is overcome. We straighten out mentally. We don't get the mental obsession. Therefore, we would never take the first drink. And then we don't have a physical craving. So and so they're going to tell me now in dealing with resentments. These are our instructions for the inventory. And I didn't know if you were going to have anybody write or anything. But they tell me that we set them on paper. We listed people, institutions, or principals with whom we were angry. Stop. Draw a line. That's the only instruction for the first column. And what I would like to do is I would to ask a couple of people in the room that have written inventory before while we're going through these instructions, I would you to write out one. First, second, third and fourth column that you'd be willing to share verbally. So the instructions, and if JP is going to take a person and Nick will take an institution and Tony would take a principal. I think the thing, you know, to realize though is that we do have three lists. going to list people. And I was instructed to do exactly as the book tells me, which is I do my people first and then I go to the next thing that they say, which is institutions and for anyone that's like what does that mean? Institutions could be banks. It could be i wrote the institution of marriage police you know public service public service they can also be groups of people right polacks mexicans black people white people honkies right redneck brothers sisters i was in it everybody anyway smart people beautiful people okay so i went home and i started to make my list i don't do it like treva i just let it flow sometimes i'm thinking of a person and an institution comes to mind i don'T worry about saving space i just LET IT FLOW AND I BELIEVE IF THE INVENTORY IS COMING FROM THAT PLACE YOU'RE NOT WORKING ON IT IN YOUR HEAD AND WHEN YOU'RE SITTING MAKING YOUR LIST AND YOU START WORKIN' ON IT in your head you pause you say a prayer and you start to learn to do something You start to learn to go to that place every time you pray, before you pray. And you start to pray from that place. And you starts to experience your list coming to you rather than from your head. And I want to work on inventory in my head. So what I do sometimes is I start with my earliest memory and I come up to today. Sometimes I start to today and I go back to my earliest memories. People are simple. And names will start coming to me that you haven't thought of in years. There's guys in school and teachers. Sometimes it'll just be like the girl on the corner, you know, the girl in the bar in Key West. Sometimes I don't remember the name. Institutions or groups of people or institutions like banks and bill collectors and landlords. Now principles are interesting because principles are the least understood. People usually say it says people, places, and things. It says people, institutions, and principles. Principles are values and beliefs that we were raised with as kids or that we're told we have to live by in AA to stay sober. And the interesting thing for me is every time I find one principle that I've resented sometime in my life, I've also resented the opposite of it sometime in mine. I've presented selfishness, especially yours. Even once in a while on my own, sometimes sober. I've also resented unselfishness, that I have to be unselfished to stay sober. I've resented love, hate, truth, lies, prejudice, bigotry, all the way through. All these ideas. I resent self-righteous people, evangelists, the principle that what goes around comes around. Read what you saw. The truth will set you free. Right. just don't drink no matter what. Let's see some of the interesting ones from my last list. People in the program that do not have to do the work. Non-alcoholics. And the only thing I can tell you about when you know you're done with the list is when you're not. When you know you're down with the rest. I kept asking my sponsor, how will I know when I'm done with my list? He kept saying, you'll know you're done with your list when you know you've done with you list and you have to start getting some experience with that because by the time we're through the eight step you're going to be so tired of these damn lists you're gonna be up to here with it but you have two start to trust you will know when the list is done what I like to do is I like carry a little pocket-sized notebook around me with me for about a week and if I'm at work or in the car and one of these names comes to me I jotted down I take it home I put it on my list don't worry about space Just fill up the pages and let it flow. Some people get 200, some people get 80. Some people gets 500, some people get 1100. The meekest, quietest librarian types have much longer lists than us guys that do all this stuff out here than us extroverts. Right? I mean my friend JP, one of the most quiet, humble, nice kind, considerate guys you could ever meet, has a big long list. How many in the first column? We know another girl who does it all up here. Boy, you get her talking, it's just like she'll call you on the phone and she's in the middle of a conversation when you pick up the phone. It's right to the middle of the conversation she's already in. She had 1,100, okay? She was a year writing. She was six months to do a FISTA. Some of us have 80s. I think my first list was 320. It doesn't matter. It's not better if it's longer, and it's not worse if it're shorter. You go with what comes. And then you'll go with what comes the next time. My last two, I did a little trick on myself. I don't know if it would ever work again because I think it's a trick that I did. But the last two something was pulled on me beyond my control. I made my appointment for my fifth step before I started writing. And I started riding on Monday and I set my fifth-step appointment for Saturday and by Friday night I was done riding. So how many did you have? My last two, I had 80. 80 in the first column. And every inventory since my first one, I get less people and more principals. Now I don't know if that's reflective of my life or what. but it's kind of hard to resent principles when you don't come here with any. But as you start to get some, you don' t like them all the time. Then it says we asked ourselves why we were angry. Stop, draw a line. That's the only instruction for column two. So what do I do? I take the first name off my list. I put it on another piece of paper and I put Y and I usually number the resentment like the person's name, Treba, right and then I let her the resentments a B C D E F G and I let it flow when she did this once you did that when she didn't do this when she did that no no no no on and on I found the best way in the second column is just to be specific just the way it is in the book I mean we don't have to write along you know not too general but not too specific not do yeah for example I don't want to put she's a liar tell what lie you know she lied to me about boom-boom he said he wasn't married her examples are always key my examples are oh is she and what this process does it takes what you think is the truth here's another example of perception. It takes what you think is the truth and turns it into a lie, and it takes what you think is a lie and turns it into the truth. For example, my last inventory, I had one that went like this. First column. She. Her name. We have a different way of saying it in our group, but I just put her name. The first entry in the second column was, she left me. Now if you would have asked me that week or that month, Why are you upset? Why are You angry? Why are Your hurting? I would have said, because she left me. That's the truth. That's true. That is the truth, right? Well, then it says that I'm to examine when she left Me seven areas of self that were hurt, threatened, or interfered with. And it says, in most cases, I will find that self-esteem, pocketbook, ambition, personal relations, sex relations were either hurt or threatened. So we're looking for seven areas, self-esteem, pocketbook, ambition, personal relations, sex relations. Then in the next paragraph it says, and it's kind of a confusing paragraph because they repeat themselves, they say on your grudges list you said opposite each name your injuries. Was it self-esteem? They already gave me. Now a new one, security, ambition they already gave me, personal relations they already gave me, sex relations they already gave me which had been interfered with. Then all the way down at the bottom in the example with his wife he uses in the third column pride. So we look at seven areas of self. Self-esteem, pocketbook, ambition, personal relations, sex relationships, security and pride. So when she left me, which of these seven areas of self were hurt, threatened, or interfered with? So what I like to do is I like on one pile of paper I have my list and I have mine here in front of me. And what I'd like to put on another piece of paper is what I call my guide sheet and I like put these seven areas of self Self-esteem, pride, ambition, personal relations, sex relations, security, and pocketbook. And I like to have those in front of me, and I like to write out a definition for each one. Self-esteem is about how I see or feel about me. Pride is how others see or feel about me. Ambition is about what I want. Security is about what I need. Personal relations are about my friends and family. Sex relations are about people I'm involved with or what I think about how other men should treat me. And pocketbook is my money. So what I like to do is I like to take my list, and I like to take the first name off my list, and I like to put her name in the first column of a piece of paper. And then I like to let the second column flow. A, B, C, however many come. And I like to do that for everybody. I like to do the second column for everybody." Some people there's one resentment. He stole $500. Some people there's three. He punched me in the face. He wasn't there for this. He didn't show up for that. And I like to do the second column for everybody. Some people there's one, some people there's twenty. Some of the major people in your life, mom and dad and sisters and brothers, you're going to have a whole bunch. Then when the second colum is all done, I like to go back, and I liketo go back to the first person, andInumbered her, and then I lettered the second column, andi like to look at just that specific resentment. A, she left me. AndI like to say to myself when so-and-so blank, column one. Did, blank, column two. Did it hurt, threaten, or interfere with? And I like to read it that way. And I'd like to say to myself when she left me, did it hurt threaten or interfere how I saw or felt about me? Yeah. Self-esteem. Did it hurts threaten or interfere with how others saw me? Yeah. Pride. Did it hurt, threaten, or interfere with what I wanted? Absolutely. Ambition. Did it hit, threaten or interfere with what you thought I needed? Sure. Security. Our personal relations and others? Yes. Sex relations? Sure. Pocketbook? Yep. And I found that when she left me, seven areas of self were hurt, threatened, or interfered with. Now, if you've been around for a while, you can then do something with that where you look at why. If not, you just do that in the fifth step and you go on. But it's good to see when and which seven areas of self were threatened or interfered with when so-and-so in the first column did such-and‑such in the second column. So it starts to look like the example on page 65. The example on page 65 is where Bill had Mr. Brown, Mrs. Jones, the employer, and his wife in the first column. And then he took one at a time, and he said, with Mr. brown, there was three resentments. Pays attention to my wife, told my wife about my mistress, and He might get my job at the office. And then for each of those, he does a third column. when Mr. Brown paid attention see you're going to write it this way up and down but you're gonna read it across and you're gunna read one person one resentment one third column and one fourth column at a time so you're writing it down but you are reading it across so the way Bill would have read that would be I resent Mr.Brown for paying attention to my wife and it hurts my sex relations and my self esteem and there is fear involved they ask us to mark fear next to the third column whenever there's fear involved. But that gets a little redundant because what you're going to find is, and I guess it's a good exercise to do, whenever one of those seven areas of self are hurt, threatened, or interfered with, there's always fear. You're either going to not get something you want or lose something you already have. So I mark fear. With Mrs. Jones, he blocked about four resentments into one paragraph and put what was hurt, threatened, or interferred with. I like to do it the way it is with Mr. Brown. One resentment with one-third column for each one. Then he went back to the employer and lumps them all together in one paragraph. Then, with the wife, misunderstands and nags, likes Brown, wants the house put in her name. He put them all altogether. So my favorite way is the way that he did it with Mr. Brown, numbering each of those. Pays attention to my wife, A, lettering them. B, told my wife about my mistress. and C, might get my job at the office. I like to do one second column at a time. So it says, go back through your life. Nothing counts but thoroughness and honesty. So not to make it sound too complicated, I've made a list of people, institutions, or principles. I've taken one name off my list at a times. I've done the second column for everybody. However many resentments come, I've lettered those A, B, C, D however many come and then for each second column A which seven areas of self were hurt B which seven areas of self were hurt the first thing when we're finished we consider it carefully the first thing apparent is that the world and its people were often quite wrong but to conclude that others were wrong was as far as we ever usually went the usual outcome was that people continued to wrong us and we'd stay sore sometimes it was remorse and then we were sore at ourselves but the more we fought and tried to have our own way the worse matters got as in war the victor only seemed to win our moments of triumph were short-lived okay you know i wanted to just go back a little bit and talk about the third column because it was in the third volume where i really got to see for the first time, what I believed. And not only what I believe, but how it had really literally blocked me from living my life. And I think about one specific resentment that I held on to. It was against my first love, Curly. I was resentful because he left me for Jeanette. It affected... It affected you know, it affected all seven areas of my life, but see what I believed and this is what I want to talk about because if you could get someone to help you look at what your belief system is I believe because Curly left me that I was no good and that not only would he leave me but every other man that I'd ever meet was going to leave me so what I did is I was never able to just totally surrender to a relationship because of what I believe now no one else had anything to do with what Curly did but I held on to that And I think it's important that we look at what we believe. And I don't know if Joe forgets, but see, he gave me the instructions the first time to do this. And he did say to write this down, people, institutions, and principles, and I just keep doing it that way. But not only that, when we got to the third column, he suggested that I write, it affects my ambition, which is what I want that I'm not getting. because i believe and then just see what you know see what comes up i believe people should do what i want them to do when i want him to do it that's what i really believe you know i don't believe any man should ever leave me ever because i am so bad but no man should never think about leaving me you know I mean that was the truth uh and i think that that is real important that we look at that because those are the things I had to be willing to face and be rid of. And that was terrifying for me to look at, that I had held on to something that long and as a result of that, and that's a small one, there were larger ones, beliefs, thinking, you know, that I was holding on to that just totally would not allow me to live my life because of the fear, you now, everything that blocked me. I really got to see that my thinking and my beliefs were, you know, totally paralyzing me from living my life, you know? So. When the first three columns are done and I, like I said, I like to do one column at a time because it's a shift in thinking. I don't like to do one name, one second column, one third column because I'm shifting. My thinking is too confusing. I like to do the whole list, the whole second column and then a third column for each resentment. A third column. If I have ten resentments for one person, I have 10 third columns. Not one third column for a whole bunch of resentments toward one person. If there are ten entries, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, I have ten third columns. Every time you see what she did, look at how it affected you. Use those guide words. Did it hurt? Threaten or interfere with my self-esteem? Boom. Put it down. Pride? Boom put it down, etc., etc. So, so far I have three columns. Now as we have done with the whole book, you continue to turn statements into questions and you start looking at is it plain to you that when your life includes deep resentment that it leads only to futility and unhappiness? To the precise extent that you permit these resentments do you squander the hours that might be worthwhile? Is your hope the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience? Is the business of resentfully infinitely grave to that hope? Is it fatal? Do you believe when harboring such feelings you set yourself off from the sunlight of the spirit, the insanity of alcohol returns and you will drink again? And do you believe for you to drink is to die? Do you belief if you are to live you have to be free of anger? Are the grouch and the brainstorm for you? Do you believ they may be the dubious luxury of normal men but for the alcoholic these things are poison. Now it's going to ask me to turn back to what I've written twice. once is an exercise to get a new view of it in prayer and one is a written exercise first we turn back to the list for it holds the key to the future now that sounds pretty important to me I like the idea about a key like opening the door to let me out to some freedom freedom this is about freedom and somewhere in here and I think it usually happens for most of us