THE TWELVE STEPS
and
TRADITIONS
(©1952 by the Grapevine, inc.
and Alcoholics Anonymous
World Services)
We admitted we
were powerless over alcohol--- that our lives had become unmanageable.
۞۞۞۞۞
Who cares to admit
complete defeat? Practically no one, of course. Every natural instinct cries
out against the idea of personal powerlessness. It is truly awful to admit
that, glass in hand, we have warped our minds into such an obsession for
destructive drinking that only an act of Providence
No other kind of
bankruptcy is like this one. Alcohol, now became the rapacious creditor, bleeds
us of all self-sufficiency and all will to resist its demands. Once this stark
fact is accepted, our bankruptcy as going human concerns is complete.
۞۞۞۞۞
After
the complete smashing of ego by alcohol it was easier to admit defeat. Some go
to hospital beds to find this launching pad into the realm of the spirit while
others go through it alone in dark rooms filled with the litter of empty
bottles. However it happens, it doesn’t matter as long as it happens. The
spirituality we speak of isn’t a relaxed one, which finds us sitting in
luxurious comfort wearing a smoking jacket, in an armchair. No, it isn’t likely
the spirituality of philosophers, theologians and academicians either. It is a gritty
affair of desperation and despair. We come to the altar of self-sacrifice, not
because we possess some sort of moral/spiritual superiority or intellectual
acumen, but rather, we surrender all we suppose of ourselves in spiritual and
material terms, completely defeated. If there was another way to do it I would
have done so. If it meant I went to a high mountain to hear the word of God
from a burning bush I might have preferred that to the self-imposed exile from
humanity that was my route. However, since this was my course, I honor and
respect the protection and care of the Heart of Compassion. I find inspiration
and direction in the Twelve Steps and Traditions of AA and I am encouraged by
the unrestrained compassion of, and for, my fellow alcoholics in and out of the rooms of AA: even those who are still in the grip of drug addiction and alcoholism. These are the three gems my sobriety depends on.
geo 4,711
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