Month: July 2022

I’m back for what must be Round Three. I’m going back to the beginning again using some of the material I put together for a project called Discovering the 12 Steps. The material here isn’t that, but the rumination of someone in recovery about the journey from Taking A Leap to today.

A Series of Questions

Some years ago, I assisted in creating a program introducing people to 12-Step recovery. This program targeted treatment facilities to introduce the 12-Step fellowship and the attending Steps to people who had never been exposed or to those whose experience had been less than favorable.

My involvement consisted of answering a series of questions regarding my experience. I was also one of many filmed discussing their experience with the Steps. The series is now available. Since I’m not here to sell anything, I’ll say it has been distributed widely and includes many from the Minnesota recovery community.

Every once in a while, I will come across this questionnaire in my many folders of past work. Whenever I come across it, I think, “I should share what I wrote here.” I have considered that because it contained a lot of experience not captured by the original project. So now, I have a blog.

I will share my answers to these questions over the next few weeks and months. I also encourage others who have read these words to share their answers in this blog. This should be fun. I like to talk about recovery, but it only works when I get every perspective.

The Basics: Question One

The project started with the origins of the 12 steps, the scope of their use, their intent, and the spiritual component.

It then moved into practical information such as finding a 12-step group (open groups, beginner meetings, women only, men only, cultural, gender orientation, etc.). Then adding the importance of relationships you can’t get attempting the 12 steps alone, what happens at 12-step meetings, how to find a good fit in a sponsor, and so on.

For the first segment, the first question was:

Did you think, “I’m afraid of opening up to a group of strangers?”

My first meeting outside treatment was in Tucson, AZ, in January 1987. While in treatment, I committed myself to follow through with anything I said I would do. As I went out the door after 31 days in the desert, my counselor asked, “Are you going to a meeting tonight?” I responded, “Yes.” This wouldn’t be the last time I would wish I hadn’t made that commitment to myself.

Tucson isn’t known for its snowfall, but they had a blizzard that night. First time in 13 years, and I was going to drive to a meeting in a town I didn’t know, at a location I’d never been to before, and decidedly pre-GPS. The positive thing was I was from Chicago, so driving in snow wasn’t an issue.

I barely remember anything about that meeting except it was in a church and was so full of people some of us sat on the floor. It had that late 80’s hootenanny feel to it. I don’t know why I can’t remember anything else. Probably because nothing bad or funny happened, those are usually the things I remember.

The next day I flew home to Chicago. The flight was barely filled. I was sitting near the back of the plane with several empty rows in front of me. Once the plane was at “cruising altitude,” the flight attendant parked in the back asked me if I wanted a beer. I politely declined but asked if she had coffee. She gave me a cup of coffee, and then cooly asked, “Would you like some Bailey’s in that?”

I’m thinking to myself, “I just got out of treatment. What the hell’s wrong with you? Do you work for them somehow? Is this a test?” I didn’t say this out loud. I just said, “No, thank you. The coffee’s fine.”

Looking back on it, it’s a miracle I didn’t say, “Yeah, do that. And you know what? Give me that beer too, and keep ‘em coming until we land in Chicago, and you have to push me out that little window on the side of the plane.”

That night, I went to my second meeting at the venerable Mustard Seed. At that time, the “Seed,” as it was referred to, was located in a converted fire station. To walk into that building was to see what was meant by “We are people who normally would not mix.” (Alcoholics Anonymous, pg.17) It was a veritable panoply of Chicago life in one large room. You could also smoke two packs of cigarettes without lighting up.

I spent many nights in that room, found my sponsor there, and learned the true meaning of fellowship. But not that night. I found a seat in the meeting area. I sat in awe. Two people on either side of me shared they had just “relapsed.” They had both gone to treatment, and then they used. I wasn’t afraid of opening up in front of a group of strangers, but the information they shared scared the shit out of me. Until then, I hadn’t thought returning to use possible.

The next day, back at work, I headed to Madison, WI, where I would conduct recruiting interviews with prospective college seniors. That night, I had the address of a meeting. Unfortunately, as in Tucson, although a little less peculiar, it was snowing hard. I couldn’t see street signs; I could barely see streets. I was pretty lost.

Suddenly, in front of me, I saw “Easy Does It” on a car’s bumper. At a stoplight, I pulled up beside this person, honked my horn, rolled down my window, and said, “Are you a friend of Bill W?” The driver said, “Who?” Come to find out; he’d gotten the car from a friend of his who had gone to prison. I didn’t find that meeting, but I’d made an effort and felt that counted.

I’ve lost count of how many meetings I’ve been to since those first three days out of treatment, but I’ve thankfully and gratefully been sober ever since.

How many of you remember your first meetings? I’d love to hear your stories. Were you afraid to share in front of a group of strangers?

I‘m sure I’ve said it somewhere in here before but it bears repeating. I’m not an authority on recovery or the Steps. Like all those before me, I share my ‘experience, strength, and hope.’ These are essentially conversations with myself. It’s like, “if someone were to ask me, what would I say?”

This particular journey through the Spaces Between the Steps started with me long ago. The conversations about that started three years ago as I was about to present a weekend workshop on this subject.

I chose the above photo because it so wonderfully represents my experience with the 12 Steps. No matter how dark things get, I can always take the steps back to daylight.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this long conversation. I would appreciate any thoughts you might have. 

See you soon.

Step Twelve talks about ‘this is what happened to you.’ If we take these steps in the way that is suggested we take them, we’re going to have a profound alteration in our reaction to life. That’s not what the Step says. It’s what it says in the Appendices under “Spiritual Experience.” He finally realizes that he has undergone a profound alteration in his reaction to life.” The spiritual awakening it talks about in Step Twelve is just that. If this happens to us as it says it will, we won’t address or deal with life the same way we used to. We will not react to life the way we used to. That doesn’t mean we can’t slip back and occasionally act out, utilizing all our character defects.

What it means is that we made a trek and that trek was transformative and transfiguring, walking through the fire instead of walking around the fire. That transfiguration allows us to have authority and experience to share with other alcoholics. So we’re carrying a message: “here’s what I did, and here’s how it changed my life, and if you want to have a change in your life, you’ll need to do this as well.”

Not everybody is interested in that. It doesn’t matter because that’s the message. The message doesn’t change because the recipient rejects it, doesn’t want it, or doesn’t understand it. The message remains the same. If you want to be transformed. If you want to be transfigured. Then do these actions precisely as instructed, and you will have that transfiguration. And when you do, your only obligation is to pass that message on to the next alcoholic or addict. That’s a pretty profound but straightforward directive.

What makes Step Twelve so powerful is that it tells us why we took those Steps. It was to be changed, and it was to be changed in a way that made us more beneficial to God and to others. It’s not necessarily to feel better, although, luckily, in most cases, a person feels better. It doesn’t eliminate problems. Problems are going to exist no matter what. There’s no amount of praying, going to meetings, talking to your sponsor, or reading the Big Book that will eliminate problems from our life. But, how we manage those problems or react to them will be changed and will be different. We’ll begin to see things in a more mature and rational, and logical way. And we will be able to manage our troubles in solution-based ways rather than problem-based.

Most people who have been in the program a while believe strongly in the idea of sponsorship and service. As with all actions, the repetitiveness of a good service commitment changes our brain chemistry. Some are resistant to the idea of following instructions, even simple instructions. They don’t feel like being told what to do. This presentation doesn’t change the fact that they’re hurting. Allowing those new to the program the opportunity to do service is one of the ways to begin changing that attitude. Once we start to do service, usually under the tutelage of a sponsor, we begin to feel better about ourselves. When we feel better about ourselves, we’re less resistant to discussing things we need to change. We become more open to the idea of making changes in ourselves. The idea of sponsorship and service, however simplistic it might seem, is an essential starting place towards change that only talking about the steps doesn’t do.

My first sponsor in Chicago, Mike, believed that an individual understood a step a year. I initially thought he meant work a Step a year. The operative word was “understand.” If we work on some aspects of the Steps in a week, like the old, old timers did, we would still need much time for a complete understanding of the Steps. This means that I probably should have understood each Step entirely by the time I got to 12 years. I’ve been in the program exactly three times 12, and I won’t say with any confidence I fully understand the steps.

By having these conversations with myself and connecting with others, I understand the more profound nature of the Steps and what they mean. I know that taking the Steps is not a “to-do list.” It is a process I repeat, mostly daily, to make myself better suited to do whatever God’s will for me is. God’s will for me doesn’t necessarily mean running into burning buildings or feeding the hungry, or bringing World peace. It just means I’m not that person I used to be. That person was hurtful, angry, sad, and destructive to themselves and others. That person didn’t feel worthy, didn’t feel they fit in, didn’t feel like they contributed anything by their presence. A program of recovery allows that person to negate all of that thinking by taking action. These Steps are the platform by which these actions happen.

The Steps’ profoundness is that they apply to all issues, with some significant exceptions. The exceptions have to do with childhood trauma, especially sexual exploitation and sexual abuse of a child. These things have such deep and robust scarring that only professional help can move a person to a place where forgiveness is allowed and becomes the healing aspect.

I’m sure there are other issues that some would argue AA or NA or any of the Twelve Step programs would not address effectively. I’m not here to argue that point. I know that for this alcoholic, the Steps have become a centering process by which almost all the problems I create for myself especially can be dealt with effectively if I’m willing to do the work. That’s the bottom line. How willing am I to follow directions? How willing am I to surrender what I believed all my life and take on something else? Again and again, how often am I willing to come to a point where to remain in the old ways is to cause me to stagnate spiritually. The need for the new way will be difficult and frightening but will, in the end, nurture me; it will comfort me and allow me to grow. That’s all.

I’m not as upset about the world as it is today as many are. It’s not that I’m impervious to the fact that things I disagree with are offered as alternatives or that there seems to be a lack of rationality among many. I’m not upset because change is what life is all about. Some of that change is positive, and some of it is not. To be like Lear, raging against the storm, is not something I can afford. I’ll take on the smaller things, the things that I can manage, the things that are in front of me. 

What is God’s will for us? That’s what this following section addresses; how having that purpose in life makes life more reasonable.

There isn’t much of a space between Step Ten and Step Eleven. They fit together like interwoven fingers or tongue and groove flooring. It’s easy to segment Step Eleven and only pay attention to a part of it. It is the longest Step of the twelve at 32 words. It also contains a lot for us to consider. It does refer to “prayer,” and it does refer to “meditation,” but there is more to contemplate than those two actions.

If you take Step Eleven in its entirety, instead of segmenting it, the Step says that we are to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood him. And we pray only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out. So the Step says, “Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.” That’s the whole Step. So taken in its entirety, it means one thing: we seek to gain understanding so that we may “be of maximum service to God and the people about us.” It says that in the book.

I go to a Step Eleven group. It’s a meditation group where we spend 20 minutes meditating and then talk about the Eleventh Step. Maybe it’s because the nature of the group is about meditation that the discussion tends to be about meditation. But meditation in and of itself is not the whole answer. It is a clearing; it is a centering that is often necessary. In my own life, I’ve discovered that the more strife I have and the more distress that comes my way — whether it’s the death of a spouse or difficulties with my job, or dealing with jerks in the things I volunteer to do — the more I need centering so that I may continue to function. However, if my life merely becomes a series of distressing activities countered by constant meditation, where’s the benefit to God and to others? That’s just beneficial to me.

At this stage of the process, Step Eleven is preparing me to do what Step Twelve says, and that’s “carry this message” of the Spiritual Awakening. We will need this in order to be free of our problem. It’s all problems, really, but for now, it’s the problem dogging me most at the point at which I decide to take these steps. In my case, it was alcoholism.

That was the problem that needed a solution. That was a spiritual solution, and at the point where I was doing Step Eleven. I used prayer and meditation to improve my understanding of this spiritual solution. Eventually, I was expected to carry a particular message to other alcoholics – people who still suffered from this problem.

I want to take a moment to express a fear I have for people who become so enamored with the idea of meditation, breathing, and finding closeness with something, who then find only that to be the answer they need and step away from that which introduced them to this way of life through the 12 Steps. Whether it’s AA or NA, the 12 Step program is what helped us navigate our way to the peace of meditation. If we haven’t done the other steps before jumping to Twelve or Eleven and starting to do what Eleven says, then we’re at a very precarious place.

I have more than once seen people slip off and return to use because they don’t understand that the answer to meditation is in the centering once the person has done all of the essential groundwork of the other steps. Then “sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God” makes sense. We’ve had a psychic change in the process of the actions that we took. We took the Fifth Step, we took the Seventh Step, and we took the Ninth Step. These were actions that we took that changed us. They changed the way we reacted, the way we navigated life, the way we viewed the day-to-day, and the way we behaved.

With those things altered, seeking through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God makes sense. The fact we’re doing it, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out, makes sense, especially when we move to Step Twelve.

Step Eleven is all about improving conscious contact. We’re attempting to be in a relationship with a power greater than ourselves in a way that allows us to understand, daily, what we should be doing next. What’s in front of us? Can we do it? Of course, we’ve asked for help that way; we’ve asked for the power to carry it out. So the actions we take, if we’re asking daily, are supported by a spiritual connection.