The Wrong Way To Consider 12-Steps

Just Joking Here

LOL

Read!

Rarely have we seen a person fail who has completed their aftercare.
Those who do not recover are people who cannot or will not learn our
numerous slogans, and go to 90 meetings in 90 days. They are usually
men and women who are constitutionally incapable of forming meaningful
relationships in treatment centers. There are such unfortunates.
They are not at fault; their therapist told them so. They are naturally
incapable of grasping and developing a relationship with a vulnerable
newcomer. Their chances are less than average. There are those, too,
who suffer from grave emotional and mental disorders, but many of them
do recover if they have the capacity to form meaningful relationships.

Our stories disclose in a general way: how we were harmed, what happened
to those who harmed us, and how we got even in the end. If you have
decided you want what we have, you obviously haven't been paying attention
to our stories. If you're still determined to get what we have and are
willing to exert minimal effort to get it--then you are ready for a
temporary sponsor.

At their first suggestion we balked. We were sure that our sponsors
didn't understand. We were determined to find a sponsor who would see
things our way. But we could not. With all the earnestness at our command,
we beg of you to take it easy on these old fools. Some of us have tried
to re-educate our sponsors but the result was nil until we let go of
them absolutely.

Remember that we are dealing with your ego, cunning, baffling, powerful!
Without constant praise and reassurance it is too much for us. But there
is one, and possibly more, who has all power, that one is your significant
other. May you find them now!

Half measures availed us nothing. It was time to move in together. Having
abandoned common sense completely, we asked his or her protection and care
with great expectations.

Here are the steps we took, which interpreted properly, offer a spiritual
path to staying sober and having your own way in a meaningful relationship:

1. Don't drink or get loaded. Try to ignore the fact that you've never
actually been able to do this.

2. Came to believe that the right relationship could restore us to sanity.

3 Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of our
significant other, assuming they had what we needed.

4 Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of our significant other.

5 Complained to God, to ourselves, and to our temporary sponsors about
the exact nature of their wrongs.

6 Were entirely ready to have God remove these defective characters.

7 Humbly demanded that He find us the right significant other.

8 Made a list of everyone we found attractive and became willing to have
significant relationships with them all.

9. Made direct amends to people we believed might still be willing to
help us restore our net worth, except when their significant other was
attractive to us.

10. Continued to find fault with others and when they were wrong promptly
pointed it out.

11. Sought through prayer and manipulation to improve the behavior of our
significant other, praying for knowledge of all their hot buttons and
just the right time to push them.

12. Having gotten our own way as the result of these steps, we tried to
convince our significant other that this was really for their own good,
and that their future happiness lay in doing my will.

Many of us exclaimed, "What an order! They won't go through with it."
Do not be discouraged. No one among us has been able to do this with just
one partner. Fortunately the treatment centers, meetings, and social
activities are full of prospects who are not saints. The point is, that
we are willing to keep replacing partners until we find one or more who
will do it our way.

The principles we have set down have proven themselves in coffee shops,
clubhouses, and meetings across the land. We claim personal development
rather than personal perfection.

Our description of the alcoholic, the chapter to the wives, and our
personal difficulties before and after make clear three pertinent ideas:

(a) That we were alcoholic and it wasn't our fault.

(b) That our current therapist and significant other could not relieve
our alcoholism.

(c) That the right partner could and would if they were sought.

:)