Thoughts on the Third Step

My experience with the Third Step started with a decision to take the advice of my sponsor and the people in the group. They were in touch with a higher power than I was, since they were sober and I wasn't. So in those days it was a matter of going to meetings, sharing, hanging out afterwards, going to social events, getting a sponsor, working the steps, and so on -- in short, following the suggestions of the program.

As I progressed, it became more of a spiritual investigation. Who or what is my higher power, and how do I turn things over to it? I became willing to look into any tradition, try anything once, and see how it worked. Then I started noticing all these "coincidences," where I would get an intuition to take some action, then take it, and I'd get a reward or confirmation that I was on the right path. I was tuning in the God Channel.

Today the Third Step reminds me to take a breath, not go with my first thought on a subject, and instead ask myself how this situation would look without my fearful ego being involved at all. I simply question my thinking and try to access a higher, more pure place to get answers. It still works better than whatever I first think of!

Why can't we let go?

Written to a sponsee:

"The reason you can't let go of your behaviors and resentments is that they serve a purpose and give you apparent, short-term relief, coupled with a type and level of pain that you are used to, can manage to some extent, and which you have begun to think of as your birthright. Or birthwrong. In the long term you know this isn't working, but in the short term you have no idea how you can change from a familiar pain to something unknown. That's where faith comes in; it can act as the bridge beyond all the "yeah-buts" that your mind puts up in defense of the ego -- which, ironically, is the source of all your pain.

I say this because it's true of every human being, not you in particular. Maybe not the Dalai Lama or Jesus."