One of the wonderful lessons I have learned from doing my ninth step is to be more careful about how I behave, so I do not have to make more amends than necessary. Thanks to this step, I have not only freed myself from the baggage of my past, but I have learned valuable lessons about how to conduct myself in the present.
One of the best ways I make my amends these days is to discontinue engaging in my addiction. This is an ongoing amend, and a change I have committed to. Through following this path of ongoing amends I live a more normal life—a life that is becoming more normal to me all the time.
STEP TEN. THE PRINCIPLE: PERSEVERANCE
When I continued to take personal inventory and promptly admitted my wrongdoings (when I realized I had committed them), my life came into greater order. When I persevere in practicing the tenth step, I look at what I have done to ensure I am acting properly—or normally.
Since I discovered the advantages of this step, I have been putting it to use in an ever-more-expedient manner all the time. This step has allowed me, on many occasions, to avoid making mistakes. I am learning to keep my mouth shut when it could do more harm than good to open it. I am learning to consider other people’s feelings before taking any action, and I am learning how my actions might affect others in general.
After practicing the tenth step for a short time, I began to see how it was helping me act more normally. I was causing less turmoil in my life and in the lives of those around me.
STEP ELEVEN. THE PRINCIPLE: PATIENCE
When I first sought to improve my conscious contact with God, as I understood God, patience was near the bottom of my list of assets. I wanted tomorrow’s results yesterday, and sometimes that was not fast enough. Seeking to improve my conscious contact with God has helped me greatly in this area, because, as I have learned, God does things in His time, not mine. Since He is the One responsible for the results, I had to wait, whether I liked it or not. This was a new concept to me. Acceptance helped me with this new concept, but it still was not easy in the beginning. I began to pray every day, morning and night, from my very first day of recovery. Some days I had to be patient with myself because I could not slow my mind down enough even to pray. I had to take time to really focus in order to get the job done. Learning to be patient with myself helped me be more patient with others. Prayer reminds me of who is really in charge of the results. It is not me; it is not any other person, either. It is God.
When I remember who is in charge, I can slow down, and I can be more patient with myself and others. I can let God do His part. Through this process, I can be more calm, relaxed, and serene. This, in turn, helps me to act more normally. After all, when I am calm and relaxed I can think straight. When I am angry and all keyed up, I do not think very well, if at all, before I act. When I think first, I act more properly and more normally.
Daily prayer keeps me focused on what is important.
Prayer keeps me closer to God as I understand Him today, so when He guides me I can move on with full faith that I will be growing better and faster than before, that I will “bear more fruit,” so to speak, instead of feeling a need to know “why me?” in cases where “bad” things happen. If I can apply some patience—allow God to care for me—I will always find a benefit; I will always find growth, which, again, is normal.
STEP TWELVE. THE PRINCIPLES: CHARITY AND LOVE
As the spiritual awakening promised in this step took hold, and I did as the step suggests, I began to carry the recovery message to others, and began to practice the principles of all the steps in everything I did.
It’s hard to decide whether this is the most difficult step or the easiest. I know now that a spiritual awakening will happen of its own accord, if I work the steps. My job is to work the steps, and let God do His job, providing a spiritual awakening for me. Therefore, the first part of this step happens normally as I practice the program.
I learn valuable lessons about life. This is especially true when considering charity and love. I learn that through giving I receive. I had to learn this, because I once thought I received through taking. This is a valuable lesson—this lesson of giving. It teaches me to love whether I want to or not, because I almost never get to choose the people I help; they seem to choose me. The people I have sponsored over the years have always asked me to help them—they did the choosing—my part was simply to be of service. I learned to love them, every one of them, and some of the people I have sponsored I most certainly would not have chosen. God provides the people and the love. All I have to do is do my best to do my part.
Once I had tasted charity and love—and saw what they can do—my desire to continue along this path was heightened, and I discovered I wanted more. There is one final purpose to the twelfth step. I have heard it said that practicing the principles of the program in everything we do is the key to the whole program.
If I could put all of the principles into action, I would be a very busy man. Fortunately, the step says I can practice them, and practice implies that I will make mistakes along the way. In fact, the mistakes themselves help me practice the principles. I must become honest enough to admit the mistakes, while perseverance helps me move forward with the rest of what needs doing. Acceptance keeps me from beating myself up too badly about making a mistake, while patience keeps me from trying to just patch things over if they need a total rebuild. Faith helps me know things will work out if I surrender the outcome to God and trust that He will take care of things. When I find humility, I become willing to forgive wherever necessary, including forgiving myself, and then I summon the courage to make amends, which provides the freedom to move back to charity and love. Of course, it does not always happen in this order, or with this kind of ease. However, as I practice I become more proficient, and as I become more proficient the practice becomes more second-nature, until one day I realize that practicing the principles is a normal part of the way I conduct myself. I am “becoming normal.”
THIS WENT A LONG WAY TOWARD REASSURING ME THAT I WAS INDEED NORMAL, ALTHOUGH I NEVER WOULD HAVE BELIEVED IT IN THE OLD DAYS.
IF I TOLD MYSELF THAT NO
MATTER HOW MUCH I GROW I
WILL NEVER BECOME NORMAL,
I WOULD SIMPLY ADD TO THIS
DESIRE TO BECOME NORMAL
A MEASURE OF FEAR THAT
SAYS IF I SHOULD SOMEHOW
REACH THAT PEDESTAL I
WOULD MOST CERTAINLY
FALL OFF, OR AT LEAST BE
IN DANGER OF DOING SO.
For me, normal once meant drinking and drugging. Mood- and mind-altering substances, including alcohol, brought me to my knees. My addiction had many manifestations, but a single common thread. Its power lay in what I thought of myself, what I thought others thought of me, and my reaction to what I was thinking. This is my story—how I went from being a drunk to being someone who chooses not to drink. My story is about my old idea of normal and how, through recovery, I was able to define and re-create my new understanding of what I believe normal is.
In recovery, I discovered how my thinking perpetuated my drinking and how my thoughts and my addiction shaped my life. Through the process of working the Twelve Steps in my recovery fellowship, I was able to completely change my relationship with my addiction, and I came to understand why I viewed those who could drink or use socially or recreationally in such a different way. With the help of my sponsor, other members of my fellowship, my twelve-step work, and my Higher Power, I have been able to transform my life in ways I never thought possible. Self-acceptance allowed me to discover that I already was normal. I just did not know how normal