The admission of a wrong compares in its effects to a strong cauterizing agent. When applied promptly it burns away the infection, but the treatment may be painful. How much mental pain an individual incurs by admitting a wrong depends not so much on the degree of the wrong as on how …

Like others of the Steps, Number Nine is closely related to Number Three – “to turn our will and our lives over to God as we understood Him.” If we have accomplished this step to any measurable degree, we have attained at least a small measure of humility and a realization of our dependence on Him.

It was characteristic of many of us as alcoholics to at least attempt to perform in the grandiose manner. And in harming others we usually succeeded magnificently. So, to say that the first phase of the Eighth Step …

Seventh Step Prayer
“My Creator, I am now willing that you should have all of me, good and
bad. I pray that you now remove from me every single defect of character which stands in the way of my usefulness to you and my fellows.”

Step Six – Became Entirely Ready
What is the meaning of the word defect? What is the meaning of the word shortcoming? Those are two words that we hear often when we are discussing steps six and seven, and we sometimes get caught up in…

Step Five – A Clean Slate
Most of us were born perfect and the slate was clean. From the very
first day of our lives we started to experience different emotions (for
lack of a better term) …

WHEN I first began to hear people in AA talking about character defects I presumed I possibly had one or two. I knew definitely that I drank much too much but aside from that fact I was a pretty good guy.

After twenty-eight years of mind-obliterating alcoholism, I finally attended my first AA meeting. Within a few weeks, I became capable of memorizing the Third Step Prayer that I had positioned on my refrigerator door.

When I first came to A.A., I didn’t believe that I was an alcoholic… but I could agree that I was slightly nuts. As a matter of fact, when I showed up at the San Fernando Valley Central Office of A.A., on the morning of …