We have emphasized willingness as being indispensable. Are we now ready to let God remove from us all the things which we have admitted are objectionable? Can He now take them all—every one? If we still cling to something we will not let go, we ask God to help us be willing.
Willingness
- Willingness: this means being prepared to do something
- You do not have to be happy about it
- You do not have to be without conflict
- You do not have to agree with it
- But you do have to commit to doing it
- ... often regardless of what you think or feel
- This means getting rid of character defects has to do with consistent action
Indispensable
- Indispensable: this means that, without consistent action, nothing will change
Action
- What is the action?
- Steps Eight through Twelve
- These do not concern defects (at least not primarily)
- So, defects get removed when we take action
- But the action is not the action to remove the defects
- It is the action on the other steps
- And the defects get removed in the process or as a by-product
- We do not therefore remove our own defects
- But we are responsible for taking the action which creates the conditions in which the defects are removed
- If defects are wrong beliefs, thoughts, and behaviours
- Wrong beliefs are like settings in a computer system: fixed pieces of information that govern how the computer behaves
- Wrong thoughts are thinking processes that occur in real times, like the running of software code on a computer
- Wrong behaviours are the output of the computer: the visible counterpart of the wrong thoughts
- Behaviour is not autonomous: it comes from thought
- Thought is driven by belief
- The real problem is therefore belief
- The solution
- Consciously adopting, meditating on, and applying new beliefs (Steps Ten and Eleven)
- This is a mental action
- It displaces the old beliefs
- Eventually the old beliefs fade away
- Consciously redirecting thought along new tracks (Steps Ten and Eleven)
- This is a mental action
- This causes the 'old train tracks of thought' to 'fall into disrepair'
- Eventually the old train tracks of thought are dismantled
- Consciously directing action along the line of God's will (see page 85, Alcoholics Anonymous) (Steps Eight, Nine, and Twelve)
- This is a physical action
- The defective actions simply cease to take place
Objectionable
- Objectionable
- To conclude that a defect is objectionable is to conclude that I object to it
- That means on balance
- I may still want to eat the cake
- But I conclude on balance that it's a bad idea
- I am therefore willing not to eat the cake
God's role
- If we have to be willing to take action, what is God doing?
- Firstly:
- The above actions in Steps Eight through Twelve require two elements
- Knowledge of God's will for us (which actions to take)
- The power to carry that out (the resources to take them)
- Both of these come from God
- We have chief initiative and active responsibility for these actions (Concept VI)
- But God has the final responsibility and ultimate authority (Concept I)
- Simply: we take the action, but God tells us what actions to take and gives us the resources to take them
- Secondly:
- 'I ruthlessly faced my sins and became willing to have my new-found Friend take them away, root and branch.' (Bill's Story, Alcoholics Anonymous)
- The removal of defects has a visible element, the branch: removing this is our contribution
- It also has an invisible element, the root, removing which is God's contribution
- I cannot rewire my brain
- But I can consciously adopt new beliefs, direct my mind along new pathways, and take different action
- This products conflict, between the old (in the subconscious) and the new (in the conscious)
- God brings about the deeper changes in my subconscious
- Over time, the conscious and the subconscious are brought into alignment
- Thirdly:
- When I seek to do God's will, the universe seems to help make it possible
- Normal space and time relations are overridden
- These collapses of time and space are technically referred to as 'miracles'
- The process is replete with the internal counterpart of these external 'miracles':
- Sudden insights
- These insights are corrective in nature
- The correction is reminiscent of those games where, when two items are matched, the items are removed or disappear
- The process is one of subtraction and simplification
- Errors are brought to light
- The light corrects them
- And the both the error and the correction disappear
- God appears to be behind these miracles
- Others appear to be the channel (indirectly or directly)
Every one
- The ego's mode of living ...
- Grab everything you can from the material world & build up a flattering image of yourself while casting all but your allies into darkness
- ... and God's mode of living ...
- Trust God, clean house, help others, be grateful, be a channel for God to work miracles in the lives of others, rest in God in between
- ... have no line of communication, have nothing in common
- Each belief, thought, and action we have serves one or the other
- We cannot in principle hold onto any element of the old way of living
- A single false belief can hold us trapped entirely in the old world
- A single thought pattern (e.g. a single resentment) can ruin a whole day
- A single wrong action can divert the course of a life
- There must be no reservation ...
- ... although, if we are sincere, our mistakes of belief, thinking, and behaviour ...
- ... of which there will be many ...
- ... will usually cause little lasting harm.
Resistance
- If we are resistant
- ... don't try and think it through beyond a simple application of knowledge, experience, and reason
- Go straight to God
- 'If thou has made some difficulties for thyself, if thou art such a fool as to be tying knots and wanting to get them untied before thou wilt believe in [God], then I have nothing to say to thee, except it were, beware lest thou dost tie a knot that shall destroy thy soul; but if thou be troubled with an honest objection, I say to thee now, in God's name, "Ask of God." You need not wait till you get home, you need not stay till you have left that seat, but now, silently, in your soul, …, breathe the prayer, "O God, teach thou me: …; save my soul this day; end the doubtful strife; answer these questions; bring me, as an humble seeker, to lie before the footstool of thy sovereign mercy, …" "Let him ask—that is all—let him ask."' (Loving Advice for Anxious Seekers, Charles H. Spurgeon)
When ready, we say something like this: '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. Grant me strength, as I go out from here, to do your bidding. Amen.' We have then completed Step Seven.
Ready
- Treat ready as synonymous with willing
- Bill repeats ideas with different words
- Similarly: defects of character, twists of character, and shortcomings are all the same
Creator
- God is our Creator
- We are always under manufacturer's warranty
- When something is wrong, we invoke the warranty
- We go back to the manufacturer
- And ask for the fault to be corrected
- iPhones don't mend themselves
- You have to send the whole iPhone back, not just the apparently broken bit
Good and bad
- As indicated above, our whole way of believing, thinking, and behaviour has to change
- That is why it says good and bad
The way
- If 'the way' is the line of God's will (page 85, Alcoholics Anonymous) ...
- The 'way' is to serve God by serving others
- It is not about serving others as gods (which is the anon defect)
- ... the defects are the obstacles on the road
- These are removed
- This can be understood as: removed to the side of the road
- ... not zapped out of existence for ever
- Just because an obstacle is removed from immediately before me does not mean it is gone forever
- It may reappear in a moment's time
Another image
- When we have only one option we are powerless
- The programme offers an alternative to every wrong belief, thought, and action
- We now have more than one option
- We are also given the means to choose again
- This means we are no longer powerless
- We are not powerful, because the power does not originate in us
- But we are empowered
- Lauren H-W says that we will be given the opportunity to act out on any every wrong belief, thought, and action
- Our job is to spot this, pray, and ask God:
- 'Show me a different way'
- 'Give me the strength to follow it'
- Don't pray for relief: pray for strength
- Right belief, thinking, and action come first
- Right feeling (eventually) follows
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