[MycoolFitz]

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

I recently read the following and it resonated with me, thought I'd share it.

Often we imagine that there’s some particular thing or entity—God, say—that made the world and now runs it. With such a notion in place, we soon start talking about this entity as if it had attributes like us—as if it had wants and desires. We talk of the “will of God.” Soon we’re developing ideas of how people should comply with God’s will.

But if we look carefully at this, we’ll discover that this is just our putting our ideas of God—that is, our will—onto unwilled nature, onto Reality. If we think of God—or whatever overarching principle we might have in mind—as being “out there.” We should realize that all we are doing is projecting our own attitude, our own view, our own small mind, on the world and on others.—Steve Hagen, Buddhism is Not What You Think.

While I'm in the sharing mode/mood, there's this:

BODHI'S BUDDHIST NON-THEISTIC 12 STEPS:

1. We admitted our addictive craving over alcohol, and recognized its consequences in our lives.
2. Came to believe that a power other than self could restore us to wholeness.
3. Made a decision to go for refuge to this other power as we understood it.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to ourselves and another human being the exact moral nature of our past.
6. Became entirely ready to work at transforming ourselves.
7. With the assistance of others and our own firm resolve, we transformed unskillful aspects of ourselves and cultivated positive ones.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed.
9. Made direct amends to such people where possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. In addition, made a conscientious effort to forgive all those who harmed us.
10. Continue to maintain awareness of our actions and motives, and when we acted unskillfully promptly admitted it.
11. Engaged through the practice of meditation to improve our conscious contact with our true selves, and seeking that beyond self. Also used prayer as a means to cultivate positive attitudes and states of mind.
12. Having gained spiritual insight as a result of these steps, we practice these principles in all areas of our lives, and make this message available to others in need of recovery.

Namaste