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Originally Posted by Phinneas Hello, family. I am (finally) ready, willing and able to do my 4th step. Can call on your collective wisdom to answer a few questions? (My sponsor is out of town and I'd like to get a start on this before she gets back.)
How do you organize it? I am doing it in a spiral notebook and by organize, I mean how do I get all of the resentments for one person/thing all in the same place without jumping all over from topic to topic?
Where do I start? Should I go back to childhood or stick to my drinking/using career?
Most of my resentments are of myself, is this ok; is it normal? Do I handle this any differently than resentments against other people or things?
How long should I allow? How will I know when I am done?
I know there is probably no "right" answers to these questions. I'd love to hear your wisdom and experience on the topic.
I am going to just take a deep breathe and dive in. Wish me luck! |
First, let me say I think you should wait for your sponsor to get back into town and ask him/her to set up a time with you to go over how it's done...
This is how I did mine:
Met with sponsor, she explained the process I took notes
Did it big book style (the best way IMO)
Four columns:
Resentment Why Affect My part in it
Note: I did the first three columns and wrote out all my resentments (anything and everything I've ever be pissed off about) until I was done. (took me about a month but I worked on it twice a week for about an hour or so at a time)... After a few weeks I went back and looked at my part in it...I needed to take that time off so I could be objective and honest. (And yes, ME was a resentment on my list....COMPLETELY NORMAL)
After that was done I listed all my fears (took one sitting)
Next, I answered the conduct questions on pg 68-69 of the Big book and in the 12&12 (pgs 54 and 55 I think)....
Lastly, I listed my assets...
Alll in all it took me about two months to do... but I have a very busy life, work, gym, meetings, etc. Anyhow, the most important thing I did was cover my entire life... b/c at the time I could do that. As long as you're doing the best thorough job you can do at the time, you'll be fine.. It's not going to be your last 4th step so if you leave something out by accident you can cover it next time... But if you find yourself thinking you might purposely leave something out... It NEEDS to get in there...
Generally, I find that ppl sweat way too much over the 4th step and complicate the **** out of it... But when you break it down, how my sponsor did, it's baby steps through it , just like everything else in sobriety. I thought mine would take me years.. haha... and when I was done, I was like "Am i done? I can't be done? Wow I think I'm done." Basically, I complicated the hell out of it in my head, when in fact it was a very simple task.
But the most important advice I can give you, is to definately pose all of these questions to your sponsor before you begin. In fact, our sponsors are there to guide us through the step process... Does he/she know that you're even taking your 4th? I waited for mine to agree that I was ready..