Today's Step

[nandm]

Day 1

How to begin

"Intelligence is not to make no mistakes, but quickly to see how to make them good. Bertolt Brecht

To get a toehold on how to proceed with this step, it is helpful to review Steps Four and Five. Our list of resentments clearly indicates that there are many people with whom we need to set the record straight. Despite the fact that we've admitted our wrongs to God, to ourselves, and to another human being, this is the first time in our program that we're actively preparing to acknowledge to others the harm we've done.

The interpersonal difficulties we've had in the past were not necessarily all our fault. Nevertheless, in Step EIght, it's our own house that needs putting in order. Therefore, no matter what part others played in the situation, we need to focus only on ourselves and our own responsibility. We derive no value at all from clinging to the memory of personal slights. Nor can we afford such rationalizations as, "I would never have behaved that way if she hadn't started it," or, "He asked for it. He was so dammed self righteous!"

In this Step, we're trying to free ourselves from the wreckage of our own mistakes. Since we're also seeking forgiveness for the unkind, unfair, and untrue things we've done in the past, our best bet is to clean up our side of the street.

Today's Step: In reviewing my inventory, I acknowledge that I have harmed others.

Step by Step, Meditations for living the 12 Steps. Muriel Zink

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Day 2

Transforming our resentments

"The Haves and the Have Nots can often be traced to the Dids and the Did Nots." Anonymous

In Step Eight we keep coming around full circle to our number one difficulty---resentment. Somehow it seems to recur with even greater intensity as we make our amends list. It's so hard to let go of the feelings that others deserve to be punished for their actions toward us. Getting to the point where we're willing to make amends to them is a real exercise in self-control.

The whole purpose of the steps that preceded Step Eight, as well as those that follow it, is to make us feel at one with ourselves. "Enlightened self-interest" is the name of the game in recovery, for until we put our own house in order, we won't be able to make any real progress.

This step doesn't suggest that we become meek, fawning or subservient. On the contrary, our strength and resolve grow enormously when we do not immediately react to negativity or even hostility from those we approach as we follow the dictates of Step Eight. It's not their mess that we're trying to clean up. It's ours. No matter how negatively they may respond to our efforst to set the record straight, we must remember that we're not setting out to seduce them into forgiveness or absolution. We're simply clearing away what we frequently refer to as "the wreckage of our past."

Today's Step: Making ammends increases my own sense of self-worth.

Step by Step. Muriel Zink

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Day 3

Ambivalence

"The fundamental defect of fathers is that they want their children to be a credit to them." Bertrand Russell

Often the most difficult task we face in Step Eight is making amends to a parent.

What mixed emotions we have about this!

Many men will say they never seemed to be able to cut the mustard as far as their fathers were concerned. Nothing they ever did was good enough. And their fathers never really demonstrated their love for them.

Many woman, on the othe hand, experience difficulties with their mothers. Sometimes this difficulty stems from the mothers and daughters competing for the attention or affection of the husbands/fathers.

The normal process in growing up is to leave our parents' home and make our own way in the world. However, for some of us, the umbilical cord has never been severed. We continue to behave as if we were still under our parents' control and responsible to them for all we do.

Even if we've become successful in our own right, we continue to be deeply affected by their opinion of us, and we're constantly seeking their applause and approval. We vacillate between love and resentment for them because although we need them, we resent our dependency.

Today's Step: I examine my relationships with my parents fearlessly and without blaming

Step by Step. Muriel Zink

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Day 4

Writing a letter.

"An ounce of blood is worth more than a pound of friendship." Spanish proverb

Step Eight tells us we must become willing to make amends to the people on our list, and Step Nine brings us out of the passive and into the active phase of our recovery process. But, for the moment, what we really need to do is some soul-searching about why we need to make these amends, and the possible benefits we may derive from doing so.

Yesterday, we suggested parents as probable candidates to head our list. However, many of us no loner have a living father or mother, although we still carry an enormous amount of guilt over how we behaved toward them.

A wonderful solution was shared by a member of a self-help group who said: "The only way I could get rid of all that residual guilt and anguish was to write a letter to my dad, seal it and toss it into the fireplace. In it, I told him how much I truly loved him. I also told him how sorry I was for having lied to him, stolen from him and disparaged him in front of my friends because he was not successful enough to satisfy my ego needs."

"Then I promised him that I'd do some nice, helpful things for older people whenever I could. I also promised to do those things silently and in his name. Then I felt better."

Today's Step: Even if it is no longer possible to be in touch, I find a way to express my amends to those I have harmed.

Step by Step. Muriel ZInk

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Day 5

How we've harmed others.

"We act as though comfort and luxery were the chief requirements of life, when all we need to make us really happy is something to be enthusiatic about." Anonymous.

Some of us had startling revelations when we did the exercise in which we evaluated the payoffs we experienced from our character defects. Now, if we look at those defects---this time to assess how they affected others----we'll find that our list of amends will start to grow.

For instance: How did our depressions affect our family, business associates, friends and neighbors? What impact did our lying have on them?

What about unfaithfulness, reckless handling of money, excesses of food and drink, being judgemental, unreasonable expecatation, sexual demands? Indifference? Dependency? Secrecy? Procrastination? Neglecting health problems? Selfishness?

We've tried to convience ourselves that our attitudes and behavior really harmed no one but ourselves. But as we really begin to dig, we find that we've only looked at the tip of the iceberg. The more we probe, the more we realize we have to probe. Since no human being exists in a vacuum, it would be an impossiblity not to affect others by our deeds, our moods and our demands.

Today's Step: In honesty reviewing my character defects, I add to my list of amends.

Step by Step. Muriel Zink

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Day 6

Matters of Property

"Income tax returns are the most imaginative fiction being written today." Herman Wouk

Once we've covered all the financial areas where amends are called for, we need to see where matters of property have been affected. These can include places of employment, business and social activities, as well as the manner in which we treat both public and private facilities.

Have our actions caused damage or property loss to others when we have carelessly (or sometimes willfully) defaced or vandalized public buildings or real estate belonging to private parties?

Have we been responsible for automobile or recreational vehicle accidents in which others have been injured?

Whether we owned our home of rented from others, have we allowed the place where we live to have become so unkempt or seedy that it reduced property values or became a health hazard to others?

Have we been careless with cigarettes and burned holes in furnishings or clothes? Have we failed to do an honest day's work, or have we collected sick-time pay when we were simply goofing off? Have we failed to follow through on a committment that caused our company and/or others to suffer financial losses? Have we made promises to help or support a cause and then failed to fulfull our obligation to do so?

As we search our conscience, we will certainly find many more instances where we need to set the situation right: where we must do whatever is possible to make restitution.

Today's Step: I honestly examine the ways I have caused material loss and/or harm to others.

Step by Step. Muriel Zink

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Day 7

Matters of Prestige

"I have never seen a greater monster or miracle than myself." Michel De Montaigne

Today we need to look more closely at how morality enters into the blueprint for making amends. And this brings us into the area of "omissions and commissions."
* Have we been unfaithful to the significant other in our lives?
* Have we dealt in character assassination against someone we know?
* Have we been so self-obsessed that we've failed to meet the needs of our spouse? Our lover? Our parents? Our siblings? Our children? Our friends?
* Have we been a parent who has not been sensitive to the needs of our children? Have we ruled them by emotional blackmail? Have we withheld love and approval? Have we not been there for them when they needed us?
* Have we been so preoccupied in furthering our own social and business careers that everyone else must take second place on our priority list?
* Have we been demanding? Critical? Patronizing? Untruthful? Self-serving?

As we answer these questions on our written inventory of amends (for it must be written---just like our Fourth Step), we will proabably discover even more incidences where money, property, and prestige were the motivating factors for our old behavior.

Today's Step: I uncover ways the need for presige has led me to wrongdoing.

Step by Step.. Muriel Zink

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Day 8

The Courage To Make Amends

"Courage is to feel the daily daggers of relentless steel and keep on living." Douglas Malloch

Someone once said that we come into this world like a clean sheet of paper, and that everyone we meet scribbles on us. This may well account for the part of us that feels victimized by circumstances beyond our control.

As we pursue Step Eight and write our own findings on paper, we become more and more aware of our own culpability. And yet, we also begin to realize that when we face up to our problems we can evoke skills and talents we didn't know we had. When we go deep inside ourselves, we find that we do posses the courage to face those to whom we have done harm. We also know, that having aligned ourselves with a power greater than ourselves, we have an ever-present support system to bolster our resolve.

As we progress, we can define more and more clearly how we were drawn into our dependency. With hindsight, we can identify the attitudes and actions that catapulted us into this downhill run. We can track how one act led to the next. One lie led to the next. One disaster led to the next. Until, at last, we were forced to realize that we were caught in a web of such tenacity that it was impossible to find a way out by ourselves.

The old adage "forewarned is forearmed" now becomes a vital tool in preventing us from falling back into old habit patterns.

Today's Step: With the support of the group and my Higher Power, I face my amends with courage.

Step by Step. Muriel Zink

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Day 9

Depression

"The lowest ebb is the turn of the tide." anonymous

As we resurrect past situations, and the people who were involved with us, many of us begin to reexperience old depressions.

But now, we can begin to look at our depressions in a different light. Not so much from the standpoint of who or what caused them, but rather what we gained from them. As we make our list of those we've harmed, we can also think about the payoffs we experienced by having depressions. There always has to be a payoff in any continuing behavior. True, it might be a negative payoff, but it does serve a purpose.

One woman reported that migraine headaches were her payoff. It took her a long time to figure out how something that painful could work to her advantage, but she finally got it. Whenever she had a migrain, she was forced to retire to a dark room where she was unable to tolerate any sounds, sights, or smells. She might stay there for a day or more in complete seclusion until the pain and nausea had subsided enough for her to emerge.

The payoff was, of course, that during the headache episode no one could expect her to do anything. Hence, she was not only freed from responsibility, but no one had the heart to confront her when she was in such obvious pain.

Today's Step: I see clearly the payoff in my depressions and other difficulties.

Step by Step. Muriel Zink

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Day 10

Risking Ourselves

"It's O.K. to ask dumb questions. It's easier than facing up to dumb mistakes." anonymous.

Very often we experience uneasiness and a sense of helplessness as we pursue our list of persons to whom we have done harm. This is because it takes a great deal of courage to face up to our own shortcomings.

A copy of a poem which appeared in a "Dear Abby" column might be helpful at this point.

To laugh is to risk appearing the fool.
To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.
To reach for another is to risk involvement.
To expose your ideas, your dreams, before a crowd, is to risk their loss.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying.
To believe is to risk failure.
But risks must be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.
The people who risk nothing do nothing, have nothing, are nothing.
They may avoid suffering and sorrow, but they cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love, live.
Chained by their attitudes, they are slaves; they have forfeited their freedom.
Only a person who risks is free.

Our responsibility is to ourselves. By accepting the need to end the qualms of conscience caused by our behavior toward others, we can face ourselve with affection and approval.

Today's Step: The risks I take in making amends pay off in terms of better relationships.

Step by Step. Muriel Zink