Step 1 - I finally came to the realization that I could NOT continue, after a long time of face-in-the-asphalt struggling. However, it had become painfully obvious I could NOT fix myself, and I certainly wasn't able to let anyone else fix me.
Step 2 - Thru the long time of struggling, in and out of meetings, I came to realize their was obviously a 'spiritual power' that worked in the AA program. The changed lives of the people in AA that actually 'did the work of the program' was proof that I eventually became aware of. From the absolute hopeless state I was in (Step 1), here was something I came to believe I could have hope (and trust) in.
Step 3 - I made a decision to turn my will and my life over to 'do the work' of the program, because I was told by the people whose lives had been transformed, that the spiritual renewal from God came thru working the program.
Steps 4 thru 12 - the spiritual renewal that came thru working the steps IS a miracle, that I could not have anticipated, and any expectation would have been woefully inadequate of what actually happened to me. Becoming a New Creation. Kinda like a carterpillar becoming a butterfly. The carterpillar does not become a butterfly by 'figuring out how to become a butterfly' - it ONLY happens by going thru the process.
RDBplus3