JJLSober

I've been balking on my 4th step for a few months now. I've started to actually sit down with a journal the past week and stare at it.

My problem is that I don't have resentments. I had a couple extreme resentments against my father and a stepfather since early childhood. 10 years ago, after living a bitter life, a just accepted things. I came to peace with things and through hard experience learned the self destructive nature of resentments. Even though I was a drunk, I could still get an understanding of other peoples motivations in situations, and realize my faults in situations. I realized long ago I am the only one who gets consumed when holding a grudge. I still get wronged, and get angry about it. It's a natural emotion. But I just don't hold things anymore. I might be angry a couple of days, but that's as far as it goes.

I've been sober a year now. I'm trying to do this 4th step. I talk to my sponsor about this. He has he never met anyone who doesn't have resentments. So it's getting to the point where I'm just writing down people I got mad at, even though I never held a resentment against them. I feel like it is lying, but I want to get this over with. I'm actually trying to work up resentments for these people as I write them down, like "I can't belive he did that too me!" But it's just stupid.

I also have been making a list of the 7 deadly sins and when I act on those. That I can write on for months, but it's not a 4th step.

Maybe I'm not ready for a 4th step yet? Am I deceiving myself?

Anyway, I figure some people had the same problem, so I'm posting here to see what other people say.

Thanks

Mark75

Hi JJ

I never thought I had any serious resentments, ones that were important enough to put on my 4th step. I also tried to work it using the seven deadly sins... which did sort of help kick the logjam out a bit.

Certainly, the purpose of the 4th step is not to create resentments where there were none. Go back and take another look at the fifth chapter. Set up your columns and start writing what you have now. The point of writing it down is so that the resentments you do have can start to take some sort of shape... and perhaps there is something important for you to see... but you won't know until you do.

And, well, Just Do It.... I felt like you did too. Sometimes I just take direction and move forward. Otherwise I wouldn't have moved forward.

Mark

keithj

JJL,

Almost always when I'm working with a guy who is struggling on Step 4, it's really a problem with the earlier Steps. The needed power just isn't there to be fearlesslly honest with ourselves.

I did this once, in an earlier attempt to get sober. Never accepted 2nd Step, so 3rd was meaningless, and stalled on the 4th. Then I went and got drunk and stayed drunk. When I hit complete surrender, I returned to the program and found a sponsor who talked constantly about the spiritual nature of the Steps. The 4th Step was straightforward, sometimes almost writing itself.

If your other Steps are solid, try looking at other definitions of resentment. Who are you uncomfortable around? Who don't you like? What don't you like? Who do you feel better than? Less than? Who or what do you avoid?

Gypsy Feet

oh and welcome!!!

CarolD

JJLSober....
Welcome to our recovery community

Well done on your sober time

tabfan

KeithJ,

Hey, THANKS for your input! You've helped ME think of a couple more.

Cowbell

The important thing about resentments, and writing them out for a fourth step is that the AA book uses the word "were" angry. Not "are".

I too, find it hard to believe you have never been angry in your life. Doing a fourth step, just to do it (coming up with stuff just to get it written down) doesn't carry any depth and weight.

Perhaps you can just start with one column? List of names, institutions, principles.

Or how about starting with "I can't get in touch with resentments that MUST be there, somewhere"

Charmie

hello and welcome to sr! keithj put it all in a nutshell for me,how is your work so far? is it solid? if you have a solid 1,2,3 then 4 should come as a natural progression,i think of the steps as a process.i too found that once i started,i couldnt stop.if i were you i would maybe review 1,2,3.

Boleo

I agree with your sponsor. If you think you don't have any resentments it is probably due to denial rather than honesty.

Think of all the people, place's and institutions that have made you feel inferior and you will probably come up with hundreds of them. How about schools, church's and government agencies? How about teachers, boss's and politicians?

Ago

re·sent·ment (r-zntmnt)
n.
Indignation or ill will felt as a result of a real or imagined grievance

My experience with this was kind of similar, but when I started writing I was amazed at what started pouring out, but much of it came out "sideways"

How to explain.....

I was in a relationship when I got sober, and one of the things we did was go to couples counseling (years later this therapist was my sponsor for awhile, she had 25 years at the time so she was good at what she did, she had a good grasp of the program and was familiar with me and our situation) but I went in with no resentments and this woman turned me into a screaming angry crying rage filled lunatic in under five minutes by knowing which questions to ask.

A few months later I wrote my GF's name on my fourth step (she had run off with another man right after I got sober) and I was unable to muster a resentment, I "deserved" everything she had ever done to me (I had cheated on her incessantly) and as much as I stared at the paper, no resentments would come, so I skipped it.

A few names down was my best friend for 20 odd years, when I lost her, she was best friends with his wife, so I "lost" him as well, he "chose" her over me (rightfully so at the time) but when I started writing about him, all of the sudden stuff just started pouring out of my pen, I got literally 5 pages (both sides) about my her, not him.

My point is, do the work, be thorough, and in my experience I was amazed at what crawled out from under the rocks in the dark abyss that was my brain, and it was never hidden where I thought it would be.

I have seen this time and again with sponsees as well, it takes some doing sometimes, but for many of us it's like a safe where we have to dial the right "combination, then the floodgates of hell open up.

It's not I didn't have resentments, it was I was so out of touch with my feelings and had so successfully buried them in a sea of alcohol and sex, I didn't know what they were or that they were there.

Two things I have learned to be true.

More will be revealed

Don't worry about getting in touch with your feelings

They will be getting in touch with you. They show up like an assassin, in my experience they come out of nowhere, when you least expect it, and they stalk you step for step, and know your every move before you make it, because the "enemy" is your own grieving heart, and when it strikes, it can't miss.

So don't worry if you can't get in touch with your feelings, stay sober long enough and don't do the steps they WILL come calling, it's just you won't like it nor know how to cope, and you may drink.

Plus it's painful as all get out, but it's "frog in the boiling water" painful, you won't even know you are in pain until you start sorting your pistol collection by barrel flavor.

"Stuffed" Feelings in one form or another, as resentments are stuffed feelings, take out more alcoholics then even thinking, so it's best to deal with that sh1t before it deals with you.

I did that by just writing and writing and writing.

I think my first fourth step was over 150 pages, it could have been summed up in about 2 paragraphs, but that's how much writing it took for me to get out what I needed to get out.

It's either that or you are a sociopath with absolutely no human emotions, but I don't believe that is true, or you wouldn't even be trying to do the steps.

intention

Hi and welcome,

So have you never felt a resentment at the ........

person on the checkout in the supermarket who is slow
the traffic lights which always seem to be red when you have to go
the person who cuts you up and causes you to hit the brakes
the receptionist who keeps you waiting despite you arriving on time
the dog who barks in the middle of the night and wakes you
the car alarm which doesn't shut up
the postman who delivers an unwanted bill
the salesperson who calls you and interupts
the taxman who takes your money
the government who spend your money
the weather which spoils your plans for the day
the clock which ticks too fast when you have much to do
the computer that freezes when you are working on something crucial
etc
etc

I could go on and on. Like you I didn't think that I had any resentments but once I started looking at ones like this, the list was endless. Then the list moved onto resentments from the major relationships I had in my life. ...and I found there were many. I also found that resentments were so constant in my thoughts, like incessant back ground noise, that I had become so used to them that I was unaware that they were there.

I found it helped to follow instructions and just write the first column and finish it before moving to the next column.

This disease has a habit of telling us we are unique and special and that nobody quite feels the way that we do. Yours is telling you that right now - in that in your special circumstances step 4 doesn't really apply. Don't listen to the "cunning, baffling, powerful" disease. It wants you to drink, not work the steps.

good luck with it.

BP44

Old resentments that you've never put on an inventory go in column one. So, you're Dad and Stepfather should be on your inventory. It doesn't matter that you believe you have no current resentment toward them. Besides, current resentment is where Step 10 comes in. How long have you been attending AA? Please don't tell me you haven't found somebody in AA to resent. You're in AA for crying out loud. If you like everyone, you're still being a phony. Inventory, like everything else we do here, is about Step 1. If it looked like mine, inventory will be a piece of cake compared to what booze asked me to do. Step 2 asked us to set aside our predjudice. That means that during this process, I need to set aside what I think I know about resentments, fear, and my sexual conduct and all spiritual matters connected to them for an open mind and new experience.

timbo555

I didn't have any resentments either, so my sponsor told me to write down all the people I used to resent. My inventory grew from that.

Also, I've learned that there is a pretty big difference between acceptance and forgiveness. As A little boy, I wouldn't allow myself to resent my father, or even doubt him. He was the first higher power I ever knew; who am I as a eight year old, to doubt him? But to my mind, I wasn't getting what I needed from him.

This was carried inside me into adulthood, where I "accepted" the wrongs of my father. My subconscious wouldn't allow me to profess to the seething resentments I held for the man who failed me in my mind, at least, in many ways. My job is not to accept or not accept my job is to do a searching and fearless inventory.

Are you willing to go to any lengths? Did your sponsor suggest that you do an inventory? Do you want to get and stay sober? Then you don't really have any say so in the matter, do you? What comes after three? Oh yes, four!

If you don't have any resentments, then it shouldn't be any problem to examine your relationship in light of the good and bad aspects. If you are balking at doing this, then you may well have some unresolved issues, and this is the best opportunity you're going to have to get it out into the open.

The third step is only a decision. I demonstrate my faith by doing a thorough fourth step. Good luck

intention

I think that is a very important distinction to make. Thanks for sharing.

CarolD

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Cowbell ....

timbo555....