Inventory

Thought for the Day

"When we saw our faults, we listed them. We placed them before us in black and white. We admitted our wrongs honestly and we were willing to set these matters straight. We reviewed our fears thoroughly. We asked God to remove our fears and we commenced to outgrow fear. Many of us needed an overhauling in regard to sex. We came to believe that sex powers were God-given and therefore good, if used properly. Sex is never to be used lightly or selfishly, nor is it to be despised or loathed. If sex is troublesome, we throw ourselves the harder into helping others, and so take our minds off ourselves." Am I facing my sex problems in the proper way?

Meditation for the Day

Roots of Reality

"We started upon a personal inventory, Step Four. A business which takes no regular inventory usually goes broke. Taking a commercial inventory is a fact-finding and a fact-facing process. It is an effort to discover the truth about the stock in trade. One object is to disclose damaged or unsalable goods, to get rid of them promptly and without regret. If the owner of the business is to be successful, he cannot fool himself about values. We has to do exactly the same thing with our lives. We had to take stock honestly."

Facing Our Darker Side

Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
  —Step Four

By the time we get to the Fourth of the Twelve Steps, we are ready to face our darker side, the side that prevents us from loving others, from letting others love us, and from enjoying life and ourselves. The purpose of Step Four is not to make ourselves feel worse; our purpose is to begin to remove our blocks to joy and love.

CHARACTER BUILDING

Demands made upon other people for too much attention, protection, and love can only invite domination or revulsion. TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 44

When I uncovered my need for approval in the Fourth Step, I didn't think it should rank as a character defect. I wanted to think of it more as an asset (that is, the desire to please people). It was quickly pointed out to me that this "need" can be very crippling. Today I still enjoy getting the approval of others, but I am not willing to pay the price I used to pay to get it.

Fear of the Fourth Step

“As we approach this step, most of us are afraid that there is a monster inside of us that, if released, will destroy us.” Basic Text, p. 27 ––––=–––– Most of us are terrified to look at ourselves, to probe our insides.  We’re afraid that if we examine our actions and motives, we’ll find a bottomless black pit of selfishness and hatred.  But as we take the Fourth Step, we’ll find that those fears were unwarranted.  We’re human, just like everyone else—no more, no less.

Bondage Of Resentments

......harboring resentment is infinitely grave. For then we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the spirit. AS BILL SEES IT, p. 5

It has been said, “Anger is a luxury I cannot afford.” Does this suggest I ignore this human emotion? I believe not. Before I learned of the A.A. program, I was a slave to the behavior patterns of alcoholism. I was chained to negativity, with no hope of cutting loose. The Steps offered me an alternative.

Accepting Our Humanness

We finally saw that the inventory should be ours, not the other man’s. So we admitted our wrongs honestly and became willing to set these matters straight.
AS BILL SEES IT, p. 222

Why is it that the alcoholic is so unwilling to accept responsibility? I used to drink because of the things that other people did to me. Once I came to A.A. I was told to look at where I had been wrong. What did I have to do with all these different matters?

Big Book on Resentments... Page 552, 4th Edition

Someone was having a problem with resentment in the meeting this morning in StepChat , and I told them to read this as I was told to and it helped me!
So I figured I would post it here so I have it handy.


"If you have resentment you want to be free of, if you will pray for the person or thing that you resent, you will be free. If you will ask in prayer for everything you want for yourself to be given to them, you will be free. Ask for their health, their prosperity, their happiness, and you will be free. Even when you don't really want it for them and your prayers are only words and you don't mean it, go ahead and do it anyway. Do it everyday for two weeks, and you will find you have come to mean it and to want it for them, and you will realize that where you used to feel bitterness and resentment and hatred, you now feel compassionate, understanding and love."

Everyday Living

Everyday Living

The A.A. emphasis on personal inventory is heavy because a great many of us have never really acquired the habit of accurate self-appraisal.

Once this healthy practice has become a habit, it will prove so interesting and profitable that the time it takes won't be missed. For these minutes and often hours spent in self-examination are bound to make all the other hours of our day better and happier. At length, our inventories become a necessity of everyday living, rather than something unusual or set apart.

TWELVE AND TWELVE, pp. 89-90

Complete the Housecleaning, p. 213

 As Bill Sees It

Complete the Housecleaning, p. 213

Time after time, newcomers have tried to keep to themselves
shoddy facts about their lives. Trying to avoid the humbling
experience of the Fifth Step, they have turned to easier methods.
Almost invariably they got drunk. Having persevered with the rest
of the program, they wondered why they fell.

We think the reason is that they never completed their housecleaning.
They took inventory all right, but hung on to some of the worst
items in stock. They only thought they had lost their egoism and
fear; they only thought they had humbled themselves. But they had
not learned enough of humility, fearlessness, and honesty, in the
sense we find it necessary, until they told someone else their
entire life story.

Alcoholics Anonymous, pp. 72-73

CHARACTER BUILDING

Demands made upon other people for too
much attention, protection, and
love can only invite domination or revulsion. . . .
TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 44

When I uncovered my need for approval in the Fourth Step,
I didn't think it should rank as a character defect.
I wanted to think of it more as an asset
(that is, the desire to please people).
It was quickly pointed out to me
that this "need" can be very crippling.