Step 10

[Leadfoot]

Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

[mcgowdog]

I chaired a meeting last night. First meeting I got to chair in about a month and a half-two months. I've missed my home group, which meets once every Monday, two times in a row.

The topic was the 10th Step. I read from 84 and 85;

...continue...set right...vigorously commenced...entered the world of the Spirit...grow...watch... ask...discuss...turn... carry...daily reprieve...Thy will be done... thoughts must go with us constantly... proper use of the will... carefully followed directions... sense the flow of His Spirit into us...

Then I opened the topic up as aligning my will with God's Will... how do we know or go after God's Will?

We meditated on that for 3 minutes and I called on people to share. There was only four of us. We started at 7:30 and concluded with discussion by about 8:10... and went to about 8:50 with crossfire.

People's experiences ranged from "God doesn't send me a tablet with instructions on it or call down to me from the sky, "YOU MUST DO THIS AND THIS...", and "You have to sometimes just go out in faith and trust that God's will be done", "Intuition comes with continued work with 10, 11, and 12", "working with the power of intention", "what it sort of feels like when you get one of those 'ah HA' moments"...

Then we went into crossfire and such things we asked of each other; "Looking at the short form of the step, have you ever encountered 'and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it' and give an example", "is doing God's will always comfortable, or can it include confrontation and argument?"...

What came from that one was very interesting to me. The answer given was something to the effect, "I don't suffer fools. But at the same time, I try not to be rude to the person. Sometimes humor can be used to turn a stressful situation into something better."

Example of that; you've got a neighbor who comes to you from time to time and is so wrapped up in selfishness that they always talk "at you". They like to go on and on about their life and won't let you get a word in edgewise. It's a pure display of ego and it just drains you to sit there and listen. The solution; wait till you get an opportunity to speak of something they say that DOES interest you. So for example, they bring up motorcycles. Then you break into the conversation and say, "You know? I really like motorcycles and motorcyles this, and motorcycles that, and..." Next thing you know, your neighbor's eyes gloss over and they say, "Oh... I gotta go... be somewhere."

My goal out of this meeting was to learn more about the 10th step as to better apply some of these incredible techniques into my life now. As we know, there's an abyss of stuff in there and we cannot tackle it all at once. And besides that, you gotta sort of mix it up once in a while.

One thing's for sure, most of the meetings you go to in Pueblo, the 10th Step rarely if ever gets brought up, and if it does, you hear stuff like this; "The 10th Step is taking steps 4 through 9 on a daily basis."

Really? Well fuck me running backwards! I didn't know you could work the steps off the wall scrolls and stay sober!

The 10th Step is about a whole bunch more than "continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it", huh?