12 Steps (For newcommers)

[Vince1]

If you want what we have to offer, and are willing to make the effort to get it, then you are ready to take certain steps.

These are the principles that made our recovery possible.

1. We admitted that we were powerless over our addiction, that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. We came to believe that a power greater then ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. We admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. We were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. We humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. We made a list of all the people we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. We made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. We continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. We sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to addicts, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

There is one thing more then anything else that will defeat us in our recovery; this is an attitude of indifference or intolerance toward spiritual principles. Three of these principles that are indispensable are honesty, open-mindedness and willingness. With these we are well on our way.

Just for today, you never have to use again.

[spike]

Could also add: there is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance - that principle is contempt prior to investigation. (Herbert Spencer)

[MonkeyMonk]

Vince, Thanks for posting. I can never read the 12 steps enough... My coffee mug even has the 12 steps on it.