4: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove these defects of character
7. Humbly asked God to remove these shortcomings
(look at all that GOD up in there! Holy shit!)
"Don't grovel! No groveling!"
The "to another human being" part of the 5th step this time around took three evenings, stretched out over more than 6 weeks, and lasted about 9 hours altogether. Grateful to have a sponsor who is so generous with his time. Of course, the sense of "admitting to God" is involved in the reality of admitting to ourselves and another human being-- the subjective experience of "confession" seems only authentic when it is heard by another person, which has been a traditional aspect of confession for a long, long time. Not believing in "God," per se, I'd describe my subjective experience of that part of step 5 as one of cultivating the spirit of devotion specifically to complete transparency. Nothing to hide, a light turned to all of the shame, guilt, remorse, regret and denial, connected to a strong feeling of "coming home" into the world.
Admitting to ourselves the exact nature of our wrongs is an interesting aspect of this process also. For me, this time around, it has been about self acceptance. There's no way I can come to know myself or have a relationship with myself of any quality or endurance until I can sit with myself comfortably and in appreciation of my limitations and the reality of my character. So this part of step 5 creates the space for that and paves the way to talk to another human being about all of it. I'd say admitting to "God" and to myself the truths of my values, conduct, harms I have caused others and myself and the whole story are prerequisites of talking openly with another human being.
Another aspect of step 5 that seems often misunderstood, at least in my opinion, is "the exact nature of our wrongs." There is a deep wisdom in that phrase that gets deeper the more you contemplate it. The simplistic, moralistic consciousness thinks "confession" is merely about relating a laundry list of "sins." "I stole money, I cheated on my wife, I had impure thoughts about the bank teller, I lied to my employer, I yelled at my dog." That's okay as far as it goes, which from a spiritual standpoint, in my opinion, is about a millimeter. It is probably better than not taking inventory at all but also probably will not keep a person sober as a person ventures deeper into the process.
I'm often working with myself, my sponsor and my sponsees on getting underneath all of that conduct-- why did you do these things? What is the ground from which you acted? Exactly what kind of harm did you cause? Ultimately, precisely what is the exact nature of "wrong" itself and exactly what is harm? As difficult as it may be to admit that I stole money, for example, it often feels even more difficult to admit the underlying "character defects" that were causes for that conduct. Fear, greed, selfishness, resentment and bitterness and hatred, entitlement-- character states that get to the core of my humanity and are down at the level of the *nature* of the wrong. The central "wrong" (i.e., mistake) is a spiritual sickness in which I strongly enforce my separation from myself, others, and everything. That's a huge mistake-- the biggest mistake there is. (cf. Satan in Paradise Lost).
"YES! I got what I wanted without regard for the well being of anyone else!"
The harm for the person from whom I stole the money might be, for example, that I stole the sense of the goodness of the world, the reliability of the world and a basic trust and sense of safety. It's not that I stole the money. That in itself is only harmful as a result of the hell states of despair and anger it induces in the victim of the theft. The real stuff that is stolen is spiritual-- joy, faith, trust, purpose, the ability to love. Those are *real* and *enduring* harms.
So this leads to the extremely subtle and very tricky sex inventory. Bill W makes it sound fairly simple and straightforward in the book Alcoholics Anonymous:
"We reviewed our own conduct over the years past. Where had we been selfish, dishonest, or inconsiderate? Whom had we hurt? Did we unjustifiably arouse jealousy, suspicion or bitterness? Where were we at fault, what should we have done instead? We got this all down on paper and looked at it."
The specifics are crucial, and each "character defect" (selfishness, dishonesty, lack of consideration, being a cause of emotional suffering, arousing jealousy, arousing suspicion, arousing bitterness) is quite distinct. But the overall, more essential questions are: how did we invite spiritual and emotional sickness into the lives of people we supposedly loved? How did we steal their basic trust in the world? How did we threaten to take away their ability to love?
Rest in pieces....
And in this arena arise all of the fundamental realities of being human among other humans. Again, with uncanny wisdom, Bill W starts step 4 with resentment, with a grudge list. Then moves on to an inventory of fears. But he puts the sex inventory last, because this is the most subtle, private, shame-bound, aching and toxic part of the spiritual malady. In fact, one of the boldest statements in the Big Book is in regard to the failure of an alcoholic to unearth as much of this as possible, look at it, admit it and form a "sane and sound" ideal toward which to grow:
"If we are not sorry (for sexual misconduct), and our conduct continues to harm others, we are quite sure to drink. We are not theorizing. These are facts out of our experience."
This also goes to traditions that have been a central part of a great many religions surrounding sexual misconduct. The absolutism and inhumanity of some of the prohibitions are sick, in my opinion, and the other weird manifestations of mistaken fanaticism are dangerous, but these traditions definitely signal the intense power and potential for harm to ourselves and others in sexual misconduct.
Anyway, this time around I made a list again of every woman I have ever had sexual interactions with. I was able to then look at the overall patterns. Specifically, I took from that general list 7 women with whom I had longer relationships, including marriage and domestic partnership, or women who seemed to have a profound and intense effect on me, from 1978 to the present. Then I looked carefully at each of those central relationships, writing in detail using the format in the Big Book Awakening workbook, a very helpful and thorough guide to the basic questions in the above paragraph.
(Side note: combine the vulnerabilities of recovery with the plain fact that a great many alcoholics and addicts are also sex and love addicts and toxically codependent, and you get a sense of why "13th stepping" is such a chronic and awful problem).
Okay- so- are we having fun yet? I feel like this process of investigation (fact finding and fact facing) and confession (admitting the exact nature of wrongs) is a perfect stage on the journey through Hades. Maybe it is only in close relationship to death that we are able to get perspective on the truth of ourselves. If we contemplate the transitory nature of our lives and become more friendly with death, we are also able to let go of the sense of attachment to our look good, our denial, our sense that we are so important that we can't honestly take a look at ourselves.
I apologize if you read this far looking for juicy details of my sexual misconduct over the past 40 years. "Admitted to God, to ourselves, on our blog, and to another human being" is not what step 5 says. Anyway, in summary, my wrongs in sexual relationships (and all of my relationships) were banal, typical and ordinarily human: selfishness, self-centeredness, dishonesty, fear, arrogance, entitlement, lack of consideration, jealousy, anger and resentment, codependent attempts to make the other person my Higher Power-- surely you get the picture. These are all the ways we act toward other human beings we supposedly love. For me, it is only through admitting this that I am able to start to love for real.
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ReplyDeleteThe steps are in order for a good reason. It's a process for me, getting to step 5, and I've only ever done step 5's with sponsors-- men who I knew for a while through doing the earlier step work, men in whom I had placed a lot of trust. That trust has never been violated. By the time 5 comes around, these sponsors have been basically the opposite of strangers. My sponsors in fact have known me better than any other human being ever, and have accepted and loved me for exactly who I am more completely than most.
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