3rd Step PRINCIPLE: Faith

Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood God.

If I made better decisions, then I would probably not be in AA.  Or I would have introduced myself to the program sooner than I did, because when I noticed that I was not able to control my drinking, I would have sought help rather than order another drink.

The judgment that I brought into the program did not serve me well, and yet as early as the second step, the program trusted me enough to formulate an understanding of God that would help me to be and stay sober.

AA is inherently optimistic.  In the first step, it asserts that men and women who are wired to drink may be able to stop and then be made happily and usefully whole.  In the second step, the program promises that the alcoholic's life will improve through faith, and in the third step, one begins to actively trust the God of his or her understanding.

Place your bets.

French philosopher Blaise Pascal suggests that faith, at best, is an educated guess, but, in truth, it is a gamble.  Pascal's wager, as it is known, says that it is better to assume the existence of God than to act as if one is alone in the universe.

If I place my faith in God, and God doesn't exist, then what I have lost?  A few more wild nights?  But: if God exists and I have faith in this God, then what I have gained?  Everything.

Conversely, if I flatly deny the existence of God and God exists, then I am subject to God's mercy (best case scenario) or wrath (worst case scenario).  If I do not believe in God and God does not exist, then I forfeit only the hope that belief in God provides.

Foster a sense of well being.

Faith and hope are not the same, but they are intimately related.  Both foster a sense of well being that diffuses anxieties and calms fears.

Hope looks forward and trusts that everything will work out for the best.  It clarifies one's place in the world in which he or she lives now, and it motivates one to act in accordance with the promises before him or her.

Faith is more deeply rooted than hope.  Sometimes hope precedes faith.  For example, one may not be able to trust the God of his or her understanding until one has a sense of what one's future with this God will be.  Often faith comes before hope, because faith is passed down from one generation to the next, and in my experience, faith flourishes in communities where human beings gather to be made well.

Encourage and be encouraged.

In the beginning, I applied Pascal's wager to my experience of AA.  I had doubts about the program and even more self-doubt.  I did my best to proceed cautiously and confidently and am happy about where the program has taken me.

Still, I remember in sitting in a Big Book study early on and thinking, "If I give AA everything that I have and AA is wrong, then what have I lost?  But if AA works and I choose not to work the program, then what would I gain?"

AA provides me with a sense of well being by placing me in an open and honest community of people who have suffered and are striving to be well.  Walking into an AA meeting is one of the most honest things that I do.  Nobody asks why I am there, because they are there for the same reason.  As we share in each other's joys and sorrows, we encourage and are encouraged.

Encouragement, in the end, may be the essence of faith and hope, which begin and end in love.

Be decisive.

AA, like life, consists of living with the consequences of a series of choices that begins with the decision to go to that first meeting.  Then, one has to decide if one is an alcoholic or not, if one is powerless over alcohol or not, if one's life is unmanageable or not, if one is able to believe in a Power greater than one's self or not and if one is insane or not.

The questions asked in the third step are: 1) Would God make better decisions directing my life than I have?; 2) Am I willing to trust God completely at this point in my sobriety?; 3) and Am I comfortable enough with my understanding of God to accept this God's care?

In AA, I am positive that I am not alone in the universe.  I feel God's presence in the stories that are told and the experiences that are shared.  Meetings help to center me and to feel connected both to the group and to the God of my understanding, who proves time after time that trust in this God is a sure bet.

2nd Step PRINCIPLE: Hope

Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

There are two big, bold pronouncements made in the second step that many alcoholics are reluctant to accept: 1) that God exists; and 2) that alcoholism is a psychological disorder.

Power greater than ourselves

I recognize that the language used in the second step is "a Power greater than ourselves," but let's face it: the program encourages belief in God.  Read on in The Big Book.  In the step three, one is asked to turn one's will and life over to the care of God as he or she understands God.

I wonder if alcoholics, who are working the steps for the first time, ever feel deceived.  I did not, but faith came naturally to me, almost as naturally as did drinking to excess.

To the person who feels rejected by the God with whom he or she was raised, this step offers hope, because AA offers theological freedom.  The God of my understanding may not look or act like yours, and yet the differences in our understandings of God do not prevent us from sitting in meetings together or helping one another to achieve sobriety.

Restored to sanity

Both the person who suffers from alcoholism and I are there for the same reason: to recover from "a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body," which, let's face it, introduces another truth that may be difficult to accept: the second step asserts that alcoholics are sick.

On the one hand, I did not like being told that I was/am insane.  However, wasn't it Albert Einstein who said that doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is the definition of "insanity"?  I considered Einstein a genius, even when I sat in the same bar, drinking the same drinks and driving home for years.

On the other hand, there was something comforting in thinking about myself as sick, as opposed to thinking of myself as bad.  Sick people heal.  Bad people are punished, dismissed and forgotten.  Maybe the God of my understanding would act compassionately and remember me.

Exodus life

Inasmuch as alcoholics strive like to think of themselves as unique, ancient wisdom helps me to practice AA's 12 steps.  For example, I am not Jewish, but the story of the Exodus helps me to think about alcoholism.  The Hebrews are slaves in Egypt until Moses leads them out.

One of the titles considered for The Big Book before it became The Big Book was A Way Out.  The big difference between slavery in Egypt and the affliction that the alcoholic suffers is that alcoholic suffering is self-imposed.  However, before I completely understood the nature of alcoholism, I was already lying to myself about how, with more self-discipline, I could manage my drinking.

I had to suffer before I could hear the voices that helped me first to understand the nature of my oppression and then to follow them through a wilderness, up steps and to a place where promises are fulfilled.

  

The assurance of things hoped for

In the Christian Scriptures, faith is defined as "the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen."  The terms of the things hoped for are set by God, or in AA-speak, the God of one's understanding, who knows the way out of alcoholism.

When I came into the program, I was not sure of much.  This uncertainty did not stop me from being bombastic and making big, bold pronouncements on every subject under the sun, but it did open me to accepting the possibility of being accepted by a God who welcomed alcoholics, all alcoholics, from every station in life from which one wandered into a meeting.

When I attended my first meeting, I was sure that I would be convicted of a DUI, and yet the suggestion that the God of my understanding was with me, even when it felt like this God was not, was comforting as I faced one of the most difficult periods of my life, which, for the most part, is behind me now.

Avoiding real disaster
The Dalai Lama of Tibetan Buddhism assures his followers that, "No matter what sort of difficulties, how painful experience is, if we lose our hope, that's our real disaster."

In the final years of my drinking, it was increasingly difficult for me to imagine life getting better.  I sat in the shadow of a mountain of debt, and the wreckage of my past haunted me every day of my life.

It was not until I was arrested for a DUI and felt like I had no choice but to go to AA that life began to seem manageable again.  I knew that it would take time to clean up the mess that I created and that time was one of goals of every person in the program.  At last, the disaster of lost hope was averted, because at last, I was able to stop worrying about an imagined crisis and to start addressing a real one.

The sum of human wisdom
Alexandre Dumas, who is best known for writing The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers, writes that all human wisdom is contained in these two words, "Wait and hope."

With jail behind me and a court appearance before me, I was not equipped to do either one, but I did not have a choice.  I had to wait and hope.

At that stage in my sobriety, feeling that I did not have a choice was good for me, because given a choice, I would drink, but after waiting and hoping for a while, I started making better choices, and now that I have made a few of them, I choose to wait and hope and am confident that good things will come from these choices.