We alcoholics tend to look down on New Year's Eve as “amateur night.” We often stay off the highways, believing them to be filled with dangerous, untrained, drinkers who have no tolerance for alcohol. We like to believe that when we drank and drove, we did it well. There is a little bit of truth in this, because we did develop a tolerance for alcohol, but mostly it is what the Big Book calls “gutter bravado.” Our tolerance just allowed us to drink more, and we were just as foolish as anyone else.

Tony DeMello, a great spiritual teacher, used to say that in the spiritual life only three things are necessary:  “Awareness, awareness, awareness.”

He might as well have said that all we have to do to live spiritually is, “Wake up, wake up, wake up.”

"I've got to stop auctioning myself off to the low bidder."

Back in the early 1970’s, I had the opportunity to be summer pastor at a small church in Struble, Iowa, just north of LeMars.  There was little to no night life and I quickly became the gathering place for the adolescents of the town.  Night after night, as July gave way to August, they would appear, telling their tales of “walking the beans” or “walking the corn” that day.   As a city boy, I had no idea what they were talking about until they actually took me out to a field and invited me to “walk the beans’ with them.  I was amazed at the number and variety of weeds that were growing up with the crops.   I was also surprised at how quickly the work became tedious and taxing, necessary as it was.  

The 12 step program is a framework for confronting problems that involve addiction, alcoholism, and pressure. Sometimes referred to as spiritual methods, the Alcoholics Anonymous(AA) program was originally started due to a text that was published in 1939. The text, Alcoholics Anonymous: The Story of How More Than One Hundred Men Have Recovered from Alcoholism, created the foundation that paved the way for the 12 step program of AA. Today this method is regarded as the most successful practice of abstinence. 

I agree with the words attributed to Fred Holmquist of Hazelden that the first nine steps “will get us well but not keep us well,” that step 10 is the step that not only maintains our sobriety but begins our awakening.  Early in its treatment of this step, the Big Book contains the remarkable sentence:  “We have entered the world of the Spirit (page 84).” 

But how do we stay in the world of the Spirit?  The Big Book again is quite clear:          

“What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent

on the maintenance of our spiritual condition.  Every

day is a day when we must carry the vision of God’s

will into all of our activities. (page 85).”

And how do we maintain “spiritual condition?”  I find that if I am faithful to five practices in the course of a week, I have a 95% possibility of recovery and of being awake.  Those practices are a 10^th step throughout the day and especially at night; an 11^th step spiritual practice, especially every morning; an honest conversation with my sponsor, at least once a week; participation in my home group, again weekly; and availability for service, daily.  That has been my experience of myself and others.  And your experience?

All of us, or nearly all of us, are sober when we read this essay. For us, getting sober is no longer the issue. Staying sober is. Alcoholism and addiction are chronic illnesses, and relapses are common. Staying clean and sober requires an ongoing participation in recovery. The best recovery is in Twelve Step programs. Meetings are good. Step work is better. Working with other alcoholics to help them get sober is best. A.A.’s “Big Book”says "Nothing will so much insure immunity from drinking as intensive work with other alcoholics. It works when other activities fail.” (p.89) I know that  this is true for me.

The Import of a Word: Some years ago I called the research library of AA International and asked one of the librarians if he knew why Bill W. wrote “turn our will and lives over to the care of God” rather than simply “turn our will and lives over to God” in the third step. He said he would research the question and get back to me soon.