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Source: Scott L – Step Study (2003) – CD 2 – Date Unknown.mp3 File: scott-l-step-study-2003-cd-2-date-unknown.mp3 Duration: 01:10:03
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Good morning, I'm Scott L. and I'm an alcoholic and welcome back. If somebody closed those back doors would help and I'd like again to open with a few moments of silence and let's acknowledge the presence. Amen. Thank you. I would like to quote a friend of mine on two rules. One is the first rule of holes, when you're in one stop digging. The other one is the first rule of cavalry, when the horse is dead, dismount. These concepts are difficult for many of us and I wanted to pass them along under the for whatever it's worth category. We left off on the bottom of page 60 having discovered the first requirement of the third step was to be convinced that any life run on self-will could hardly be a success and then we talked about motive versus principle and it says most people try to live by self-propulsion. Each person is like an actor who wants to run the whole show is forever trying to arrange the lights, the ballet, the scenery, the rest of players in his own way. Have you noticed that it's not the director they're talking about? That's the director's job. It doesn't even say it's the star of the show. This is one of the bit players. He wants to run the whole thing. Boy, that is my story and just trying everything I can think of to make it come out my way because I'm a victim of the delusion that I can rest satisfaction and happiness out of this world if only I manage well and if you guys would just shape up, I'd be okay. I'm going to go to page 62 again. I'd say there's no way to be completely thorough on this. I want to try to get some important points across. Selfishness, self-centeredness, that we think is the root of our troubles. The root of our troubles, that must be important. Driven, not mildly moved along, but driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity, we step on the toes of our fellows and they retaliate. Sometimes they hurt us seemingly without provocation, but we invariably find that at some time in the past, we have made decisions based on self, which later placed us in a position to be hurt. And then here comes the best news, I think, in the whole book. So our troubles, we think, are basic of our own making. Because if it really is the cops, and the courts, and the blacks, and the Russians, and the Chinese, and the PTA, and the ex-wives, and if it really is all of them, I'm cooked. Because I can't do a thing about them. And the good news is that I'm the problem. That we can work on. That's great news. Says they arise out of ourselves. The alcoholics is an extreme example of self-will run riot, though he usually doesn't think so. Boy, I didn't think so. I always thought if they'd shape up, I'd be okay. Above everything, now that must be important. Above everything, does that sound important? Above everything? We alcoholics must be rid of this selfishness. Got to go. We must, or it kills us. Now that's a death threat. It kills us. We're going to see a lot more death threats as we move on through this work. Says God makes that possible, and there often seems no way of entirely getting rid of self without his aid.
That's an important concept, because they're going to tell to us twice in the same paragraph. When the book's redundant, I think it's on things that are extremely important. And it says, I can't get rid of self without God's aid. Says many of us had moral and philosophical convictions galore. I was one of those. But we could not live up to them, even though we would have liked to. Neither could we reduce our self-centeredness much by wishing or trying on our own power. We had to have God's help. There that concept is again. I got to have God's help. I can't do this myself. I tried and tried and tried. Says this is the how and the why of it. First of all, we had to quit playing God. Now hold it.
I thought we already had a first over here two pages ago. First requirement was that we be convinced that any life run on self-will can hardly be a success. Now we have, first of all, we had to quit playing God. So we have two firsts. That works for alcoholics, don't you think? I mean, I had so many things in first place. Everything was in first place. All right. It says we had to quit playing God. I had the privilege of sitting with a man that I think is a great carrier of this message. And he, we spent a morning and he asked me at one point, he said, in the third step you agreed to quit playing God. And I said, that's right. And he said, how did you play God? And I said, I don't know. And he said, this is how I played God. I got angry with God when somebody died. And that's me saying, I know who should die and how and when. Clearly that's me playing God. And I tried to manage my own life and the lives around me. And the closer you were to me, the harder I tried to manage your life. My wife and kids, you know, got the most of it. And myself, clearly God's job and not mine.
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And I judged people. And the way I know I judged them is because I had resentment. And there's only one way to get a resentment. You must judge someone, find them guilty, be angry with them, and then feel that anger again. Because resentment is old anger. It's old anger felt again. The word resent comes from the Latin, re- prefix re- means again, like reload. It's something you do again. And centere means to feel. So resent means literally in English to feel again. And what you feel is old anger. So the way I know I judged people is because I had resentments. I must have judged. And I also judged myself when I was angry with me. I've added two to that list of ways that I played God. One was that I needed to know.
I just needed to know. Whatever it was, I needed to know. And that presupposes that if I can find out, then I, the great and powerful Oz, will be able to change it. And that's my own spiritual arrogance. That is very simply me playing God. The other one was that I was sure that everything that I knew was right. And that is me playing God. When I think everything I know is right. When I can't hold it in an open hand, I'm telling him he can't change this. That's some of the ways that I played God. So it says here, this is actually, I said, to me the third step breaks down into nine parts. This is the second one. It says first of all, we had to quit playing God. So I asked this new guy, you want to quit playing God?
Did you play God like I just described? Can you think of any other ways? Are you willing to stop? Okay. It didn't work. Well, that's a good reason. And then it says, next we decided. So here's the decision we refer to in the third step. Next we decided that hereafter in this drama of life, God was going to be our director. He is the principal. We are his agents. He is the father and we are his children. I say, have you made that decision? He says, yes. I say, okay. What I want you to do is to read that back to me now in the first person. We're going to formally make this decision. I want you to make it formally out loud if you're ready. If you're not ready, I had a guy not too long ago say, I'm not sure I'm ready. I said, great. Take some time. Take a few days and think about this.
This is a big deal. This is a big deal. And when they're ready, they say, I have decided that hereafter in this drama of life, God is going to be my director. He is the principal. I am his agent. He is the father. I am his child. And I say, congratulations. I think you've made an excellent decision. Now you and I are going to make a pact. And the pact is that that decision will stand until the day you formally change it with me or with a sponsor or spiritual advisor that comes after me. Do we have a pact? We do. Shake hands. The decision stands. My third-step decision stands. I made it a long time ago. The implementation is better on some days than others, but the decision stands. And then it says, most good ideas are simple, and this concept was the keystone of the new and triumphant arts through which we pass to freedom. Keystone is the one that holds it all in place. If you know anything about architecture, the keystone is that strange-shaped one right in the middle that makes it all work. So that's the reference here, that this is so important. This is what makes it all work. And then we have the third-step promises. It says, when we sincerely took such a position, that's the position of God's a director, and he's the principal. I'm his agent. He's the father. I'm his child. Took such a position, all sorts of remarkable things followed. We had a new employer. Now that's who I work for. Being all-powerful, he provided what we needed if we kept close to him and performed his work well.
Established on such a footing, we became less and less interested in ourselves, our little plans and designs. How about that? It had a death threat on the page before saying that if I don't get rid of this selfishness, it's going to kill me. And having taken this simple position, it says now that I am already beginning to be less and less interested in ourselves, our little plans and designs. Starts immediately. More and more, we became interested in seeing what we could contribute to life. That's out of self. As we felt new power flow in, as we enjoyed peace of mind, as we discovered we could face life successfully, as we became conscious of his presence, we began to lose our fear of today, tomorrow, or the hereafter. We were reborn. Powerful, powerful, powerful set of promises. And then we have the third step prayer, which I would suggest that the third piece of the third step is to read that prayer. Not to pray it, but to read it. And I'm going to read it and talk about it. It says, God, I offer myself to thee to build with me and do with me as thou wilt. Relieve me of the bondage of self that I may better do thy will. Take away my difficulties that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of thy power, thy love, and thy way of life. May I do thy will always. I would note that the word amen does not appear. It's just an
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observation. Let's talk about what the prayer says to me. I offer myself to thee. I'm not saying come on and help me out a little bit with this and then I'll take it from here. That's not what it says. I'm offering myself, all of me to God, to build with me and do with me as he will. Sometimes to build something somewhere we got to tear down some of what's already there. Relieve me of the bondage of self.
I am bound to self. I'm imprisoned in self. It's my problem that I may better do his will. Take away my difficulties so that so that others may see what you can do, so that others will be helped also. And then I'm asking that I might do his will always. And so having read that and talked to someone about what it means, here's a direction. It says we thought well before taking this step. And if you have not done this, I'd like to recommend that you think well. Because I'm going to tell you that your life is going to change and you're not going to like some of the changes. You are not going to like some of the changes. But this is a package deal. It is absolutely a package. Think about bowling balls. My will, God's will, pick one. And it's not 95 and 5. I'll take sex and money and he can cover the rest. That is not the package. Some of this you are not going to like. But overall it's a spectacular package. It's the best package there is. I'm convinced of it. And I'm convinced also that the parts that I don't like are the ones that help me the most. Rarely have I learned anything when I was up on one of the peaks. When I'm on the pink cloud, which is my favorite place, I don't learn much.
What I learn is in the valleys when I'm making the mistakes. If you ask me truthfully, what do I want? I want to take the rest of my life off with pay. I've gotten a lot of lessons. Isn't that enough? Can we quit here? Can I just ride the cloud? I'll trade the pink in for a lavender, but can I just ride? That's my will. And yet some of these things that I don't like have brought me some of the greatest blessings, have brought me some of the greatest lessons. So I need to tell somebody new that the book says to think well, and I think that's the fourth piece of this step. As having read this thing, you better stop and think. You want to take a couple days on this? I'm good with it. Take a couple of days. And then it says, we found it desirable to take this spiritual step with an understanding person. So it's suggesting that you want someone to witness your third step prayer. So you would have to, I would think is the fourth, the fifth piece is to select somebody, and the sixth piece would be to ask them. All right, I'm just kind of making this up as I go, but it kind of lays out in a logical fashion to me if I do it this way. And then it says the wording was of course quite optional. So it says I can write my own third step prayer. And that to me is the next piece, is you can write your own prayer. And I encourage someone to do that. This fellow, I just asked if he want to write his own prayer.
He says, everything I'm touching I'm screwing up. I think I'm gonna do it just like it says it here. I said, hold that thought. Don't let that one get away. And then the next piece would be to pray the prayer. And if my counts any good, that's that's nine options. Or not nine options, it's nine separate pieces in the third step. And so that was the first requirement to to observe that, or be convinced that playing, that any life around self will could hardly be a success, to quit playing God, to decide that God's going to run my life, to read the prayer, to think well about the prayer, to figure out who I'd like to witness my prayer, to ask them to write a prayer myself if I want to, and then to pray it. I think that counts nine. All right. And and so I like to break these things up into little bitty pieces to to spoon-feed this. Seems to work pretty well. How'd y'all feel about us doing this prayer together? Is that good with everybody? Those who are not comfortable? If you're new, anybody here sober less than 60 days? Okay, tremendous. I'm glad you're here. If you have not thought well about this prayer, I'd like to encourage you not to do this with us. Whatever you need to do is good with me. I'm not telling you what to do, but give that some consideration because I promise you your life's going to change and you're not going to like some of it. But oh, the package is spectacular. The package is great. I mean, I lost an 84 Riviera convertible, okay? I mean, some of this you're not going to like. I really did. But what I'd like to do now for those who are so inclined is let's take a few moments of silence. And if you have your book handy, if you happen to know the prayer, we'll do it together.
Prayer. God, I offer myself to thee to I offer myself to thee, to build with me and to do with me as thou wilt.
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Relieve me of the bondage of self, that I may better do thy will. Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of thy power, thy love, and thy way of life. May I do thy will always. Thank you. A friend of mine observed that the next place the word Amen appears is at the end of the seventh step prayer on page 76, and that maybe everything from the beginning of God I offer myself to thee, to that Amen is a prayer.
I don't know. I think it's a very interesting observation, and I present it as such quite sincerely. Now I hear around the fellowship the discussion rages as to when to do a fourth step, and I've heard people say don't do a fourth step too soon, you may drink. I have so far never yet seen anybody do a fourth step too soon and drink. I've seen a few hundred thousand go too slowly, but I haven't seen anybody go too fast.
Is that your experience too? Yeah, because the steps are designed to bring me relief. That's what they're for. They don't look like it. They don't look like it. If you're new, don't the steps look like they're designed to punish you, especially four, five, eight, nine, and ten. Don't they look like that? That's what they look like to me. That's what I saw. They're going to pound me into the pavement for this, for being this bad guy I've been.
That was one of the many, many things I was wrong about. The steps actually brought me relief, and that's what this fourth step will do. The book is not, and I hear some people say we'll do one step a year. What page is that on? And I hear people say don't make any major decisions the first year. That third step looks like a relatively major decision to me. Are we … I like don't make any decisions at all without consulting your sponsor.
I think that's a pretty good plan. But anyway, the book is not specific about when to do a fourth step, and I do have some fun with this. Okay? It's not specific. It makes two time references, and I tell a new person if the book gives leeway, I give leeway. It makes two time references. As far as I'm concerned, you can use either one of those or anything in between. Does that seem fair? Okay, that's how we'll approach it.
So the bottom of page 63, it begins, it says next. That's a time reference. Next. All right, so that's one time reference. We launched out on the course of vigorous action, the first step of which is a personal house cleaning, which many of us had never attempted, though our decision, okay, we saw the third step decision, talked about how to do that formally, was a vital, vital from the Latin word vita or vita, I'm not sure it's how it's pronounced, means life, okay?
This is a death threat. This means you only have to do that if you want to live, all right? Though our decision was a vital and crucial step, it could have little permanent effect unless at once, that's a time reference, at once. So you do your fourth step either next or at once or anything in between. I'm prepared to give all the leeway the book gives, okay? I'm a very, very gentle sponsor, very, very gentle.
I am used to getting my own way, however, okay, unless at once followed by a strenuous effort to face and be rid. Isn't that interesting, be rid? It's going to tell us be rid again on this page. It's redundant. It must be important. And in the fourth step, we are going to be rid. And I'd like to observe that in writing, the only thing you're going to get rid of is ink and paper. The fourth step is not about writing.
There is writing involved. But it is the observations and prayers in my experience that changed my life and the other lives I've seen changed by doing this work. If you get your mind hung up on the fourth step being about writing, I think you're going to miss the parts that will change your life, all right? And I think we're going to come to some of that information here shortly. Okay, to face and be rid of the things in ourselves which have been blocking us.
Here's the good news again. I'm the problem. Our liquor was but a symptom so we had to get down to causes and conditions, therefore we started upon a personal inventory. This was step four. A business which takes no regular inventory usually goes broke. Now the businesses that I'm familiar with take a computer update every night, all right? You can think of that as the evening half of the 11th step.
But once a year they do a full tear down inventory. That seems to me to be the reference here. Taking a commercial inventory is a fact finding and a fact facing process is an effort to discover the truth about the stock and trade. One object is to disclose damaged or unsaleable goods to get rid of. It says again, get rid of them promptly and without regret. If the owner of the business is to be successful, he cannot fool himself about values.
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We did exactly the same thing with our lives. Exactly the same thing with our lives. We took stock honestly. First we searched out the flaws in our makeup which caused our failure. There's a good news again. The flaws in my makeup that caused my failure. Being convinced that self manifested in various ways is what had defeated us, we considered its common manifestations. The common manifestations of self that we inventory in step four are resentment, fear and sexual misconduct.
We do not have a sex inventory. There is no direction in this book that says write down all the things from the sexual category that you did that you thought were right and good. That direction is not in here. We do not inventory sex per se. We inventory sexual misconduct only. The format that the book seems to use is it is a series of lists, observations and prayers. The lists are all written. The observations, few are written.
Most are not written and none of the prayers are written. It has been my experience that the unwritten observations and prayers are what are life changing in step four. They are the portions that get rid. I see some people grinning and nodding. I'm glad to hear that. The fact that the actual four steps in this book is big news in a lot of places. I have seen an awful lot of treatment center guides.
I don't want to get off on that but I don't think too much of them. As a matter of fact, I think they are killing people with them. This thing is powerful. I have never seen anything that touches it. Resentment is the number one offender. I would have thought it was sexual misconduct, wouldn't you? I thought that was the one that was eating me up the worst. The book says resentment is the number one offender.
We talked about resentment. It is old anger based on having judged somebody. It destroys. Now there is an interesting word. Destroys. Wow. It destroys. That is a death threat. Death threat. It destroys more alcoholics than anything else. From it stem all forms of spiritual disease. Holy mackerel. Is this bad stuff? It has got to go. For we have been not only mentally and physically ill, we have been spiritually sick and when the spiritual malady, which is another word for sickness, is overcome, we straighten out mentally and physically.
What we are going to do now is search for directions. The assumption is going to be when I sponsor someone that they want what the people who wrote this book had. That was long-term, happy, contented, productive recovery, not thirsty for a drink. If that is what you want, then the assumption will be that if these people say they read something, you will read it. If they say they wrote something, you will write it.
If they say they observed something, you will stop and see if you can see it also. If they say they prayed something, that you will pray it. That is what I ask for from the men that I sponsor because that is what we are going to do. That is all I know how to do. It says in dealing with resentments, we set them on paper. That is a very general description. They are going to tell us quite specifically how to do that.
I don't consider that to be a direction. It says we listed people, institutions, or principles with whom we were angry. Calls for a list. Think about a list for a minute. Think about the word list. I don't know that I have ever seen a list that ran across the page. Think about your last laundry list. Was it not a series of words and phrases that ran, a grocery list, runs down the page, right? A list runs down the page.
If I sponsor somebody, I stop here because it has been my experience that if I give them too much at once, they try to do it all at once. So many of us, certainly me when I was new, read the rest of this chapter, sat down, drew a line under it mentally, and added it all up and said, it says, write the story of your life and make sure to write down every rotten thing you ever did. That is not what it says.
That is not it. At this point, it calls for a list. You are probably wondering what color ink to use and what color paper. Was anybody wondering that? It is amazing. I mean, you guys would say, yeah. I mean, you could say anything. On page 67, it says, when we saw our faults, we listed them, we placed them before us in black and white. Well, that is not specific. That doesn't say black ink and white paper.
That could very easily be black paper and white ink. And I will go either way on that. But I am not dealing with yellow paper and blue ink, I will tell you right now. And do I think you can do one as well on yellow paper and blue ink? No, I do not. Because I am scared to judge these directions. I am afraid to say, well, I don't have to do this one. Because when I open that door, there is no telling what else I am going to let in.
So I am very much a literalist, but I say again, I am not as hung up as I appear to be. It is the content that matters. And I sponsored a guy. He kept saying, I don't believe this is going to work for me. And I kept saying, okay, do you believe that I believe this will work for you?
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And he said, yeah. I said, well, that is good enough. We will go on my belief. Now, here is what I want you to do next. His head was so screwed up, he could not argue with that kind of logic. And he is sober to this day. He went down to the art store and he bought an inch thick of 8 1⁄2 by 11 sheets of black paper and two pens that wrote white ink and got a three hole punch and a loose leaf notebook and he did his four step in black and white.
No problem. No problem. I am up for that. I always offer that option to the men that I sponsor. Black ink, white paper, black paper, white ink, either way. But that is the only two ways because the book gave that leeway. And what most of them do is go down and get a spiral notebook. It is interesting. I have noticed that they tend to get one that has a white cover or a black cover. And I rather like that.
And what I like to ask, I wish I had brought one and I did not. If somebody got a spiral, can I use your notebook here for a minute, George, to just kind of show what I like to do. And then, so we will assume this is a spiral notebook. What I like to do is on this first page, this is the title page, you want to write something like this is my four step. Please put it down. If I find you with it, I will kill you and hide your body.
Okay. Make your point. Okay. And the other thing I would tell you, I do, that is what I tell them. And then this is one page. When you turn it, it is one page. We are into a four column inventory. The first column is going to be, it says we listed people, institutions, or principles with whom we are angry. So this is what I, and I am going to refer to the chart on the facing page. So at the top of the margin on the left-hand page, you write I am resentful at.
In the middle of the left-hand page, you write the cause. About a third of the way across the right-hand page, you write affects my. And you just put the number four above the other half of that second page. We are going to get to that later. Because we are going to use this whole thing as one page. And then what I want them to do, at this point, we are talking about sponsorship. I am sponsoring a fellow right now, and I have his permission to tell every story I tell up here.
I wouldn't tell him if I didn't. And I have his permission to tell you, he is a stay-at-home dad. His wife works. And his child takes a nap from noon to 1, five days a week. I expect him to do at least five 30-minute periods a week on his recovery program. I don't think the recovery program should have a negative effect on any other part of your life. That's what I think. And that's what I expect from him, is five a week.
Now if he had six kids and was working two and a half jobs, it would be a whole different thing. So you have to know something about somebody to talk about how much of this they need to do. There is only 168 hours in a week. And if you work 40 hours, you have a half-hour drive both ways to work, that's another five. And you sleep eight hours a night, and you go to seven meetings a week, and you mow the lawn, and you take the kids to Little League practice, and you eat three times a day, you start adding that up, folks, that doesn't leave much.
So I think we have to be careful about that. I also don't think it's possible to move too quickly through the steps. One of my mentors will take, I think he likes to do this with people who've been, they say they've been in and out of the program. They haven't. They've been in and out of the fellowship. People don't go in and out of the program. People do these 12 steps, stay sober, period. But in and out of the fellowship.
He'll sit down on a Saturday morning and take them into step nine in a day. I don't have any problem with that, but I don't typically do it that way. So what I want them to do is to sit down for a 30-minute period, and I want them scheduled. Typically I ask for three a week with a guy with a wife and a couple of kids and a 40-hour a week job. I want three 30-minute periods a week. I want you to spend, and I want you to schedule them.
And Monday, Wednesday, and Friday is not a schedule. Monday from 6 p.m. to 6.30 p.m. is a schedule. And like anything else on your schedule that's important, it's not subject to cancellation. Might have to change. Holy cow, I didn't know we had the Little League game. Well, great. Instead of doing it 6 o'clock at night, you did it at 9.30. No problem. All right. But I don't want to hear about cancellations.
And I have them call me every Sunday and give me next week's schedule. Because this is about, you know how to eat an elephant, right? One bite at a time, baby. Yeah. One of these days, that sucker's gone. And that's what this four step's about. It's about taking the next bite. That's all we can focus on. Just the next bite. I think a lot of people get started on this four step, and they give themselves the responsibility for completing the four step.
And if that's your mindset, then you hate yourself until it's done. If you and your sponsor can agree on how much time a week you should spend on it, and you spend that time on it, you can feel good about yourself while you're in the process. I think we felt bad about ourselves long enough. Now those are opinions. I apologize for that. So, I want them to take the first five minutes of this 30-minute period in prayer
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and meditation. I recommend that they ask for clarity and courage, clarity to see what God would have them see, courage to write it down, and whatever else they want to do suits me fine, but I want five minutes of prayer and meditation. And then the next 25 minutes, writing down names. And I like them to just puke them, just as fast as you can think of them. And you write down one name, and then you skip one line.
Those were not estimates. Those are exact numbers. One name, skip one line. And they say, now wait, now I get to my dad, I've looked ahead, I've got a lot I want to write. I say, I don't care. One name, one line. That's how we're going to do this. Write a name, skip a line, write a name, skip a line. When you get to the bottom of this page, you must turn, because we've already seen that we're going to need this other side. So you turn the page, write the column headings again, and start puking names again. And it's everybody that you can ever think of that you've been angry with. Everybody. Even if you think you're over it.
Everybody. Everything. There should be a major political party. At least one. Several political figures. The Infernal Revenue Service. Sure. Any number of government agencies. Religious bodies. Communism. Foreign countries. It could be absolutely anything you've ever been angry with. And the rule is, when in doubt, write it out. If you're not sure, put it down. It won't hurt anything. When we get to the end of this, if we discover you don't really have a resentment there, nothing lost.
If you don't put it down, and we don't dig it out of you, the book says it will destroy you. Let's make the safe mistake. When in doubt, write it out. Anything you've ever been angry with, write them down. And I want them to puke them for the first couple of sessions, and forgive me for saying it, they were just as fast as you can write them down. So I had one boy tell me, he says, I've only got three or four.
I said, well that's fine, just sit down and see what you've got. And then I said, when it starts slowing down, when you sit for two or three minutes on a watch and you can't think of another one, there's a direction on the facing page at the bottom that says we went back through our lives. So that would indicate that we begin with the present. I'm living in Nashville. I'm married to Miss Linda. The back room is my home group.
I work for the Meadow Group. And I've got this group of friends and this social club thing. But ten years ago, I was married to wife number one, and I was doing this and doing the other. And then before that, I was living in this other place. And before that, I was in the Air Force. And before that, I was stationed at three different places in the Air Force. So I go back through each of those. And before that, I was in college.
And then before that, I was in high school. So we go back through our lives chronologically. Spending some time at each one, thinking of people, institutions, or principles with whom we were angry. And when we get back to your very earliest memory, we are finished. And I like to tell them, we are not saving a special alcove in Akron at the AA Hall of Fame for your four-step. You are not going to do the greatest four-step ever. It is not going to be complete.
And that's not the assignment. The assignment is to get what we can get. This is peeling of the onion. On my eighth four-step, so over ten years, I discovered resentments that were over 25 years old. And before that, I just couldn't see them until then. And I like to tell them, too, that we are not going to give you a trophy. Our home group does not give a trophy every year for the best four-step. And this is the trophy that we don't give.
If you can't see it, it says, four-step trophy never awarded. This is the trophy you are not going to get. All right? Y'all can have your picture made with us later if you'd like to. Because the point I'm trying to make is, if you task yourself with perfection, you can never go past the first step. You can never go past the first direction on step four. And then the next thing I do is, after they've started, I want to get my hands on their four-step as soon as I can. I give them a grade.
And on that title page, they get a great big F minus in red. Because that's part of it, that you're going to have to do this again. So we're not going to do this perfectly. Let's take that off the table. When they get to that part, I give them the second direction. It's the next sentence. It says, we asked ourselves why we were angry. In the example on page 65, under the cause, it says, his attention to my wife. Told my wife of my mistress, Brown may get my job at the office.
And what I ask them to do is to start with the word office and work backwards.
[00:35:02]
If they work forward, they always get the wrong number. Start with office and work backwards and count those words. That's 19 words, by the way. If they count forward, they miss of a couple times. They don't come up with 19. If you start with office and work backwards, you count those words, it's 19 words. This guy is messing with his old lady, has told her about his girlfriend, and it's after his job. He got 19 words. 19 words is the limit. 19 is not optimum, it is maximum. You have written a name and skipped one line and written a name. So you have the room beside the name that you wrote over to the spiral and the line below it from the margin over to the spiral in which space you can write 19 words or less. It's a summary.
It says things like, left me for another guy. Screwed me in a business deal. Left me for another guy. Next to a high school football coach. Didn't play me as much as I deserved. Left me for another guy. Just… I might need to talk to my sponsor about that. What do you think? Anyway, it's a summary. It's not going to say it was a rainy Wednesday night. No, we're not doing that. We are not doing that. It's a summary.
I am not as hardcore as I appear. This is not set in stone. I tell the guys I sponsor, I say, if you think you've got somebody who's done more than that to you, call me and we'll negotiate whether or not you can write the 20th word. I'd be glad to talk about it. I've never given it up, but I'm willing to talk about it. I've never been asked. You wouldn't ask me, would you? I didn't think so. No. Okay. And so the second column is 19 words or less. And I really like to use that format because there are two reasons. Number one, and most importantly the book called for a list. And lists run down the page. The second one is if we work across the page, if I give somebody these first three directions they will work left to right instead of top to bottom because we're Americans and that's what we do.
And you can't tell them enough times to stop that. So when I do this with somebody I spoon feed this first direction. The other reason is if you work across the page it has a tendency to make that stuff flare up. And that's not what we're trying to do. We are merely getting this on paper so we can figure out how to get rid of it. Because that's what this work is about. My sponsor told me that these 12 steps, he said and I do this in my talk too, I think it's maybe the most important thing that I have to say.
He said you think of yourself as a garbage can. And what we do with these 12 steps is we dump you out. We scrub the can, stand it back upright and we fish through your life. Most of it is trash and we will throw it away. And that's the portion that we're at here. That's what we're at here. We're taking out the trash. The book has said these resentments will kill you. It's going to say that five more times on the next page.
So that's what we're about here. And if we work across the page it tends to make them flare. If we work down the page it's much more analytical. So that's the other reason. But the most important reason is that's what the book said. The book said list, so we make the list. Now we've done the second column. Third column it says on our grudge list, I'm at the top of 65, on our grudge list opposite each name, I'm sorry, on our grudge list we set opposite each name our injuries. Five part multiple choice test. Was it our self-esteem, our security, our ambitions, our personal or sex relations which had been interfered with? Some of these things will only get one of those. Some will get two or three. Some may get all five. Some you may not be able to figure out. Do not give yourself a brain hernia trying to work this out on your own.
Call me and I'll explain to you why it's self-esteem. laughter I don't tell them that part but you know that's the truth. My first ten four step self-esteem got the most ink. Astoundingly enough on my last one it was security. I was really surprised. And I think security is going to be on the next, I'm due. I'm due to start four step pretty quick. And I think that's what I'm going to find on this next one.
It's a pretty interesting process. At any rate, it's a multiple choice test. Doesn't take long. Working down the page. And then I think I've seen more lives change with the directions between the third and fourth columns than everywhere else combined. And so many of us have missed these. This I have a passion for. This is where I see the lights come on in the eyes. Almost every time. At the bottom of the page, 65, we went back through our lives nothing counted but thoroughness and honesty. When we were finished, we considered it carefully. That's a general description. They're going to tell us specifically how to consider it. What to observe. These are observations.
It says the first thing apparent was that this world and its people were often quite wrong.
[00:40:02]
Okay, you can stop and observe that. I won't you taking much time on that. Let's move right along. I already know you got that piece. Now it says to conclude that others were wrong was as far as most of us ever got. Is that your case? Can you observe that in yourself? The people who wrote this book observed that about themselves. Can you see that in you? The usual outcome was that people continued to wrong us and we stayed sore. Is that what's happening to you? Is that your case? Let's observe that. Sometimes it was remorse and we were sore at ourselves. You've been beating yourself up for not being perfect? They have too.
Welcome to the club. The more we fought and tried to have our own way, the worse matters got. If things are going so good in your life, how did you wind up at AA? Uh-huh. Okay. As in war, the victor only seemed to win. Our moments of triumph were short-lived. Boy, that was my case. It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. That's an observation. They observed that.
Can you observe that? Are you aware of any lives that include deep resentment that are not also futile and unhappy? Is that your story? Let's observe that. To the precise extent that we permit these, do we squander the hours that might have been worthwhile? Did you squander hours? Did you lay awake at night and hate them? Did you sit in class planning their demise when you should have been listening?
Did you squander hours that might have been worthwhile, feeding these resentments? It's an observation. I think it's an important one. But with the alcoholic whose hope—do you want to know what your hope is? Here it comes. Your hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience. Maintenance means two things. The first one is that I must keep what I already have. I can't fall back. And growth means what I already have is insufficient.
I don't need to plan to stay sober on my 2002 program this year. I must grow. Maintenance also means that I maintenance my program. I maintenance my vehicle. I keep air in the tires. I change the oil. I wash it occasionally. I wash it rarely. Vacuum it out. Have the engine lubed. I maintenance my spiritual program through prayer and meditation, through attending meetings, attending conferences. I take meetings into jails and prisons and treatment centers.
I'm active in my home group. I try to be a good guy. I'm polite. I read spiritual literature. Some conference approved, some not. I maintenance my spiritual condition like I maintenance my vehicle, which means I maintain it by doing the things that are necessary to keep it running smoothly. But with the alcoholic whose hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience, this business of resentment is infinitely grave.
That's not a misdemeanor. That's a death threat. We found it is fatal. Is that a death threat? Sure it is. I want to tell a story. I went to the fellow that took me through the steps the first time. I said, Jerry, do you remember, and I gave a man's name. I said, if anybody you sponsor ever commits suicide, you will always remember their names. I said, Jerry, he and I had the same sobriety date, plus or minus a month or two.
We both had you for a sponsor. We had the same home group. I saw him five to eight times a week at our group. It looked to me like we had everything the same. At two years sober, he drove home from a meeting without drinking, pulled into his garage, hit the button, and closed the door and left it running and took his own life. I sit here, eight years sober, at peace in my own skin, happy, joyous, and free. What was the difference, Jerry?
I can't see a difference. Jerry said I could not get him to do a four-step. I could not get him to do a four-step. Resentment killed him. I thought about it, and he was right. Every time you'd see this guy, he could not wait to run up to you and tell you what some SOB had just done to him. He was a victim, constantly. He would not do the work to step out of that role. Victims don't get sober. That's an opinion. Forgive me. That's my opinion.
Victims don't get sober. This is where we begin to cease being victims. Resentment killed this man. I saw it. What I'm telling you is that these aren't just words on a page. We found it's fatal. I saw it. I've seen it more than once. For when harboring such feelings, we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the Spirit. Interesting it didn't say having such feelings. Interesting it didn't say having such feelings. I don't think the language in this book is by mistake. To harbor means to nurture, to give us a safe place to,
[00:45:00]
all right, to comfort, which means I think that when I have a resentment I'm okay if I'm not harboring it. We're coming to the directions for not harboring resentments. I think it's an important difference. It says, for when harboring such feelings we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the spirit. The insanity of alcohol returns and we drink again. With us, to drink is to die, a death threat. If we were to live, there's another death threat. You only have to do this if you want to live, all right. Everybody else is dismissed.
Okay, if we were to live we had to be free of anger. The grouch and the brainstorm were not for us. I think it's one of the most misunderstood sentences in the book. In the 1930s, a guy named Walt Disney invented a concept he called brainstorming, where they would sit around and spit out ideas on a subject and that's how they wrote Mickey Mouse cartoons. He named it brainstorming and we all know brainstorming as that kind of activity where you sit around and have a real creative process. The word brainstorm in 1935 meant rage. In a 1930s dictionary that I looked it up in, it said transient, violent, mental outburst. That's rage, all right. So we're not asking you to give up your creativity. I'm told I made the master's presence. I can tell you one thing for sure about God. He's creative, okay. I know that for sure. So we're not asking you to get up your creativity. But anger comes, according to the book as I understand it, in two forms. The grouch or the slow burn, you know, we just sort of sit there and seethe. And the brainstorm or rage, the detonation, all right. The grouch and the brainstorm were not for us. Now you want to hear something thin, listen to this.
They may be the dubious luxury of normal men. Oh, is that thin? My goodness. But for alcoholics, these things are poison, a death threat. They're going to kill you. All right. We turned back to the list for it held the key to the future. I'd like to note that we have made a tremendous number of observations. We have written nothing. And these are important things. What we have been doing here is establishing value. I'm a salesman by trade. And a good salesman will never ever mention price until he's established value. And the reason that we have gone to this tremendous trouble here with this indictment of resentment on the one, two pages before, resentment is the number one offender, it destroys, and so on, is that the price is high. The price is very high. And we hope we have established the high value that it will kill you if you don't. So that's been the purpose, in my opinion, of this whole thing. Bill was a salesman too. And this looks like great sales material to me. So now we're going to turn back to the list. We have just followed a tremendous number of directions that did not call for writing. We haven't even looked at the list. We just made these observations. It says we were prepared to look at it from an entirely different angle. Well, it says they prepared. It does not say how they prepared. Consequently, I'm not sure that it matters how you prepare. But if I sponsor you, I'll tell you I expect you to prepare. You might want to shake out your writer's cramp, get up and walk around your chair two or three times, go in the bathroom, wash your face, sit back down in your chair and announce that you have been preparing and you are now prepared.
All right? I do not care how you prepare. I expect to be told how you prepared when you get to this direction. All right? Because we're not here to judge these things. We're going to do them. I do that tongue-in-cheek. I also expect them to prepare. All right? To look at it from an entirely different angle. And the big surprise is we're not going to look at what I did wrong yet. It says we began to see that the world and its people really dominated us. Let's spend some time and go back to your list and take a look at how these things dominated you. Because that's what it says they saw. You said you'd observe what they observed if you could. Let's take a look at your list and see how these things dominated you. Did you plan your life so that you'd be around these people that you resented so you could sit and hate them? Did you squander the hours laying awake at night and whatever working on them? Did you plan your life so you'd never be around them because you felt less than when you were around them? Did they dominate you because they did nasty things to you in public and made you feel bad and there were all kinds of people you didn't want to be around because they made you feel less than? How did these things dominate you? Let's spend some time and review your list and see how these things dominated you. I think it's important. It says in that state the wrongdoings of others, fancied or real, which is to say some of this only happened in my head, had the power to actually kill. Oh, a death threat. Another one. They're serious about this. How could we escape? We saw that these resentments must be mastered. Time out. Do you see that? They observed that. Do you? We could not wish them away any more than alcohol.
[00:50:05]
This was our course. We realized that the people who wronged us were perhaps spiritually sick. One of my mentors defined spiritually sick as cut off from God. I have something the angels don't have. I have the ability to turn my back on God and go right back to doing it my way anytime I want to. Cut off from God. And what I asked someone I sponsored to do is to say, I want you to sit now and think of the two or three worst things you ever did. I'll give you a minute. Go ahead and get them in your mind. I'm not going to ask you what they are now. Get them in your mind.
Okay. Were you not spiritually sick to have done those things? Had you been walking in the sunlight of the Spirit, in conscious contact with the God of your understanding, in that grace and love, could you have done those things? Absolutely not. Would you have even thought of doing them? Probably not. That's right. You were spiritually sick. You were cut off from God or you could not have done those things. And these people who wronged you also were cut off from God. For people who are walking in the sunlight of the Spirit do not do those things to other of God's kids. They just don't. Realize is a wonderful word.
I have a good friend in Louisville, Kentucky who does a lot of this who says the word realize is interesting. You can know something but when you realize it, it becomes real for you. I can head knowledge know something for a long time but when I heart knowledge it, when I realize it, it becomes real for me. I think this is one of the most powerful directions in the book. This is the beginning of the forgiveness process. It is my experience that forgiveness is not something I do when I forgive someone. It's not something I do, it's something I receive. And I'm going to try to talk about that a little bit. And so what I ask them to do is to go through their list one at a time and prayerfully ask God to help them realize that these people who wronged them one at a time were spiritually sick and not SOBs. One at a time. I got 160 names on the list. It's going to take a while. Great. We got plenty of time because at this point you are no longer harboring the resentment. No longer are you harboring it. This is the beginning of the forgiveness process. And I had a fellow the other day tell me he says, I don't believe God's got that much power. I said, isn't it wonderful that believing that God has that power isn't part of the assignment? I didn't ask you to believe it. I asked you to do it. Thank you very much. And he did it and it worked. Isn't that great? And when I'm coaching someone through the work, I give them the first step, I'm sorry, with the first piece, the list. When they've done that, I give them the second column. When I've done that, I give them the third. And then I do this much that we just did here. There's the fourth session. And when they've completed that list, go to the top of the facing page. Though we did not like their symptoms and the way these disturbed us, they like ourselves were sick too. I'd like to break that sentence down. It's a little bit confusing. Their symptom, the symptom of their spiritual sickness is they did things that left me with resentments. And the way they disturbed me is the resentment. And then the great truth, they like ourselves were sick too. That's so important. I've told it to us twice in two sentences. Important stuff. And then it says, we ask God, now that sounds like a prayer to me, that we ask God's are almost always prayers, all right? We ask God to help us show them the same tolerance, pity, and patience we would cheerfully grant a sick friend. We're going to pray for these people. I like to add something that I found in the more will be disclosed section, which is the story section, by the way, in the back of the book. And I do this advisedly. But I found it in my big book. I've got friends that got sober in the second edition that don't use this because it wasn't in the second edition. But it's helped me a lot. And there's the story of freedom from bondage. The lady's talking about resentment against her mother. And she's blamed her mother for her lack of education, everything that's wrong in the universe, and what's wrong with her kids, and everything. And beginning at the bottom of page 551, she says, let me see here if I can find it. One morning, I realized I had to get rid of it. That's the resentment against her mom. For my reprieve, which by the way, if you don't know, a reprieve is a stay of execution.
This is a death threat. My reprieve was running out. And if I didn't get rid of it, I was going to get drunk. And I didn't want to get drunk anymore. And my prayer that morning, I asked God to point out to me some way to be free of this resentment. During the day, a friend of mine brought me some magazines to take to a hospital group I was interested in. I looked through them. A banner across one featured an article by a prominent clergyman in which I caught the word of
[00:55:00]
resentment. I want to observe something here. She took God the problem. And then what did she do? She's not trying to help somebody else. She didn't stay focused on the problem. She tried to figure out something. I don't know what this hospital group she was doing. I don't know what kind of magazines these were. But I know she was going out of her way to do something for somebody else when she got her answer. And I think there's a principle that underlies that, that if I stay focused on the problem, it'll grow. Dr. Paul was right about that.
And my job is to talk to God about this is what I got. Please take it. And now who can I serve? What can I do for somebody else? And that's what she was doing. She was trying to do something for somebody else when her answer just showed up. He said, in effect, if you have a resentment you want to be free of, all right, caveat, if you want to be free of, if you will pray for the person or thing that you resent, you will be free. If you will ask in prayer for everything you want for yourself to be given to them, you will be free. Ask for their health, their prosperity, their happiness, and you will be free. Even when you don't really want it for them and your words or your prayers are only words, and you don't mean it, go ahead and do it anyway. Powerful. I've added that. What I asked the men that I sponsored to do said, now we're going to continue with 30 minute periods. But now you can do this in the shower, you can do it when you're driving your car, you do it anytime you think of one of these people. God, please help me show George the same tolerance, pity and patience I would cheerfully grant a sick friend. And then I pray for him. I say God and I asked that his hair doesn't fall out and that his wife is fantastic in bed, that his kids go to school on scholarship, that he wins the Florida lottery, that he gets promoted at work, that his lawn grows lush and green but it grows so slow he only has to mow it once a year, that he has a major spiritual experience and walks humbly and and joyfully in your presence. Get your creative self out here and let's ask all the things that you like for yourself for this guy. So interestingly enough, if we add those two prayers together, the first one is I ask God to help me show him. So I'm praying for me, on the other one I'm praying for him. I'm praying for both people involved. So forgiveness is not something I do in my experience, it's something I receive. I used to say yeah I forgive you. Oh but boy if you ever drop the soap you might be smart to let it lay. I mean if I can sneak up behind you one of these days I'm gonna hurt you, right? I'm looking for a way to get you but I forgive you but I'm gonna get you.
That's not it, that is not it. Forgiveness of someone else is a gift from God that I receive. I got here locked up and what you do is you taught me to open up to receive these gifts because when I've forgiven him I'm free. I have received freedom and that's how I get it. I think of resentment as ice around my heart and what we do here in prayer is hold the icy heart up to the sunlight of the Spirit and maybe based on the thickness of the ice because of how long I've had this thing and how much I've nurtured it and maybe depending on how close I can hold it to the sunlight and how long, eventually it will melt and eventually it'll be true and I tell the guys I sponsor I say if you need to preface your prayers by saying okay God it's me again and I don't mean a word of this but that idiot you've got sponsoring me told me to do it and I'm gonna do it just to prove it won't work. If you need to start there I'm good with it. We're not asking you to lie to God, that is not what this is about. What we're asking you to do is to hold the icy heart up to the sunlight of the Spirit and when you finish the prayer what you do is ask yourself one simple question do I mean that? If the answer is yes you go on to the next name. If you really mean all that stuff for him go on to the next name. If you don't mean it I'm sorry that's if you don't mean it go to the next name. If you do mean it put a checkmark by that one and go to the next name and come straight down. We're not going to focus on the first one stay there let's done we're gonna come all the way through the list and when you get to the end of the list we're gonna start again with just the names that aren't checked. Did I make that clear? I got myself confused there in the middle. Okay and we're gonna do that until it's done and I don't care how long it takes. The book says this will kill you it says it about seven times. This is maybe the most important thing I've done is to get free of hating God's kids. How can I possibly hope to walk in the sunlight of the Spirit carrying grudges against his kids? Can't do it. It's important stuff and I've got I've got two men I have the privilege of sponsoring right now one of them's got five years one I got ten I just picked him up and they're at this piece of the work right now both of them and I've told him I don't care And I've told them, I don't care if this takes months.
And I want you to do it in 30-minute sessions. One guy's doing five a week, one's doing three, based on what I know about them. And when you're driving the car and when you're in the shower, and any time you think about
[01:00:02]
them, you keep doing this. Because what we're doing here is we're digging poison out. That's what this thing is about. Our program is kind of like going to the dentist. We got to drill before we can fill. We got to get this poison out of here before we can fill with the good stuff. If we just fill with the good stuff, it gets sicker and sicker in there, and eventually it explodes. So we got to get the poison out first.
And this is the beginning of that. This is the opening of the flower. This is where we begin to receive the forgiveness process. And this is how we get rid of the resentments. And then it says, when a person offended, we said to ourselves, this is a sick man, how can I be helpful to him? God save me from being angry, thy will be done. There's another prayer. This is what I'm supposed to do when somebody makes me mad right now.
As I'm supposed to say to myself, this is a sick man, how can I be helpful to him? God save me from being angry, thy will be done. That's my marching orders. That's how I go on from here. I said that the Four Step was a series of lists and observations and prayers. At this point, we've listed the people, institutions, and principles of whom we were angry. We observed the cause. We observed what part of self had affected.
And we made all these observations about resentments. And now, we have gotten rid of them. For having followed these directions, they will now be gone. They'll be gone. And if you have not done this process, your body will be lighter. You will feel lighter. I don't know how to explain it any better. I see some people nodding who know exactly what I'm talking about. You will feel lighter. And you will not want to feel heavy with those things again.
And then it says, we avoid retaliation or argument. We wouldn't treat sick people that way. If we do, we destroy our chance of being helpful. We cannot be helpful to all people, but at least God will show us how to take a kindly and tolerant view of each and every one. Page 77 at the top tells us what our real purpose is. It says our real purpose is to fit ourselves to be of maximum service to God and the people about us.
I can't very well do that if I'm retaliating against somebody or if I'm still carrying a resentment against them. I thwart my own real purpose. And then it says, referring to our list again. Okay, now we're going back to the list. It says, putting out of our minds the wrongs others had done. That's difficult if I still hate them for it. That's impossible if I still hate them. If I've followed these directions to this point, I'm cleaned on that.
And putting out of my mind what they've done is very, very easy. We resolutely look for our own mistakes. I hear people say, I look for my part. That's not what it says. If I'm looking for my part, I'm saying he has a part. And if I've made these observations and prayers, his part's gone. I'm not looking for my part. It's not what it says. I'm looking for my mistakes. I made mistakes. Now, I was abused as a child.
And that child didn't do anything to deserve that abuse. But I made a mistake. My mistake was I nurtured that resentment for 30 years. There is a mistake in all of these for me somehow. It says, we resolutely look for our own mistakes. Where had we been? Selfish, dishonest, self-seeking, and frightened. Though a situation had not been entirely our fault, we tried to disregard the other person involved entirely.
Once again, I don't think you can do that if you haven't done the prayer work, if you're not clean. Where were we to blame? The inventory was ours, not the other man's. When we saw our faults, we listed them. We placed them before us in black and white. It's really easy to be fluid with that particular paragraph. I like to use this as a fourth column beside each one to write what your mistake was, what did you do wrong.
I've got a mentor who likes to do this, like it says here, rather more specifically. He makes a list of his faults on a separate piece of paper. Once again, I think it's content and not format. The content. I like to do the fourth column because it's helpful when we get to step eight, when we start looking for the things. We can see where our mistakes were, who did we hurt here. If I sponsor somebody, what I do is I make them use this as a fourth column.
That's one where we had the number four. Then it says, interestingly enough, we admitted our wrongs honestly and were willing to set these matters straight. That sounds like step eight, doesn't it? I think steps four and eight are a good bit more closely related than four and five. My four steps do not contain some of the worst things I ever did. The four steps are very specific and it doesn't call for them.
The fifth step did, so I didn't get completely off the hook on that, but I tried real hard. We have found here a series of lists, observations, and prayers about resentment. At this point, we're about 90% through the fourth step. We've only done the first third of it, but the rest of this stuff has a tendency to move pretty quickly. I'll do a little bit more here and then we'll take another break.
[01:05:01]
It says, notice that the word fear is bracketed alongside the difficulties with Mr. Brown, Mrs. Jones, the employer, and the wife. This short word somehow touches about every aspect of our lives. It was an evil and corroding thread. This is the indictment of fear. This is the piece that's telling me fear has got to go at any price. The fabric of our existence was shot through with it. It said in motion, trains of circumstances which brought us misfortune we felt we didn't deserve, but did not we ourselves set the ball rolling.
Sometimes we think fear ought to be classed with stealing. It seems to cause more trouble. That's pretty direct. I think they're trying to tell me that fear is bad news. We reviewed our fears thoroughly. That's the general description. They're going to tell me rather specifically how to go about that. It says we put them on paper, even though we had no resentment in connection with them. For the purposes of that sentence, there are two kinds of fears.
There are the ones that have a resentment attached to them and the ones that don't. What I like to do at this point is to have somebody turn three or four pages into four step. Actually at the point where they have finished writing that first column, I ask them to carry a pencil and a piece of paper all the time, because you're going to be in the grocery store and you're going to see that candle over and say, oh, his head looked just like that.
Well, just write it down and we'll add it to the list when you get back to it next time. Okay, catch up. Let's turn a couple of pages, just to have room in case you're thinking some more before we finish this fourth step, no problem, and let's have a list of fears. It looks to me like in the fear inventory that this is the only portion that's written, so I need a list of your fears. They can write one and skip a line is a pretty good way to go.
You can use the facing page as there's nothing else written in this one. List of fears. Are you afraid of snakes, spiders, homosexuality? A lot of men are afraid of holding babies. They're afraid of babies. They're afraid of holding babies. Are you afraid of failure? Are you afraid of success? Fear of flying? They're not afraid of flying, George. It's crashing and burning that they're afraid of. The flying is okay.
Are you afraid of death? What are you afraid of? Let's list them. Let's have a list of them. And then when you can't think of any more, let's review your resentment inventory and see if you can spot some more. So what we need at this point is a list of your fears. This part is written. Typically on the resentment inventory first trip through, I think the shortest list I ever saw I thought was complete was about 40 resentments.
It was all this guy had. The longest list I ever saw was about 450. And that list was incomplete. This guy hated everybody and wished there was more of them. I mean, he really did. Typically it runs somewhere between about 60 or 80 and about 150 or 60 is about what I usually see. But that's just sort of a whatever. I don't worry about it too much. But I ask a lot of questions that will bring up more, I think the list is short.
Fears will be dramatically shorter than that. And I try to warn them about that. Sometimes it will be 8 or 10, rarely more than 20. And you may have 110 and that's wonderful. But I think it's really important, I had a discussion with a guy one time and he said the reason he looks both ways before he steps off the curb is he has a fear that he'll get run over by a bus. He may have. But I look both ways before I step off the curb because I intuitively know that's what an intelligent person does.
That is not a fear. Fear is that thing that grips you in here. Fear is that kind of thing. So let's be sure we know what we're talking about here. And then it says, we asked ourselves why we had them. I will be eternally grateful that they answered the question for I had no idea why I had the fears. And it says, wasn't it because self-reliance failed us? And I asked them to go through that fear list and ask yourself this simple question.
Is it because self-reliance failed you? If you were totally and completely 100% God-reliant, would you have that fear? No. None of them. Fear of death? No. Snakes? No. I wouldn't be afraid of anything. You would still have flying George, yeah I know. Your case is different. I know it is. All right. It says, self-reliance was good as far as it went but it didn't go far enough. Some of us once had great self-confidence but it didn't fully solve the fear problem or any other.
And when it made us cocky, it was worse. We're going to take a lunch break right now. It's about 11.30. We will reconvene at 12.30. Is that good for everybody? Great. 12.30. I want to thank you all so much. I'm having a ball.