When I was working on the Eight Step with my sponsor, she suggested that I organize my thoughts using the column format found in many books on recovery. I put the name of the person I had harmed in the first column, our relationship in the second, my harmful actions in the third, the reason I should make amends in the fourth, and the status of my willingness in the last column.

A pattern emerged.

The same character defects were turning up over and over again in the third column. I had become aware of these defects in Step Four, but their truly destructive impact did not really sink in until I began to think of making amends. I had to pause and reconsider Steps Four through Seven. Was I really ready for Step Eight? Or had I just learned why it is said that recovery is a continuing process—one from which we will never be graduated, but one which can continue to lead us to progress.

—Anonymous

Tags: Personal Responsibility

When someone disagreed with me, I used to take it as a personal failure. If I only had the right words. Other people seemed to be happier than I was. More self-confident. They seemed to have all the answers. So I faked it, and many people thought that I was happy and easygoing.

If they were so wrong about how I felt, could it be possible that I was mistaken about them? Were they happy? Were they putting on the same sort of act that I was? Was I comparing my insides to their outsides?

If I compare myself with someone else, I will lose. He'll be richer. She'll be more popular. I'm only responsible for myself. I should be taking inventory of my progress, comparing myself to what I once was and to what I understand God wants me to be.

—Anonymous

Tags: Personal Responsibility

Blaming my own discomfort on outside events, on someone else's behavior, is a way of denying what might be the real cause—my own attitudes. I can play the victim ("If you had a job/wife/situation like mine, you'd _____ too."), or I can accept responsibility for my own life and begin to get my act together.

Of course, if I had the personal resources to have my act together, I wouldn't be a person in need of recovery. I need to realize my powerlessness and let God take charge. He can get my act together.

I can choose to let Him be in charge or not. I am responsible for that choice—and the consequences that flow from it.

—Anonymous

Tags: Personal Responsibility

If we have been thorough about our personal inventory, we have written down a lot. We have listed and analyzed our resentments. We have begun to comprehend their futility and their fatality. We have commenced to see their terrible destructiveness. We have begun to learn tolerance, patience and good will toward all men, even our enemies, for we look on them as sick people. We have listed the people we have hurt by our conduct, and are willing to straighten out the past if we can.

[F]aith did for us what we could not do for ourselves. We hope that you are convinced now that God can remove whatever self-will has blocked you off from Him. If you have already made a decision, and an inventory of your grosser handicaps, you have made a good beginning. That being so you have swallowed and digested some big chucks of truth about yourself.

—AA's Big Book

Tags: Personal Responsibility

A friend held her hand up to her face, her palm touching her nose, and said, "I need to remember that my business is from here back." That's true for all of us.

I've turned my life and my will (not someone else's) over to God's care. I've inventoried my personal characteristics (not someone else's) and asked God to work on my (not someone else's) character defects. I make amend for the hurts that I (not someone else) have caused. I continue to take personal inventory and, when I (not someone else) have been wrong, promptly admitted it.

The process of my recovery is about me and my relationship to God. It's not about anyone else.

—Anonymous

Tags: Personal Responsibility