Step Seven
"Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings."
Since this Step so
specifically concerns itself with humility, we should pause here to
consider what humility is and what the practice of it can mean to us.
Indeed, the attainment of greater humility is the foundation principle
of each of A.A.'s Twelve Steps. For without some degree of humility, no
alcoholic can stay sober at all. Nearly all A.A.'s have found, too,
that unless they develop much more of this precious quality than may be
required just for sobriety, they still haven't much chance of becoming
truly happy. Without it, they cannot live to much useful purpose, or,
in adversity, be able to summon the faith that can meet any emergency.
Humility, as a word and as an ideal, has a very bad time of it in our
world. Not only is the idea misunderstood; the word itself is often
intensely disliked. Many people haven't even a nodding acquaintance
with humility as a way of life. Much of the everyday talk we hear, and
a great deal of what we read, highlights man's pride in his own
achievements. With great intelligence, men of science have been forcing
nature to disclose her secrets. The immense resources now being
harnessed promise such a quantity of material blessings that many have
come to believe that a man-made millennium lies just ahead. Poverty
will disappear, and there will be such abundance that everybody can
have all the security and personal satisfactions he desires. The theory
seems to be that once everybody's primary instincts are satisfied,
there won't be much left to quarrel about. The world will then turn
happy and be free to concentrate on culture and character. Solely by
their own intelligence and labor, men will have shaped their own
destiny. Certainly no alcoholic, and surely no member of A.A., wants to
deprecate material achievement.
Nor do we enter into debate with the many who still so passionately
cling
to the belief that to satisfy our basic natural desires is the main
object
of life. But we are sure that no class of people in the world ever made
a worse mess of trying to live by this formula than alcoholics. For
thousands
of years we have been demanding more than our share of security,
prestige,
and romance. When we seemed to be succeeding, we drank to dream still
greater
dreams. When we were frustrated, even in part, we drank for oblivion.
Never
was there enough of what we thought we wanted. In all these strivings,
so many of them well-intentioned, our crippling handicap had been our
lack
of humility. We had lacked the perspective to see that
character-building
and spiritual values had to come first, and that material satisfactions
were not the purpose of living. Quite characteristically, we had gone
all
out in confusing the ends with the means. Instead of regarding the
satisfaction
of our material desires as the means by which we could live and
function
as human beings, we had taken these satisfactions to be the final end
and
aim of life. True, most of us thought good character was desirable, but
obviously good character was something one needed to get on with the
business
of being self-satisfied. With a proper display of honesty and morality,
we'd stand a better chance of getting what we really wanted. But
whenever
we had to choose between character and comfort, the character-building
was
lost in the dust of our chase after what we thought was happiness.
Seldom
did we look at character-building as something desirable in itself,
something
we would like to strive for whether our instinctual needs were met or
not.
We never thought of making honesty, tolerance, and true love of man and
God the daily basis of living. This lack of anchorage to any permanent
values, this blindness to the true purpose of our lives, produced
another
bad result. For just so long as we were convinced that we could live
exclusively
by our own individual strength and intelligence, for just that long was
a working faith in a Higher Power impossible. This was true even when
we
believed that God existed. We could actually have earnest religious
beliefs
which remained barren because we were still trying to play God
ourselves.
As long as we placed self reliance first, a genuine reliance upon a
Higher
Power was out of the question. That basic ingredient of all humility, a
desire to seek and do God's will, was missing. For us, the process of
gaining
a new perspective was unbelievably painful. It was only by repeated
humiliations
that we were forced to learn something about humility. It was only at
the
end of a long road, marked by successive defeats and humiliations, and
the final crushing of our self sufficiency, that we began to feel
humility
as something more than a condition of groveling despair. Every newcomer
in Alcoholics Anonymous is told, and soon realizes for himself, that
his
humble admission of powerlessness over alcohol is his first step toward
liberation from its paralyzing grip. So it is that we first see
humility
as a necessity. But this is the barest beginning. To get completely
away
from our aversion to the idea of being humble, to gain a vision of
humility
as the avenue to true freedom of the human spirit, to be willing to
work
for humility as something to be desired for itself, takes most of us a
long,
long time. A whole lifetime geared to self-centeredness cannot be set
in
reverse all at once. Rebellion dogs our every step at first. When we
have
finally admitted without reservation that we are powerless over
alcohol, we are apt to breathe a great sigh of relief, saying, "Well,
thank God that's over! I'll never have to go through that again!" Then
we learn, often to our consternation, that this is only the first
milestone on the new road we are walking. Still goaded by sheer
necessity, we reluctantly come to grips
with those serious character flaws that made problem drinkers of us in
the
first place, flaws which must be dealt with to prevent a retreat into
alcoholism
once again. We will want to be rid of some of these defects, but in
some
instances this will appear to be an impossible job from which we
recoil.
And we cling with a passionate persistence to others which are just as
disturbing
to our equilibrium, because we still enjoy them too much. How can we
possibly
summon the resolution and the willingness to get rid of such
overwhelming
compulsions and desires? But again we are driven on by the inescapable
conclusion which we draw from A.A. experience, that we surely must try
with
a will, or else fall by the wayside. At this stage of our progress we
are
under heavy pressure and coercion to do the right thing. We are obliged
to choose between the pains of trying and the certain penalties of
failing
to do so. These initial steps along the road are taken grudgingly, yet
we
do take them. We may still have no very high opinion of humility as a
desirable
personal virtue, but we do recognize it as a necessary aid to our
survival. But when we have taken a square look at some of these
defects, have discussed them with another, and have become willing to
have them removed, our thinking about humility commences to have a
wider meaning. By this time in all probability
we have gained some measure of release from our more devastating
handicaps.
We enjoy moments in which there is something like real peace of mind.
To
those of us who have hitherto known only excitement, depression, or
anxiety--in
other words, to all of us--this newfound peace is a priceless gift.
Something
new indeed has been added. Where humility had formerly stood for a
forced
feeding on humble pie, it now begins to mean the nourishing ingredient
which
can give us serenity. This improved perception of humility starts
another
revolutionary change in our outlook. Our eyes begin to open to the
immense
values which have come straight out of painful ego-puncturing. Until
now,
our lives have been largely devoted to running from pain and problems.
We
fled from them as from a plague. We never wanted to deal with the fact
of
suffering. Escape via the bottle was always our solution.
Character-building
through suffering might be all right for saints, but it certainly
didn't
appeal to us. Then, in A.A., we looked and listened. Everywhere we saw
failure and misery transformed by humility into priceless assets. We
heard
story after story of how humility had brought strength out of weakness.
In every case, pain had been the price of admission into a new life.
But
this admission price had purchased more than we expected. It brought a
measure
of humility, which we soon discovered to be a healer of pain. We began
to
fear pain less, and desire humility more than ever. During this process
of learning more about humility, the most profound result of all was
the
change in our attitude toward God. And this was true whether we had
been
believers or unbelievers. We began to get over the idea that the Higher
Power was a sort of bush-league pinch hitter, to be called upon only in
an emergency. The notion that we would still live our own lives, God
helping
a little now and then, began to evaporate. Many of us who had thought
ourselves religious awoke to the limitations of this attitude. Refusing
to place God first, we had deprived ourselves of His help. But now the
words "Of myself
I am nothing, the Father doeth the works" began to carry bright promise
and meaning. We saw we needn't always be bludgeoned and beaten into
humility.
It could come quite as much from our voluntary reaching for it as it
could
from unremitting suffering. A great turning point in our lives came
when
we sought for humility as something we really wanted, rather than as
something
we must have. It marked the time when we could commence to see the full
implication of Step Seven: "Humbly asked Him to remove our
shortcomings." As we approach the actual taking of Step Seven, it might
be well if we
A.A.'s inquire once more just what our deeper objectives are. Each of
us
would like to live at peace with himself and with his fellows. We would
like to be assured that the grace of God can do for us what we cannot
do
for ourselves. We have seen that character defects based upon
shortsighted
or unworthy desires are the obstacles that block our path toward these
objectives.
We now clearly see that we have been making unreasonable demands upon
ourselves,
upon others, and upon God. The chief activator of our defects has been
self-centered fear--primarily fear that we would lose something we
already
possessed or would fail to get something we demanded. Living upon a
basis
of unsatisfied demands, we were in a state of continual disturbance and
frustration. Therefore, no peace was to be had unless we could find a
means
of reducing these demands. The difference between a demand and a simple
request is plain to anyone. The Seventh Step is where we make the
change
in our attitude which permits us, with humility as our guide, to move
out
from ourselves toward others and toward God. The whole emphasis of Step
Seven is on humility. It is really saying to us that we now ought to be
willing to try humility in seeking the removal of our other
shortcomings just as we did when we admitted that we were powerless
over alcohol, and came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves
could restore us to sanity.
If that degree of humility could enable us to find the grace by which
such
a deadly obsession could be banished, then there must be hope of the
same
result respecting any other problem we could possibly have.