The other day I saw Roger Ebert, a feisty film critic for the Chicago Tribune, write honestly about his several decades in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous. Sure the program relies on anonymity and at the same time by speaking freely of the successful support found in AA maybe another troubled drinker will join us.
One of the peculiar moments in working through the Twelve Steps is Step Three: “We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood him” (59). Shortly after I qualified for and joined AA, some folks shared with me that “will” can mean obsessive thinking. Imagine you have a body that willy nilly craves a certain substance. And after your body makes contact with that substance, all bets are off. This biology will run its course–no matter what. And an obsessive mind is a perfect companion for such a physiology.
Now if someone quits drinking, removes the physical craving, then only the obsessive mind is left. In AA parlance this is called living as a dry drunk. Picture a person obsessing about work, food, relationships, sex, or whatever. Simply replacing one addiction with a more socially acceptable one is not the most fun way to live. That was me for nine and a half years. Ultimately then extreme drinking (soft phrasing for alcoholism) has little to do with actually drinking. Doing so just fulfills the expected trajectory of someone living with this physiology. Real alcoholism is the behavior without drinking. Because living authentically sober, and not just dry, means taking the obsessive and extremely self-centered pursuit of fulfilling that physical craving and turning this energy into altruism–helping others without any expectation.
To find relief from this limited state of living–just quitting without looking at behavior–is turning willful thinking over to a more balanced style is at the heart of step three. Other AA folks have shared with me that “our lives” as it appears in step three means “action.” So, step three eggs on anyone in early sobriety to stop obsessing (controlling) their lives away; instead, look to a more graceful source of energy to motivate your thoughts (will) and actions (lives). This is called turning it over. And to do so is a very conscious decision.
Once this decision is made, a path has been chosen. In fact, a type of incision has been made on the path not chosen–continuing to drink. Once the decision to live life beyond self-centered motives, a change happens. “Established on such a footing we became less and less interested in ourselves, in our little plans and designs” (63). The cut–the conscious incision–is made on the past. Then God (as any person may perceive this spiritual source of new power) forgives the wreckage behavior and regret becomes inspiration rather than humiliation. It’s true that our drinking stories inspire others to change their life, too. This is not always a literal return from fatal drinking, but it’s always a return from emotional withering. Addiction robs any person of a real life–one lived in emotional honesty.
Making a conscious decision to “turn it over” can create real change swiftly in a person’s life. “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 hereafter. We were reborn” (63). This phrase “reborn” could spark some alarm for me if I associate the language with, say, born again religious folks here in the United States. But tonight I heard what the definition might mean more intentionally.
She coiffed her short silver hair in a cute haircut. Wearing gold wire-rimmed glasses, blue jeans, sneakers, and a yellow sweater, she looked like somebody’s cool grandmother. Jane told our group of thirty women, at a meeting in an upscale San Francisco neighborhood, that she felt reborn. A woman who appeared seven or eight months pregnant had just spoken for twenty minutes or so. Jane looked at her and reflected aloud that she’d heard babies birth themselves when their lungs are ready for real air. Jane admitted that she too felt like a new born arriving to this earth ready to truly breathe for the first time. At 59-years-old she had always laughed at and accepted herself as the well-known drunk. But finally she had arrived to take serious her recovery from abusing herself with a substance for so many decades; swiftly she was birthing a new self. Her eyes looked vibrantly clear, her skin healthy, and her emotions honest, powerful. Yes, a new power to give the ease back in a day of playful, artful and purposeful living. Reborn at 59-years-old.
