Step 11 Reflection 2009

Prayer and meditation is essential to the cultivation of recovery and wellness.  It is daily process of behavioral planning, programming, and the spiritual life.  This is a life skill that is indispensable and rewarding.  It is a practice that can result in a high functioning life.

Building the practice - In the beginning I often did not feel anything out it, understand it, get anything, or do it very well.  But, I was beginning and building the practice and got a sense of constructive effort and felt a sense of growth by looking at the cumulative effort. 

Building a better self - When I pray I am connecting to God for love and power but I am just as much talking to me and telling myself that with God's help I resolve to conduct myself effectively in the behaviors that are most critical to good living.  Prayer and meditation is the process of amending the character.   It is the process of building effective thinking, emotional control, and good behaviors.  This deliberate process of seeking better living paradigms re-forms the value-desire dynamic and facilitates a joy-filled life and cultivates a high functioning life that is greater than good.


Building a connection to God - When I pray and meditate I am striving to move out of my self centeredness and toward God and other centeredness.  I build a spiritual life and place this in the correct priority as the most important action in the process of wellness cultivation.  This comes through improved conscious contact with God.  This is the process of divine filiation.  It is what we are designed for.

Building strength of faith - I had been thinking about the placebo effect and faith.  I had thought about how critical it is to build faith on a daily basis through prayer and meditation so that when trouble comes and faith is needed most critically it has been cultivated to the extent that is efficacious. I thought of how this is a way one would actualize the Placebo Effect.

"Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God.
Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
Keep on doing what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me. Then the God of peace will be with you." 

Philippians 4:6-9

A Sense of Direction

The emphasis of my 12 Step work must be upon God and His will.  I must be careful that I do not lean too heavily on my own efforts or on the 12 Step fellowship.  Here is a visual to describe this.

I had often heard the 5 things to do to stay sober (particularly when exiting a treatment center).  They are usually some variation of these.

1. Go to Meetings 
2. Get a Sponsor 
3. Read the Big Book
4. Pray and Meditate (or Work The Steps)
5. Do Service Work (or Help Others)
   

The pyramid illustrates how much power I get from them.  The largest part of the pyramid is the base, in service and the steps.  The smallest parts of the pyramid are meetings and sponsor. 

The power I get through doing the work is most effective if I am doing it in the spirit of service to God and others.  This is where most of my efforts should be.  At the beginning I was upside down in that most of my time was spent in meetings and with my sponsor and the Big Book.  Later I often got this upside down in continuing to place my dependence mostly upon making meetings and asking my sponsor to solve my problems.  To keep my experience alive and healthy (vital), I must be of maximum service to God and my fellows so I  must get the pyramid right side up.

A new life has been given us or, if you prefer, "a design for living" that really works.
There is a Solution, page 28

The "Vital" Spiritual Experience

It is easy to let up on the spiritual program of action and rest on our laurels. We are headed for trouble if we do, for alcohol is a subtle foe. We are not cured of alcoholism. 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. "How can I best serve Thee, Thy will (not mine) be done." These are thoughts which must go with us constantly. Into Action, page 88

The spiritual experience must be kept “vital” in the sense of alive in order to stay connected and to grow. Steps 10, 11, 12 keep me connected to God’s power.

A. We usually think of the steps like they are listed on the wall 1-12 in linear fashion. We think of them as a process we finished when we worked them with a sponsor. We studied them, we did the writing, we had the Spiritual Experience.

B. However, when we do step 12 it takes us back to step 1 working with another alcoholic.

C. Continuing to do step 12 makes the steps circular.

D. Doing 10 11 and 12 are like a small circle in the big circle. Each of the growth steps reconnects us with all of our steps. We have an experience with the steps again. We keep the experience alive. We continue to work them.