Step 5: Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
The first thing I like to appreciate about Step 5 is a clear understanding of what to "admit" means. It does not mean to just say out-loud. To admit is to confess the truth of. If I'm going to confess the truth about the exact nature of my wrongs, that takes on a much deeper meaning.
Re-read pages 72 - 75; Into Action
Why do we need to do this step? I'll remind you that since accepting the powerless nature of your condition and the unmanageability of your life, you're NOT in management any more. "Why?" is a management question. Our job is to do precisely what those who came before us did so we have the best opportunity at what they have, a recovery from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body. Bill W., nonetheless, will tell us.
pg. 72 "The best reason first: If we skip this VITAL step, we may NOT overcome drinking. Time after time newcomers have tried to keep to themselves certain facts about their lives. Trying to avoid this humbling experience, they have turned to easier methods. Almost invariably (or almost always) they got drunk. Having persevered with the REST of the program, they wondered why they fell. We think the reason is that they never COMPLETED their housecleaning. They took inventory all right, but hung on to some of the worst items in stock. They only THOUGHT they had lost their egoism and fear; they only THOUGHT they had humbled themselves. But they had not learned enough of humility, fearlessness and honesty, in the sense we find it NECESSARY, until they told someone else ALL their life story."
We share our inventory with another person because we are masters at believing our own self justifications and half-truths. We are experts in denial. "No no, I don't have a drinking problem." pg. 72 "We think we have done well enough in admitting these things to ourselves. There is doubt about that. In actual practice, we usually find a solitary self-appraisal insufficient."
A few requirements who to disclose our inventory to: they should be close-mouthed, understanding, yet be unaffected by what we have to say. The same requirements we may have used for hanging on to our sponsors, which today is who we almost always use to take our 5th Step with. Most sponsors will require that you do, or at the very least, they are present when it happens. Please put in context that when the book was first written the fellowship had not yet sprung up in every community around the globe as it nearly exist today and sponsorship was done at times by mail, phone, or not at all.
Read Step 5 in the Twelve Steps & Twelve Traditions
Much the same as when we took Step 3, when we are finished writing our inventory "we waste no time. We have a written inventory and we are prepared for a long talk." You are on a "life and death errand" and it simply cannot wait. pg. 75 "We pocket our pride and go to it, illuminating every twist of character and every dark cranny of the past."
pg. 75 "Once we have taken this step, withholding nothing, we are DELIGHTED. We can look the world in the eye. We can be alone at perfect peace and ease. Our fears fall from us. We begin to feel the nearness of our Creator. We may have had certain spiritual beliefs (Step 2), but now we begin to have a spiritual experience. The feeling that the drink problem has disappeared will often come strongly. We feel we are on the Broad Highway, walking hand in hand with the Spirit of the Universe."
The benefits with each step begin to be realized and for some us they happen quickly, for others slowly. It's worth reflecting at each step in recovery on your own spiritual growth. For an alcoholic like me, stringing together a few days of sobriety was the most I could accomplish on my own. With some more meaningful time in the rear view mirror at this point in my journey on recovery I had to acknowledge that a higher power was doing for me what I had never in my adult life been able to do for myself. I found this encouraging and would muster the willingness to continue forward taking these steps.
When you have finished sharing your inventory with your sponsor, the Big Book give us very clear directions on what to do next:
pg. 75 "Returning home we find a place where we can be quiet for AN HOUR, carefully reviewing what we have done. We thank God from the bottom of our heart that we know Him BETTER. Taking this book down from our shelf we turn to the page which contains the Twelve Steps. CAREFULLY reading the first five proposals we ask if we have omitted ANYTHING, for we are building an arch through which we shall walk a free man at last. Is our work solid so far? Are the stones properly in place? Have we skimped on the cement put into the foundation? Have we tried to make mortar without sand?"
This textbook we call the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous has 164 pages as a road-map for you to build a "wonderfully effective spiritual structure". This structure begins with a foundation. In Bill's Story he would tell us, pg. 12 "Upon a foundation of complete willingness I might build what I say in my friend [Ebby Thatcher]". The foundation is willingness.
In Step 2 we learned that believing is the cornerstone. pg. 47 "We needed to ask ourselves but one short question. "Do I NOW believe, or am I even WILLING to believe, that there is a Power greater than myself?" As soon as a man can say that he DOES believe, or is WILLING to believe, we emphatically assure him that he is on his way. It has been repeatedly proven among us that upon this simple cornerstone a wonderfully effective spiritual structure can be built." A cornerstone is the first stone set in the construction of a masonry foundation. It is importance since all other stones will be set in reference to this stone thus determining the position of the entire structure. Believing is the cornerstone.
In Step 3 we learned that the decision to turn our will and our live over the care of God is the keystone. pg. 62 "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. Most good ideas are simple, and this concept was the keystone of the new and triumphant arch through which we passed to freedom." A keystone is the wedge-shaped stone piece at the apex of a masonry vault, or arch. The keystone is the final piece placed during construction and locks all the stones into position, allowing the arch to bear weight. Although a masonry arch cannot be self-supporting until the keystone is placed, the keystone experiences the least stress of any of the stones due to its position at the apex. The keystone is our decision.
Willingness is the foundation. Believing is the cornerstone. Our decision is the keystone.
In a quiet hour of reflection and medication we ask ourselves the questions at the bottom of page 75. "Are the stones properly in place?"
pg. 76 "If we can answer to our satisfaction, we then look at Step Six."
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