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So in my last post AA a Go-Go: Who will the 12 steps Help ?
I wrote the following is one of the traits that will make you succeed in AA and thus you WILL give all the credit to the steps for that success.
“people raised to have self confidence will do well. Whether one or both parents raised you, if you were raised to believe in yourself, told you can succeed, given encouragement through out your childhood, you will do ok with the 12 steps “

well let’s suppose, as far fetched as it may seem, that there are those people who were raised in an environment void of any of these things. I know, that’s crazy talk, but it could happen.

These are definitely some demons to battle through out ones life.
Well they were for me.

But please, put away the violins folks, no pity is needed here. Well not then and not for a very very long time would any pity be needed. Because the boy does well and using his intelligence and SELF will, wins in the end. He does pretty fucking well as a matter of fact.

When there is no confidence to be found, when there is nothing resembling self esteem inside a young person, it is amazing what can be accomplished through selfdetermination. Sure some disfunctional behavior was needed and extreme measures taken. However, for an adolescent to overcome such an upbringing and to do so alone, well to borrow a phrase, I say “Our hats are off to them.”

Yes, that’s my beginnings in life. And my extreme measures were to seek refuge from those early demons with drinking and drug use. Self medication actually.

Bury all those memories, all those feelings, by any means necessary. Use what ever you have inside you to move on and escape that life. Use your intelligence, your looks, your physical and mental strengths, whatever you can and recreate yourself and your life. Yeah the new life you have maybe nothing more than delusion. Maybe all those demons are still whispers to be heard still. Maybe all that garbage is bury nice and deep, or just barely under the skin. IT DOESN’T MATTER. When you have no self esteem, when you were taught to believe you were worthless, when there is nothing resembling true confidence, I swear to you DELUSIONS are a fine substitute.

I am not alone in that sort of beginning to life. I am sure the AMA or some such medical organization can give us statistics on this sort of thing, but the numbers or the percentage of the populace really isn’t important.

While 12 step groups and addicted people in general may have more than their share of such people, I am sure these people are among all walks of life including those adults who are now successful and happy.

Delusions unbroken are as powerful as the truth. Where there is nothing else, delusions are literally life savers. Believe all the new truths you create and forget all you were told and all that you experienced as a kid, and you will be come someone else.

That is, until you meet the TWELVE STEPS. Especially steps 4, 5, and 6.

If you are such a person and you do the “uncover, discover and discard” that the fourth step and 6th step are meant to do, and YOU ARE FUCKED.

Delusions once broken cannot be replaced.

The twelve step program is meant to get you back on track to living right. And they picked God and humility as the main ingredient in this method to get you back to living right, to getting you back on track to a life you had before you became an alcoholic (or addict).

Just one tragic flaw in that program, it does nothing but harm to those of us who didn’t get on track in the first place until we took to self medicating. Alcohol, pills, pot, whatever your method, if that was the way you recreated your life and escaped that bad beginning, you do not want to remember that’s what happened.

Yes I know, the theory is “Clean house and trust God” and you will be healed and live a wonderful life. I believed that theory for well over a decade, working the steps and praying and acting as selfless as I could do.

The result was a disaster.

I really don’t know if I am going to get back that successful life I once enjoyed. But at least I can put the word out about the truth of How it Works.

Get sober if you have to, but if you weren’t raised in a loving and nurturing environment, avoid the steps at all costs.

Until next time,
Harry A.