"Almost none of us liked the self-searching, the leveling of our pride, the confession of shortcomings which the process requires for its successful consummation."
The pioneers didn't like it. Imagine that? They didn't care for the process of recovery, the proven twelve steps. The self-searching, steps 4 & 5, and step 9. The leveling of their pride, steps 4 & 5, and step 9. The confession of shortcomings, steps 4 & 5, and step 9.
"But we saw that it really worked in others, and we had come to believe in the hopelessness and futility of life as we had been living it."
And this my friends is exactly why they took their 6 steps, what is today our 12 steps.
Personally, I was a couple of decades into attending open AA meetings and wanted to die. Sober. I was coming to believe in the hopelessness and futility of life. Sober. I was being shown through "circumstances" that there was something more to this. It wasn't just about being sober. Indeed it was as the pioneers of AA wrote about. It was spiritual illness. And it permeated every aspect of my life.
"When, therefore, we were approached by those in whom the problem had been solved, there was nothing left for us to pick up the simple kit of spiritual tools laid at our feet."
Perhaps you are being crushed by life at the moment, whether by alcohol, or "self," and have exhausted every avenue to recover. And perhaps its time to take a look at the "simple kit" that frees one from an illness that requires a Power greater than oneself. It was so with me. And what was the result?
"We have found much of heaven and we have been rocketed into a fourth dimension of existence of which we had never dreamed."
I don't know about you, your circumstances, or even your station in life but I was intrigued when asked if I would like to find heaven and live a life of peace.