Step 4 Study from the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous

My name is Bob Stonebraker and I'm an alcoholic. And I run around and attend meetings with people who belong to 4th dimension group, and we go we have about 4 meetings out here in Santa Monica, West LA area. And one of the things we do, we try to find out and practice the clear cut directions in the big book. And so as we may get back to the original program as it was many years ago, maybe back in the early '40s, where the sobriety growth was so wonderful and success rate was so good, especially in Clarence Snyder's group up in Cleveland when all they had was a big book and the program was the same as the fellowship. This tape is meant to be mostly an in group tape, and we're not authorities here.

Be aware of the procedures as Big Book lays it out. It said, Further on, clear cut directions are given on Page 29 of the big book. And indeed, they are clear cut here, but it doesn't mean they're uncomplicated. And I really needed a little help to get this thing altogether. And this paper is to help, 1, to reach into the book and find out exactly what it says and how it says it and lay it out in such a way that it is an easily understandable whole, the process of going through the 4th step.

So that is the purpose of this. I am not quite an expert on the book, but I have done it many, many times over the last many years. And it comes very easy to me to see what is where and how it flows together. It may be some help to you. It isn't that I know everything about step 4.

I don't pretend to. The reason we do step 4, in the big book, there's only 1 Alcoholics Anonymous 4 step. Around the fellowship, you'll hear lots of people talk about lots of different kinds of 4 steps they do and the treatment centers have what they call step 4, they imitated from us and pretend like that. And some people do, maybe they've done the Haselton 4 step. Well, the question is this.

How do you expect to get the big book promises if you do the Haselten step 4? You get the Haselten promises. But for these, I mean, the promise are great here in this book, like the problem has been removed. It does not exist for us. And this is the promise that's in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous.

That was the main one I shot for. There were a lot of other ones, but that was the reason I got here to begin with. So I'm glad my sponsor set me to follow these clear cut directions in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. There's a great confusion from one end of the United States to the other, I find, about where the directions to do the steps are. So a lot of people think the directions are in the 12 and 12.

They are not in the 12 and 12. This book of alcohol this big book of Alcoholics Anonymous tells us when to do the the the the the 4th step and all the steps. The the 12 and 12 does not tell that. The book of Alcoholics Anonymous, the big book tells how to prepare for step 4. The 12 and 12 does not tell how to prepare for it.

The big book tells exactly and precisely how to go through the process of the step. The 12 and 12 does not tell that either. The big book tells you the promises you get from the 4th step, and what you're going to find out, the 1212 does not tell the same thing. The the the big book shows and tells how all the steps flow together and make them as easily understandable whole if one really studies this thing. And, the 12 and 12 just simply confuses a person.

And the 12 and 12, causes things to happen like people think, well, smorgasbord or work the steps backwards or take what you want and leave the rest or something like that. And that has nothing to do with getting well by going through the process. Hello. This is Bob again, but it's about 13 years later. What you've heard before was recorded in 1988, but due to technical problems, actually, the tape, the old tape started talking real fast on us, we had to reconstruct it.

So the same information will be presented to you again, but it is now 2001. That shall now continue back on page 60 3. So open your book to 63 and be prepared to start. Thank you. Well, let's go to the bottom of page 63 and where it says, next we launched out on a course of vigorous action.

The first step is a personal house cleaning. Notice that launched out business it doesn't mean we're going to hang around too long, we're going to launch out which many of us had never attempted. Though a decision that step 3 was a vital and crucial step, it could have little permanent effect unless at once followed by a strenuous effort to face and be rid of the things ourselves which have been blocking us. Now mark at once and put a little TT there that means timetable and so that's an important thing. When do we do step 4?

Well, when do we do step 3? We'll get more into detail on that in just a few minutes And the rest of that sentence says something else really important. It said, Followed by a string string us over to face and be rid of. Mark face and mark be rid of. See?

This is why we do step 4. Man, what a powerful sentence this is. This sentence tells us not only when to do step 4, but why we're going to do it. Now that's a lot of news to people. A lot of people think step 4 is like, Well, I put down some awful things about ourselves and have to tell somebody about it and be punished for it and then maybe we'll feel better about ourselves or or something like that.

No. This this is this is learn to face and be rid of. In other words, we're going to find some tools right here in step 4 to face and be rid of these things which have been brought which have been blocking us off from the great power which is God who can help us. Our liquor was but a symptom, so we had to get down to causes and conditions. Now these causes and conditions are simply the ingredients we are going to use in step 4 to activate the tools that are going to teach us to face and be rid of.

We're going to learn a spiritual tool, and we're going to learn a psychological tool right here in step 4 on resentments. But how are we going to get down to causes and conditions? How are we going to find out the things which ourselves have been blocking us if we're not honest? Most alcoholics are terrible liars. We had to be at least liars to ourselves because we've probably learned by now that an alcoholic cannot drink on the truth, an alcoholic can only drink on a lie, and we drink.

So we we got to be liars. If we were truthfully we never would have continued on. Our minds would have worked properly. But like we probably learned back in step one, our liars are kind of crushed up there and we, we don't think right. Now, a question for you is this a question for me is how can a dishonest mind write an honest inventory and put down these causes and conditions and find out what they are?

Venture down to the second full paragraph on page 64 and it says, We did exactly the same thing with our lives. We took stock honestly. Mark the word honestly. Now how are we going to do that? Our mind doesn't work.

We might have to use something different than our mind. That might sound a bit bizarre, but I'll tell you something. I was just to the international convention up in Minneapolis this year, and I heard a guy who was 53 years sober who claims he was to the 1st big book step study meeting in the world of Alcoholics Anonymous out Los Angeles way back when. And he said that even way back then, that would have been probably 1947 or something like that, that they believed in spontaneous writing. Well, the big book doesn't say about it, but it does tell us.

It does say to take stock honestly but there are no directions how you're going to do that with your dishonest mind. It's like you can use willpower. Oh I'm gonna be honest now. Well that doesn't seem to work very well with alcohol. We trick ourselves.

So this is this is what I was taught. I got sober out California and this is how what they taught me to do and it worked for me and I haven't had a great sense either. So, but this is this is what we did to take stock honestly without using our good keen intellectual alcoholic lying mind. We took 4 pieces of paper. On top of one piece of paper wrote down resentment.

Write down God help me. I'm doing my inventory. In another piece of paper, write down guilt. God help me. I'm doing my inventory.

Another piece of paper write down fear God help me. I'm doing my inventory. And sex on another piece of paper and write the same thing. Nothing wrong with sex but it's a strong drive in the world and and and we can put a lot of things under that category. Thinking doesn't count Thinking doesn't count for this kind of thing.

Scribble and not only one word at a time, just one person's name, one one place, one thing that reminds you jogs your mind. It doesn't matter. Nobody's gonna read it but you. And just scribble things down there and sit down immediately When I did step 3, remember I mentioned that great effect. When I did step 3 Remember I mentioned that great effect and it says at the top of page 64, Though a decision was a vital and crucial step, You can have little permanent effect unless at once.

See? Permanent effect. Well, I've had a permanent effect and and and I did do it at once. My sponsor didn't say, well, we'll do step 4 tomorrow. Uh-uh.

We started writing right away this spontaneous writing which is which is connected to step 4 immediately within I'm not going to say seconds but within minutes of saying the 3rd Step Prayer we were writing this stuff down. Scribbling. Scribbling. Scribbling. I took it home and scribbled more.

I took it home and scribbled more. I worked with midnight scribbled some. And I just I I went on before long, but I'll tell you, in 10 or 15 minutes, I had more honesty in that paper than 6 weeks of of thinking that I ever got there and probably would have been honest anyway. So this is what I call step 3a half. It's a 4th dimension kind of a deal we do here but it's not step 4.

It's not in the big book and it's not big book directions and if you don't like it don't do it. You know, but this is just some sharing that you get extra on this tape that, that you didn't bargain for. But it's wonderful. It really works and I do it with with everybody I sponsor. I I have them to do this wonderful preparation for step 4.

Spontaneous writing. See, God writes everything down, not your mind because you've had this great effect and God just pours over into it. If you didn't do step 3 with all your heart and all your soul, sadly, I don't think you'd get very much out of the spontaneous writing at all. It's only for the people who are serious. And if you haven't done steps 1 and step 2, came to believe and I became willing to believe, I don't think you could do a step 3 with all your heart.

The timing is very, very important. Do not, if you're sponsoring somebody, do not say well we did step 3 now we're gonna do some spontaneous writing next time I see you. No. Do it right away. The step for itself might wait a few days, but but this this should be right away at once.

Okay. Let's go to the 3rd full paragraph on page 64. Resentment is the number one offender. It destroys more alcoholics than anything else. From it stem all forms of spiritual disease for we have not only we have been not only mentally and physically ill, we have been spiritually sick.

When the spiritual Well, that that that's real that's real good to know because that's what we're doing. It says 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 followed by 10, 11, 12. We're straighten out to visit the spiritual melody and then we can straighten out mentally and physically. I don't think we have to wait to a big toke with her or something like that to get in on this or the factory perfectly mentally well. Of course, I think we've obviously, we're not gonna come in here with a hangover or or we're still going through detox or something like that.

But the the the thing is that there's a lot of hope in that because once we get spiritually well we're going to straighten out mentally and physically and and that's what our problem is. Our problem is mental and physical if you remember. Remember it's a mental obsession coupled with a physical allergy. Okay, in dealing with resentments we set them on paper. We listed people, institutions, or personals with whom we were angry.

Well, you got your chart with you there. If you have these tapes you probably have a chart I sent, So for you and the people in the room probably should all have a chart in front of you. If you don't, just take a piece of paper, 8 and a half by 11, lay it, on a horizontal way, landscape, they call it, and and draw a line, a column, vertically up and down it. And, and in that in that, space above, write down resentments. And then just write down the things what you're angry with.

And and you've got them right there because you did your spontaneous writing. That's all there. Plus other things you thought about later on. Obviously, you'll put them down there. That's the first direction.

That's pretty simple. The next sentence says, We ask ourselves why we were angry. Well, naturally, we're gonna make another line down a couple inches and just put down why you're angry for each one. Just just, word, maybe 2 words of, you know, what they did to you to make you angry. That's simple.

You know? And, so that's your first two columns right there. Now we'll get 5 columns in a row, and, we're gonna hear the same thing said twice. Here we go. In most cases, we found it was our self esteem, our pocketbooks, our ambitions, our personal relationships, including sex, were hurt or threatened.

So we were sore. We were burned up. Now here it comes again. On our grudge list, we set option each name our injuries. Was it self esteem, our security, our ambitions, our personal or sex relations which had been interfered with?

There we hear those same five things again. Make 5 little vertical lines about, oh let's say, half an inch. That's all they have to be. Up and down and go across those. And one of them, of course, we naturally, one, you'd put self esteem, one's security, one's ambitions, one's personal relations or sex relations.

Well, self esteem we all know what that is. I don't think that doesn't need to be explained. Security could be financial security or emotional security. Doesn't matter. Put it in there.

And there's no sense of going a great deal to specify exactly where all that stuff is. This is remember, this is a tool to learn to face and be rid of, not just to get everything exact perfectly down there. Our ambitions, that's political ambitions, maybe, or or or any kind of ambitions you had, write it down to personal or sex relations. So you got 5 columns and those are gonna be done by just little check marks. What's that?

Yeah. Yeah. I heard you say that. Check marks. You think, well, check who's got what's what's check marks?

They don't mean nothing. What does mean a lot, my friends? Because every little check mark is something you're going to talk about at length when you get into step 5. So this is not something superficial just little check marks. This is real important because it's gonna prompt your mind into the more particular details which you don't need to, get into right now.

This is just a way to to prepare you for step 5 here in step 4 and show you a few tools. Okay, so you you go down each one of those one at a time. At first, you go down self esteem, put little check marks if it affected you, and our security okay. And then go down our ambitions, then our personal relations, then our sex relations, and we're done. We got little check marks up and down there, crosses, or whatever you wanna put in there.

It don't matter. And by now you've got some names down, and you saw who did things to you, what they did, and how they affected you. Well, we made a big start on our step, 4 part of facing and ridding ourselves of resentments. This is the time when you might want to leave the room. If you're sponsoring somebody at this time down to the bottom of page 65 it says, We went back through our lives.

Nothing counted but thoroughness and honesty. When we're faced, we considered it carefully. Well, that's something to do. So if you're sponsoring somebody, don't let people just put the check mark down and rush you on to the next thing. Let them consider it carefully.

Leave the room. If you live in California, Florida, walk around the block. Come back. You're in Indiana. We gotta go near room another room of the house or something like that, but don't stand over somebody's shoulder while they're doing this stuff.

To, continue the bottom of page 65, the first thing apparent was this world as people were often quite wrong. To conclude that others were wrong was as far as most of us ever got. The usual outcome was that people continued to wrong us and we stayed sore. Sometimes it was remorse and then we were sore at ourselves. But the more we fought and tried to have our own way, the worse matters got.

As in war, the victor only seemed to win. Our moments of triumph were short lived. It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. To the precise extent that we permit these do we squander the hours that might have been worthwhile. But the alcoholic whose hope is a maintenance and growth, I like that maintenance growth of a spiritual experience, this business of resentment is infinitely grave.

We found it is fatal, marked fatal. For when we are harboring such feelings, we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the spirit, the insanity of alcohol returns and we drink again and with us to drink is to die. If we were to live, we had to be free of anger. The grouch and the brainstorm are not for us. We may be the dubious luxury of normal men but for alcoholics, these things were poison.

We turned back to the list where it held the key to the future. We were prepared to look at it from an entirely different angle. We began to see the world as people really dominated us. In that state, the wrongdoing of others, fancies are real, have power to actually kill. That's me.

How could we escape? We saw that these redemptives must be better than hell. We could not wish them away any more than alcohol. This was our course. That's what I love about the big book it tells you what they did see not what you ought to do so much it it tells you what they did.

This was our course. We realized that the people who wronged us were perhaps spiritually sick. Though we did not like their symptoms and the way these disturbed us, they like ourselves were sick too. So I understand that. I've been spiritually sick.

I've done lots of spiritual sick things when I'm drunk. Have you? You know? And so I can't look down my nose at those people the way I was before I read that. Now I begin to see that I got to put myself on the same level as they.

I am not some kind of a spiritual giant looking at wrongdoers. I am wrong too. So, that puts us on even keel. Makes things a lot easier. Next it says, we ask God to help us show them the same tolerance, pity, and patience that we would cheerfully grant a sick friend.

When a person offended, we said to ourselves, now mark these 4 persons prayer separately. This is a sick man. How can I be helpful to him? God saved me from being angry. Thy will be done.

K? Well, this is a spiritual tool and you notice nowhere in that tool does it say which is almost AA folklore to pray for the SOB or something like that. No, it's not. This is this this prayer is all for ourselves. It's not for the other individual.

Now this is a sick man. Well this shows me to get myself in a in a humble position. I'm no better than the person who hired me. How can I be helpful to him? Now isn't that a lot more powerful asking God to show me how I can be helpful to that person I hate, rather than than than just saying a prayer for him and say, that's that's kind of passing on.

This is this is much deeper than that. How can I be helpful to him? God saved me from being angry. This means I realize I can't stop myself from being angry. See?

If myself is angry I can't stop myself being angry with self. Self cannot rid self of self with self. See? I gotta have a power. I gotta have god to help me on that that it won't go away.

And last, it says, thy will be done. Give up my will. Once again, just like in the third step, take it away. Take away my will and do your will, God. And this is a wonderful tool to face and be rid of resentment.

This is a spiritual tool. This is a tool that is that is used for people who have who have harmed us terribly, have despitefully used us, did bad things to us, they were completely in the wrong. Let us say that just for sake of it, they were completely in the wrong, but we have to learn to stop that repeating thought of anger because it's gonna kill us. And this is a way to do it. Somebody says, well, does that mean I can't pray for the, guy I hate?

Or the big book says you can do anything you want to in that respect. It says spiritual people write so on. Norman Vincent Peale wrote a wonderful prayer back on page 552 and I use that all the time, when I'm angry with people and have a repeating thoughts of anger. But that is not step 4. That is a good tool to use but it is not step 4.

Remember we talked about doing the tools we're going to do the tool right now. Pick up your paper or your chart whichever you have to have in front of you and the first column might say mister Brown. The next column might say shot me and then the check marks were affecting self esteem, security, ambitions, personal relations, sex relations, either check mark or not. When you get to the end, stop there. Now it's time to say this 4 part prayer.

If you're sponsoring, of course you leave the room. Don't don't look over somebody's shoulder while they're saying that prayer and let them, say, this this 4 part prayer for each person on the list. There might be 10 or 15 people on the list. Who knows how many? And so just have her just go across horizontally each one and stop at that heavy line we have there in our in our chart and say this is a sick man.

How can I be helpful to him? God save me from being angry. Thy will be done. This is the spiritual tool. When this is finished, come back to the room and start on what we call the logical tool or psychological tool if you prefer.

Let's go down to the second full paragraph which says, Referring to our list again, putting out of our minds the wrongs others had done, we resolutely look for our own mistakes. Where have we been selfish, dishonest, self seeking, and frightened? That self seeking fright is one phrase. So look at your chart now and you've got some space left on the right hand side. Make 3 vertical columns out of that space.

In one of the columns write the word dishonest at the top, the next one selfish and the next one self seeking and frightened. Now what is to be done is to go across the line and once again, mister sponsor, mister sponsor, you leave the room and allow the to go through this on his own. I'm present for that. We're gonna go horizontal. Mister Brown, he shot me in the kneecap, affected my self esteem, my security, my ambitions, my personal relations.

Oops. Well, it didn't affect my sex relations then but okay. So go on. Well, where was I at fault? Was it my fault?

I don't like to think about it, you might think. You know what I'm saying? But nevertheless, you put it down. Yeah. Well, you know, I gotta tell you the truth, actually.

You start thinking you think to yourself and if you're doing it yourself, you say, Yeah. I was dishonest because, just selfish? Yes. Self seeking frightened because actually I was I was stealing out of his safe when he shot me. That's why he shot me.

So because we fast up and we see that we were at fault. So this becomes a logical tool and it is it is not rational to be angry with somebody, if you are the one who caused the whole thing to happen. So write logical tool off to the side of that paragraph. Now we've learned 2 tools. 1 is a spiritual tool.

1 is a logical tool. That doesn't mean there's not a 1000 other tools you can use. Go and beat your pillow if the psychologists tell you to, but don't. But but this is the Alcoholics Anonymous tool. These are 2 of the wonderful tools we have in the face and be rid of resentments.

Yeah, you can say I see I see how you'd be thinking. Well it's never one way or the other. You know, you're partially at fault. The other person's probably anybody's been through a divorce or a matter of fact you've been married even. You you will see that that that that both are taking place at the same time and it's very seldom the other person was completely in the wrong and you were completely in the right or vice versa.

So but these are tools we can use to face and be rid of which will save our lives. Remember resentments will kill us and we won't go to any length to get rid of these. So so try this wonderful, alcoholics anonymous tool. It's been working for for for 65 years or so now, and, I'm sure it will work for you. This lesson will engage itself in finding what the big book has to say about ridding ourselves of fear, especially irrational fear, and being able to face and rid of our inability to see the harms we've done to other people, especially, sexually.

Let's go to the bottom of page 67. And it says, notice that the word fear is backed alongside the difficulties of mister Brown, mister Jones, the employer, and the wife. This short word somehow touches about every aspect of our lives. It was an evil and corroding thread. The fabric of our existence was shot through with it.

It set motion trains and circumstances which brought us misfortune we felt we didn't deserve. But did not we, ourselves, set the ball rolling? Sometimes we think it ought to be classed with stealing. It seems to cause more trouble. Then it says, we reviewed our fears.

We put them on paper. Uh-uh. Now we got a direction, didn't we? You got the clear cut direction. Well, take, 8 and a half by 11 piece of paper and divide it in 3 columns.

Either way you like, either portrait or landscape. It doesn't matter. And, this is gonna be one of the most simple, directions you can imagine. It says for our first column, what we're gonna do with that, it says, we reviewed our fears thoroughly. We put them on paper even though we had no resentment in connection with them.

So just make your first column on your left hand side. Just go down and write the fears that you have that's been bothering you. Where do you get those? Well, you remember the spontaneous writing we did. Right?

There they are. And, also think over I might show the things that weren't on there. Well, put those on if they belong there. Okay. Now we're gonna talk think about the next column.

It says we, asked ourselves why we had them. Wasn't it because self reliance failed us? Self reliance was good as far as it went, but it didn't go far enough. Some of us had great self confidence, but it didn't fully solve the fear problem or any other. When it made it caught made us cocky, it was worse.

Okay. Write a question at the top of the second column. Said, has reliance on self failed me? Well, what a what a question that is. You wouldn't still have the fears if if reliance on self would've worked.

Reliance on self worked for most of us when we were in certain grade, whatever it was in school, and they put that multiplication table up there. And we thought, boy, we could never ever learn all that stuff. But within a period of time, we learned it and self reliance worked for us. We rely on ourself and we did just fine. But there are certain things that this self reliance hasn't worked for us because we'd be rid of them by now if we would've.

Water was quitting drinking. Well, another one is we got right here is the fear. These especially these irrational fears that crop up all the time. That that, that feeling that that police cars behind us. He's gonna get us for drunk driving.

We had a drink for 5 years, but still there's a there's the, fear cropping up. Afraid to go look for a job because you might not get it. Something irrational. There's also irrational fears that that everybody has, fear of the future, inferiority complexes of different kinds. And so just dulling yourself and and and and you've already got those fears down here.

Just say the self reliance solve on those. Well, it might have solved some of them as as the years have gone by, but certainly not the ones that have been bothering you, driving you crazy here in these last years and and and shutting you off the sunlight of the spirit. So along with it's that's called next to the each fear, write the word the yes. Did self reliance fail me? Yes.

It did. Yes. It did. Yes. It did.

Yes. It did. It failed me. And that's as simple as the second column is. Okay?

Let's see about that 3rd column, what to do. Let's go to the 3rd full paragraph. It says we never apologize to anyone for depending upon our creator. We can laugh at those who think spirituality is the way of weakness. Paradoxically, it's the way of strength.

The verdict of the ages is that faith means courage. All men of faith have courage. They trust their God. We never apologize for God. Instead, we let him demonstrate through us what he can do.

We ask him to remove our fear and to direct our attention to what he would have us be at once we commence to outgrow fear. Well, there is another clear cut direction in it. What's what is the clear cut direction? Alright. Here it is.

We ask him to remove our fear and direct our attention to what he'd have us be, another 2 part prayer as Bill's prayers almost always are. Out to the side, write fear prayer, and write that prayer at the top of the 3rd column. Now if you're sponsoring somebody, this is a time once again to leave the room. And who if you're doing it or your sponsor is doing it, the thing to do is go down that list and and and each one, see what fear you have, come to realize in column 2 that that you can't rid of it by yourself. You have to have God's help.

And in step the the the the last column, you simply ask for God's help by using this beautiful little prayer. And, this this completes, the the, section on how to face and be rid of irrational fear. Now what could be more simple than that? You can complicate the dickens out of this kind of thing if you want to, but there's no point in it. It says in the big book, the last sentence there on that paragraph we were in, it says, at once, we commenced to outgrow fear.

So that's the end of it, folks, and, I hope this will work for you. It sure worked for me. I still have fears, but, nothing like they were. And I think fear is a root of, of my anxiety. It's a root of my hatred and anger.

It's a root of my dishonesty. It's a root of my selfishness. I think fear is a root of all these things. When I start to get rid of fear this is my own personal opinion. You get this for free here too.

But my personal opinion is fear is like, when it verifies, goes away, all sort of things are attached to that fear, and they go away too. It's almost like taking a block of ice, solid as can be. Call it take us a big chunk of fear. You put it on the stove, a hot stove, and all at once it begins to melt. That's called rarefications.

The molecules get further and further apart and go faster, faster and faster, and they and they further apart. It's such a while more, it turns into steam and it goes off and flies in the air and disappears completely. It's all gone. Well, this is what God can do with our irrational fears. And when those begin to leave, we begin to see other defects of character just just leave us too.

It it just happens. That's the miracle of it like the big book says, and I think this is the key to it. It. So this is a because this is simple. Don't think it's not important.

This is a very important exercise to learn how to do it. Now don't forget, you know, we learned to do something back last week that face and be rid of resentments. Now we've learned how to face and be rid of fear. This isn't something you learn once. This is a tool you use that's gonna be used in step 10 every day all the rest of your life many, many, many times.

And this is something you do once, but go on. No. It ain't it. It ain't what it is about. This is a lifetime project.

This we're learning the tools by which we are going to live the rest of our life. It's just as important. So so so so don't don't don't take this trivially because it's short. It's very, very serious. Okay.

Now we're gonna talk about harms the other, especially sexual, situations that we get ourselves in. Page 68 down towards the bottom. It says, now about sex. Many of us need an overhauling there, but above all we try to be sensible to this question. It's so easy you get way off the track.

Here we find human opinions running to extremes. Absurd extremes, perhaps. One set of voices called the sex and the lust of our lower nature, a base necessity of procreation. Then we have the voices who call for sex and more sex. They be real.

The, institution of marriage who think who think the troubles of race are traceable to sex causes. They think they do not have enough of it or isn't the right kind. They see its significance everywhere. One school will allow a man no flavor for his fare, and the other one have us all on a straight pepper diet. Don't you just love the way Bill writes?

We, we want to stay out of this controversy. We do not want to be the arbiter of anyone's sex conduct. We all have sex problems. We'd hardly be human if we didn't. What can we do about them?

Now on this next paragraph, you're gonna find every word that's in the chart that you have in front of you. I hope you have a chart. If you don't have one, well, stop right here and write down my address, and you can send it to me and I'll send you one. Just to be confidential, I'm Bob s, I guess. And, but I live at 212 Southwest 18th Street, Richmond, Indiana 47374.

Or you can phone me at 765-935-0130 or email me atbbbobat infocom.com. And I will send you, some of these right away because I think these little charts are really helpful to to to to to guide you through it. I'm gonna try to describe how to make the chart up to you for you you want people who don't have one, but it's gonna be rather difficult. It might not be too bad. But as long as you just get close.

See? No one among us has been able to maintain anything like perfect adherence to these principles, it says. And do you know what anything like me? It means you don't even get close. See?

So so so but but if you get just very close, you'll you'll be going the right direction. Besides, you might know more about than I do. I I don't know. But but this is just what we've been using over these last well, it's been 14 years now we've been using these charts and stuff and then they've been we've got great results with them. So that's all we know.

We don't know everything. Don't mean to. Don't mean to reply we did. Okay. Here we go with with this chart.

I'm gonna read the paragraph first, then I'll tell you how to make up your chart. We reviewed our own conduct over the years past. Were we had we been selfish, dishonest, or inconsiderate? Whom had we hurt? Did we unjustifiably arouse jealousy, suspicion, or bitterness?

Where were we at fault? What should we have done instead? We got this all done in paper and looked at it. So all done in papers like this. Make a fairly wide column about 2 inches.

Whom did I hurt at the top? And simply right underneath it who you hurt sexually. Especially sexually. It's not sexually. Well, you you harm somebody, you lied to them, you jolted them, you, did it for to get the money out of them, or or some kind of selfish reason.

And, so that's one thing. The next thing is, what did I do? You put your names in the first column. The second column, what did you do? You lied.

You cheated. You you you chipped them out of the money or whatever you did on that one. So that's your second column. So simple. Now the next, big column says, did I unjustifiably arouse?

And under it is these 3 little dinky, narrow columns because you got little check marks in. 1's jealousy, 1 suspicion, the next one is bitterness. So you go down a column and like, Susie, jealousy, do you make her jealous? Yes. And and Mary, do you make her?

Yeah. And said, yeah. What about Alice? Do you make her judge? So I like that.

The same way with suspicion. The same way with bitterness. Now I I I don't know that that's so hard to understand and explain. Just put those little things down there and and put little check marks there if if you did or didn't. Now we've done vertically so far.

Now we're gonna change. We'll start going horizontally. On the next big wide column, write where was I at fault And under it, put 3 little sub columns or narrow sub columns. 1 selfishness, dishonesty, and inconsiderate. Now we're gonna go across.

Now we're going horizontally. Whom did I hurt? Mary. What did I do? I jolted her.

Did I cause jealousy? Yes. Suspicion? Yes. Bitterness?

Yes. Where was I at fault? Well, I was selfish. Yes. I was dishonest, and, yes, I was inconsiderate.

See? So I put that all down there, and this way I get a picture of myself. K? As unpleasant as might be, but that's a that's that's who we are. That's what we get.

And, the the what we want to take God what God to take us away from into his world instead of our own world because we certainly don't want that other world anymore, I hope. The next paragraph. In this way, we tried to shape a sane and sound ideal toward our future sex life. We subjected each relation to the test. Was it selfish or not?

We asked god to mold our ideas and help us live up to them. We remembered always that our sex powers were god given and therefore good, neither to be used lightly or selfishly nor despise and loathed. Next paragraph. Whatever ideal now every time you hear the word ideal market, see, whatever our ideal turns out to be, we must be willing to grow toward it. We must be willing to make amends where we have done harm provided that we do not bring about still more harm in so doing.

In other words, we treat sex as we would any other problem. In meditation we ask God, mark those three words, what we would do about each specific matter. The right answer will come if we want it. God alone, Mark God alone, can judge our sex situation. Counsel with other persons is often desirable, but we let God be the final judge.

We realize that some people are as fanatical about sex as others are loose. We avoid historical thinking or advice. Suppose we fall short of the chosen ideal and stumble, does this mean we're gonna get drunk? Some people tell us so, but this is only half truth. It depends on us and our motives.