Censorship

A poster from Sober Recovery left this beauty and seems to have been given the boot at some point thereafter;

yogurt75 from Middletown NY;

Thank you




---------------------------------------------------------



Having been thoroughly spanked by more than one moderator I have decided, after much thought, prayer and guidance to discontinue active participation in these forums.



The way of life I have chosen to live demands rigorous honesty. I believe that the use and abuse of substances is quite often inconsistent with the continuation of life. life shortening, destructive to emotional, spiritual and physical health and destroys families and those around us along with ourselves. I will not, just not to offend anyone or put a tiny band-aid on a gaping mortal wound. People's very lives are at stake and it would be totally dishonest to be dishonest and not true to myself.



Rather than be dishonest I would rather disengage from having my remarks censored or accused of being only interested in my self-importance. My primary purpose is to stay sober and to help others to achieve sobriety. I feel that helping others achieve sobriety does not include lying to them. To thine own self be true includes, at least for me, being rigorously honest with others. As it has been pointed out to me by moderators that these forums are for support and hope. Unfortunately, what is meant by support and hope are really euphemism's for lets not offend anyone or scare them away with the truth. I will not lie to myself or others in these forums or anywhere else.



Thank you all for some wonderful conversations and open dialogue. I will not abide by censorship. May God bless each and every one of you.

Step 4; Instructions are in the book

4th Step: instructions are on pp 64, 65 and 66 of the BB

Unless, of course, you write a 4 column inventory. Then you can go to page 67 too. PP 67-70 for fear and sex. Yes, sex is on page 69! But not so in the 1st edition and maybe the 2nd edition. I can't remember about the 2nd Edition. Second edition too!

I write a 3 column inventory and I focus a whole bunch on the 3rd column.

I start with a Resentment inventory, then a fear inventory, then a sex-harms done to others- inventory.

Start on top of a page of a spiral notebook and I like to leave the left page for columns 1 and 2 and the right page for column 3, and I start the top of the page with "God, I pray Truth flows from this pen" or something like that. Oh, and before we write, we review steps 1, 2, and 3; maybe even get on your knees and say the 3rd Step prayer.

The 1st column is which person, institution or Principle with which we are burned up, with whom we have a grudge, or with whom hurt, threatened or interfered with us. Start heading with , "I am resentful at..."

The 2nd column is what they did to us. Be honest and be specific. Start heading with "The cause..."

The 3rd column; Start heading with "Affects my..."

• 
  Self Esteem- I am... start the sentence off with I am... the Engineer, etc.
• 
  Security- I need... start the sentence off with I need... power, respect, compensation, etc.
• 
  Ambition- I want... start the sentence off with I want... praise, adulation, prestige, etc.
• 
  Personal Relations- men (how men treat other men or how women treat other women, etc.
• 
  Sex Relations- women (how women treat men or how men treat women ......different than the 12 and 12, but this is how we do it [keep in mind there are 3 inventories here. Sex isn't about sex here; it's about how gender relates to the resentment]
• 
  Pocketbook- what is money? Often, money is about power and control, etc.

I don't write about pride. I know that Joe and Charlie did. But what do I care about how others view me? That gets taken care of in Self Esteem.

We always write the 3rd column from the positive too. We are writing from how we behave and think when we're playing God. Keep that 2nd column dribble out of the 3rd column.

This is how I write inventory and I do like the 12 and 12's description of our God-given instincts and how we need them to survive, but us alkies demand way more than our share of them and step on other's toes.

So in just writing these 3 columns, we don't conclude. When you write a 4th column, you conclude and then your ego just runs and hides. You can't fool or trick your ego this way. And we can't fight or kill our ego. I hear this is a bad mistake. We can, from time to time, smash our ego though. So what we do is let the wound lay open and fester. When we share this in our 5th step, the 4th column comes out. We see, once we talk with our mouths to another person and God, this inventory. We see, in broad daylight, how we've harmed another.

It's very fortunate if you see more than a few truths in your whole inventory. Some say it's like peeling back the layers of an onion. I agree with this. If God let us see all of our defects of character all in one shot, I think our heads would explode.

When I'm 5th stepping this and my advisor mentions things that I didn't see or identifies harm I caused, I jot that down for my 8th step list and take it to my 6th and 7th step to ask God to remove them.

Anyway, thoughts? What's your experience?

I hear a guy say taking inventory is like performing surgery on yourself or like a guided trip to Hell. The process don't seem that bad when you're in it, but there's always something in me that fights it.

Oh, when you're done writing for the day, close it up with a prayer or meditate on the line "In God's protection and care with complete abandon". Don't go out into the world raw and expect the world to tolerate your bad behavior just because you're writing inventory. Don't cause new inventory, in other words.

But it's been my experience that when I'm writing inventory, my resentments come flying at me. It's a trip.

Step 5: a recent experience

5th Step; a recent experience

When I see that I'm wrapping up that dreaded inventory, I call my 5th step partner or spiritual advisor and arrange a place, a date, and a time.

I show up with my inventory and before we begin (keep in mind, you may be on the other side of the 5th step some day ) we review steps 1, 2, and 3 first.

My most profound 1st step experience ever came when I went over to Dr Death's home to 5th step. The first thing he did with me when I asked him to take me through the steps was to ask me to write a piece of inventory. Just one piece.

So I brought it to him and he showed me how to write the columns. Then when I went to 5th step with him, he looked at my inventory and sent me home. He said, "This is your life and death here. This is sloppy. Get this dribble out of your 3rd column and put it back in the 2nd column where it belongs. Is it ok to write about my self and God? Sure. Get it down on paper. Don't judge your work. So after I'd gone back home and finished it, got a ruler out and made straight lines and wrote neatly, I was done. So I went back to his home to 5th step. He said, "I don't know you. Tell me about your drinking." So I told him about my drinking. He said, "That's it?" So I dug down deep and just started talking about everytime I drank and got drunk from back when I was 10 years old to the present. I was shook up and about to explode. He looked at me and said, "Do you now believe that God can do for you .... what you cannot and take you further in every area of your life?" I said "Yes!" We then proceeded on to the 3rd step prayer. Then he said, "Read."

I shared my inventory with him and he shared some stuff with me too. When we were done, he said "Watch the road." I said, "What?" He said "Seriously, be careful driving home and watch the road. Go home and take the book down off the shelf and do what it says to do. Then go and meditate what you've done. Consider the 1st 5 proposals..."

Oh, I'm sorry! I said a recent experience! Well, most all of my inventories have gone that way. On this last one, when I was reading resentments against my brother, I literally got up and started pacing the floor, any my advisor said, "Sit down and settle down." I was feelin' it. I always love the way I feel when I finish 5th stepping. Unless I'd been sent home to rewrite the thing, I know that I'm lined up to finish the other steps; 6,7,8,9, and even 10. Then once I start 9, I can start on 10 and 11. Oops. Getting ahead of myself.

Whenever I baulk on any of these steps, a wonderful tool has been given to me; ask yourself if doing this step is harder than drinking down a bottle of Bourbon? Then I get to thinking, it's not that bad. If you feel like you might be sharing something with someone that will harm or affect them, don't do it. Find someone who's had your experience and gotten past it with God's help. If you go to enough speaker meetings, surely you'll find that person.