“Here are the steps we took, which are suggested as a program of recovery:
- … that our lives had become unmanageable.” The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous, pg. 59
Lets look at the other half of the First Step, “…that our lives had become unmanageable.” What, exactly, is that unmanageability to which that line refers? We can look at all the external aspects of our lives and nothing seems to be going right, everything’s askew, from finances to relationships to employment, etc. Maybe, as we are at this alcohol and drug rehabilitation center in Los Angeles, it seems obvious that everything we have touched or are/have been involved with/in is less than manageable. That may be, in and of itself, more than enough of a description and proof of our inability to handle anything in our lives.
With that said, the unmanageability that plainly shows itself in the day-to-day of our existence is no match for the unmanageability that is churning and roiling within us. The drive to numb ourselves because of how we feel about the things we may have or have not done comes from the place of being so unsettled in the very core of our being. That is true unmanageability; everything else outside of us is simply a vague reflection of where we are internally.
Coupled together with the first half of the First Step, it sums up our torturous misery and insanity regarding alcohol and/or drugs. Fear not, the staff can help guide you into truly understanding this. In assisting us toward our necessary and thorough First Step experience, it allows us the opportunity to move forward, out of our prison built on alcohol and drugs. It no longer causes us to reside in that empty yet sick feeling in the place of our soul which leads us back again and again, no matter how much of our lives or the lives of those around us have disintegrated into sorrow and poverty, be it of the financial and/or spiritual kind. There is a way out of that cycle however we must be open to learning new actions and the true meaning of the words by which we begin our new lives.