Step by Step - Step11

“Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.”

 – Step Eleven

“As we go through the day we pause, when agitated or doubtful, and ask for the right thought or action. We constantly remind ourselves we are no longer running the show, humbly saying to ourselves many times each day, ‘Thy will be done.’ We are then in much less danger of excitement, fear, anger, worry, self-pity, or foolish decisions. We become much more efficient.” 

– Alcoholics Anonymous, 3rd Edition, 1976, Ch 6 (“Into Action”), pp 87-8.

Today, let me understand that the 11th Step is the logical extension of Step Three – “Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.” In handing off to my Higher Power my self-will and entire life, it is then proper that I begin each day and take on any problem by asking through prayer and meditation what His will is for me instead of plunging into the habit of doing it my way. As the Big Book accurately reflects, my way generated anger, fear, worry and self-pity, and a host of other destructive feelings. Today, I can do without them, and an “easier, softer way” is to let a Higher Power who is stronger and wiser than me call the shots. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M. 

Step by Step

“Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.” 

– Step Two

” …(W)e believe there is no middle-of-the-road solution. We were in a position where life was becoming impossible, and if we had passed into the region from which there is no return through human aid, we had but two alternatives: One was to go on to the bitter end, blotting out the consciousness of our intolerable situation as best we could; and the other, to accept spiritual help. This we did because we honestly wanted to, and were willing to make the effort.” – Alcoholics Anonymous, 3rd Edition, 1976, Ch 2 (“There Is a Solution”), pp 25-6.

Today, if I remain skeptical about a Higher Power or even atheist, let me accept that the one entity I entrusted to run my life – myself – simply has not worked. Especially if I am in “the region from which there is no return,” may I at least want and be willing to accept the possibility that a force for the better and stronger than my self-will exists. If I am still caught up in the myth that the spiritual entity is religious, maybe I have already set myself up as unwillingness to find my own Higher Power. In holding onto unwillingness and not opening myself to the possibility, the recovery I seek probably is not in the cards, especially if I continue to do it my way although it has shown me time after time after time and time and time again that I simply cannot do it on my own. Today, enough is enough, and I take the step to at least consider the possibility that something better, stronger and wiser than myself can help me do it. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M. 

Step By Step

Today …”having had a spiritual awakening.” Today, I ask myself seriously and honestly what “spiritual awakening” means. If I talk the Program’s talk but don’t walk the walk, I am little more than a dry drunk and have missed out on one of recovery’s most elusive and cherished accomplishments – a fundamental change emotionally and spiritually. If I talk of strict adherence to being in service to the Program and other alcoholics who still suffer but beg off because I am too busy to give someone a ride to a meeting, my talk about being in service is little more than self-righteous, self-serving, sanctimonious ego-blowing. Today, I need to ask if I have truly undergone the basic requirement of a spiritual awakening – a fundamental change in attitude, perspective and spirituality. And if I conclude honestly that I have not, it’s back to the basics of the Program. And if today I catch myself only talking the talk, may I seek the Higher Power to teach me the walk. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M. 

Step by Step

“Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.”

 – Step Four

“If we have been thorough about our personal inventory, we have written down a lot. We have listed and analyzed our resentments. We have begun to comprehend their futility and their fatality. We have commenced to see their terrible destructiveness. We have begun to learn tolerance, patience and good will toward all men, even our enemies …We have listed the people we have hurt by our conduct, and are willing to straighten out the past if we can.” – Alcoholics Anonymous, 3rd Edition, 1976, Ch 5 (“How It Works”), p 70.

Today, if the Fourth I wrote down yesterday is not “a lot,” chances are I have not been thorough; more likely, I have been dishonest by not accepting responsibility in any injury I inflicted or by seeing myself as I hope instead of how I am. But putting to paper our indiscretions and injury to others is not sufficient; we are asked to perceive our defects as futile and fatal and begin to understand their damage. Further, we are compelled to begin learning “tolerance, patience and good will toward all men …” and become willing to undo some of our damage. If I not been moved to understand all this, the Fourth I took yesterday may have been premature or dishonest; today, I seek the courage and understanding to do Step Four as it is intended. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M.

Step by Step

“…(D)eep down in every man, woman and child is the fundamental idea of God. It may be obscured by calamity, by pomp, by worship of other things, but in some form or other it is there. For faith in a Power greater than ourselves, and miraculous demonstrations of that power in human lives, are facts as old as man himself.” 

– Alcoholics Anonymous, 3rd Edition, 1976, Ch 4 (“We Agnostics“), p 55.
Today, if I expect AA to work for me, I must expect myself to work with it, and I must knock down the wall that separates me from the Power stronger than myself to begin my recovery from alcoholism. If I am struggling or even rejecting the possibility of such a Power, let me read and embrace these words from the Big Book and accept on blind faith the hope that somewhere inside me is a “fundamental idea of God.” He, God, need not be a religious entity but a spiritual one, and a “spiritual awakening,” even if it is a basic change in my psyche or character, is required if I am to achieve any kind of quality recovery. Today, I must put aside any resistance and open myself to the idea of a Power stronger than myself so that I can earn the benefits of recovery. If alcohol is stronger than me, I have to believe and hope that a force stronger than alcohol can restore me. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M., 2013

Step by Step - May 30 2026

“The old pattern reasserted itself, but it was no longer once every six months. The intervals grew shorter. The binges were longer. They were harder to get off. I wasn’t the type that could taper off. I had to stop cold. My last binge followed the previous one by two weeks. I had just come off a good one, and I went back on to the next one.” 

– Alcoholics Anonymous, 3rd Edition, 1976, “They Lost Nearly All,” Ch 3 (“Desperation Drinking”), p 514.

Today, let me guard against the passage of time and my last drunk from fading the memory of what my drinking days were really like – pure desperation. If it is true that the best predictor of my future is my past conduct, I cannot afford to “romanticize” my drinking, that it was “fun” and that it didn’t rip a path of destruction through myself and others. God grant me the honesty and wisdom to remember the desperation that finally pushed me to ask for help after I exhausted all the denial, justifications and rationalizations. Let me understand and accept that desperation is all the awaits me again if I am not honest with myself in remembering what active alcoholism is truly like. Today, the desperation that is always there to greet me again can wait. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M., 2013

Step By Step - May 28 2026

“Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.” 

– Step Two
Today, whether a newcomer or veteran of the Program, if the term Higher Power discourages me because my faith has been ravaged by alcohol or the less than serene episodes of sobriety, let me re-read and understand the literal interpretation of Step Two. We are not asked or mandated by this Step to believe, but “come to believe” in the possibility of a Higher Power. If I shrug off the possibility of some being stronger and greater than myself, I need only look to why I came to AA in the first place: by doing that, I also reached out for the possibility that some help that I need desperately exists. By the same measure, if I cannot yet grasp the concept of a stronger power, let me believe that Step Two is telling me that coming to believe in and accept a Power greater than myself is a dynamic process, one that requires ongoing change. Just as I did not become sober after my last drink and probably needed weeks, months or longer to move from being dry to being sober, so it goes with developing an understanding of the principles of all Twelve Steps. Today, I will not give up if I do not believe in that Higher Power; instead, I will proceed with the promise of Step Two that I will one day find my Higher Power. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M.,

Step by Step - May 28 2026

Today, I realize that my moral inventory in the Fourth and amends of the Eighth are not confined to my wrongs of commission but also apply to my wrongful acts of omission. With that awakening, my Fourth and Eighth Steps, hopefully, will be more honest. My moral inventory and amends I have tried have focused on things I have done or said, but they have not included my wrongs of having not said or done what I should have. Maybe I neglected or refused to return love or support that someone showed me in my darkest days, or maybe I didn’t answer someone’s call for help for whatever reason. Today, I return to my Fourth and Eighth Steps to decide if I owe restitution not for what I did, but for what I didn’t do. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M., 2013

Step by Step May 27 2026

Today, I have to give overdue appreciation to the spouse, companion, brothers and sisters, parents, children and friends who wanted to help me as I spiralled out of control but who I shut out, who were and are still there as I inch toward recovery. In being focused on my own recovery and working the Steps, I have probably been negligent to admit that the hell I put someone else through might have been worse than my own. And I have to acknowledge that they, too, have their own recoveries to work. Today, I will be grateful and offer to anyone who stayed with me a simple thank you and, to them, my superior amend is that, today, I can and will stay sober. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M., 2013

Step by Step May 24 2026

“Let no alcoholic say he cannot recover unless he has his family back. This just isn’t so. In some cases, the (spouse) will never come back …(R)ecovery is not dependent upon people. It is dependent upon his relationship with God.” 

– Alcoholics Anonymous, Third Edition, 1976, Ch 7, pp 99-100.



Today, grant me understanding why my alcoholism, sobriety and recovery are dependent only on me and that I cannot make my recovery a condition of what someone else does or how some situation plays out. Just as none of those dynamics can be “blamed” for my alcoholic drinking, neither can they be the reason for my recovery. To place conditions of my sobriety on someone or something else does little more than substantiate my refusal to take responsibility and consequences and exert emotional blackmail on an external source that I cannot or will not stop drinking if I don’t get from them what I want. Today, my addiction, my character defects, my spiritual defects are my responsibility, the result of my reckless and selfish behavior, and no one else’s fault; likewise, no one and nothing outside of me are responsible for my recovery. And if addiction is as selfish as the Program says, then so it is for my recovery. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M., 2014

Step by Step May 22 2026

“It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness. …But with the alcoholic, whose hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience, this business of resentment is infinitely grave. We found that it is fatal.” 

– Alcoholics Anonymous, Third Edition, 1976, Ch 5, p 66
Today, I will understand and accept that resentments are both futile and unhappy and, by holding onto them, other words in the Big Book are gospel: ” …(H)arboring such (resentment), 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.” Because I cannot afford to empower anything so strongly that my sobriety and, subsequently, my life are imperiled, I will listen to my Higher Power for the way to release to Him my resentments without taking them back. By holding onto and later taking back resentment, I must follow the Big Book’s conclusion that I am still spiritually sick and that the sickness can magnify to trigger a slip or relapse. Today, I beg in sincerity and humility for the courage, strength and willingness to release that which I cannot control. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. Chris M.

Step by Step May 22 2026

Today, I will reach into my past to measure the enormity of my present and try to grasp the scope of the life sobriety has given me. Whereas I once was helpless, hopeless, weak, apathetic, selfish and destructive – and pathetic – today I have hope, strength, selflessness, compassion, passion and the courage born of humility to treat sobriety with awe and respect. While I cannot and do not want to live in or return to yesterday, I also do not want to forget it; its lessons can steer me from the same mistakes today. And all I have left behind and gained what I have now is through sobriety and, therefore, my sobriety is my No. 1 priority for. Without it, I have nothing except for all that I pray is gone – just for today. And our common journey continues.

Step by step. – Chris, M., 2014

Step by Step May 21 2026

Today, if I get frustrated or overwhelmed by the responsibilities with which sobriety has entrusted me, I will slow down to remember gratitude and humility, if for no other reason than I once could not be trusted with the responsibilities that I have in sobriety. Getting sober and, more importantly, recovery have given me a purpose and sense of inclusion that addictive drinking took from me. But although sober and (hopefully) getting better emotionally and spiritually day by day, I must guard against a reckless or stupid moment in which what I have gained is destroyed – by me. Today, even if the candle burns at both ends, I will be grateful that my candle now even has a flame. And our common journey continues.


Step by step. – Chris M., 2014

Step by Step May 20 2026

“In spite of (a) great increase in the size and the span of this Fellowship, at its core it remains simple and personal. Each day, somewhere in the world, recovery begins when one alcoholic talks with another alcoholic, sharing experience, strength, and hope.” 

– Alcoholics Anonymous, Forward to the Third Edition, 1976.


Today, I will not diminish or dismiss the enormity of my personal recovery by thinking that mine is insignificant among the millions of others who have found recovery in the Program. The words of the Big Book empower us and our recovery by telling us that our own and another person’s hope begins one-to-one when two alcoholics talk to each other and share their experience, strength and hope. In turn, the alcoholic whose recovery began by talking to another alcoholic passes onto yet another alcoholic his own experience, strength and hope. Today, I embrace with gratitude and humility the significance of my recovery along with those millions of others because, without my experience, strength and hope to pass on to someone else, our Fellowship will not increase in size, span – or power in its message of reconciliation and redemption. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M., 2014

Step by Step - May 19 2016

” …(W)hat about the real alcoholic? He may start off as a moderate drinker; he may or may not become a continuous hard drinker; but at some stage of his drinking career he begins to lose all control of his liquor consumption, once he starts to drink.” 

– Alcoholics Anonymous, Third Edition, 1976, Ch 2, p 21.

Today, I will not search in futile desperation for a reason to deny my addiction by twisting the Big Book’s reference to a “real alcoholic.” If, for example, I drank only beer, how can I be an alcoholic? If I drank only on weekends or even one day a weekend, how can I be an alcoholic? If I drank only to relax or calm my nerves, how can I be an alcoholic? If I never lost a job, a spouse or partner, if I never got nailed for DUI or spent a night in the county jail’s drunk tank, how can I be an alcoholic compared to the “real” one who drank every day, to the “real alcoholic” whose job history makes him now virtually unemployable, or to the “real” who has up in jail so many times that he has his name engraved in the cell? Today, may I understand and finally accept that because I lost control over drinking regardless of how much or how often I drank, I am as much the “real alcoholic” as the one who now is serving a long-term prison sentence for what he did when he was drunk. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M., 2014

Step by Step - May 18 2026

Today, I will not take disproportionate pride in any job or thing well done to the extent that I unconsciously elevate myself above others, nor will I embellish any mistake to the degree that my self-confidence is so devastated that I con myself into believing I can do nothing right. Either way, the source of excess pride and a shattered self-image is an ego that is not centered but is too far to the left or right. In the end, egoism is the character defect that, had I been thorough and honest in my Fourth, remains with me. And I ask my Higher Power to strike the proper balance. May I understand that a job well done is no license to toot my own horn and that deep disappointment with myself for making a mistake blinds me to a basic edict of the Program – progress over perfection. Today, I will give up perfection as a goal and leave it to the Power that is truly perfect. And our common journey continues.


Step by step. – Chris M., 2014

Step by Step - May 17 2026

“He was drinking to hold on to his job, to hold on to his wife, to hold on to his sanity. Finally, he was drinking to keep away those little men, and those strange voices, and the organ music that came out of the walls.” 

– Alcoholics Anonymous, Third Edition, 1976, Ch 8, p 512.


Today, grant me the understanding that the reasons and excuses I used to justify drinking are now the reasons I cannot drink. If I drank out of fear of losing a job, let me not drink to keep it; if I drank with uncertainty that I might lose a spouse or loved one, let me not drink to have a chance at salvaging the relationship; if I drank to stop for a while the hallucinations that were not real, let me not drink to extinguish them forever. The desperate excuses I used to drink can now, ironically, become the reasons not to drink. In the end, as the Big Book repeats time and again, I am only drying out and not sobering up if I hinge my recovery on something other than for myself. Today, I choose not to drink for myself and not to avoid a pending consequence; by becoming sober for myself, I am given greater strength and courage to deal effectively with whatever consequences of my alcoholism await me. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M., 2014

Step by Step - May 16 2026

“The fact is that most alcoholics …have lost the power of choice in drink. Our so-called will power becomes practically non-existent. We are unable …to bring into our consciousness with sufficient force the memory of the suffering and humiliation of even a week or a month ago. We are without defense against the first drink.” 

– Alcoholics Anonymous, Third Edition, 1976, Ch 2, p 24.

Today, I understand and accept that I cannot quench the lie of “just one” and that my defense rests wholly in the Higher Power of my understanding. I need only to review with honesty my drinking history and its trail of broken bottles that were opened on the promise of “just one drink.” And if the Big Book is correct that the memory of “the suffering and humiliation” of my last try at just one drink doesn’t last more than a month at best, I pray for the wisdom to search beyond the impotence of my own devices to overcome any temptation. Today, that search beyond leads me to my Higher Power in whom I must place my trust, faith, hope and confidence that He has better luck than my own tactics to overcome temptation. And our common journey continues.

Step by step. – Chris M., 2014

Step by Step - May 15 2026

Today, I will not immerse myself so deeply into service or 12th-Step work that I neglect my own basic needs: to put into anything the passion I spent on drinking, I will predictably suffer the same outcome of physical, emotional and spiritual bankruptcy. While we are called and even commanded by the 12th Step to commit ourselves to service, the quality of that service will be negligible if I have not stored and reserved enough of myself to offer something worth giving. Today, I will guard against becoming too hungry, angry, lonely and tired – HALT – to assure that I can be the best of what the 12th Step asks of us – to be an effective carrier of the message. Today, I will listen to the message again. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M.

Step by Step - May 14 2026

Today, I will stop expending anymore needless energy on the thought that I can’t drink by saying I neither need nor want to drink. I don’t need, want or have to drink because the Program has graced me with a fundamental character change that is rooted deeper than merely abstaining from alcohol, and that basic change in my character is that I have been given the strength and courage to look at and correct the reasons that I drank. Today, I don’t need to moan that I cannot drink now or ever again because AA has empowered and strengthened me by taking away the need and desire for alcohol. But may I not rest on the laurels of sobriety and conscientiously practice Step 10 every day: taking a continuing moral inventory and readily admitting and taking responsibility for my mistakes. And our common journey continues. 

Step by step. – Chris M., 2014