"I am profoundly, deeply, everlastingly grateful for the gift of the 12 steps. The process of learning to apply the Spiritual Principles in my life has changed my life from an unendurable hell to an adventure that is exciting and enJoyable most of the time. The twelve steps work. That is the bottom line. They work to help a person transform their experience of life into something better. They work to help a person learn to develop a relationship with life and self that allows room for inner peace, happiness, and Joy. The twelve step process works to help a person open up to Love."

"Mystics, gnostics, and certain "primitive" peoples have, throughout recorded human history, understood the Truth in this concept - but the "organized religions" of urban-based civilizations have persecuted, tortured, and crucified any messengers or groups of people who believed in a Loving, personal God or Goddess - because it threatened the power of those organized religions' control over the masses and therefore their very existence. This time the dissemination of the message has been effective because: The time was right; the revolutionary concept was camouflaged as part of a successful treatment for a fatal, incurable disease; and it was accompanied by the Twelve Step Spiritual program."

"The tool, the gift, that I discovered when I was willing to start asking for help was the Twelve Steps. The Twelve Step Recovery program that was developed by Alcoholics Anonymous is a work of mystical Spirituality. It is a formula for integrating Spiritual Truth into day to day human life."

"The first three steps of the twelve step program basically involve: Step 1. getting honest enough to recognize that what we have been doing is not working; Step 2. getting willing to open up to some help from outside; Step 3. asking for help. The next step - the 4th - involves taking an honest inventory and starting to see ourselves with more clarity. When we start getting more honest with ourselves, the 11th step tells us how to access the power to change our lives - through prayer and meditation."

There are two points of powerlessness with Codependence

The first is intellectual - when we first realize that there is something that's not working and that maybe we have to change, to learn a different way.

The second comes after we have intellectually learned what boundaries and healthy behavior are but we cannot stop acting out the old patterns in our closest relationships - we watch ourselves saying things we don't want to say, and doing things we don't want to do.

This is when it is necessary to do the emotional healing.

Here is my version of the initial steps from these two different levels.

Step 1. I acknowledge and accept that I am powerless out of ego-self to control my human life experience, and that the delusion that I should be in control has caused pain and suffering in my life.

Step 2. Came to remember that I am a Spiritual Being who is part of the ONENESS that is the Unconditionally Loving, ALL-Powerful Universal Force, and that believing in that Force can help to bring balance, harmony, and sanity to my life.

Step 3. Made a decision to ask the Force to help me align my will, my actions, and my life with the Universal Power.

Step 1. Admitted that I am powerless to substantially change the learned behavioral defenses and dysfunctional attitudes from childhood until I deal with the emotional wounds of my childhood experience.

Step 2. Came to remember that I am a Spiritual Being who is part of the ONENESS that is the Unconditionally Loving, ALL-Powerful Universal Force, and that believing in that Force can help to bring balance, harmony, and sanity to my life.

Step 3. Made a decision to ask the Force to help me face the terror of healing my emotional wounds.

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