Step Six:
“Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.”
“This is the Step that separates the men from the boys.” So declares a well-loved clergyman who happens to be one of A.A.’s greatest friends.

Step Five:
“Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.”
ALL OF A.A.’s Twelve Steps ask us to go contrary to our natural desires . . . they all deflate our egos.

Step Four:
“Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.”
CREATION gave us instincts for a purpose. Without them we wouldn’t be complete human beings. If men and women didn’t exert themselves …

Step Three:
“Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, as we understood Him.”
PRACTICING Step Three is like the opening of a door which to all appearances is still closed and locked.

Step Two:
“Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.”
THE moment they read Step Two, most A.A. newcomers are confronted with a dilemma, sometimes a serious one.

Step One:
“We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.”
Who cares to admit complete defeat? Practically no one, of course.

Step Twelve:
Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Steps:

Ten: Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
Eleven: Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him,

Steps:

Eighth: Made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all.
Ninth: Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

Seventh Step:
Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.
Seventh Tradition:
Every AA group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions.