D.Y.O.G.

Design Your Own God.

A.A. Step 2 (of 12) Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
A.A. Step 3 (of 12) Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God "as we understood Him".

So many times I hear "the god thing" being a major obstacle to people new in A.A. These two steps probably cause more balking, fussing, hesitation and possibly even relapse than any of the other steps (in my opinion, no facts to back that up). But why? I look at it like this: These are the BEST two steps imaginable!! Why do I see the glass half-full this way? I'll tell you why. Because we get to be creative, that's why. It doesn't say in step 2, or 3 that I have to become a Catholic, a Protestant, a Born-Again Christian, a Buddhist or a Hindu for that matter. It opens the door to a connection to "something" greater than myself - ANY something - it doesn't dictate what that something is. Now, there are A LOT of "suggestions" (i.e. rules) that one needs to be willing to follow if he/she is going to be successful in A.A., but following someone else's mandate about what kind of gOD to have is NOT one of those suggestions, yippee! If dogma were a part of the twelve steps, A.A. as we know it would not have the millions of successfully sober recovering alcoholics that it does.

In the rooms of A.A. and other twelve step programs they talk about "a higher power" - why stop there? I have at least four, and counting. Here's something I've recently been studying in a Human Relations class. It's an exercise of connect the dots. What you have to do is connect all the dots with straight lines but without lifting your pen/pencil from the page and the lines have to be straight. This is a square box of dots with 9 total 3,3,3. People get stumped on how to do this because it seems nearly impossible. The only rules are staight lines and you can't lift your pencil off the paper. So, why so hard? It's not really...it's just about thinking outside of the box! Nothing in the rules says you can't draw OUTSIDE of the rows of dots in order to connect them! ONLY to draw in straight lines and w/o lifting your pencil.

Much the same way, many people don't stop and realize they can think outside the box when it comes to the spirituality or gOD aspect in A.A. What most people are balking at is the dogmatic practices or hypocrisy they dealt with as children. I know I did. But, I'm also an oddball even as far as an alcoholic goes because I LOVE spirituality. To me its an endless journey of learning, growing and getting answers to cosmic questions. My main 4 higher powers consist of "god" which I generally refer to as Source or Universe, Angels, in particular Arch Angels, Spirit Guides (beings who've either lived as a human, or maybe not, who have made a pact with you before entering this physical plane/life to help guide you through your journey here) and Faeries/Nature Angels (I saw one of these once - with my very own eyes!!). These 4 higher powers have demonstrated to me time and again that they are VERY real, as real as the stink on my breath in the morning and the toe nails on my tootsies. Once a person gets over the dogmatic issues that they're actually balking at, an entirely different world opens up. But, it often takes a lot of work to be willing to let your guard down and have some blind trust in some "thing" you can't see or feel. So, I work more with the "feel" approach. I can't see the wind, but i can sure feel it when it blows and when I'm paying attention I can see its effects. Same goes with a higher power despite whatever label is placed upon it.

It's really not as hard as we make it out to be, honestly. Give it a shot! You've really got nothing to loose.