“I finally had the answer; the reason I felt hostile when confronted with hostility was because I am hostile…” (RC 5)

Recently, while sitting in an SA business meeting, I began feeling uncomfortable. It seemed that others were not sufficiently valuing my opinion! I began feeling hostile, but I was unwilling to admit it to myself. In that moment, a lust image I thought I had given up came to the forefront of my mind. I said a half-hearted prayer of surrender to my Higher Power, but in reality, I was still holding on.

I suddenly realized that I was slipping into dangerous behavior. When I was new in recovery, I would have nurtured the image into a fantasy, and the fantasy would have led me back to acting out. Today I can see the image for what it is: a symptom of my underlying disease. I am the problem. Until I can sit and listen to others in a business meeting without feeling hostile (or without truly surrendering my pride and my own agenda), then my recovery will be incomplete. More than mere sobriety, I need recovery over myself and my defects.

It was sobering for me to see my sudden powerlessness. The moment of blindness passed, and I was able to bring my hostility to the light of my loving Higher Power. I quickly went through Steps One through Twelve in my mind. Just a 30-second version of the Steps (I call them “Speed Steps”)—and God took the image away.

Then I remembered Traditions One, Two, and Twelve. Tradition One tells me that the group comes first, and that my own personal recovery depends on group unity. Tradition Two says there is but one authority: a loving Higher Power, and He speaks through the collective group conscience. I need to listen to other people in the meeting and hear what they have to say. Tradition Twelve tells me to place principles before personalities. I was making the meeting all about me and my fears, instead of listening to others and hearing what they had to say.

Through my practice of the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, I can more successfully put the group’s welfare above my own agenda—and then my “individual welfare follows close afterward” (Tradition 1, 12&12 189). I am grateful for my SA service work because through service I get to see what still needs to be changed in me. Then I can work the Steps and Traditions on my defects and get closer to God’s will each time I do.

Thank God for SA business meetings and thank God for SA!