I’d like to thank a friend in the program who phoned me tonight, and I’d like to thank God for bringing our lives together. My friend and I have always connected by sharing who we are with each other; not who we should be, but who God created us to be.

Before entering this program, I had been trying to be someone else all my life. I ran away from people or pushed them out of my life, making my world so small that there was no room for anyone but me. I was unable to focus on anyone but myself. But focusing only on myself led to a life of dissatisfaction, emptiness, and pain.

I don’t know how not to be me, how not to run my life around my will (my needs, wants, obsessions, and fears). I am truly powerless over who I am—a weak and imperfect human. Therefore, I have been driven into a relationship with God, because slowly I have seen that I have no other place to go.

I don’t try to do God’s will with my own power. Instead, I give God my will and acknowledge my need for His will in that moment. By doing so countless times, I have built a relationship with God that brings peace into my life. I don’t ask God to change me; I only acknowledge my need for a will other than my own, and by doing this, my life somehow has changed into something I could never have dreamed of.

God has given me the ability to accept who I am, and consequently to build relationships with others and with Himself. When I go beyond myself and interact with God and others, I can better see myself, through each person that God brings into my life.

This is the ultimate paradox: Instead of needing to be “fixed,” my hope lies in accepting myself for who I am. Instead of running away from myself, my hope lies in staying right where I am, falling to my knees, and thanking God for reminding me how much I need His will in my life. My imperfections and my addictions have become gifts, because they are the things that have driven me into a relationship with God—where I find peace in accepting myself just as I am.

I don’t need to run anymore. By speaking about who I am with others, I find the peace and serenity that the Program talks about. I have not changed at all, but my life has changed into something far beyond my own will.