I’ve always had an approach-avoidance relationship with working the Steps. I always feel great after having done some writing on a Step, but it can take quite a long time for me to stop the squirrel cage long enough to actually sit down and start writing. The fact that I took five years to work the first three Steps in the program tells me that I wasn’t in any great hurry to recover from my self-destructive behaviors and attitudes.

Over my years in SA, I’ve become much more motivated and disciplined than I was in my former six-tenths-of-a-Step-per-year mode, but I still often need a kind of jump-start with the writing. I found a simple little ritual (which I must have heard at a meeting) that helps me progress in my Step writing but with relatively little pain involved. Here’s what I do.

I get out the materials I normally use (pen, paper, Step guide, Big Book, White Book), set the timer on my watch to ten minutes, sit down, and begin. I work until the alarm goes off and then stop. The main thing for me is to sit in front of the blank page while pondering my question or topic. If I write something, that’s great; if I write nothing but get closer to the subject (the truth about me), that’s fine too. The main thing is to do some Step work as opposed to zero work. I figure that sitting in front of a piece of paper for ten minutes is a realistically achievable goal. Since I spend ten minutes several times a day just staring into space, I know that this ten really isn’t going to cause too much damage to my day.

After the alarm sounds, I ask myself if I’d like to stop now or continue writing. If I stop, at least I know that I’ve done something good for my recovery that day. If I continue, so much the better, but either way, I always feel good about having been willing to do something to live in the solution that day.

Another thing I do: if I’m going to be out where I might have to spend time waiting in an office, bank, or shopping center I carry my pocket-sized Step writing book and a photocopy of my Step guide in my pocket. Thus I always have it handy to work on if I “get stuck” somewhere. I’ll often do this when my wife and I plan to be out shopping. If she stops into a store to browse for something for herself, I’ll just sit on a bench outside and work on my Step. We’ve both agreed beforehand that this is okay.