If you have made it this far on the path it is highly likely that you are feeling a mixture of emotions. On the one hand, you have dug up and are now facing the shadow parts of yourself. This is not meant to be a comfortable process, though it is incredibly productive and will lead you to a greater sense of wholeness, freedom and contentment with your life. For the time being, you may be absolutely irritable, unhappy and feeling stuck…or maybe you’re not. Either way, do your best not to attach to your current state of emotions. You are going through a powerful transformation. The feelings you feel at this time will not last provided that you hold the course and continue on your path to true recovery. This brings us to Step 5.
The 5th Step in 12-Step recovery reads approximately: “Admitted to the Uni-verse, to ourselves, and to another Human Being the exact nature of our wrongs.”
This is the Step where we acknowledge what we’ve discovered about ourselves and share it with another person. The importance of this part of the process can be summed up as follows: We are only as sick as our secrets. For how long have we carried a sense that there was something not quite right about us? Wandering through our lives, we constantly compared ourselves to others and usually we came up short. Filled with fears of all kinds, subtle and acute, we always had worked to prevent anyone from knowing what was really going on with us. And so we remained separate, frightened and spiritually sick. Now, with this all-important step we are willing to shed our loneliness and to tell the truth to someone else. Usually, people in 12-Step programs work with a guide, known as a ‘sponsor’, to help them navigate through the steps and their newfound lives in recovery. If you do not have a sponsor to do your 5th Step with, you might pick a spiritual leader who you trust in your community or a close friend that you feel safe with and who could handle the responsibility of holding space for you.
Remember, in Step 4, we did some profound searching as we laid out our resentments as far back as we could remember. We listed people and situations that had “wronged” us and then we looked deeper to see how we had played a part in our own suffering. We saw where we had been fearful, self-seeking, selfish and dishonest. We saw where, through our own actions, we had placed ourselves in situations where later we would be harmed. We began to see a pattern in our life. We had, in fact, played a lead role in our own unhappiness. Now, we were ready to turn the tide and play a role in our own fulfillment and bliss.
I was in a drug rehab center when I did my first 5th Step, which was the final rite of passage before leaving those hallowed halls. I had written my 4th Step to the best of my ability. I was 50 days sober and it was time for me to do it. I sat opposite a very spiritual man who was a Christian pastor that worked at the facility. I had to get beyond the idea that somehow I was flawed or different or broken. I had to release my secrets that I thought no one could hear and still love me. This was about joining the human race. We sat there together for about 3 hours non-stop as I recounted the story of my life. I told him what had happened, how I had reacted and what had resulted from my reactions. Interestingly, the pain I had felt was released not through tears, but through gut-splitting laughter. There was one point where we both had tears streaming down our faces from a laughing fit.
When it was all over, I felt a sense of relief and accomplishment. I knew myself so much better. There was another person on the planet who knew my whole story. The Uni-verse, too, had listened, but there had been no Armageddon, no End of Days. The world continued to turn and I had no secrets left. I hugged the pastor and thanked him. I have never seen him since, but will never forget him.
As you go through your life, let there be at least one human being in the world who knows the inside truth about you, who has stood by and listened to your tale without judgment, who has stood as a witness to you and your development as a human being. May you be so humble as to ask the Uni-verse for such a person to come into your life and may you be so fortunate to find one.
I wish this for you.
With Love and Gratitude,
Tommy Rosen
# # #
Tommy Rosen is a yoga teacher and addiction specialist. Check out his website here.
Pingback: Thoughts for 1/23/2012 | Todd's Point of View