Some time back, I was going over the Third Step in the Book.

I have every intention of taking the Big Book literally. But sometimes, some of the phrases seem to skew my ability to do so. For instance, there's that sentence in Chapter Three where it says "Nobody likes to think he is bodily and mentally different from his fellows".

Hah. I used to "like to think" exactly that - specifically, that I was mentally different - mentally superior, in point of fact :)

The evidence that eventually accumulated caused me to drop that pretense, although it still shows up from time to time. But still, whenever I read that phrase, it makes me do a double-think, trying to figure out - am I that strange, or does the book mean something other than what it seems to be saying?

And suddenly I realize - this is the same page where it says "the delusion that we are like other people, or presently may be, has to be smashed". It doesn't specify drinking, but elsewhere in the book it tells us that many alcoholics are entirely normal except in the effect alcohol has upon them.

So, when it says that the idea that we are like other people is a delusion, it means "with respect to drinking". So I reckon that when it says "bodily or mentally differnet", in this context, it means "inferior; sickened; weaker or flawed in some way" - specifically, that we can't drink like other people.

So, when I saw on page 62 this admonition -

" Above everything, we alcoholics must be rid of this selfishness. We must, or it kills us!"

...and I really took it in, it sorta gave me the heebie-jeebies. I mean, do you know any alcoholic who has gotten rid of selfishness? It doesn't say "have it reduced", or "maybe not be quite as obnoxiously self-centered as we were in the old days" - it says "we must be rid of this selfishness...or it kills us".

That bothered me for a long time.

Then, one day while going through the Step 3 prep with a pigeon, I realized that there is an extra word in there - "this". Not "we must be rid of selfishness", but "we must be rid of this selfishness".

And I realized what was being addressed. Self-centeredness - that is the problem.

The Third Step is where we ask to have our self-centeredness be replaced with God-centeredness (that's a term from Appendix II) - up until this point, I don't have any other option. I operate on the basis of self, and, when that doesn't work - I "try harder", still operating on the basis of self.

But now, I am no longer centered on SELF - I have another Voice in me. I have another Option - another Decision Maker. Now, when I realize that I'm being self-centered, I can actually stop - and turn to that Other that has awakened in me,

The book doesn't say (in Step Four) that I'll get drunk if I have resentments - it says "if I HARBOR them" - give them a safe place to stay. When I'm self-centered, that's my only option. But when I am God-centered, I have another option.

Same with Step 10 - I still have selfishness at this point (it says "When these crop up", not "If these crop up : ) - but I can turn to something other than Self to be relieved of it.

So the way that I get rid of this selfishness is that I make a decision, work the rest of the Steps - and I have another Self awaken in me.