Step Four

 

My old sponsor used to say Steps 1, 2, and 3 would be the ones that saved my life, steps 10, 11, and 12 would be the ones that kept me alive, and the ones in between (4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9) would determine the quality of the life I led. To quickly review:

Step 1 identified the problem (a lack of power). Step 2 offered a solution (power). Step 3 gave me an opportunity to choose between the problem and the solution.

The next 6 steps are where we do the work necessary to apply the solution to the problem. The first of these action steps is Step 4 - Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. The act of taking a personal inventory is not a novel idea. It has been around for centuries. Even the philosopher Socrates is credited with the saying: The unexamined life is not worth living.

I know I make many references to the book Alcoholics Anonymous, more commonly referred to as the Big Book, and it is because the clear-cut directions for taking these 12 steps can be found in that book. The 4th Step inventory process is referred to in the Big Book as a personal housecleaning, which many of us have never tried. Before I entered recovery, I had never tried one. My first wife tried this inventory step numerous times, however it always seemed to be my inventory she was taking.

The Big Book also says that a personal inventory is a fact-finding [searching]and fact-facing [fearless] process [inventory]. It is an effort to find the truth[moral is a synonym for truth]about the stock-in-trade [ourselves]. I worked in many restaurants so I know how to take an inventory. We used to take them daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly. Simply put, they are a record of what we had, what we used, and what we have left. I never worked for any restaurants that took a business inventory of what we had when the store opened up 50 years ago. So, if you have an inventory guide or set of questions that want you to talk about your childhood or your years as an adolescent, that's not what we're doing here. We want to know what's wrong with us now.

One object [of a 4th step inventory] is to disclose damaged or unsalable goods, to get rid of them promptly and without regret. Let's pretend we work at a fruit stand selling apples, oranges, peaches, and pears. Our apples and oranges are bruised and rotting, but our peaches and pears are ripe and juicy. It stands to reason that we have to get rid of the bruised and rotting apples and oranges and replace them with fresh ones. Naturally, we keep the peaches and pears because they are okay. Makes sense, right?

That's what we do in the 4th step. We find the rotten fruit and get rid of it. There are lots of 4th step guides available on the internet or in treatment centers and you are more than welcome to use one of those, but I use the one in the Big Book. Why try to fix something that isn't broken? There is a very helpful explanation and they even give you an example of one on page 65.

The example they give is concerning resentments and we can presume it is just a sample of the author's inventory. There is some controversy in recovery circles about how many columns there are in a 4th step inventory. It is my understanding that there are 5 columns. In the example I am referring to there are 3 columns. The other two columns are discussed in the following pages but no examples are given.

We start a 4th step inventory by making a list of people, institutions, and principles with whom we are angry. To simplify that even further, we list people, places, and things that we are angry at. When I was drinking, nobody had to tell me who I was mad at. I told anyone who would listen. So now they ask me to make a list on a piece of paper. How hard is that? My list had about three dozen entries, Most of them were the usual song and dance - my wife, my father, my brother, my boss, etc.

After I wrote that list (column 1), I asked myself why I was angry at them. My sponsor had suggested that I keep my answers brief - she cheated on me, he beat my mother, he lied to me, he fired me for no reason, etc. I'm not writing a book, just a short story. So that becomes column 2.

In column 3 I wrote down my injuries as I saw them, what part of self was hurt or threatened by what happened. In most cases, it is our self-esteem or our pride, our pocketbook, personal relationships, that sort of thing.

So now I had a few pieces of paper with some writing on it. It might have taken me 30 minutes to write this stuff down. When I was finished, I read it back to myself and I came to the same conclusion that almost everybody does. There were a lot of people in my life that did me wrong. In the big book it says, to conclude that others were wrong was as far as most of us ever got. And that's because most of us did not complete the inventory. There are two more columns and they are the most important ones.

We asked ourselves where were we at fault? My sponsor told me to look at each one and ask myself, in my relationship with that person, place, or thing, was I ever selfish, dishonest, self-seeking, angry, or afraid? So I tried that and although at first I didn't want to admit it, I was that way in every relationship I ever had and in all but a few instances, my injuries were brought about by something that I did that prompted these people to react.

Under the direction of my sponsor, I got another piece of paper and put it beside my 3-column inventory. In column 4, I listed my faults. Beside those, in column 5, I listed things I should have done instead. My sponsor then told me to look very carefully at that second sheet of paper because what I had written in column 4 were my apples and oranges, the rotten ones, and in column 5 were my peaches and pears. Liabilities and Assets. Wrongs and Rights.

There are two other sections to the Inventory. Fears and Sexual Conduct/Harms Done.

The fear part is easy. We made a list of any fears we had, even though we had no resentment about them. We asked ourselves why we were afraid. The answer is fairly obvious. All my life I had relied upon myself and in the end I had failed myself. When I took the third step, I had without realizing it, placed my reliance upon the god of my understanding, so now I can rely upon him to remove any fears I have.

As for the sex conduct, I'm certainly not going to get into it here, but the book says we all have sex problems. It's part of being human. I know that I made mistakes in that area of my life. When there was coldness and rejection at home, I used that as an excuse to shop around the bars for a woman who understood me. When I was single, I was selfish and greedy and unfaithful to many of the women I was involved with. I did a lot of things that I am not proud of, but I made a list of those people I had emotionally injured by my sexual conduct and I made amends to them. By using columns 4 and 5 I was able to shape an ideal for my future sex life. Its really quite simple. I just ask myself if its selfish or not? If you need professional help for your sex problems, or for any other problems, by all means, go get a therapist, just don't confuse your therapist with your sponsor or vice-versa.

I learned something very valuable while doing this part of my inventory. In the Big Book it says We treat sex as we would any other problem. I don't know if I was supposed to read between the lines but I did anyway. That means we treat all of our problems the same way. And what do we do? In meditation we ask God what we should do about each specific matter.

Even today, 20 years after taking the steps, I still have problems. And I treat all those problems the same way. When I woke up this morning I said a little prayer, "Show me what to do today. Show me the stairway I have to climb. Let me do your will, not mine."

It works for me.

Altogether, it took me an hour, maybe two, to write my inventory. So, if you have an afternoon to spare, grab a pen and some paper, and write your inventory. Once you get it all down on paper, then you have taken Step 4.