I've Been Waiting For A Girl Like You

I balked at attending the fourth step workshop for three years. Thank God.

Now I am in it, working it, doing my homework, feeling all of it. Never before would I have been able to stick with this, and stay sober. I needed every meeting, reading, phone call I've made to get ready for this step. This is the tough stuff, friends. You get to unwrap those pretty little boxes tied up with satin ribbons (or nooses) that have been kept high up on the closet shelf throughout your life, your drinking life, your life when it was messy and ugly and not at all neat. The Big Book approach to your fourth step helps you wade through all that wrapping and padding without falling into and letting it eat you alive. I won't detail it; if you've done it, you know, and if you haven't, you will. Or, you will drink. Up to you.

So tonight I am reflective, but not victimized by whom I'm looking at. I am strongly moved by my experience, but calm in my emotions. I'm incredibly empowered by knowledge, but not ego maniacal. I am full of compassion for myself and others, without pity. With respect and gentility I have been shown how to take an honest look at myself. There is a beautiful truth about who I am, and I like this woman. Finally. You might, too.