1. We admitted we were powerless over alcoholthat our lives had become unmanageable.

If your life is unmanageable, precisely how did you manage to come to an AA meeting If you are powerless over alcohol, you are literally incapable of !uitting, so right here with step one, we"re at a dead end, an absurd contradiction #. $ame to believe that a %ower greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. Anything is possible, but I"m still waiting for tangible proof that such a thing e&ists. '. (ade a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of )od as we understood Him. *ounds to me li+e a proposal to substitute one habit, drin+ing, for another, superstition. If you understand god to be at best a remote and unli+ely possibility, and at worst a vicious, irrational, insane, hateful concept responsible for centuries of crime, war, rape, pillage, ignorance, fear, stupidity and death, then how would I be even remotely any better off turning over my will to such a thing *ounds more li+e a cult wanting you to give up your brain and free will, and accept orders blindly.

,. (ade a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. What, precisely, is the moral standard by which this inventory is to be conducted -. Admitted to )od, to ourselves, and to another human being the e&act nature of our wrongs. .irst, see number #. /e&t, no one can ever +now the e&act nature of their wrongs because it"s impossible to +now all of the conse!uences and effects of our actions. Also very creeped out by the confess aspect of this. .uc+ that. 0he last thing in the world I need is for someone to 1udge, forgive or condemn me. 2. Were entirely ready to have )od remove all these defects of character. 0his is getting really tiresome. *ee 3#. 4. 5umbly as+ed 5im to remove our shortcomings. 6+ay, now I"m getting angry. 0he commonplace 7. (ade a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to ma+e amends to them all. 8. (ade direct amends to such people wherever possible, e&cept when to do so would in1ure them or others. 19.$ontinued to ta+e personal inventory, and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it. 11.*ought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with )od as we

understood Him, praying only for +nowledge of 5is will for us and the power to carry that out. 1#.5aving had a spiritual awa+ening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.