Eleventh Step: We Sought
“We sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out.”
The main Spiritual Principle of Step Eleven is Spirituality. What is Spirituality? The beautiful thing about AA and NA is that Spirituality is whatever you decide it to be. Neither the program nor the fellowship can decide for you. Although by the time we’ve reached this step, we already have a relationship with a God of our understanding. It is in the Eleventh Step where we”…improve our conscious contact with God.” We do what we can to enhance this relationship further.
In Step Eleven, like any good relationship, we nurture, grow and expand upon this relationship with our Higher Power. The Spiritual Principle of Commitment plays an important part of the Eleventh Step. We continue to pray and reach out to our Higher Power. During this time, it is also suggested that we learn how to meditate. Many addicts and alcoholics agree that prayer is asking God and meditation is listening for the answer. It is also a time for us to become centered and more at peace with ourselves and others. We are blessed with peace of mind and the comfort in knowing that we are loved and cared for by our Higher Power.
Once again, we have the good fortunate to practice some more Humility. The Humility we learned in the previous Steps allows us to “pray for only knowledge of his will… and the power to carry that out.” After Step Three, we have a fairly good understanding of God’s will. In Step Eleven, we refine that realization and pray beyond that, for the power to carry out our Higher Power’s will. God’s will for us is always good!
The C-c-c-c-courage we learned in Steps Four, Five and Eight will further enhance our addiction recovery and dedication to staying clean and sober in Step Eleven. The people that use to have control over us, because we were drunk or high, no longer have that power. We have our own personal program based upon Spiritual Principles, despite how others feel threatened by our new lives. It takes Courage not to fall back upon old ideas and behaviors when confronted by the people of our past. They may not be too thrilled with whom we have become, but we will stay clean and sober, regardless.
The Spiritual Principle of Faith is inherent in the Eleventh Step. God has always met our needs, not our wants, our needs. Once more, we are reminded that our Higher Power hasn’t brought us this far to drop us now! Recovery has given us a second chance at life. Remember, may God’s will be done, not ours!
It is with this precept we move forward with the Faith in God’s will for us and on to Step Twelve.