The 12 step method is a spiritual process to cure the spiritual malady of addiction. As we explained earlier the illness of addiction is the distorted longing of the soul for the relationship with his Creator and its intense pleasure of completion, masked in the form a drug, alcohol, or some other physical pleasure giving (or self imagined pleasure-giving) thing. The drive for this feeling of completion entirely takes over the addict to a level which he is incapable of acting against it. The only cure for this disease is to build a true and real relationship with his Creator, in the place of the false relationship with the drug trying to fill his void. The Creator will then fill the void with himself and remove the addiction. The drug or drink no longer stands at the center of his life, he is no longer interested in the chase of that which doesn’t exist. He is cured of his addiction.
However, to build a real relationship with the Creator and to allow Him to remove the addiction, the addict himself must be willing to let go of the addiction and allow the Creator to remove it and fill the void. The addict must see that if he continues on the path he is currently on he is destined for disaster. He must admit that he has lost control over his problem and it is not in his power to fix it. This realization is called the “first step experience.” It is a horrifying and earth shattering experience, as the addict finds himself on a free-falling roller coaster to disaster and no person can save him. He then comes to realize that he has a Creator of ultimate power and kindness who can and will save him from the addiction. He gives himself over to his Creator and forms a relationship with Him. The addiction is removed, this true relationship with his Creator settles in the void of his soul, and his soul no longer yearns for false replicas of what it is truly looking for.
The process of recovery is far from finished. Now that he started to forge a relationship with his Creator he must now change his lifestyle to be a person who will maintain such a relationship. He now must undergo a fundamental character change. An addict is a dishonest, distorted, self-centered, egotistical being. Cheating, lying, and manipulating is his life. He must turn around his entire lifestyle into becoming a truly honest, caring, and giving person. The addict must take a fearless and thorough moral inventory of his actions and past and current feelings and resentments. He then goes over the inventory with his therapist, sponsor…. and recognizes how in all of his resentments he is responsible for his own fate; it is him and only him to blame for his situation. The addict admits to Gd, to himself, and to another person the exact nature of which he did wrong. He readies himself for G-d to remove these defects of character and humbly asks Him to remove his shortcomings. He makes a list of all that he has done wrong to other people and became willing to make amends to them all. He makes direct amends to those he did wrong wherever possible (except when to do so would injure them or others), and correct whatever can be corrected and returning that which can be returned. They continue to take personal inventory and promptly admit when they’re wrong. It takes a tremendous amount of courage to face the truth, but the addict knows it is the only way for him to achieve lasting recovery.
The addict then goes on to live a more spiritually guided lifestyle of helping others, and be a living testimony to G-d’s kindness and power. The eleventh step is to seek through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with G-d, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out. Continuing with the twelfth step of having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, they try carrying the message to other alcoholics/drug addicts, and to practice these principles in all their affairs.
This is the twelve step method. Only a spiritual cure can fix the root of a spiritual malady