"Regular Inventory"

I've heard some people describe steps ten, eleven, and twelve as 'maintenance steps'. I understand what they're getting at. You've done the other steps, and these are the steps you keep on doing to stay on the spiritual path. For myself, I've found it more useful to keep working all twelve, but that's just me in this moment of my Recovery. These last three steps, though, are a distillation of the previous nine. Step ten is about us; step eleven is about God; step twelve is about working with others. So, if just working these three steps works for someone, I get that.

Step Ten: continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

A full-on tenth step can be a fair share of writing. I try to keep something of a tenth-step attitude, just in general as I go about my day to day life. It's important for me to be mindful. I need to stay in touch with myself and with my disease. It's almost like how diabetics need to check their blood on a regular basis. If something's out of whack, they make adjustments. I do the same. I look at myself, examine my motives, see what I'm doing and if it's working. If it isn't, then I can change it. If I make a mistake, I take care of it promptly instead of letting it snowball into something unmanageable.

Checking in with me doesn't have to be a torturous process, either. It can be as simple as being detached and noticing things. "Hmm, I'm feeling a lot anger today; interesting." Or I can take a more humorous approach to it, which, for someone like me who used to take himself WAY too seriously, can be important. "Oh great, Uncle Steve's watching THAT channel again..." "Yeah, lil Joshua has been whining about wanting to play on the swingset for days..." These are both just different ways of admitting to myself that I'm stuck on something, or being childish.

As I continue to stay sober, continue working the program, my instincts are slowly changing. I'm thinking less of myself and more of others. I'm living a more spiritually-centered life. But I am still an addict. I will always be an addict. Keeping a tenth-step state of mind helps me to stay in touch with myself and keep my less-spiritual side at bay.