Practicing These Principles in All Our Affairs… By Jamie Moon

Jamie Moon examines how to put the 12 steps into practice in all your affairs.What Principles? Well let’s begin with Step One. The Principle that both my loving Sponsor and I held as the Principle for many years, was Defeat. And we had evidence galore that we use to prove that that was the Principle of Step One. I was right about that and until I noticed that fact recently it remained that way. I run around all the retreats I do claiming that “I am willing to be wrong.” So when I finally noticed that I was holding on to my righteousness about this I at long last opened my mind to other possibilities.

For years I’d hear people in the rooms say their sponsors told them that the Principle of Step One was Acceptance. I was unconsciously closed minded to the possibility that I could be wrong. Now that I have seen my unwillingness to open my mind to another possibility I started to study and listen to what others thought the Principles were of each Step. I then began to ask myself why any of us had to be wrong. So I began to accept the possibility that there could be more than one Principle found in each Step. The following is what I have found and what I accept today as the Principles found in each Step. They are…

Step One—Defeat and Acceptance

Step Two—Open-Mindedness and Hope

Step Three—Surrender and Faith

Step Four—Honesty and Courage

Step Five—Confession and Integrity

Step Six—Willingness and Patience

Step Seven—Humility and Choice

Step Eight—Forgiveness and Compassion

Step Nine—Restitution and Justice

Step Ten—Stewardship and Perseverance

Step Eleven—Consciousness and Spirituality

Step Twelve—Service and Unconditional-Love

I also found that there was an overriding Principle of Gratitude. Without which there is no happiness—no freedom. That makes twenty five Principles and I am now I trust open-minded enough to allow myself to hear of even more. So what do we do with all of these Principles? We practice them. What I would like to do is create a conversation as to how these Principles may help us. How do the help us in our alcohol addiction treatment, or drug addiction treatment, and anorexia and sex and love addiction?

Also, why do I capitalize both the word Principle and the Principles themselves? I intend to answer each of these questions to the best of my ability. I’ll begin with the last questions first. Then I will turn to each Step and each Principle within each Step in the next article.