I completed my annual inventory and conversation with my spiritual coach. The top defect that we identified for the next year was childish grandiosity.
I thought, this will be an interesting year. Removing childish grandiosity seemed vague and complicated, like wrestling with fog. How was this defect to be removed, I wondered.
Little did I know that the removal of this defect would eerily echo the removal of another defect, my drinking.
By this time in my Program life, I was in the habit of taking continuous inventories. In my daily and weekly inventories, I saw the defect more frequently. It seemed I was becoming more childish and grandiose, not less. I was making amends every day. It might have been my heightened awareness of the defect, or I was regressing. Either way, it was more and more irritating. My efforts to manage my childish behaviours were failing.
I was desperate.
One day I recalled how my drinking problem had been removed. Before I came to AA, I knew I had a drinking problem and tried to manage it. But that didn’t work.
Finally, I became desperate enough to ask for help and follow instructions. Let’s be clear; I did not desire to stop drinking; I was desperate. But asking for help and following instructions, I transitioned from desperate to manage drinking to desire to stop drinking.
With increasing manifestations of childish grandiosity, I was frustrated and angry. My attempts to manage the defect were not working, and I became desperate enough to ask for help and follow instructions, echoing the removal of my drinking problem.
I asked my sponsor for help. He suggested I focus on childishness. He pointed out, “mature people exercise restraint—focus on restraint. And let’s keep it simple; practice pausing before reacting to anything.”
The focus on restraint started to work. I occasionally paused before reacting, and these moments were beautiful; I came to want more of them. I often slipped in the beginning, but I started to progress. Soon, I looked forward to difficult situations where I could pause before reacting. I was starting to grow up and away from childish grandiosity.
As it was with drinking, so too for the removal of childish grandiosity; desperation led to asking for help and following instructions. I moved from desperation to desire.
Desperation is a great starting point for any defect; with persistence and continuous self-examination, it will become desire. It worked for drinking, a real and evident problem, and childish grandiosity, a subtle and esoteric problem.
These principles work in all my affairs.
Related posts
Beauty in the Wreckage
Transforming Through Partnership with God
Nicely done, Andy. But I’m not sure we can leave our childish grandiosity too far behind without addressing our self-centred narcissism. This brief and well-written article that accurately represents the type of sharing we offer and hear at meetings, included 36 references to I, me or my. This trait is often playfully pointed out by my Al-Anon-steeped partner in describing the self-referential language of AA visitors to Al-Anon meetings. RB
Ray, the article link did not come through, and you send it again so that the website users can see it.
Thanks for the comment and thanks for all that you do for Recovery.
There’s a kid in all of us Andy!
Andy, I relate. At one point in my sobriety I was having a major difficulty accepting that other AAs were not on board with my vision. This was about a pamphlet for the alcoholic with mental health issues. I was mentally ill myself and frustrated to the point of crying.
When I got home from the business meeting, I found a book that a friend had given me. It was Emotional sobriety. I read how Bill conquered his depression. He admitted to being childish and I related. It’s childish to look to the world to parent me like was not parented at home. Children want things right now. They have no patience. That was me. I worked on the motion for that pamphlet for 5 years and I realized that I needed to let go and let it find it’s own way.
At the next Voting Assembly, the motion passed. What then occurred was miraculous. The mental illnesses, which I’d suffered all my life, gradually faded away and have not returned even through 5 years of pain, several broken bones and disability. I realized how much I had created my own misery by acting like a child. Like Bill, I wanted perfection and perfection doesn’t occur in this life except through the acceptance of what is and the willingness to keep alert for other childish defects. Thank you very much for all that you do and for your great posts. Love in AA, Lyla
Great to hear from you Lyla, and what a great message for all to see, thanks for sharing.
Practice pausing before reacting to anything…becoming a mantra for me. Restraint of tongue and pen, and keyboard these days. Thanks for the article Andy. Always making me think deeper, much appreciated
Thanks, Richard; this is such a powerful tool and an important lesson. Thanks