“Step Three: Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, as we understood God.”

– Life with Hope, first edition, page 11

God, mentioned eight times in the Twelve Steps, is a big part of our program. I am most fascinated by the concept of “…God, as we understood God.” I grew up in an evangelical Pentecostal church in the South. While that may work for many, it did not work for me. I was afraid of that God. My insides did not match up with that God; in short, I did not understand that God. For the Twelve Steps to work, I must exist and work within a concept of a God that I can understand.

The Twelve Steps give me permission to go with what I feel on the inside, as opposed to trying to make myself live up to a thought system that does not mesh with my own instincts. In a way, I’m grateful for my addiction; it got me into the rooms where I was given permission to trust my own understanding of a Higher Power.

Final thought: Today, I give thanks for my Higher Power. I have been given permission by the Twelve Steps to trust my own spiritual intuition.