Drop The Rock: Removing Character Defects, Steps Six and Seven

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In recovery, we try to take the opposite of our character defects and shortcomings and turn them into principles. Perhaps a better way to understand the concept of character defects is through changing how we view and define it. This book reads very easily between talking about character defects and not living in resentment, with great shares in between, and moving through understanding of the steps. If you don’t follow the “clear-cut” directions of our Program, you can’t move into receiving God’s directions. As I do in my longer seminars, the group leader preassigns the personal stories in the book to individuals.

Based on the principles behind Steps Six and Seven, Drop the Rock combines personal stories, practical advice, and powerful insights to help readers move forward in recovery. Drawing on his years of lecturing on the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous and Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, he reveals Step 10 as the natural culmination of working the previous Steps. This book took me a long time to finish as I tend to really have to stop and reflect every darn page. I may choose to hold on to them for fear of letting go, but holding on to them for years and years led me into alcoholism.The tools here are useful for self reflection and measure of progress toward enhancing your life on an ongoing basis. While a few may go away, you will have to realize that the rest of them are considered a “work in progress” and you want to work towards steady improvement of those defects. this book was a good explanation of the attitudes and actions needed to make a productive start on the 6th and 7th steps.

This is a thought-provoking “self help” book, however, if someone doesn’t have “years in the program” I suspect reading this book would be confusing or feel like a foreign language.I took out the list of defects, read it over, and asked myself two questions: Why are you holding on to these things? Some common character defects or shortcomings can include fear, dishonesty, greed, lust, jealousy, grandiosity, willfulness and anger. I am particularly pleased to see Joe McQ quoted so much, as he was influential in my own understanding of sobriety, and spiritual growth, and a man I much admired.

If we use the analogy of recovery being akin to trying to swim to shore, that rock can cause us to sink in the water no matter how strong we swim. The crux of the Sixth Step of Alcoholics Anonymous is addressing our character defects and having the willingness of the God or Higher Power of our understanding to remove them from our lives. Instead of seeing your faults and failings as defects, you should frame it as shortcomings that must be address and worked on. One of the steps to becoming a band leader is to drop your inhibitions and find collaborators who play the music that you want to make. Sure enough, someone was trying to catch the boat, swimming for dear life but not making much headway.Joseph heard Cardenas with drummer Joey Baron’s Killer Joey ensemble and was immediately struck by the guitarist’s warmth and musicality. Steps 6 and 7 are the core of the program moving the work of putting one's life back together from self- based focus to repair of relations with the world around us on an ongoing basis. If I believe in God and believe God made me perfect in mind, body and spirit than I have to accept who I am. Hey’s work with his bands Rudder and Forq provide perfect examples of groove-based instrumental music that grabs listeners, as it is a truly impressive feat to make wordless music listeners connect to. Once free of the rock, she was amazed how easy it was to swim, and she soon caught up with the boat.

It seems like a lot of work, but compared to the disaster an alcoholic leaves in his wake and the work it takes to clean up that mess, the spiritual work seems an easy trade. It is during this step that you must be completely willing and ready to have the God of your understanding remove the character defects. The band’s namesake tune, “Right Back Blues,” is a fast swing piece that sounds like a perfect set closer. It was a very valuable experience for me in really getting what these two Steps are all about and a way for me to work them. Not only is this an extremely helpful book for those working "The Steps" for the first time, but it's a wonderful refresher course for those of us who've been around for a while and want to keep things green.

With that encouragement, Mary started swimming again, only to start sinking again shortly afterward. Taking a look at this description of the word, it can easily be seen how the meaning focuses on where a person is flawed and has a specific character trait or traits that need improvement.