October 5

For a lot of us, by the time we wrote our Eighth Step list, our Fourth Step list of names nearly doubled our list for the Eighth Step. The reason for this is the result of the Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Steps. What began as anger and resentments toward what was done to us in our Fourth Step, was flipped around in the Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Steps. Our own defects were then revealed to us.

We got to see our part in those situations. We saw that our addiction and drugs put us in situations to harm and be harmed by others.

Our part is that if we weren't practicing the disease of addiction, we probably wouldn't be in a position to get harmed. We no longer could play the blame game. We cut away our justifications and see the part we played.

One of the purposes for this Step is to achieve Freedom from the guilt of the past. Many of us were truly victims as children. We may still hold resentments against our perpetrators.

It will still hurt our Spirits to hold on to these resentments. The Eighth Step makes Forgiveness of these people possible.

We also Forgive ourselves in this Step. We are shown in this Step how our actions and behaviors, in active addiction, actually affected us at a deep level. That's why it's suggested that we also put ourselves on the list.

With Prayer and the Help of our Sponsors, we become Willing to Amend our past. Our Gray Book says that in this Step, " we are gaining new attitudes about ourselves, and how we deal with other people. "