Let Go and Be Free Podcast: Episode 45 (Exploring Step 6 of the Twelve Steps of Adult Children of Alcoholics)

In today's episode, I discuss the sixth step from Adult Children of Alcoholics & Dysfunctional Families World Service Organization's 12 Steps.

Step 6: Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

Fear not. If you’re not interested in doing this step and stay far away from any concept of God, there’s still a lot you can get from this step.

Self-reflection, seeing yourself from a different perspective, and be willing to change.

Does “defects of character” mean that you’re “broken” or that something’s “not right” with you?

How to embrace who we are, the fullness of our existence, and not just the parts that we want people to see.

Incorporating our hurt, the pain, along with all of our experiences by owning our past allows us to step onto a new path instead of running from who we truly are.

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Want to learn more about Let Go and Be Free? Check out the Let Go and Be Free book series.

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Transcript

Welcome to the Let Go and Be Free podcast, a podcast for those who grew up in an alcoholic or dysfunctional family. I'm your host, Ron Vitale, author of the Let Go and Be Free: 100 Daily Reflections for Adult Children of Alcoholics series. If you'd like to learn more, feel free to visit, letgoandbefree.com. And with that, let's get on with the show.

Welcome to the show. For this week's episode, I want to continue going through and discussing the 12 steps of adult children of alcoholics. We are going to go through step six right now. And we're gonna break this one down. Similarly, as I did with the others, I know that there could be some challenges related to how this kind of plays out the sense of whether again, you believe in God or not. I don't want to have that discussion here. I think that's a personal decision.

Either you do or you do not or you're not sure. And I think that there's a lot of value that can be taken from the 12 steps, even if you don't believe in God, and kind of, you know, kind of stress on that, that I really think that the the tools that we're learning from the 12 steps are extremely helpful, no matter if you believe in any particular God or not. I don't think that's the strength of the steps. So to kind of start off with how about we start with, let me read step six. So step six, is, were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

And I know right there, you know, some people are like, whoa, wait a minute, I don't want to, you know, focus on God. And, you know, I don't believe that God's gonna save me and I hear you, I do. So imagine, if we were to reread this step. And step six, is we're entirely ready to have all these defects of character removed, like, remove all these defects of character. So it's something that internally, there is some self reflection, something in which instead of blaming others focusing on this is what happened to me when I was a kid, it was their fault, it was this person's fault.

If this person didn't drink, or didn't do drugs, or didn't hit me, or didn't this or didn't, that there might be some of you that have focused on that path. And I understand where you're coming from, you know, for the longest time, I was in the same boat, where I just kept thinking back, like, Oh, I'm never going to have a father that, you know, played ball with me, and they didn't teach me how to ride a bike, and he wasn't there for me, XYZ milestone, you know, and that was, they'll be honest, that was really difficult for me to kind of come to terms with I think I would, you know, I'm remembering times where I would reflect back and just realize that I just was never going to have that, you know, with my father. And, and to think of that, really did cause me a lot of pain.

A lot of hurt, where I just was, like, I just want to some of the basic things, you know, that some people take for granted, someone that would be there for you to toss a ball and hear you talk about your day at school, or, you know, to teach about how he met my mom and how he, you know, was in a relationship with her and, and you know, what he did in dating and just sharing stories, none of that happened. I just felt like, again, I, I had this blank book of like, who I needed to become, I knew that I needed to mature and he needed to grow, but I had no clue how to do it, where to go to figure this all out. I just felt lost, to be honest. And so for a lot of my early years, just put a lot of anger and hate toward, you know, my father of like, it's his fault. You know, he was bad he did XYZ, which is true. But that doesn't necessarily mean one, it was the full story.

And two, no matter how much energy I spent on the past and hating him, that was never going to quote unquote, fix me or strengthen me to become the person that I needed to be if I wanted to be, you know, a good husband, a good friend, a good co worker, good father myself. So when I look at step six, Next, you know, again, step six, we're entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character. If we take the word God out, if we think about if we ourselves are ready to have our defects of character removed, and I, you know, I'm can hear some of you, but probably screaming back at the podcast, wherever you're listening from, well, I'm not broken. And I'm not saying that you are broken. I'm not saying that all of us carry these, these baggage weight with us. But I think it is fair to say that we do have again, in in the terms of adult children of alcoholics, defects of character, for me, that would be how I communicate to other people under stress.

You know, when I'm, you know, feeling being put upon and feel like the world is coming at me, do I withdrawal? Do I fight back? You know, do I lash out? What are these defects of character that I've learned from seeing dysfunctional behavior model time and time? Again, when I was a kid growing up, and in my teenage years, what did I see? You know, in my own family, like, there's lots of yelling, and lots of screaming, and I've mentioned this before yelling, fighting, fighting, and a sense of arguing, screaming, and then 10 minutes after the argument, the sides would call again. And then later in the day, you'd have to pretend that nothing ever really happened. Again, everything went back to normal, nothing was ever solved. But it was like, it was like a, you know, trying to think of the right analogy, the balloon was gathering all the stress and stress and was growing big and being and being in and would explode. And then sure, everything would go back to normal again, that's just how my, you know, childhood was, you know, and growing up.

So the defects of character that I personally have had to deal with is learning, you know, what are the rules of arguing? What are the best ways of communicating? How do you really listen to someone instead of trying to quote unquote, win a fight, win an argument? How do I learn these things, if I wasn't learning them from the modeling that I saw and the dysfunctional behaviors within my family? With step six, is basically saying, What if I do the self reflection? And if I look at things from a different perspective, what if I'm willing to change? You know, what if that's a very powerful phrase, what if it creates possibility, as you know, the opposition to that is, you're stuck the way you've always been, you know, you're always going to be a certain way, if you believe that, that there's no chance for growth or for change, then that's a really heavy burden to carry through the course of life.

That's something where, you know, you're just going to be defined by your past, and not have the possibility of either reinventing yourself, learning new things, or exploring your own personality and coming to terms with your past, to find healing, and becoming whole at something that I think is extremely important. We've talked about the various paths for this, some people do therapy, the adult children of alcoholics, meetings, self help books, writing in journals, you know, meditation, visualization techniques, some people do all those things, some people do yoga, pilates, all kinds of stuff.

There are many ways many paths to get to that, you know, future state where you can say, I'm learning new skills, you know, for lack of a better phrase reprogramming your neural pathways. So that way, the habits, those defects of character habits that you've learned, you have to basically learn new ones. And you got to roleplay in the sense of practice those out and learn them over time. If you're in an argument with someone, and let's say, simple example, I think this is a pretty common one that many people can identify with.

You're married and you and your spouse argue about something, it could be something that you argue about the same thing, again, and again, and again, and nothing ever gets resolved. The question is, what could be different in the future? Are you really listening? Or are you just trying to tell somebody where your own opinion is and how you're right, and they're wrong? Are you willing to compromise? Are you willing to try new communication, interpersonal communication skills? Are you willing to work with somebody?

You know, in therapy, there's lots of different paths that you can get to to have that healthier, more functional communication with let's say your spouse us. And again, just using an example. This could be anything could be with family member, it could be with, you know, co worker or boss, it doesn't really matter, just using a simple example. In this step, it's what are we accountable for talked about boundaries, many other times through reviewing these 12 steps. If you think about the boundary, we're entirely ready to have our defects of character removed. Our the things that we own, that we are responsible for things are that we are accountable for that boundary line, we are us, not them, their problems, their issues, we know that this step is is basically drawing the line of what can you improve in yourself?

It doesn't say, you know, you're broken, and you're ruined. And these are these things that you've got to do to fix yourself. It's how do you remove and unlearn some of these dysfunctional defects of character? What if you, you know, are always gossiping, or you're lying, or you're cheating, or your whatever, whatever those defects are? How can you learn a different path. So want to be very clear, that defects of character, I don't see that as meaning something's not right with you, or something's broken within you. It's that defects of character, you're choosing to do something that isn't helpful for you. What if you were to choose a different path, learn different skills, what if you were to let some of that past go, see what that boundary is of what you are responsible for what you're not responsible for, and you focused and reflected on that. So you can embrace all of who you are, like the fullness of what you're hearing in, you know, in our existence, you know, not just the part, the smiley face that you want people to see.

But what if you embrace the parts where you feel sad and lonely, two o'clock in the morning, when you wake up from a bad dream? What if, you know, the hurt you feel when somebody says something to you, and you're too, you know, timid or shy to say anything back, or when you lash out at people and you get angry, let's say you get angry at your spouse, but you're really angry at your work, you've deflected and changed, the energy coming in, maybe energy is the wrong word, but someone's treat you badly at work, and you swallow it, because you don't want to get fired. And you don't know how, in a constructive way to communicate that what they've done is not fair to you.

So you get home. And let's say your spouse says something and just set you off, and you just lash out at them. That's, you know, a defective character in that you've learned to repress in certain ways, and then redirect and share energy, you know, in the wrong person, you've, you've basically let your emotion out at the wrong person that you're not really angry at. I have done that, you know, myself. And that's something that I've learned of like, Am I really angry at this person? Because of X, Y, or Z? Or am I resentful because of blah, blah, blah, fill in the blank?

That's something that when we can take that time to question ourselves, and to really think it through and realize that it's not, it's not easy to admit some of these things about ourselves, these defects of character. These are traits that maybe are really ingrained within us. We may have learned them when we were kids, because they were survival mechanisms that helped us get through difficult times. But then as we matured, became older. It doesn't really serve us anymore. So the question is, do you want to continue to repeat those patterns and have unhappy results? Or are you willing to have these things removed from you? This step is basically the self reflection part of you've gone through, you've done the moral inventory. You're now open to the possibility of what if these things could change? What if that could happen? What would that mean for me? What would that really do for me in my life, and I think, you know, many times people don't go around and talk about what they really feel, you know, especially in American society these days you how you doing?

Feel great at work. Remember, and a part of me if I've shared the story on a previous podcast, there was a coworker of mine. She was from overseas. And I asked her, How are you doing? And she replied, you know, really having a difficult time this or that. And, and I listened. And she was surprised, because she said to me, she's like, most people in America when they ask you that they want the pat answer. I'm doing great. I'm doing fine. Good. It's almost like a greeting. You know, like, Good morning, where, you know, good evening. How are you doing? Great, fine. Good. Wonderful, superb. Not, you know, I had a really difficult night last night. It's difficult had some challenges on the home front.

And then the other person goes, oh, you know, anything you want to talk about? Yeah. And then you have a real conversation? That doesn't typically happen. Most of the times, unless it's your close friend. In America, it's often how are you doing? Great, wonderful. And then you move on to whatever the next topic of conversation is. And I think that's funny. Funny, in the sense of, often we are afraid, or uncomfortable sharing our real emotions.

And I believe that when you find really good friends, and let's say, your spouse, or within your family, people that you can trust. And I should stop for a moment, when I say family could be your found from family, you know, if your family are struggling with addiction and other issues, you may not be able to have these really close, intimate and open conversations with them. But you're found family, who are they? Your friends? Is it someone in church group or someone in a book club? Or, you know, childhood friend that you've stayed close with all these years? Who is that person? Is it your spouse? Is it not your spouse? I do think it's important that we look around at our relationships. And we see what level of comfort we have with various people. It also allows us to look at our defects of character, Miguel, you know, I didn't treat this person really, you know, nice. I did X, Y, and Z, you know, how do I deal with stress at work? How do I deal with, you know, this problem or that problem? How do I work that out with people that, you know, those interactions, those daily interactions, I think, are really important for us to reflect on?

And then we have to be honest with ourselves, like, are we ready? Are we truly ready to have these defects of character removed? What does that really going to entail? We'll talk about that, you know, in future steps. But for right now, you know, when we look at how we've been hurt, and we can incorporate that pain and the hurt all the things that we've dealt with in our experiences, and we can own those things. And we can say this is all of who I am. All those horrible things that happened to me, or frankly, some of them still may be happening till today.

That's part of who you are. What about the other parts? What about the fool you, the you that yearns for hope, goodness, light, whatever, whatever your goals are, whatever your definition of happy life will be. It's not just, oh, woe is me, I have all these defects of character, here's all the things that are wrong with me, I'm broken. Nobody wants me, nobody loves me. This step is basically saying, let's put a boundary line down. First off, whatever anybody else, whatever their baggage is, that's theirs. Keep that out on the outside. What are your defects of character?

And are you ready to have them removed? Meaning Are you ready to grow beyond who you are now, right now, and who you think you are, and become someone different? That's the beauty of life is that we're not stones that just fall to the ground and we're stuck, like, there's a stone, that's stones going to be what the stone is going to be until water or the elements or something, change it over time. And that will happen. But it takes whatever millions of years with us. We have the opportunity to grow each day, each hour each minute each second. And we have the ability to think of that to actually think about our existence and the words that we use, and how we think of ourselves if we're always thinking, you know, against ourselves, putting ourselves down. Is that really going to help us in the long run?

Is it really going to help us you know, grow from We grew up with when we were young, to become people that are full, able to embrace the goodness of everything we are the good, the bad, the ugly, whatever you want to call it, the mix of we're imperfect people, and that is perfect. I know that sounds like an oxymoron. But I kind of really like that we don't go around is perfect people. Nothing's, nothing's ever wrong. We have nothing ever to learn from nothing to grow from, you know, we're messy, we make mistakes. But it's like, what do we do with those mistakes? How do we learn from those? How do we become better people? How do we emulate the behavior that we see in others so that way we can learn and then say, you know, I do want to do something different this time, instead of me always arguing a certain way and lashing out. Maybe I can do X, Y, and Z, I can listen.

And then I can say, You know what, I'm getting really angry right now, I need to step away for 15 minutes. Let's regroup later today. Again, just using an example. So when we think about this step, the step six, I think it's important that, again, you can take the word God and just remove it from this. Think it's more important to focus on, obviously, what the defects of character are being honest with ourselves and not, not.

Not catastrophizing, that like thinking, Oh, God, everything is so horrible, and it's the end of the world are always thinking, like, here are all these things that are wrong with me. But again, finding the balance between saying, Yep, you know what, I'll be honest, these are things that don't really serve me well, in my relationships with others, I'd really like to learn a better way. And I'm willing to do that, willing to let some of those old behavior patterns go because they're dysfunctional, and they don't help me. But I don't quite know where to go for the next step, or how to get there. That's to me what the power, you know, this step is, it's focusing on who we are, all of who we are accepting that, and then saying, I'm ready to kind of grow past whatever happened to you, you know, in your dysfunctional family, whatever that, you know, was it addiction? Was it, violence was it whatever, all of us have our own unique stories, there are threads.

And this is what I always thought was amazing. When you go to an adult, children of alcoholics meeting, and you hear the stories that other people are sharing, the people places, and situations might be different, but the themes are pretty consistent, where you can identify with something that somebody else has gone through and be like, Yeah, I've been there, or I felt that or, I, I can know, you know, I can walk that, like I've been in, in that person's shoes. So I understand what they're going through right now may not fully understand the whole thing, but I can, I can have empathy, I can really get that.

And the power in those meetings, of having the freedom to say what you want. And in my opinion, no, crosstalk nobody talks back at you. You can just say, This is what's on my mind, I'm struggling with XYZ. This is it. Thank you for sharing, letting me share. And then the next person goes on that freedom for you to take the weld up emotions within you find a way to communicate in an effective manner. What's your feeling, and processing that is a step toward healing and moving in the right direction. There's no magic here.

And that's why I do like to focus on you know, the word God and take God out, put God off to the side. I say that for a reason. It's, it's really, us coming to terms with our own feelings, our emotions, what we live through, and processing that and consciously saying, I'm going to move forward and beyond that, I'm willing to learn something new. I'm willing to try willing to become a new person. I'm not going to forget all of who I am. But I'm going to grow. And if we're honest with ourselves, like if we really are honest, and like a biological level, we have cells dying in us all the time. And we have new cells growing like we are constantly every day, different.

We are not the same. And you know, and that's on a on a biological level. We're older, everything is different. Everything's changing within us. There's certain standards that make us us, but look at yourself. From a picture of when you were five, and look at yourself, now, you might see the similarities there. But you're, you're literally a different person you've grown. And you have hair, you don't have hair, it could be gray could be change, whatever, you're a different person. I like to focus on the fact that it's the same thing when it comes to our personalities, we can grow and learn and evolve, you know, we don't have to say, Well, I'm always going to do X, Y, and Z, all the time, can never change. Like, I don't believe that.

And I hope that you don't either. Change is good, though scary and difficult, hard at times. So with this step, you know, I really wanted to focus on that ground level of understanding who you are reflecting on yourself, and embracing the defects of character. And let's say, the positive sides of your character, the wholeness of all of you, all of that you have to offer, embrace all of that. So you can then say, I am ready to let the things that are holding me back, go. Like think about that. Think about if you were to say, I'm willing to let go of the things that are holding me back, like the power that comes in that it's the words get made into power, because then your actions can get organized around those.

And you might say, well, I'm going to start going to therapy, I'm gonna start doing daily journals, you know, and then when you fall, and let's say you have some issues of big argument, let's say with a parent that is still struggling with alcoholism, you come out of that fuel wreck your mess, you're like, Oh, my God, you have then tools and skills, then to be able to say, What am I going to do? Am I going to follow the behavior pattern that I normally do? Or am I going to try something different this time? And what is that, go to therapy, talk with a trusted friend, write your feelings out, Don't lash out, at like the other person, like somebody else in your life, even though you're really angry at the parent that's struggling with addiction like you can, you can play this all out in your mind. And then as you live through these things, you have different options.

There's opportunity, there's growth, there's healing, there's love. So I wanted to, you know, just go through this, I know the steps are gonna be really challenging. Some of them can be off putting, I wanted to break these down in something that's a little bit more friendly, something that would make life easier for you, instead of saying, I don't know where to go, I don't know what to do. I'm just looking for some help. Again, I found the 12 steps to be really helpful for me, because I can break them apart.

And I can chunk out the work over time. And then I can figure out, how do I want to move forward? You know, sometimes I've gone through therapy, sometimes I've gone through ACOA meetings, sometimes it's meditation, or visualization, or yoga, or I go running, or I read self help books, I write in my journal, like, I have built up different skills, and a web of support, like a support network, that will help me in my difficult times.

That's what we're really learning here is how to process what we're feeling in a positive, healthy way, instead of emulating dysfunctional behaviors that we saw. And as kids and still might see in our families today, how do we choose a new path? And how are we comfortable with that? And what do we do to get from point A, to point B to C and to wherever our journey takes us. So again, I hope that you have found this episode helpful.

I know that when I get to talk through the various steps it it really does help me kind of look at things from a different perspective and be like wow, I've been looking at these 12 steps for decades now and hadn't thought of that before. So it gives me an opportunity to also do some self reflection and to grow. So I thank you for listening and I hope that you found this helpful. If you would like to learn more you can visit let go and be free.com.

And I ask a simple ask for for listeners for this week. Wherever you listen to the podcast. If you can, please visit us And then, like the podcast so that more people, you know, can find this podcast and we can help spread the word of others who are also looking for help. You know, if you're willing to write a quick short positive review on whatever iTunes or, you know, Google or Amazon or Spotify or you know, wherever you're listening to this, please I would ask that you can leave a positive review, or like, you know, whatever four stars or whatever the rating system is for wherever you listen, I would sincerely appreciate that. So thank you so much. And as always, I hope that you have a great week, and that you have some time to have some downtime and some fun, be well.

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