Step Ten: Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
A blessing of the program is that when I feel bad, instead of immediately looking to find out who has harmed me or blaming God for putting yet another perceived obstacle in my path, I respond by questioning what is wrong with me. What character defect of mine is once again manifesting itself? What might I have done that requires amends? What do I need to surrender?
As I practice self-inventory, my judging and condemning attitude changes. I not only learn to accept others, but also to better accept myself. I am an addict. I’m defective. I mess up. As I learn to identify my defects sooner, I mess up less and less often! The more I practice admitting when I’m wrong, the less I have to. The more serenity I get by taking inventory, the less I begrudge the time spent doing it. I practice self-inventory – not to shame myself or to feel guilty, but to more quickly identify what character defect is currently blocking me from God so that I can surrender it.
Higher Power, thank you for giving me an occasional taste of the much-prized gift of wisdom.