Steps One through Nine, taken to the best of your ability, will place your life on a new and firm footing. They will also make you feel a lot better, fast. In the final three Steps, this new beginning is converted into a permanent way of life - based on continuing self-inventory, regular daily prayer, and carrying the Twelve Step message to other addicts who are still hung up in their addictions and who are looking for a way out.

       Step Ten says, "Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it." At the most basic level, this Step entails two uncomplicated practices: (1) During the day, if situations come up involving conflict or stress, do not automatically self-justify or blame others; instead, whenever the situation seems to warrant it, be prepared to admit your fault - to yourself and to anyone else who has a need or a right to know. This one small attitude, adopted as a policy over a period of time, can do more to increase one's inner serenity and stability than almost anything else on earth. And (2) at the end of each day, before going to bed, take a minute or two - no more - to go back over the events of the day in your mind and admit to yourself and God any mistakes you have made as a result of character defects. Ask God's forgiveness. Resolve to make amends if appropriate - and go to sleep in peace after saying a small prayer of thanks for another day of sobriety.

       Step Eleven says, "Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood him, praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out." In taking on the Twelve Steps as a way of life, this is far and away the most important of the Steps. Chapters four, six, and seven of the book, How to Get Going on the All Addicts Anonymous Way of Life, are devoted to telling you in detail how to do it. Suffice it here to say that Bill Wilson got released from his alcohol addiction as the result of a direct experience of conscious contact with God. The Anonymous Fellowship movement is entirely an outgrowth of that spiritual experience. And each of us should seek to make a direct personal contact with God as we understand him every day of our lives ahead of anything else we do.

       The general rule about prayer is that the more you do the better it goes. The early AAs, taking their lead from the Oxford Group, were shooting for an hour of "quiet time" every day. That is still a good rule of thumb. But in tough times, or very busy times, or bugged-up times, the main point to remember is that some is always better than none - none is a terrible idea, and never necessary on any day of anyone's life - and five or ten minutes, done from the heart has over and over been proven to elicit a great big, life-out-of-death response from God. For the full spellout on the Eleventh Step, see chapters four, six, and seven of How to Get Going on the All Addicts Anonymous Way of Life.

       Step Twelve says, "Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to other addicts, and to practice these principles in all our affairs." When Bill Wilson had his conversion experience, he came out of it with two profound convictions: first, that God had granted him a total release from his slavery to booze; and, second, that in order to keep his new freedom he would have to spend the rest of his life helping other drunks recover. That is just what he did, and that is why today we have the enormously successful Anonymous Fellowships, and millions of recovered addicts of all kinds are walking the earth as free men and women.

       In his discussion of the Twelfth Step in the Big Book, Bill wrote: "Practical experience shows that nothing will so much insure immunity from drinking as intensive work with other alcoholics. It works when other activities fail. This is our twelfth suggestion: Carry this message to other alcoholics! You can help when no one else can. . . . Life will take on new meaning. To watch people recover, to see them help others, to watch loneliness vanish, to see a fellowship grow up about you, to have a host of friends - this is an experience you must not miss."

       It is interesting to note that, in its original wording, the Twelfth Step said we should "carry the message to others" - not just alcoholics. That is a key point in All Addicts Anonymous. The Twelve Steps work to relieve other addictions every bit as well as they work to relieve alcoholism. And they work wonderfully well for non-addicts, too. Early AA was very much a family affair, with Bill and Lois Wilson and Dr. Bob and Anne Smith meeting together, working together to formulate the guidelines that became the Twelve Steps, carrying the message together to newcomers.

       And that is our bottom-line recommendation for anyone trying to work the Twelve Step Program to gain a recovery from any addiction: the surest way to hang onto this Program and maintain a contented sobriety and abstinence from any addiction whatsoever is to spend the rest of your life giving the Program away. Join an AAA group. If one doesn't exist in your area, start one. Get a sponsor, that is, an experienced friend in the Program to help you in working the Steps. Go to meetings regularly, at least one a week, and more if you are shaky. And carry the Twelve Step message to others, especially addicts, and especially newcomers. Do these things, and your chances of success on the Program are very high, pushing 100%. Based on over half a century's experience and thousands of closely observed recoveries, we guarantee it!