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Bill Wilson often said that you
cannot trust your own mind, and must have your sponsor censor your thinking. It
was in the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, where he stated that in
both confessing our moral wrongs and in receiving Guidance from God, we
cannot trust our own thinking:
... if all our lives we had more or less fooled
ourselves, how could we now be so sure that we weren't still self-deceived? How
could we be certain we had made a true catalog of our defects and had really
admitted them, even to ourselves?
... what comes to us alone may be garbled by our
own rationalization and wishful thinking. The benefit of talking to another
person is that we can get his direct comment and counsel on our situation, and
there can be no doubt in our minds what that advice is. Going it alone in
spiritual matters is dangerous. How many times have we heard well-intentioned
people claim the guidance of God when it was all too plain that they were sorely
mistaken. Lacking both practice and humility, they had deluded themselves and
were able to justify the most arrant nonsense on the ground that this was
what God had told them. It is worth noting that people of very high spiritual
development almost always insist on checking with friends or spiritual advisors
the guidance they feel they have received from God. Surely, then, a novice ought
not lay himself open to the chance of making foolish, perhaps tragic, blunders
in this fashion. While the comment or advice of others is by no means
infallible, it is likely to be far more specific than any direct guidance we may
receive while we are still so inexperienced in establishing contact with a Power
greater than ourselves.
Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions,
William G. Wilson, pages 59-60.
With
all this stated, does that mean that we cannot make our choices? No, it
simply means that a mentor with experience, strength and hope to share is highly
recommended. It is also recommended that we use that in conjunction with
our Higher Power. Free Will, it is our choice to do as we please. I
choice to use most of my sponsor’s suggestions, and to listen to all of them.
Never hurts to have mentor for any reason.
Interviews & Pitches of original and early members of Alcoholics
Anonymous. Six decades of Alcoholics Anonymous. A. A. Study helps and
links. A. A. Trivia and A. A. Links.

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This Website was last updated on:
January 21, 2007

Disclaimer: This site is NOT endorsed nor sponsored by
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