12 Steps

The 12 steps are metaphor for the hero’s journey, Plato’s tripartite soul, Kundalini chakras, Margery Post Abbott: weighing in with nurturing the light rather than dark, multiple angles to work a higher power metaphor

Step 1: admitted powerlessness, life unmanageable

-seed lying on the ground, out of the soil, has potential to flower and grow but isn’t

Step 2: power greater than self could restore sanity

-seems similar to going beyond lower chakras, to heart, beyond appetites to reason, one lower aspect is ruling, effecting fulfillment

Step 3:decision to turn will and lives over to care of God as we understood him

-will, the third chakra, is something to go beyond in journey to whole self, God could stand for whole self, something like that

Step 4: searching and fearless moral inventory

-ashes, going down, bringing back up the grief and suffering to a conscious level, honoring it

Step 5: acknowledge failings, to self, others

-bringing failings, suffering, grief, pain to a conscious level, thinking about it, talking to others about it, taking it to a deep level, as deep as you can go

Step 6: entirely ready to have God remove defects

Step 7: humbly ask for shortcomings to be removed by him

-getting real close to the heart level and authenticity, having dealt with ashes and gained a sense of self discovery and self knowledge, in touch with different aspects of self, are ready to give ourselves permission to visit the King, to get to some higher levels of self, compassion, not to be ruled by appetites, passions, ego, lower impulses

Step 8: make amends to people we have harmed

-acting from the heart level

Step 9:

Step 10: continue to take personal inventory and when wrong, admit it

-if you backslide into will, sex, power, etc. then acknowledge you can’t be Jesus and always stay at the heart level

Step 11: through meditation to improve contact with God, praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry it out

-have a disciplined practice, to maintain contact with bliss and heart levels, consciously staying in touch with heart and authenticity, pray not to backslide

Step 12: having had spiritual awakening, carry message and practice principles in daily affairs

-authenticity rules more often than not