Step 5 (dont you know that the time is right)

And sadly my tribute to New Kids is over, now that I am at step 5:(

I don't know if you are noticing but the steps are getting harder and harder. I think that is probably the point, but I tell you what, there is nothing fun about it.

Step 5- Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

This is why AA works so well. They truly understand accountability and that we has human beings would lie to ourselves forever it was just ourselves that we were lying to. Luckily that most of us have souls (Although there are some people I question a little bit) and we cant lie to other people. My mom used to always tell me "your sin will find you out" and I really believe that. What we do in secret will come to light in some way or another.

I think about how I used to hide my eating. Eat in secret, eat before my husband came home and just tell him I wasn't hungry, offer to clean up after a meal so I can keep sneaking bites, etc and believing that I was hiding this big secret. As though people didn't see me fat and think "i just don't understand how she got so fat,, we never saw her eat,, she must be getting fat without eating at all!!" DUH!!! My sin found me out. My body is a glaring example of what I do in secret. The truth is, is that we can keep most things a secret for a while, but they will inevitably come out.

Admitting our flaws to God is easy- He is supposed to love us no matter what. He made us (so I suppose he could take some of the blame for our flaws right???-uhh probably not, and I am just glad I didn't burst into flames for even saying that!). He wont say anything, he wont reject us because of what he admit to him because he already knows it and it is just a matter of us being willing to admit it.

Admitting our flaws to another person is a completely different story. As much as we feel that we can trust someone they can still lie to us, still hurt us, and still take advantage of us. Not even on purpose all of the time. The idea of telling someone else our flaws is like being naked in front of the person you love for the first time. We expose ourselves to them and pray to God that they don't look at us, puke and run out of the room (come on ladies, you know we have all had that moment before "the first time" were we are sitting in the bathroom figuring out how to walk with our stomachs sucked in, and trying to make granny panties look cute because they make our belly look flatter!). But when we finally get through that fear and the one we love accepts us, tells us we are beautiful, and looks at us as though there was no one else that was a pretty as we were, we are relieved that we "took the plunge." If we would have remained in our fear then would have completely cheated ourselves out of the joy of that moment. But the problem is, us insecure folks constantly do that-cheat ourselves out of happy moments because we don't think that we deserve them, or sometimes (and this is really bad) we would just rather be unhappy. The longer that we are unhappy the longer we can indulge every unhealthy coping skill we have.

So once we share ourselves completely with someone else, while it may start out very uncomfortable the result is complete relief and joy. Now finding that one to share these things with, I don't know about ladies. The only way that I believe trust works is that you have to just give some out to begin with. Just like giving a kid the car right after they get their license. You have to just trust them at the beginning to they can continue to earn the privilege of driving. We have to give before we can receive the privilege of fulfillment.

Hmmm.. So much to think about.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.