Step Ten: Moving Forward

STEP TEN
We continued to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.
[Spiritual principle(s) associated with this step: Self-discipline, Perseverance]

The 53rd passage of the Tao Te Ching says:

If I had even a slight awareness,
And practiced the great Way,
What I would fear would be deviating from it.
(Chang translation)

That sums up step ten for me.

I have set my foot on this path I've been traveling and I've come a very long way from where I started. I am not - nor will I ever be - as far as I can go, but I am a long way from where I started. Using the preceding nine steps as a guide, I have begun to cultivate the spiritual principles I always valued in others, those principles I wanted to claim as my own but could not because my actions were contradicting every principle I longed to practice. I have begun to practice honesty and hope and faith and integrity and humility and justice and love. Somewhere in me, deep in my core, I've discovered a willingness and a courage I never knew I had. My outsides are beginning to match my insides. My actions are beginning to represent what I know and what I believe and what I value.

The times I act dishonestly, I feel an emotional kick in the shin. When I throw integrity out the window, something inside of me snaps. When my ego blows humility out of the water, I feel like I'm drowning. See, now that I know, now that I have that slight awareness, now that I've practiced the great Way, my biggest fear is deviating from it because in my deviation I become sick.

This sickness starts with my emotions. I become guilt-ridden and feel shame and frustration and anger. I may become depressed or feel needy and dependent and afraid. Then, like cancer, the sickness spreads. My thoughts are hit next. I start to think about how worthless I am, how much I lack, or how insane I can be, how selfish I can be. I start to think that my journey so far has been for nothing, that I should just return to what I've always known, that I should seek oblivion. Then it spreads further, and suddenly I'm acting out on my negative emotions and my diseased thoughts. Suddenly I'm lying to people I love or stealing stupid little things from work. My sickness comes out my pores and spills into every area of my life. My sickness manifests itself in how I spend my money, my time, my love, in who I associate with or sleep with. And the behavior, in turn, fuels the already negative emotions, which fuel the cancerous thoughts... and the cycle continues.

No, I don't want to deviate from this path I've been walking. I've done so too many times since embarking. It is not pleasant, and in fact, quite painful. I'm getting better at keeping at least one foot on the path. If I had even a slight awareness, and practiced the great Way, what I would fear would be deviating from it.

That is step ten for me. Staying on this path. The only way to do that is to continue to take my own inventory, to continue to remain aware of who I am and what I need - and then to accept that and to allow that. The only way to stay on this path is to return to it as quickly as I can if I find I've wandered off into the forest. The only way to stay on this path is to continue to take personal inventory and when I'm wrong, promptly admit it... and then jump back on with both feet planted firmly in the middle of the dusty path.

I fear anything less because I've been where it leads.

I’m Maze. I’m an addict.