The Twelve Steps of Co-Dependents Anonymous: Step Two

Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

For me, Step Two was the natural progression from Step One. In Step One, I admitted that I could not function as my own higher power. I admitted that my life was a mess because of my own attitude and my own choices.

I could not function as my own higher power. I had to find a higher power greater than my self.

One symptom of my co-dependency had been to let other people function as my higher power. In 1993, I was totally alone. There was not another person to whom I could turn. I had made enemies of just about everyone in my life but a few people, and those few were true friends enough to tell me I needed serious help beyond what they could do.

By grace, I learned that as a higher power, other people do not fit the job's description. People are imperfect, judgmental, given to emotional decisions, and other human traits. I say this compassionately.

I realized, too, for the same reasons, that neither could I function as another person's higher power. I had always been quick to give advice, tell others what they should do, and offer opinions and solutions when no one had asked me. This was yet another manifestation of my co-dependency.

I needed a higher power that was super human. I needed a power higher than myself in whom to trust and believe.

When I came to this realization, I woke up in a sense. All my previous life had been a delusion of my own making. I came to like a person regaining consciousness after being knocked unconscious. All my attempts to deal with life had really been attempts to deny reality and to deny my own powerlessness. Trying to run my own life had been insanity. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew I was powerless, but I did not want to admit it, was not ready to admit it, until August 1993.

Once I became humble enough to admit my own powerlessness, once I woke up to reality, then (and only then) was I ready to look outside of my self and seek a power higher than my self. Once I admitted the insanity of trying to play god in my life and in the lives of other people, I was ready to voluntarily undergo whatever change and transformations were necessary within me to achieve sanity and serenity. I willingly turned to God.

next: The Twelve Steps of Co-Dependents Anonymous Step Three