Working Step One for Emotional Sobriety! 

By 

George DuWors, MSW, BCD, MAC

Two groups may benefit from this article. Those in recovery who have worked the 12 steps, experienced long-term relief from their substance use disorder, yet are still frustrated by at least one persistent “character defect.”  And those who work with such people as sponsor or counselor. This writer happens to play for both teams. It is possible those working steps for the first time may benefit as well.  But talk to your sponsor before you try this at home.

Although Bill W’s original article on “emotional sobriety” is easily located on the web, we may as well start with a brief summary of what he was like emotionally, what happened, and how he says he ended up. And we will stick with his language, though a gentler and more precise concept for “character defect” might be “self-defeating behavior” or “residual survival skill.”

About 20 years sober, Bill notices depression coming back and is horrified at the prospect of yet another bout. He tries desperately to “work the program,” invoking the prayer of St. Francis. As Bill tries to make intention into reality, to live the prayer of St. Francis, he asks why the steps do not seem to work for depression as they did for alcohol use disorder. An answer comes to him, right out of the prayer. In contrast to the principles of St. Francis, Bill realizes that he has actually been self-seeking. Specifically, he has been on a lifelong quest for applause. Bill labels his own neediness as “absolute emotional dependencies.” Further, he identifies the behavior that results, insistent demands for the control of people, places, and things. This, he now sees, leads to failure and depression. Referring to his concept of “absolute emotional dependencies” as a “gimmick,” Bill works vigorously to “cut them out.” He combines the Step Ten approach of “spot check inventory” (described in Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions) with Step Three, “turning it over.” When “disturbed” he will seek out (“spot check”) the specific demand he is making and surrender it (Step Three.) He also emphasizes the importance of Step Twelve, putting St. Francis’ principle of “seeking to comfort rather than be comforted” into action.  Finally, Bill proposes that struggling old-timers (like him) 12 step each other for “emotional sobriety.”  After doing this persistently, he describes what it is like now, “I have been given a quiet place in bright sunshine.”    

It seems the crucial realization, the new reality for Bill, was to see dependency/demand as the problem, and depression as a symptom. Up to that point, he had been like any person with substance use disorder who always thought intoxication itself was the problem, only to suddenly realize, “it is the first drink!” In effect, Bill saw that it was the craving for applause (and aversion to disappointment) that lead to compulsive/controlling decisions and then to the emotional intoxication of elation or depression. If we are to follow the comparison logically, depression occurred when the “drug” of applause switched to the drug of indifference. For Bill, depression was a “bad trip.” The Twelve Steps are of little use once you are intoxicated, whether by a drug or by another compulsion.  The Twelve Steps may help us to regain the “power of choice,” at least for one day, of abstaining from a false need of any sort. But the time to work them is before “that first drink” or it’s emotional equivalent – what Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous calls “bottom line behavior.” For Bill, it was to (make the decision to) demand applause, driven by that “false dependency.” 

This article cherishes Bill’s intimate account of his awakening and respects his conclusions. But it doubles down on working the steps – starting with Step One – to be liberated from “character defects” and/or emotional suffering. First, something implicit in Step One (“We admitted that we were powerless over alcohol and that our lives had become unmanageable.”) needs to be clarified.  That is, that we are not “powerless” over alcohol itself. Most people with the experience of substance use disorder and recovery would not quibble that what we are actually powerless over is the craving for the substance. It is craving that robs us of “the power of choice,” before we drink or use. It either assaults the brain with an overwhelming sense of need. Or it alters that brain’s sense of reality so much that the rattlesnake of “just one” looks like a friendly puppy, wanting only to lick us to death. It may seem less obvious, even to those who have experienced it, that the broken record that is the “obsession of the mind” is nothing more than the tedious nag of craving as it demands relief. It is not alcohol itself that is “cunning, powerful and baffling,” but the insidious effect of craving on the consciousness of a person (who thinks s/he is) “deciding” to take the first drink. For good reason, Alcoholics Anonymous declares “the mental states that precede a relapse into drinking” to be “the crux of the matter.” 

This distinction, between alcohol or any other (external) substance and the craving which actually controls the person, matters. It simplifies the task Bill set for himself, to work the steps for emotional sobriety.  First, that simplification does require another distinction, one that every reader can measure against his or her own experience. It turns out there are three fundamental kinds of craving. All are experienced as needs, but two are not. All make their demands through craving, even when not felt as such. The two false needs may respond to the Twelve Steps, while real needs never will. We will never have “power of choice” over needing to eat, though we may argue about the menu.

Real needs with authentic cravings – thirst, hunger, air, even healthy sex and supportive community, all seem to be hardwired. Each is necessary for survival. When the body is deprived long enough of any of them, an anxiety and physical distress will arise that can only be effectively relieved (not covered over) by satisfaction of that biological need.

The cravings of substance use disorder, including “the phenomenon of craving” can create a similar anxiety. One apparent exception, deceptive thinking such as “one won’t hurt,” blocks that anxiety and disguises the desire that is controlling both mind and person. Nonetheless, what makes substance use disorder a “disease” is the fact that the brain has come to experience these cravings as need on the same order as survival itself. Just as starving people will eat human flesh, those with substance use disorder will act as if they have no conscience or common sense. They do. But one place nature overpowers nurture is in the battle ground of the brain of anyone with substance use disorder. 

The third kind of craving is the one Bill called “absolute emotional dependencies.” It is clearly the sort of craving Buddhism attributes to attachments and aversions. Just as Bill saw his pursuit of applause causing depression, Buddhism seems to say that “dukka,” suffering, is caused by craving for our attachments and the negative form of this neediness called “aversion.” Attachment seeks pleasure and aversion avoids pain, seeking to be safe at all costs. Hindu sages simply refer to “desires and fears.” The seven deadly sins of Christianity are a nice list of attachments. Same roses, same thorns, different names.

Just exactly how do addictive and attachment cravings rob us our power of choice?  Let us count the ways.  By aggressively controlling attention itself, blocking information that gets in the way of the mind telling the muscles to do anything other than what craving demands. This creates a kind of tunnel vision that sees only what it wants, how much it wants it, and how much suffering will continue if it is not fed.  If thwarted, craving distorts the reality of time – as if the agony of deprivation will last forever. It won’t. But don’t try to tell someone who is “Jonesing,” whether for dope or for lost love.  One of craving’s most “cunning, powerful and baffling” tricks is to somehow stop us from “connecting the dots,” keeping the painful consequences of use separate from each other and from the decisions/actions without which they would not occur. As a result, the light bulb of awareness flickers dimly. The realization that would generate willingness (and ability!) to escape cannot break through.  Finally, we cannot leave out the sense of threat, that life without the substance or attachment will be intolerable.  To the brain/mind it is, after all, a “need.”  And with all other relevant facts and options deleted from the mind, we “choose” from a menu of one.  

Okay. Okay. You got all that. But what difference do all these distinctions make, you may rightly ask?

Just this. If a “character defect” is a (negative or positive) craving, we can roll up our sleeves and work the steps on it, just as we did with alcohol or any other addictive craving.  Starting with Step One. 

If I am powerless over my craving for alcohol and it controls my decision to drink, which defeats   other values and goals, making life unmanageable, am I not also powerless over my people-pleasing? Not only may this “need” make me unduly anxious, it can make me act in ways that are humiliating. Many in recovery seem to assume that a “character defect” is mental, somehow more subject to willpower than the physical craving of a disease. Yet a people-pleaser with substance use disorder may find it much easier to go one whole day without a drink or other physical “fix,” than to finish the day without having said “yes” when they wanted to say “no.” A habitual procrastinator may be able to procrastinate taking a drink “one day at a time,” but be completely unable to actually put “first things first” or “do the next indicated right thing” all day, for even one day.”  (Don’t ask me how I know.)  Not only that, such behavior can cost promotions, jobs, relationships. And we know it and we keep doing it anyway.  Sound familiar?

Is “Pride” not craving to see oneself, and to be seen, in a certain light? And/or an aversion to being seen otherwise? How much of everyone’s decisions and actions, including yours and mine, dear reader, are controlled by just this?

“Abandonment” is an aversion to being left (as if I am a helpless child and will die.) All by itself, it fuels eruptions of toxic emotion. And it controls many decisions that lead to self-defeating actions and endless suffering, including actual rejection!

You get the idea, working from emotional distress back to behavior and the cravings and decisions that control and are controlled. What Bill called “absolute emotional dependencies.” Many in long-term recovery have to learn the hard way, as Bill apparently did, that it is possible to remove or reduce character defects that cause relapse of substance use disorder yet remain enslaved by defects that still cause intense suffering of other kinds. “Emotional intoxication,” (not his word) like Bill’s depression.

So how do we “work” step one, about alcohol or any other “fix?”

Admitting we are “powerless” is, above all, an experience, not just an idea or an intellectual choice. It is a realization born of three things. Long suffering, repeated failures to change by “willpower” or other means, and an (often implicit) recognition that my decisions and actions are somehow causing or contributing to all of this suffering. The person with substance use disorder suffers so much he or she decides to quit for good, only to make a subsequent decision to start again, and the suffering just gets worse. The eventual experience of Step One may be referred to as “hitting bottom,” “personal defeat,” “moral bankruptcy,” or even “waking up.”  Would these terms not also apply to the emotional experience Bill describes in his article … “the final agony of seeing how awfully wrong we have been, but still finding ourselves unable to get off the emotional merry-go-round.”  

Perhaps, we will suffer enough that an astute therapist or sponsor will help us connect our suffering to our own decisions/demands and the attachment craving that controls them. Maybe we will be willing to do a “step one inventory,” like the ones in treatment. Applying the same principles to our self-defeating behavior and the false need that still controls us, that we once did for our drug or alcohol cravings. As with substance use disorder, laying out in writing the suffering caused, from the very beginning, by our pattern(s). As Bill said in chapter 4 of the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, “We wish to look squarely at the unhappiness this has caused ourselves and others.” 

Yes, there are differences between attachment cravings and the various cravings of substance use disorder.  Attachment cravings may not kill us, unless the suffering leads to suicide or physical relapse. Such cravings may persist and control us even as we work on them – immediate abstinence may not be necessary, allowing us to chip away. The biggest difference between the two false cravings – attachment versus substance — may be that some form of control can sometimes be regained over an attachment – the compulsive spender may be able to shop without going on a binge. The people-pleaser may be able to seek friendship without demanding constant attention, without quivering in fear of rejection. The procrastinator may be able to wisely reschedule a task. At the same time, some self-defeating decisions may only be reduced, or “managed.” Yes, “harm reduction” may be the best we can do for our most powerful attachments or aversions. 

Here’s the deal. Those of us in long-term recovery with persistent emotional distress may have to humbly admit, as Bill did, that steps four through nine alone have not yet solved our particular problem. Cheer up. That realization may be “the final agony” that generates the secret power we will need for the work ahead. The willingness that only seems to come with Step One.

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Author Biography: George DuWors, MSW, BCD, MAC has worked with substance use disorders since 1972. Located in Everett, WA, he practices experiential, trauma-informed psychotherapy with people in all phases of recovery. From the very beginning, he has been intrigued by the interaction between various forms of treatment and the twelve-step process.  His books include White Knuckles and Wishful Thinking, Learning From the Moment of Relapse (Hogrefe, 2000) and, more recently, Getting It: Eight Facts that Fuel Recovery (Uh, If We Face Them), to be found on Amazon and Amazon Kindle. He has published numerous articles and has facilitated workshops across North America and in the UK. This includes multiple NAADAC national and regional conferences.

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