We're Not All Egomaniacs: Adapting the Twelve Steps for Alcoholics with Low Self-Esteem

By Beth Aich

Some people come to Alcoholics Anonymous feeling terrible about themselves and are told, bewilderingly, that their problem is too much ego and a lack of humility. Bill W., who wrote most of the AA literature, described himself as an egomaniac. He put his own needs and wants ahead of others, was grandiose, felt entitled, and thought he was all-powerful. He called this the alcoholic personality type, and designed a program to crush the ego as the foundation of sobriety. It worked for him and millions of other alcoholics like him, and he deserves great credit.
But what about alcoholics who normally put others' needs before their own and see themselves as less-than, unentitled, not enough, defective, impostors, losers? Their egos need building, not deflating. This book reframes the Twelve Step program so people with low self-esteem can grow to feel better rather than worse about themselves. Each Step includes exercises to build and strengthen the person's sense of self, to grow from a place of feeling unlovable into a strong sober person, no longer dependent on alcohol or external validation to feel good.
This groundbreaking book opens the door for people who feel less-than to find a comfortable sobriety in AA, rather than trying to force themselves into Bill's shoes when they just don't fit.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jul 24, 2021
• ISBN: 9781098362638

Book preview

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Edited by Heidi Mitchell

General Disclaimer

Alcoholics Anonymous World Services (A.A.W.S.), Inc. has not approved, endorsed, or reviewed this book, nor is it affiliated with this book in any way. Alcoholics Anonymous®, AA®, and the Big Book® are registered trademarks of Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent Alcoholics Anonymous. In keeping with AA tradition, Beth Aich is a pseudonym.

Although Beth Aich credits The Meadows in Wickenburg, Arizona, for the beginnings of her recovery, this book has not been approved or endorsed by The Meadows, either.

Copyright © 2021 Beth Aich

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All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Print ISBN: 978-1-09836-262-1

eBook ISBN: 978-1-09836-263-8

DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to the unknown number of alcoholics with low self-esteem who either left Alcoholics Anonymous or stayed even though it was painful and psychologically damaging, because there was nowhere else to go. You are not alone, and I hope you will give it another try.

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

My Story

Some Definitions

A Brief History of the AA Program

Egomaniacs and Shame-Based People

What Does Childhood Have to Do With Low Self-Esteem?

Feelings

Step Zero

Step One

Step Two

Step Three

Step Four

Step Five

Step Six

Step Seven

Step Eight

Step Nine

Step Ten

Step Eleven

Step Twelve

Endnotes

Bibliography

Table 1. Comparison of Egomaniac and Shame-based Tendencies

Table 2. Affirmations

Table 3. Self vs. Friend

Acknowledgments

Thanks to Pia Mellody for seeing me through the first three years of my journey, to my friend Jay for the saying about funhouse mirrors and gaslights, to my therapist Dr. Susan for all the family of origin work and encouragement in writing the book, to my sponsor Becky for always being supportive, to my sister Katie for validating my childhood memories, to the Secular AA community for permitting open discussion rather than only endorsement of the AA program, and to the many, many AA members who have been a part of my recovery.

Introduction

I am writing this book because I believe there are many people like me who come into AA with an ego that has been crushed, rather than one that needs to be deflated. In early sobriety, I kept trying to see myself as the personality type described in the first 164 pages of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous¹ because people were accepting it as gospel and told me I needed to, too, if I wanted to stay sober. Having a weakly defined sense of self, full of self-doubt, and constantly second-guessing my thoughts and feelings, I was vulnerable to allowing others to define me. I started telling myself I was selfish and self-centered because that’s what the book said. I told myself my ego was too big, that I was constantly running around stepping on others’ toes and trying to control things, knowing that I could be happy if everyone only did what I wanted them to do. Telling myself these things made my self-esteem even worse. In my mind, the worst things a person can do are be selfish and step on toes. After many years in recovery, I realized I have never been an egomaniac, never thought I was God, usually feel undeserving rather than entitled, don’t think I know best, don’t try to control others, and am far more concerned about the happiness of others than my own. I came in at the opposite end of the spectrum from Bill W. My ego needed building, not deflating. AA can absolutely work for people like me, and it has, but some parts of the program need a little tweaking.

I’m extremely grateful to AA for my sobriety. One alcoholic talking to another is pure magic. It allows us to drop the fear of being judged and become honest and authentic, at least with other alcoholics. That’s a start. Meetings provide a safe place to share, which is huge for those of us who have never learned how, or been taught not to, talk about what’s going on inside us. Without this secure, loving environment, we would never take those risks. By listening, we learn we are not the only person on the planet who feels the way we do, and we learn about other ways of handling things. We all admit we’re works in progress, not perfect. My group told me, We’ll love you until you learn to love yourself—and they did.

I learned what unconditional love means in AA, which was something I had never experienced. It means no matter who you are or what you’ve done, you are welcome. People who may not agree on anything else still have each other’s backs when it comes to staying sober. The love shown to someone back from a relapse is something to behold—love that is not tied to performance, almost the opposite. These people are usually heaping plenty of shame and judgment on themselves. We extend even more love to them because they are hurting.

Introducing myself is a shame reduction technique. I say, I’m Beth, I’m an alcoholic, and everyone responds with Hi, Beth, instead of Shame on you. You’re a disgrace. I learned how to look at my issues in an analytical format (Step Four) that helps me figure out what’s really going on with me. Not keeping secrets, making amends, and continuing to work on the areas that need improving has become a way of life. And working with others is still one of the great joys of my life today.

This book is not intended to denigrate in any way the positive impact that AA has had on the lives of so many people, including me, nor to disparage the founders and their great accomplishment. The early AA members all seem to have had the egomaniac type personality, and they developed a program that worked for them. They just weren’t clairvoyant about additional types of personalities that would later be joining AA, and they can’t be faulted for that. Nor is this book intended to replace Alcoholics Anonymous (hereinafter the Big Book) or Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions² (hereinafter the Twelve & Twelve), and in fact, it assumes you are using them. This book is an adjunct. It does not deal with topics thoroughly covered in AA literature. It is meant to fill in the spaces where the low self-esteem personality type was left out.

I am not suggesting these are the only two personality types in AA or even that personality is the dominant factor in everyone’s alcoholism. Other people’s experiences may be way different from mine, and hopefully, they will write their own books. The more models of what recovery can look like for different people, the better. No one can be pigeonholed into authenticity.

I have synthesized ideas and concepts from many different fields. I am not an expert in any of them, and I reference many other sources for you to check out. My only expertise is in what worked for me. My hope is that you will be able to make a program that works for you.

I strongly encourage anyone struggling with childhood trauma and/or mental illness to seek outside help as I did. These issues absolutely affect our ability to stay sober, but they are beyond the scope of AA and this book.

The book begins with telling my story. I want to give you an idea of the factors that shaped me into a person who drank to live and lived to drink and what needed to change after I got sober. I realize my exact circumstances are unique to me. There are many ways to end up with low self-esteem. I hope you can identify with the feelings or, as they say, look for the similarities, not the differences. My story is quite long, but please bear with me; I wanted to give you lots of examples.

From there, we look at who the early AA members were and their reason for designing twelve steps to deflate the ego. I’ve listed some character traits of egomaniacs and of people with low self-esteem, so you can see the issues that people like me have, compared to people for whom the program was written. If you are like me, your ego needs to be built up, not deflated. But that doesn’t mean we throw the program out! The Steps are a tool for self-discovery, and they work for us, too. AA meetings and the fellowship provide a nurturing environment where it is safe to discover our true selves without being silenced or judged. We need that.

In the next few chapters, we look at some causes of low self-esteem, which is usually acquired during childhood, and how to manage our feelings so that we have other options besides picking up a drink to make them go away. We wouldn’t be here if that strategy worked.

The remainder of the book goes through each of the Twelve Steps, acknowledging that some of the language and exercises outlined in AA literature are triggers for us to feel even more ashamed of ourselves. Now we know we are not alone in having those feelings and can remind ourselves that these words were written for a different audience. Yes, we’re all alcoholics, but not all alcoholics are the same. I hope to spare you some of the pain I went through, being a willing and compliant newcomer, and ending up feeling even worse about myself. But the main focus is on tweaking the Steps to be tools for building self-esteem. Most chapters have additional exercises for the step, or the step has been reframed in a positive rather than punitive way.

Step Twelve is the grand finale. Having attained enough self-esteem to know and love ourselves, we can be uniquely useful to newcomers who feel like we did when we came in. What a joy that is!

A Word about Traditional AA

When people attempt to change anything about the program or the Twelve Steps, or even comment on the Big Book in any way that is short of a full endorsement, it can be met with not only resistance but outright hostility. I understand that AA has worked for millions of people exactly the way it was written. I have no quarrel whatsoever with that and do not expect those people to read this book. They have found what works for them, and I’m happy for them.

In his own later writings, however, Bill did not take this dogmatic stance about the program. In his Grapevine articles, he reflected on the success of AA. In the April 1961 edition, he noted that although AA had saved many people over the past twenty-five years, there were even more who came in but left. This is a far cry from, Rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path.³ He acknowledged that some of these failures were not the fault of the newcomers, but that AA had likely failed them in some way. He confessed that he nearly ruined AA in the early years with the demand that everyone must get the God of his understanding. He admitted to having an unconscious arrogance about his way being right for everyone, which is typical of egomaniacs. He couldn’t see it in himself at four years of sobriety, but he did later. Maybe some people left because they felt like the worst person that ever lived and were told they had too much ego and lacked humility.

As far as the sanctity of the Steps goes, it may surprise you to learn that not a single one of the first hundred sober men who were around when Bill wrote the Big Book had worked them as written.⁴ That’s because they didn’t exist in that form until he wrote the book. Here are the steps we took… is not true. None of the stories in the first edition of the Big Book mention working the Twelve Steps.

In AA Comes of Age, Bill talked about the spread