STEP EIGHT

"MADE A LIST OF ALL PERSONS WE HAD HARMED, AND BECAME WILLING TO MAKE AMENDS TO THEM ALL"

1. We have a list of all persons we have harmed and to whom we are willing to make amends. We made it when we took inventory.

2. Steps Eight and Nine are concerned with personal relations.

3. Every A.A. has found that he can make little headway in this new adventure of living until he first backtracks and really makes an accurate and unsparing survey of the human wreckage he has left in his wake.

3. To a degree, he has already done this when taking moral inventory, but now the time has come when he ought to redouble his efforts to see how many people he has hurt, and in what ways.

4. The moment we ponder a twisted or broken relationship with another person, our
emotions go on the defensive.

6. Moreover, it is usually a fact that our behavior when drinking has aggravated the defects of others.

7. If we are now about to ask forgiveness for ourselves, why shouldn't we start out by forgiving them, one and all?

8. Thinking of people we had harmed and the prospect of making amends to those who
were aware or unaware of being hurt were some of the ways in which fear conspired with pride to hinder our making a list of all the people we had harmed.

9. This attitude of mending relations with a few casual apologies is the end result of purposeful forgetting. It is an attitude which can only be changed by a deep and honest search of our motives and actions.

10. Though in some cases we cannot make restitution at all, and in some cases action
ought to be deferred, we should nevertheless make an accurate and really exhaustive survey of our past life as it has affected other people.

11. It is equally necessary that we extract from an examination of our personal relations every bit of information about ourselves and our fundamental difficulties that we can.

12. Defective relations with other human beings have nearly always been the immediate
cause of our woes.

13. We can go far beyond those things which were superficially wrong with us, to see these flaws which were basic, flaws which sometimes were responsible for the whole patterns of our lives.

14. To define the word "harm" in a practical way, we might call it the result of instincts in collision, which cause physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual damage to people.

15. Having carefully surveyed this whole area of human relations, and having decided exactly what personality traits in us injured and disturbed others, we can now commence to ransack our memory for the people to whom we have given offense.

16. We shall want to hold ourselves to the course of admitting the things we have done, meanwhile forgiving the wrongs done us, real or fancied. We should avoid extreme judgments, both of ourselves and of others involved.

17. Until we thoroughly clear up the wreckage of our past, it will be very difficult to live in the NOW.

18. Whenever our pencil falters, we can fortify and cheer ourselves by remembering what A.A. experience in this Step has meant to others. It is the beginning of the end of isolation from our fellows and God.

RECOMMENDED READING

1) Alcoholics Anonymous (big book), chapter 6, p. 76, 3rd paragraph.

2) Twelve Steps & Twelve Traditions, Step Eight.


EIGHTH STEP GUIDE (Cont.)

"MADE A LIST OF ALL PERSONS WE HAD HARMED, AND BECAME WILLING TO MAKE AMENDS TO THEM ALL"

In Step Four, we made a searching and fearless moral inventory. If we did Step Four thoroughly, one of the byproducts was a list of most all of the people that we had harmed. Although this list may be incomplete, it will serve as a starting point for us to now use in doing Step Eight.

Having done and now living the preceding seven steps, it should be apparent that we are not only in conflict with ourselves, but also with people and situations. Since both Steps Eight and Nine are concerned with personal relations, it behooves us to extract every bit of information about our inner selves and our fundamental difficulties by examining our personal relations.

The first portion of Step Eight is making a list of all persons we harmed. What is meant by "harmed"? Simply, it is the result of instincts in collision (the acquired false self and all its defective shortcomings) which have caused physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual damage to other people. In the process of compiling this list, we backtrack through our lives and make an accurate and unsparing survey of the human wreckage that we have left in our wake. The time has come when we ought to redouble our efforts to see how many people we have hurt and in what ways. As we ponder twisted or broken relationships with other persons, the acquired false self goes on the defensive. Fear, conspiring with false pride, will hinder our making a list of all the people we harmed. But we must expose this negative impulse by making a deeper and more honest search of our motives and ac¬tions.

The other portion of Step Eight is that we become willing to make amends to all persons we had harmed. Once again, willingness on our part is the key word. We are not asking for restitution at this point, only a willingness to make amends. Willingness has to do with forgiveness. In being willing to make amends, we are, in effect, asking other people to forgive us of our trespasses. However, we must first start out by forgiving the people that we have harmed and those who, we felt, had harmed us.

In summary, we carefully survey this whole area of human relations. We further discover exactly what personality traits were acquired that caused us (the acquired false self) to injure and disturb others. In doing this, we commence to ransack the memory for the people whom we have offended. We shall want to hold ourselves to the course of admitting the things we have done, meanwhile forgiving the wrongs done us, real or fancied. Then we become willing, just willing, to make amends to them all.

The purpose of writing the Eighth Step is to compile a list of all the people we had harmed. In doing this, we deepen our awareness of the acquired personality traits that led to defective relations with other human beings. This awareness should then spur us on to become willing to make amends to all persons we had harmed.

Go through the following examples in as thorough and as honest a manner as you can. You are out to get the destructive, acquired false self that has been ruining the personal relationship in your life.


1. What is your definition of the word "harmed"?

2. Do you believe that defective relations with other human beings have nearly always been the immediate cause of your woes? If so, briefly describe a few of these defective relationships.

3. Make a list of ALL the people that you have harmed and also those people that you believe have harmed you!

4. Using the list from above, admit the things you have done which caused physical, mental, emotional or spiritual damage to each person. Write these things beside each persons name.

5. Carefully survey the compiled list of persons and how you harmed them, and then decide exactly what character defects of the acquired false self injured and disturbed them. Briefly note beside each person the defects involved.

6. How are you going to become willing to make these amends?

7. What is the meaning of Step Eight to you?

8. How are you going to live Step Eight?

An accurate and really exhaustive survey of your past life will lead to your eventual freedom from the bondage of self.

DO IT NOW!

RECOMMENDED READING

1) Alcoholics Anonymous (big book), chapter 6, p. 76, 3rd paragraph.
2) Twelve Steps & Twelve Traditions, Step Eight.


WITH LOVE
from the Top of the Hill group
San Diego, CA 92101

Shared with love,
Candy Smith, Oak Harbor, Washington June 4, 1980
Phyllis Brett, Coupeville, Washington June 21, 1987