A Searching and Fearless Moral Inventory

How do you look honestly at yourself without drowning in shame? The key is objectivity — and that only becomes possible once the first three steps have laid a foundation. A searching and fearless moral inventory is not about self-punishment. It’s about freedom.

What “Fearless” Really Means

Making a searching and fearless moral inventory represents looking at an old character with objectivity. In order to be objective about that character, the first three steps have built a foundation. Step one brought self-honesty. Step two opened us to a power greater than ourselves. Step three gave that power a name and a relationship. We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God — and with that came a sense of freedom from both past and future.

After that foundation, we become ready to look at the old character fearlessly — not out of fear, but out of curiosity. We’re investigative. We’re ready to expose the old character and be free from it. That’s why the word “fearless” is there: we are no longer afraid. We are free to look.

The Security Instinct: Emotional and Physical

We look at the primary instincts of the old character and how they’ve been affected. The security instinct has two elements: physical security and emotional security.

Emotional security asks: Are you emotionally erratic or stable? Do you shut down when scared or hurt? Do you get aggressive, moody, reactive? Or are you patient and calm? What kind of emotional character are you? Were your parents emotionally available? Did you become withdrawn, over-aggressive, or dependent? These patterns carry forward unless exposed.

Physical security asks: How has money driven you? Have your possessions been your identity? Are you neurotic about appearances? Have you compromised your values for financial reasons? Did you grow up in a family always worried about money — and did that pattern you? Recognizing what it is allows you to change it.

The Social Instinct

The social instinct asks: What kind of citizen have I been? Do I pay my obligations? Am I consumed by what people think of me? Was I socially accepted, or did I feel like an outsider? Was I domineering or withdrawn? Extemporaneous or uncomfortable?

The way we get free from social insecurity is to expose these instincts. As we expose them, we rise above to the spiritual level. Spiritual principles must come first — our instincts are what made our lives go the wrong way. Either we got hurt on an instinctual level and never corrected it; or we had violent emotional twists that changed and patterned our lives. Either way, we must expose them to be free.

The Sexual Instinct

How have you been sexually? Have you compromised because of physical attraction, ignoring who someone truly was? Have you been with someone you didn’t value because of what they could offer? These are the kinds of honest questions that set us free. What standards do I want now? What is the ideal?

True matehood requires two things: I must admire the person I’m with as much as I want to physically embrace them — equally. And I must feel they appreciate being around me just as much as I appreciate being around them. Understanding where my sexual decisions have taken me astray helps me protect that ideal going forward.

The Fear List and Feelings Inventory

The fifth category is the fear list. Create a list of who and what you’re afraid of, and why. Carry this with you so that when fears come up, you’ve already done the inventory — you know where these instincts come from, and you can recognize: these things you’re afraid of are not happening today. Your fears are from yesterday.

Also include a feelings inventory — a list of feelings that arise during this process, so you can recognize what’s happening inside you while you do the work. These inventories can be done mentally or physically, whichever you prefer — just begin.

There’s nothing to fear and everything to feel liberated about. The fearless inventory is there for each and every one of us, to give us great insight into who we are. Objectivity is the key: you’re looking at the old character, not the new. In order to live fully in the new character, you must fully understand how the old one operates. Have fun in this process.

Much love,
KC