When you feel good, you’re communicating with the voice of God, and that’s the key When your’e feeling bad and it hurts, you are not connected to the voice of God. You don’t get lined up with God by thinking that someone has better recovery than you, that somebody is in a better position than you, that person is happier than me; that’s the voice of envy. The pride voice triggers all the other defects and starts to entertain them all. The voice of that dark side that beats us up, saying you’re not good enough, is the same voice that says you need an escape right now, go do something wrong; you can spend that money, you need a break today. Go spend your money for rent today, don’t worry you’ll make it up later, don’t worry, you deserve it. That’s the voice of want. That’s why it tells us freedom from fear is more important than freedom from want. That’s a great riddle because where I can truly discover the voice of pride by looking at what I want and what I fear. What I want is a new car, but if I go to the dealership, get payments for a car that I can’t afford; I got what I want, but I forgot that freedom from fear is more important than freedom from want. Now that I got what I want, all the fear of losing what I want and not being able to keep it, those fear feelings kick in. So, what that means is that I stop wanting things that will produce a fear. See, I think that I want to be free from wanting things because my mind is never satisfied. Part of us thinks that if we can be free from want, we’ll be okay. I remember the day I discovered that, just applying that principle. I want to be free from want, God, please show me how to do that. I realized that I walked around all day, thinking, I want this and I want that, but what it makes me realize when I spend all day fantasizing, but it makes me feel that I don’t have. Even though, I want things that are going to be fun and exciting, but the other side of wanting, is that I look and I don’t have that. When I feel that I don’t have the things that I want, I feel that my life is not okay until I have those things. When I get a house, things are going to be okay. When I get those jet skis, things will be okay. That’s called postponed fulfillment.
That’s the same voice that they’re talking about, and what I need to realize is that freedom from fear is more important than freedom from want. If I treat my fear, then I don’t live in the want all the time. I live in appreciation for what I’ve got. That’s where discipline comes in. I can say, I can adjust my financial situation because I’ve learned how to do that. Serenely, to self-discipline myself not to spend so much money because now I’m getting free from fear. When I’m free of fear, it’s freeing me from want because I like when I don’t have to worry about money. So, this is what we learned, I’m going to treat the fears, and that’s going to satiate the wants, and I’m going to achieve those things I want because I’m not going to live in fear anymore. So, when I get things, I know they will be good for my life because I don’t get things anymore that produce fear. I don’t enter into relationships anymore where I wonder if they’re going to cheat, which produces fear because I recognize how important it is to be free from fear. It sets up my value system. I’ve learned which things make me fearful, and as I become aware of those things, I won’t enter into them anymore because I want to live free of fear. Now, I’m entirely ready to have all these defects of character removed because I’ve learned that I can be free from fear. I’m learning what I do that creates fear inside of me. If I go act on lust and cheat on my relationship, it produces a fear that I’m going to get caught. So, what I want to do is realize I want to be free from fear. I don’t want to live in lust anyway, that’s not the character I want to be, but that’s not good enough, just to not want to be in lust; but to be free from fear when I recognize how much fear eats me up? That has power, doesn’t it? I can use that now to keep me from going the wrong way. So, freedom from fear becomes more important than freedom from want. I don’t live in want anymore. I live in a world where I recognize those things that I fear, and I free myself by not entering into them anymore. That’s how I treat that pride defect, build that new character, and I realize that I am entirely ready to be the man that God says I should be. If anything comes up and I act in any behavior that takes me away from that man, I’m entirely ready to have it removed and recognize it right now because I’ll feel the fear, won’t I?
As I develop an awareness of things that make me fearful, and I don’t enter into those anymore, when I become aware of fear, I know something is wrong, and I’m going the wrong way. So that’s why freedom from fear becomes more important than freedom from want. I address those things as the new character who separates the adults from the children in Step 6, being entirely ready to have this removed. I won’t live in a relationship where I feel uncomfortable anymore, I’d rather go on to take over my own individual place, and deal with the unknown; knowing that it will be far better than this is, because I won’t live in fear anymore. We’re all learning the things that make us afraid and we don’t go there anymore. That builds out life because we don’t live in fear ever again.