Surrender and the Glad Gesthemane

We all know that the first three Steps are about surrender, culminating in our decisions to turn our wills and our lives over to our Higher Powers.  I, for one, frequently forget the progression in surrender represented by those first three Steps.  Initially we let go of our faith in alcohol.  For a long time we've known that our dear friend alcohol was turning our lives into pain filled shells but we saw no other way of living so we stuck by the booze.  In the First Step we jump off into the unknown.  In a terrifying leap we abandon alcohol and see what else, if anything, there is out there.  In the Second Step we go further.  We acknowledge that there is something greater than ourselves that can save us.  We give up our self reliance and in our culture that is one huge surrender.  Then, in the Third Step we go beyond just asking for help in restoring us to sanity; we actually resolve to surrender our wills and our lives to a Higher Power (in other words, acknowledge that we aren't in control of our entire lives, not just alcohol).  Now we are the ones helping in the effort.  The heavy lifting is being done by the Higher Power we are surrendering to.

Connected

Recently I've been going through one of my bouts of feeling pretty ineffective - basically useless.  Unemployment can do that to you, especially when you don't have your spiritual ducks in row.
Now, I know the standard response to such a feeling is "get off the pity pot" or "get your ass to a meeting" or something like that.  That advice can be useful, but it also helps (me, at least) to try to look objectively at the situation and see just how much of the problem is purely in my head.  (I almost wrote "is real as opposed to in my head" but, as any alkie knows, a problem in your head can be a very, very real problem.)  After looking over the situation I may come up with a way to work on it or I may decide it isn't that much of a problem after all.