Before the 4th Step

Transcript of a Sage Hill Live Fully Podcast conversation with Dr. Chip Dodd. Lightly edited for readability; speaker labels omitted.

You're listening to the Sage Hill podcast on addiction with Dr. Chip Dodd and Phil Herndon. This is a new weekly podcast recorded at the Center for Professional Excellence. Hey, everybody. Welcome back in. Sage Hill podcast. This is, Phil Herndon along with Chip Dodd. Hey, Chip. Hey, Phil. Back in our studio here. It's good to see you. And, good to see you again. Like, like five minutes ago. Yeah. Like the rest of the day has been. Every single day. Hey, we, we've been doing a little series on, steps. Right? Last time we did step three, and, rather than jump directly into the four step, we thought we would do, what we call it, like, a preamble, like a Yeah. Build up. Preface to. Yeah. Preface to the four step today. And so we were talking before we went on your our lawn planning sessions, like those seventeen, eighteen seconds before we start recording.

I I would rec I would certainly say that in the seventeen years, eighteen years build up too. That's true. There's a lot of behind it, isn't it? Yeah. But we as we're talking about that, I wish y'all could see the look I just got. The UCPE guys know the look I'm talking about. I don't even know the look. I've seen it. That's what's scary about it. I can't I don't know what I'm doing, and I get, you know, like, made fun of it. And it's like, I don't know what I'm doing because I never see it, and I don't wanna see it. No. You don't. No. I don't. No. Rest of us have. Alright. Thank you. Face looks friendly right now, though. Oh, come on, man. Oh, okay. Alright. So

so fourth step, we, this is step we were talking a few minutes ago that, this is a step where, like, alright. We've spent three steps dealing with me and me, so to speak. And this is the one where the world kinda starts closing in. Like, we're gonna deal with this ego. Right? We're gonna we're gonna deal with this in a four step, but it gets kinda your words while ago were like, yeah. Four step words get really real. I think it's real. So so I guess we're down to talking about people talk about self self self, data self, all that stuff. And they're probably really talking about something else. So take off from there. Good. Hey, Phil. You know, we talked about the three steps and something we did not concentrate on when we were talking about them is that the steps, the first three are real diminishment or deflation of the ego. Mhmm. And what we're talking about is the acronym EGO. Mhmm. Now the ego is the thing that we use it, one big picture to refer to, even a bigger picture is easing God out. It's the false front, the face. It's the person we constructed to be the show. It's the facade. If you think of the wizard of Oz, whether you are a person you call yourself shy or you see yourself as as as the fun of the life of the party, ego is the presentation that hides the struggles, insecurities, difficulties, losses, celebrations, joys. I mean, it hides the true self. Right? And it it can hide all of the true self, not just from others, but even from myself because we've talked about we did a whole podcast on denial. Yeah. And and we've talked about and have seen denial True voice. Is not lying. That's in court. This is in life and in in the world of how people really are are made. I mean, denial means I'm I'm blind blind to what's happening behind the facade. The Wizard of Oz, he really didn't know who he was behind the curtain except for just or only. And even then, the Wizard of Oz was little more than a carnival barker. Right? Yeah. And we all know about carnies. You know? So a a person in need of development. And so ego is the facade, the EGO, and as the first three steps diminish the ego, but it's also beginning of the development and the, security attachment of the self to something greater than myself. In other words, I've gone from ego to need. I've gone from presentation to becoming present. I've gone from trying to be in control of life to admitting that I'm in need of somebody to show me how to live life. Right? And so the the the the the fourth step is actually starting one of the hardest looks at my own identity and who I am and what I've done with that of all the steps. The first three steps are really about admitting powerlessness to create the beginnings of security. Mhmm. And I've come to accept that, you know, I don't have control of life. I need help in life and there's a help that I'm getting. It's real. That God is doing for me what I can't do for myself and for the the old aphorism that says, I can't, he can, I think I'll let him Yeah? Which is a real quick tidy way of saying something's huge. But the fourth step, I mean, a fearless moral inventory Yeah. Is a real look in the mirror, and and really beginning to deal with the carnival barker, the, failures that we've had, the struggles, and beginning to admit a need for change, taking responsibility, developing accountability, and return to empathy. Mhmm. You know? The true self also we're bumping into the child within. We're bumping into the sin the sin, the need of a savior, and the saint. The the the the self in waiting and you and I've talked about before in the book of John, Jesus says unless a wheat seed falls to the ground and dies, it it that kernel of wheat is only for one. You know, it's it's it's no it doesn't produce any any any fruit because it dies. There's no harvest. But when a when a seed dies, the seed itself doesn't die. The shell of the seed dies. And when the seed dies, we can call that the ego is diminished. The shell of the self dies and the true self that is not yet developed is revealed. So, I mean, Jesus is, it's an amazing thing that dying to what is called dying to self is really the death of the ego Mhmm. And the development and the the the germination, the growth of the self into someone who can give himself or herself away. Yeah. And therein is the harvest that becomes we can. We can do more together than we can apart. Mhmm. We admitted. We turned our lives over. We and so we're just like the fourth step is honestly the beginning of joining and connecting to relationship and other human beings again in ways that we've never been able to do so. To accept the sin, to accept the need of saved, salve, savior, to be healed, and also to recognize that God didn't make junk, that we have a saintliness even in our cravings for life. And I don't mean that somehow some special theological term by that. I'm talking about that that we were created to become fully alive, to love deeply, and to lead well lives of integrity. Right? Mhmm. Of intimacy and also, a passion which you know, just willing to be in pain for something that matters. In other words, make a difference because we can't help it. But until we take ownership of all the ways we manipulate and con and overachieve and how we try to perform for others so they'll think well of us, which is gonna be a daily struggle. Wouldn't you agree?

The thus the day at a time slogan that we live by. You know, as a, what we call pream precursor to the step, we probably need to be talking more humans need to be talking more about, the the shame the toxic shame Yeah. That almost has to go along with dying to self. Because I'm exhibit a through z, maybe a lot of people are too, of I tried, keyword, tried so hard to try harder to, you know, do this thing right as opposed to, letting that third step open up a gate to what we're talking about today. And so I I ended up unwittingly using ego to rid myself of ego calling itself. Yes. Say more about that. That's yeah. Well, just that, you know, I was a, you know, a church kid, and that's not casting an aspersion on the church, as much as it is how a phrase you know, I had a professor in grad school who used to say, words are symbols of meaning. Like, when you say something, it means something. Mhmm. And so I took that phrase to, you know, die to self. Like, okay. If I have a need, well, that's myself. Uh-huh. If I have desire, that's myself. If I have, you know, hope for something bigger than I could do on my own, well, that you know, so all these things ended up being I began to equate self with living. Yeah. And so I need to die to living. Yes. And then, my first, how many ever, ten four steps I did or more, I went into those grids, those inventories, shaming myself around, oh, I need to try harder to deal with this resentment I should never have toward this person. Isn't it amazing how that

that approach of so, like, I gotta use my ego to get rid of my ego, like you said, because self is ego. That actually sets us up for relapse. For sure. Isn't that amazing? Because we're something we've gotta keep talking about that in the medical world, they use the term craving. In the recovery world, they use term craving as a negative. Yeah. And the truth is we're we're made to crave. Mhmm. And we're made to want what we want when we want it. But we're made to crave and be able to tolerate four words. No, wait, and maybe. Mhmm. I mean, it's just that life on life's terms. We talk about that. I talk about it all the time. But, the the the the, craving for life will leads to lust or life. Yeah. Lust is an attempt to get my knees met without having to be in need. Ego driven. Ego driven. Mhmm. So to hide the self, because when I look at myself, I'm nothing but a carnival barker, and I just gotta become a big wizard carnival barker to be okay. So that that that sin self, that harming self and harmful to myself self, and we use the word sin related to recovery. What's called harms done to myself and others. Mhmm. Do you know? It's okay to, deal with the character defects of things we do to ourselves and others that are harmful. Taking ownership of wrongs. Uh-huh. Taking ownership of our need for character development. There are things I do and have done that need to be dealt with and or forgiven. So so I can become more than even what my lack of development has made me. I can become more than what sin has done to me. I can do more than become more than what misteaching has done to me. Shameful learning has done to me. You know, it's about it's about being regenerated. It's about coming to life again. It's about dispensing with the ego and finding that there's a self worth keeping underneath all that shame and that sin and that, you know, we're made of dirt. Humility begins to rise, but that dirt we're made out of is stardust. I mean, the saint, the person that's created by God, you know, endowed by their creator with a craving to live. Not at all. You know, that's the real self. Right, which has needs, feelings, desire, longings, and hope that you're we're ashamed of having. Right? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Shouldn't have those. Yeah. So if we looked at this is gonna be kind of a shorter you know, we talked earlier, kind of a shorter podcast today just to get ready for the, you know, four step step conversation be larger.

But so if we looked at what we're talking about today as the the territory between a third and fourth step, what would you say in terms of, okay, this this is a this is a deal where we're talking about the difference between self and ego. What would you say is a one or two or three or how many ever takeaways? Like, if if somebody's out there literally between a third and fourth step, what do you say to them about dealing with self and ego as they prepare to kinda walk through this inventory process? To me, the third step creates a security in God, something other than myself, but in God that God is doing for me what I can't do for myself. So I have learned so far that there's a process happening. And if I give myself to the process, God will take care of it. So God has given me the courage to face a lot of things that I've been in denial about or don't wanna take ownership of or that are secrets because I'm trusting that underneath all those secrets, underneath that sin, underneath those harms done, underneath that toxic shame, there just might be this life, more life, you know, more, the life I made to live, because ultimately the third step is about God doing, but it's not about the future of the life we're made to have either. Yeah. It's not about full reconnection with those people that we've we live with. Do you agree?

I really do. As a matter of fact, I was just thinking as you were talking just today, I did a a third step with a guy, one of our guys. And, what what you just said, we kinda how we ended. We actually got to do it outside on a on a trail. Kind of an unusual opportunity to do that. Sitting by the Duck River this morning doing the step with him, and not with the same word you just used, but that whole idea around, I'm completing something, but more than completing something, I'm walking into something that's so big. I've got to do what I just did to be ready to walk into it. You know? So, I think that's a great place to kind of wrap up today. I think it's important that we took the time to talk about this area in between the third and fourth steps. The management of the ego,

which never goes away, and the rising of the self that we're created to have to be able to live fully with ourselves, others, and God. Right on. So we'll come back to that next week. Sounds good. Hey, everybody. Thanks for listening. Thank you, Phil. Alright. Talk to you later.