These are notes on Step 6 from various sources:
We have emphasized willingness as being indispensable. Are we now ready to let God remove from us all the things which we have admitted are objectionable? Can He now take them all, everyone? If we still cling to something we will not let go, we ask God to help us be willing. -A.A. Big Book p.76
So Step Six – “Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character” – is A.A.’s way of stating the best possible attitude one can take in order to make a beginning on this lifetime job. This does not mean that we expect all our character defects to be lifted out of us as the drive to drink was. A few of them may be, but with most of them we shall have to be content with patient improvement. The words “entirely ready” underline the fact that we want to aim at the very best we know or can learn.
– Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, p. 65
When we tried to clean ourselves up with our own power and “discipline” we kept ourselves agitated, confused, in denial, and worn out, and we were in almost constant emotional pain. We were like the man who tore the scab off his arm every morning to see if his wound had healed.
But it was in doing the sixth Step that I saw why I had become so exhausted. I’d been trying to do God’s part in the spiritual growth and healing process. In the program I was told that my part was “being entirely ready”, being ready to let God be the controller and life-changer of myself and others. When I did that, my sponsor said, I would see how God’s power is released to flow through our lives to clean them only when we quit trying to control the how and when he is to use that power…At first this sounded like a call to complacency – until I got into Step Seven. This attitude of readiness to let God reach into our lives and uncover and remove the things that make us spiritually and emotionally sick is paradoxically the doorway to active and effective change of specific lifelong habits and sins. But it means turning loose of our control-even of our healing.
– A Hunger for Healing, p. 112-113
When we are working Step Six, it is important to remember that we are human and should not place unrealistic expectations on ourselves. This is a step of willingness. That is the spiritual principle of Step Six. It is as if to say that we are now willing to move in a spiritual direction. Being human we will, of course, wander.
Rebellion is a character defect that spoils us here. We need not lose faith when we become rebellious. The indifference or intolerance that rebellion can bring out in us has to be overcome by persistent effort. We keep asking for willingness. We may be doubtful still that God will see fit to relieve us or that something will go wrong. We ask another member who says, “You’re right where you’re supposed to be”. We renew our readiness to have our defects removed. We surrender to the simple suggestions that the Program offers us. Even though we are not entirely ready, we are headed in that direction. – Narcotics Anonymous Basic Text, Chapter 4, Step 6
We must be specific in our identification of individual defects of character, and we must be specific about the changes required to recover from them. One cure does not fit all! The approach for addressing one addiction may not work at all for another. For instance, the rageaholic may need to reduce anger expression. Conversely, the anger phobic person, who has no permission to feel or experience anger, may need to mobilize anger expression and assertiveness. The treatment has to be very specifically tailored to the defect and to the person.
As a rule, most defects of character involve some imbalance in the expression of and the experience of our most basic human needs. For example, sexuality and ambition are not bad unless our experiences of those drives are imbalanced or codependent. If we are addicted to sex or driven by ambition to the point of workaholism, these expressions have become defects we must address. Our sixth step prayers would not be “Make me asexual” or “Take away my ambition.” Rather, we might pray, “Grant me a healthy expression of my sexuality” or “Channel ambition into enhancing my private life as well as my work life.”
As we hold known defects of character up to God, we must avoid self-shaming and self-condemnation. The goal here is spiritual release, not spiritual self-punishment. For most of us, this process is ongoing. We will not be healed and sent forward immediately; rather, recovery will be a daily effort to evaluate, balance, and adjust the healthy expression of all of our God-given needs. – Serenity, A Companion for Twelve Step Recovery, p. 50-51