TOTALLY TRUE

It’s Time to Update the 12 Steps

For those of us who don’t like the word God.

This is me crossing my fingers that I don’t offend anyone. Especially not God, if there is one. Image by benzoix on Freepik. PS: It might not really be me.

I have never been a fan of the 12-step programme. Partly because all the people I know who are fans are worse than Jehovah’s Witnesses at trying to convert you. And that feels icky to me. Like pyramid selling or something.

But mainly because I have a major problem with the word God. It has always made me uncomfortable.

The God that was described to me as a child made no sense: a grey-haired man who lived in the clouds and could see everything I was doing. I was terrified to go to the toilet in case he was watching.

The first time I went on an aeroplane and discovered that clouds weren’t solid and you could fly through them was an eye-opener. They weren’t solid enough to hold an old man with a beard. Someone had been lying to me.

I never knew you could fly through clouds. Image by jannoon028 on Freepik

The Sunday School teachers put me off the Bible when they refused to answer my question about whether, if we started from just Adam and Eve, that meant that brothers and sisters had to get married to have more children. That idea was just too gross because I hated my brother…