Big Book Step 4 Instructions: The Three Inventories

If we are looking for the actual Step 4 instructions in the Big Book, they run from the bottom of page 63 through page 71 in Chapter 5, How It Works. After the Third Step decision, the book says we launched out on a course of vigorous action, a personal housecleaning many of us had never attempted (page 63). The inventory itself is three written lists: a resentment inventory (pages 64 to 67), a fear inventory (pages 67 to 68), and a review of our sex conduct (pages 68 to 70). That is the whole assignment. The book never asks for a life story or a catalog of every sin we can remember; it asks for an honest, written look at what has been blocking us.

The book opens with a plain business picture: 'A business which takes no regular inventory usually goes broke' (page 64). So we took stock honestly, searching out the flaws in our make-up that caused our failure, convinced that self in its various forms is what had defeated us (page 64).

The Resentment Inventory (Pages 64 to 67)

The Big Book calls resentment the 'number one' offender and says 'It destroys more alcoholics than anything else' (page 64). So the inventory begins there. 'In dealing with resentments, we set them on paper' (page 64). We list the people, institutions, and principles we are angry with. Beside each name we write the cause, the specific thing that happened. Then we ask which part of self was hurt or threatened: our self-esteem, our security, our ambitions, our personal or sex relations (pages 64 and 65). Page 65 even shows a sample grid so we can see exactly what a finished list looks like.

Then comes the turn. Reading the list over, we see the price we have been paying: 'It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness' (page 66). The book's way out is to see the people who wronged us as perhaps spiritually sick (page 66) and to ask God to help us show them the same tolerance, pity, and patience we would grant a sick friend (page 67), praying, 'God save me from being angry. Thy will be done' (page 67). Last comes the part many of us call the fourth column: 'Putting out of our minds the wrongs others had done, we resolutely looked for our own mistakes' (page 67). We ask, 'Where had we been selfish, dishonest, self-seeking and frightened?' (page 67).

The Fear Inventory (Pages 67 to 68)

Fear gets its own list because it touches nearly every part of our lives; the book describes it as an evil and corroding thread running through the fabric of our existence (page 67). The instruction is short: 'We reviewed our fears thoroughly. We put them on paper, even though we had no resentment in connection with them' (page 68). For each fear we ask ourselves why we have it, and the book offers an honest answer: self-reliance failed us (page 68). The remedy is not grit but trust. 'We ask Him to remove our fear and direct our attention to what He would have us be' (page 68), and the book says we begin at once to outgrow fear.

The Sex Inventory (Pages 68 to 70)

The third list reviews our own sex conduct over the years past (page 69). We ask where we were selfish, dishonest, or inconsiderate, whom we hurt, and whether we aroused jealousy, suspicion, or bitterness (page 69). We get it all down on paper and subject each relationship to one simple test: was it selfish or not (page 69)? From that honest look we shape a sane and sound ideal for our future sex life, and 'We asked God to mold our ideals and help us to live up to them' (page 69). If sex stays troublesome, page 70 gives a practical prescription: we throw ourselves harder into helping others, and we pray for the right ideal and for the strength to do the right thing.

A Good Beginning (Pages 70 to 71)

If we have been thorough, we have written down a lot (page 70). We have analyzed our resentments and listed the people we have hurt, becoming willing to straighten out the past (page 70). Then the book closes the inventory with reassurance instead of a grade: 'If you have already made a decision, and an inventory of your grosser handicaps, you have made a good beginning' (page 71). Step 4 does not have to be perfect. It has to be honest and on paper. The chapter ends by saying we have swallowed and digested some big chunks of truth about ourselves (page 71), and that truth is exactly what we carry with us into Step 5.