"God had done for him what he could not do for himself." (11:3, 'Alcoholics Anonymous')
Have you had this experience, with the relief of the obsession to drink and improvement in other areas that could not have been wrought through information plus will-power alone?
"... you may be suffering from an illness which only a spiritual experience will conquer.
To one who feels he is an atheist or agnostic such an experience seems impossible, but to continue as he is means disaster, especially if he is an alcoholic of the hopeless variety. To be doomed to an alcoholic death or to live on a spiritual basis are not always easy alternatives to face." (44:1–2)
Drinking aside, is there an area of your life where you are struggling hopelessly and facing doom, because whatever you have done to date has not worked? Are you without hope? Do you know that you need God in this area but cannot summon the faith or hope and find yourself trapped in your current ways?
"When we saw others solve their problems by a simple reliance upon the Spirit of the Universe, we had to stop doubting the power of God. Our ideas did not work. But the God idea did." (52:3)
"When we look back, we realize that the things which came to us when we put ourselves in God's hands were better than anything we could have planned." (100:1)
"... they found that a new power, peace, happiness, and sense of direction flowed into them. This happened soon after they wholeheartedly met a few simple requirements." (50:4)
When you look back, are there areas of your life where, when you relied on God and met the few simple requirements (acted in accordance with that reliance and applied the Steps), you experienced the above?
"Our stories disclose in a general way what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now." (58:2)
Make a list of such areas of your life.
Describe what you used to be like in these areas.
Describe what happened.
Describe what you are like now.
"Do I now believe, or am I even willing to believe, that there is a Power greater than myself?" (47:2)
Ask this, not as a general question, but in the area in which you are having difficulty, the area where you do not currently believe God can help.
"We found the Great Reality deep down within us. In the last analysis it is only there that He can be found." (55:3)
"If our testimony helps sweep away prejudice, enables you to think honestly, encourages you to search diligently within yourself, then, if you wish, you can join us on the Broad Highway. With this attitude you cannot fail. The consciousness of your belief is sure to come to you." (55:4)
When you search diligently, do you find that God is already working in your life in other areas? Has this exercise swept away prejudice against the idea of God working in the area of difficulty?
"... our former thinking was soft and mushy when we threw up our hands in doubt and said 'We don't know.'
When we became alcoholics, crushed by a self imposed crisis we could not postpone or evade, we had to fearlessly face the proposition that either God is everything or else He is nothing. God either is, or He isn't. What was our choice to be?" (53:1–2)
If God can work miracles in one area, do you agree it is intellectually 'soft and mushy' to deny that possibility in other areas?
What IS your choice to be? Are you now willing to start living in ALL areas of your life on the basis of God-sufficiency rather than self-sufficiency?
"Some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely." (58:3)Am I willing now to let go of every idea, emotion, attitude, plan, and design in this area, and to let God lead me moment by moment to an "un-dreamed-of future" (119:0)?