“Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.” — Alcoholics Anonymous (1939) · Chapter 5 · How It Works
Step Nine as printed in Chapter 5 — followed in Chapter 6 by the Promises, which the book says begin arriving “before we are half way through.”
“Direct” is the hard part — not a vague apology into the air, but a doorstep, a debt repaid, a wrong named to the person who absorbed it. And notice the exception clause: this Step has a conscience. It refuses to buy your peace with someone else’s pain. The Promises are stapled to this Step for a reason. Freedom, it turns out, has a street address. Usually several.
Step 9