Willingness is My Job?

Nothing is going to turn me into a nonentity. If I keep on turning my life and my will over to the care of Something or Somebody else, what will become of me? I'll look like the hole in the doughnut. (AA's Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, page 36)

I don't disagree with this (as a statement of something that's wrong) nor do I have any particular response to it, except it's neat writing.

But dependence upon an A.A. group or upon a Higher Power hasn't produced any baleful results. (ibid., page 38)

Interesting word, "baleful." I can't remember hearing it used, though it's not unfamiliar, meaning "full of deadly or pernicious influence or destructive." I did find this comparison from American Heritage Dictionary interesting: 

Baleful and baneful overlap in meaning, but baleful usually applies to something that is menacing or foreshadows evil: a baleful look. Baneful most often describes that which is actually harmful or destructive: baneful effects of their foreign policy.  

I'm assuming that baneful events are baleful as well, while some baleful things are not baneful. In this case, the usage is the more inclusive one, baleful. We're skittish people, afraid of our shadows though we're boastful and put on a good game face. But we are afraid of those things we perceive to be destructive, deadly, or pernicious. And A.A., O.A., and our Higher Power, depended upon, have not produced any baleful results. This doesn't just say they're not deadly, pernicious, or destructive -- it's not an empty representation. Instead, with about 15 years of history of A. A. groups and reliance upon a Higher Power, the proclamation is not an empty promise, but proof from experience. And since we understand each other better than we understand other people and better than they understand us, this is high praise and a reassuring affirmation. It's not an absolute promise but it's saying, "Our history bears out this stuff, this dependence, is safe." How reassuring can that be? Very.  

But now it appears that there are certain things which only the individual can do. All by himself, and in the light of his own circumstances, he needs to develop the quality of willingness. When he acquires willingness, he is the only one who can make the decision to exert himself. Trying to do this is an act of his own will. All of the Twelve Steps require sustained and personal exertion to conform to their principles and so, we trust, to God's will. (ibid., page 40)

I read "will" at the first of a long word, and it becomes "willpower" for me, so I had to read this a few times to realize that's not what it's saying. There's a huge difference in willingness and willpower--like pretty much a mirror image. And if I decide to get my will out of the equation, I'm pulling out too much, leaving the spiritual solution stranded, for the solutions needs none of my willpower but all the willingness I can muster either by surrendering or by praying for the willingness I can't find elsewhere. And developing willpower isn't even the end. There are other steps I have to take to support my recovery: The big one is "exert myself" and secondary but inherent in that is "sustain the exertion" and personalize the exertion to conform to the principles, and thereby to God's will. And all this is based on initially developing in my own circumstances the quality of willingness. So, like this chapter says at the beginning, Step Three isn't a decision step like Step One and Step Two but an action step like all the rest. 

Lord, I am willing, make me willing.