Resentment doesn't just make you angry. For an alcoholic, it cuts you off from the only thing keeping you sober. This is Corey alone with the Big Book, working through what that actually means.

Resentment clouds the heart and disrupts peace. When I hold on to it, I distance myself from the very presence that brings clarity and rest.

He opens on page 65 — the Mr. Brown inventory chart — and reads it the way an alcoholic actually reads it: Brown is moving into his house, sleeping with his wife, and taking his job. Then page 66: the grouch and the brainstorm are not for us. They may be the dubious luxuries of normal men, but for the alcoholic, these things are poison.

Page 64 turns it: we searched out the flaws in our own makeup which caused our failure. That's the flip from pointing at Brown to looking at what he brought into the relationship — fear, dishonesty, the same patterns every time. The house always wins, and that attitude never lets him be free.

A crocs story makes it concrete. Five-dollar loafer knockoffs, a comment from his significant other about the restaurant, and within seconds he's in a spiral — not good enough, inadequate, ready to make sure she feels it too. She happened to be in a spiritually fit place that day. He asks the honest question: what if she hadn't been?

Page 84, the seventh-step prayer, 12&12 pages 104-105 on making demands of God, and page 46's starlit night close it out. The feeling of awe used to be fleeting. It isn't anymore.

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Daily Ripples is a daily devotional reflection connecting recovery principles with the life of faith. New episodes every day at dailyripples.com.