# What does "Thy will be done" mean in the Big Book?

**In short:**
- In the program text ([pp. 1–164](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-1/)) "Thy will be done" appears twice, each time as words members say to themselves: when someone offends them ([p. 67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-67/)), and through the day, "many times each day" ([p. 88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-88/)). A third form, "Thy will (not mine) be done" ([p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/)), is part of the daily thought that keeps the reprieve going.
- The book doesn't define the phrase. What it shows is what the words do in each place: they replace anger and retaliation with asking how to be helpful ([p. 67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-67/)), and they remind us "we are no longer running the show" ([pp. 87–88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-87/)).
- It is tied to Step Three. Step Three's diagnosis is that the alcoholic is "an extreme example of self-will run riot" ([p. 62](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-62/)), and its remedy is that "God was going to be our Director" ([p. 62](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-62/)). Saying "Thy will be done" is how the book has members keep that decision in the middle of an ordinary day.
- The book also says what doing God's will looks like: "How can I best serve Thee" ([p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/)), and it calls this "the proper use of the will" ([p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/)), not giving up the will.

## Where it appears

A search of the main text for "Thy will" finds it on four pages, all in Chapters 5 and 6 (twice on [p. 63](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-63/)):

| Page | Wording | Where |
|---|---|---|
| 63 | "that I may better do Thy will" and "May I do Thy will always!" | The prayer at Step Three |
| 67 | Thy will be done. | The resentment inventory, Step Four |
| 85 | Thy will (not mine) be done. | Step Ten, the daily reprieve |
| 88 | "Thy will be done." | Step Eleven, through the day |

The phrase is the line from the Lord's Prayer, but the Big Book's main text doesn't say so or name that prayer. See: *Why do some meetings close with the Lord's Prayer?*

## The background: Step Three ([pp. 60–63](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-60/))

Step Three is the decision "to turn our will and our life over to God as we understood Him" ([p. 60](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-60/)). The book first explains why: "any life run on self-will can hardly be a success" ([p. 60](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-60/)). It describes the actor who wants to run the whole show ([pp. 60–61](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-60/)) and concludes that the alcoholic "is an extreme example of self-will run riot" ([p. 62](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-62/)). Its answer: "First of all, we had to quit playing God." ([p. 62](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-62/)) "Next, we decided that hereafter in this drama of life, God was going to be our Director." ([p. 62](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-62/))

The prayer offered as an example at that Step asks "Relieve me of the bondage of self, that I may better do Thy will." ([p. 63](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-63/)) and closes "May I do Thy will always!" ([p. 63](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-63/)). The book says the wording is "quite optional so long as we expressed the idea" ([p. 63](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-63/)).

## When someone offends ([p. 67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-67/))

In the resentment inventory, resentment is called fatal to the alcoholic, because when "harboring such feelings we shut ourselves off from the sunlight of the Spirit." ([p. 66](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-66/)) "If we were to live, we had to be free of anger." ([p. 66](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-66/)) The book's course: see that the people who wronged us were perhaps spiritually sick, and ask God to help us show them the patience we'd give a sick friend ([pp. 66–67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-66/)). Then the words members said to themselves when a person offended: "This is a sick man. How can I be helpful to him? God save me from being angry. Thy will be done." ([p. 67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-67/))

What comes next shows what the words are for: "We avoid retaliation or argument." ([p. 67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-67/)) Then the inventory turns to our own part: "The inventory was ours, not the other man's." ([p. 67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-67/))

So "Thy will be done" here is said by the offended person, about himself. It lets go of getting even and of winning. See: *Does the Big Book really say to pray for people you resent ("This is a sick man")?*

## Every day ([p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/))

In Step Ten, after the promise that the problem of drink has been removed, the book warns: "We are not cured of alcoholism. What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition." ([p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/)) "Every day is a day when we must carry the vision of God's will into all of our activities." ([p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/)) The thoughts that go with us constantly: "How can I best serve Thee—Thy will (not mine) be done." ([p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/))

Then a line that cuts against a common reading of "surrender": "We can exercise our will power along this line all we wish. It is the proper use of the will." ([p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/)) The book doesn't ask members to stop using their will. It asks them to point it at serving.

## Through the day ([pp. 87–88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-87/))

In Step Eleven, after the night review and the morning meditation, the book says: "As we go through the day we pause, when agitated or doubtful, and ask for the right thought or action." ([p. 87](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-87/)) "We constantly remind ourselves we are no longer running the show, humbly saying to ourselves many times each day 'Thy will be done.'" ([pp. 87–88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-87/))

It says what follows: "We are then in much less danger of excitement, fear, anger, worry, self-pity, or foolish decisions." ([p. 88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-88/)) "We become much more efficient." ([p. 88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-88/)) And members "do not tire so easily, for we are not burning up energy foolishly as we did when we were trying to arrange life to suit ourselves." ([p. 88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-88/))

The chapter ends by pointing past prayer to action: "There is action and more action." ([p. 88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-88/)) The next chapter is Step Twelve, carrying the message to other alcoholics ([p. 88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-88/)).

## What the text doesn't say

- It doesn't define God's will in general. Step Eleven itself speaks of praying "only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out" ([p. 59](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-59/)), and the morning prayer asks to be shown "what our next step is to be" ([p. 87](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-87/)). The book's examples of God's will in practice point toward others: being helpful to the man who offended ([p. 67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-67/)), serving ([p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/)).
- It doesn't use "Thy will be done" to mean passive acceptance of whatever happens. Where the book names a moment, it's one of offence or agitation and doubt ([pp. 67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-67/), 87–88); at [p. 85](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-85/) the thought goes with us "constantly." Each time it leads to an action: being helpful, asking for the right thought, serving.
- It doesn't say the words must be exactly these. Of the Step Three prayer it says the wording is optional ([p. 63](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-63/)), and the Step Eleven passage presents its practices as suggestions ([p. 86](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-86/)).

## In the members' stories (fourth edition, 2001)

Several stories use the phrase, as members' experience, not program text: an early woman member can now say many times daily, "Thy will be done, not mine" ([p. 207](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-207/)); another member links it to hearing the Lord's Prayer at meetings ([p. 356](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-356/)); and a physician writes that he "can't say, 'Thy will be done,' and take a pill." ([p. 411](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-411/))

See: *What do Steps 10 and 11 ask, day to day?* · *What is the Third Step prayer, and where is it?* · *What do "selfishness—self-centeredness!" and "self-will run riot" mean in the Big Book?* · *Is "turn it over" in the Big Book?*

## Read it yourself
- Chapter 5, "How It Works" (Step Three [pp. 60–63](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-60/); resentment [pp. 64–67](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-64/)): https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_chapt5.pdf
- Chapter 6, "Into Action" (Steps Ten and Eleven, [pp. 84–88](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-84/)): https://www.aa.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/en_bigbook_chapt6.pdf
- The full book is sold by A.A. World Services: https://onlineliterature.aa.org

## Sources
| Source | Pages | Date |
|---|---|---|
| *Alcoholics Anonymous*, Chapter 5, "How It Works" | 59–67 | 1939 |
| *Alcoholics Anonymous*, Chapter 6, "Into Action" | 84–88 | 1939 |
| Members' stories ("Women Suffer Too," [p. 207](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-207/); others [pp. 356](https://recoverystarts.com/big-book/page-356/), 411) | 207, 356, 411 | fourth edition (2001) |

*Recovery Starts is independent and not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous. Quotations are brief and cited; the Big Book is © A.A. World Services, Inc.*