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

In short:

  • In the program text (pp. 1–164) "Thy will be done" appears twice, each time as words members say to themselves: when someone offends them (p. 67), and through the day, "many times each day" (p. 88). A third form, "Thy will (not mine) be done" (p. 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), and they remind us "we are no longer running the show" (pp. 87–88).
  • 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), and its remedy is that "God was going to be our Director" (p. 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), and it calls this "the proper use of the will" (p. 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):

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)

Step Three is the decision "to turn our will and our life over to God as we understood Him" (p. 60). The book first explains why: "any life run on self-will can hardly be a success" (p. 60). It describes the actor who wants to run the whole show (pp. 60–61) and concludes that the alcoholic "is an extreme example of self-will run riot" (p. 62). Its answer: "First of all, we had to quit playing God." (p. 62) "Next, we decided that hereafter in this drama of life, God was going to be our Director." (p. 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) and closes "May I do Thy will always!" (p. 63). The book says the wording is "quite optional so long as we expressed the idea" (p. 63).

When someone offends (p. 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) "If we were to live, we had to be free of anger." (p. 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). 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)

What comes next shows what the words are for: "We avoid retaliation or argument." (p. 67) Then the inventory turns to our own part: "The inventory was ours, not the other man's." (p. 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)

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) "Every day is a day when we must carry the vision of God's will into all of our activities." (p. 85) The thoughts that go with us constantly: "How can I best serve Thee—Thy will (not mine) be done." (p. 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) 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)

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) "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)

It says what follows: "We are then in much less danger of excitement, fear, anger, worry, self-pity, or foolish decisions." (p. 88) "We become much more efficient." (p. 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)

The chapter ends by pointing past prayer to action: "There is action and more action." (p. 88) The next chapter is Step Twelve, carrying the message to other alcoholics (p. 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), and the morning prayer asks to be shown "what our next step is to be" (p. 87). The book's examples of God's will in practice point toward others: being helpful to the man who offended (p. 67), serving (p. 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, 87–88); at p. 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), and the Step Eleven passage presents its practices as suggestions (p. 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); another member links it to hearing the Lord's Prayer at meetings (p. 356); and a physician writes that he "can't say, 'Thy will be done,' and take a pill." (p. 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

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; others pp. 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.

These pages answer questions about A.A. from A.A.'s own published literature, read in full, with every quote checked word for word against the page it cites. Recovery Starts is independent and not affiliated with Alcoholics Anonymous. What we read, and when each source was written.