Our practice of Steps 10, 11 and 12, if undertaken without precondition and with commitment, must inevitably lead us to the conclusion that the judgment we feared when we were still actively addicted, and that has remained for too many of us during our recovery, is indeed an illusion. In particular, our practice of meditation in Step 11 brings with it the experience of our complete oneness with other living things and with God as we understand God. This is the vital thing about meditation -- it is experiential, not theoretical. It doesn't teach us that we are one -- it lets us experience that we are one.

And if we are one with other living things and with God as we understand God, judgment simply has no place in our spiritual lives. It is an illusion; we experience in our meditations that it is an illusion. It follows that no good can come from us associating closely with people who believe in that judgment themselves and who wish to impose it on themselves and on us. However hard it may be, we find that in spiritual terms we need to keep our distance, just as -- when we first came into Program -- we discovered that we needed to keep our distance from those who were still in the throes of addiction. It's not that we condemn judgmental people. It's simply that we will have to practice Steps 10, 11 and 12 for some considerable time before we have the spiritual strength to be around them.