God has countless secret agents working in the world, and the chances are that you're one of them.

A secret agent has one important and necessary characteristic -- she's secret. That is, the majority of people have no idea who she really is. If people in general knew who she was, of course, then she wouldn't be secret any more -- would she?

Being a secret agent is part of being in Program. It's enjoined upon us by the great spiritual principle of anonymity. The Just for Today card says, "Just for today ... I will do somebody a good turn, and not get found out; if anybody knows of it, it will not count." Our Twelfth-Step work is carried out with all the anonymity we can bring to it. But the Just for Today card suggests that that anonymity be carried into other actions that we perform for other people.

There is only one time when we deliberately break our anonymity: when we tell another person who is in trouble that we are addicts ourselves. Dr. Bob himself noted the paradox of the fact that the message cannot spread unless we do break our anonymity when needed.

But sometimes it's hard to be a secret agent. Unlike real secret agents, we are often so tempted to break our anonymity without any real justification, so that we can hear other people tell us how wonderful we are. But God's work is rarely done in the open. Step 12 reminds us that it can only really be performed when we forget about ourselves in the reality of serving others.