We all have friends. Some are close friends, some are more distant; some are perhaps better described as acquaintances.

How do we measure the closeness of our friends? Well, one way is to figure out how much time we spend -- or would like to spend -- in their company. Probably we have lots of casual friends we spend a little time with every so often. And then there are people -- one or two, perhaps -- whom we're willing to be with a lot. Perhaps we go on vacation with them for weeks at a time. We just like being around them.

By contrast, think about what it's like being in the company of someone we don't care for. The time drags on, and we can't wait to get away. We're not focused at all on the other person -- we're lost in distracting thoughts. We feel uncomfortable -- physically as well as mentally. We can't sit still: we feel the need to move around, to change our sitting position. We long to be able to get up and walk away ....

H'mm ... isn't that exactly the way we feel when we first begin to meditate against the background of our practice of Steps 10 and 11? And what does that tell us about ourselves? It tells us that we can't stand ourselves. We bore ourselves to death. We seek any distraction to avoid being with ourselves. We want to get up and walk away, or read a book, or listen to music -- anything to avoid being with this person that we can't stand.

That's one reason why it's worth persisting with meditation. We don't need to do it for very long before that feeling of self-dislike starts to slip away. We find that we're actually very interesting people, with all sorts of thoughts and feelings which will take an eternity to explore. And gradually that extends into our everyday life. We're no longer horrified if we have to be on our own unexpectedly. We can use the time meditatively to get to know a little better that person we've tried to stay away from all our lives -- ourselves.