IN MY FIRST AA INVENTORY, taken almost six years ago, I listed as my primary shortcoming an inability to cope with feelings of rejection and defeat.  In pre-AA years, whenever I had been willing to make a sincere effort to achieve anything, I often experienced gratifying success.  But ordinary setbacks, which my normal friends seemed to shrug off, would throw me into a seething anger and resentment.  I would withdraw from the contest and, wallowing in depression, would lock my door against the entire world, comforting myself with the bliss of alcoholic oblivion.

Then came AA.  For the first time in years, I became willing to be possessed by an honest desire to achieve something - in this case, sobriety.  The willingness came easily, because my life depended on it.  As my obsession was being lifted, I got down to the causes and conditions mentioned in Chapter Five of Alcoholics Anonymous.  This first inventory revealed that my old fear was still thriving, that I was still a moral coward, albeit a sober one.

For example, fear of being turned down because of my unstable employment record kept me from trying to land the kind of job for which I was qualified.  When I finally did work up the nerve to apply (to just one employer) and was refused the position, my resentment-depression hung on for weeks.  Caught in this dilemma, I reverted to form, refused to try again, and as a result, worked below my capacity for many months.

This fear of felling rejected shortchanged me in the people department, too. I was afraid to choose.  Surrounded by these well-meaning but self-assertive friends, I found little opportunity to cultivate any social courage.  The men and women I wanted and needed most seemed to move in a sphere of their own, just beyond my grasp.

This insidious feeling even crept into my periods of prayer and meditation.  What if God said no?  I hesitated to ask, even thought I knew such a request should have a qualification: that it be granted only if it was his will and if others would be helped.  Thus, God rarely refused me - because I rarely asked him.  Hung up in the limbo between fear and anger, what was I to do

I would like to say that I turned promptly to AA for the answer, that I immediately applied spiritual principles to solve my problem.  But I am an alcoholic, with the alcoholic's hard head, and it was necessary for me to waste much effort exercising my right to be wrong, before I finally yelled for help at my home group's meeting.

The first thing I discovered was that I was not alone.  Almost without exception, my AA friends admitted that they had struggled with these same feelings.  Some claimed that their fear of refection stemmed from a lack of self-worth; some of the men laid the difficulty to feelings of inadequate masculinity stimulated by years of drinking.  It was also asserted that we couldn't stand the responsibility of being loved and so sought rejection in subtle ways.  About the only thing that everybody agreed on completely was that this problem, like our drinking problem, had a spiritual solution.

That night, restless with a new energy, I paced the silent city streets, thanking God over and over again for having given me the strength to reveal my shortcoming and to receive a wealth of shared experience.  My friends had bridged the chasm of human limitations and had put something in my soul that hadn't been there before.  Wo could reject me if God accepted me?  Who could defeat me unless I defeated myself?

I began to reach out.  Through the amazing capacity of AA members to love, I received acceptance and the strength to go forward in spite of my qualms.  I continued to pray for removal of my defects.  Although the big step of willingness had been taken, my personality didn't reverse itself overnight.  I can still feel a little bad at the moment I'm refused a position for which I'm qualified; I may suffer a slow burn for a few minutes after my date has pulled away just as I am courageously about to kiss her goodnight; even God turns me down more often now.  But (and here is the miracle) I continue to try; I persist in the face of defeat.  I can risk being rejected now, because I no longer have to feel resentful and depressed when it happens.

Soon, I expect to celebrate my sixth AA birthday.  Some of the people I will be with on that day will be those I found the courage to reach toward.  I will be doing work that is interesting and fulfilling and came only after many setbacks.  Most important, if my Higher Power points out that my desires do not happen to coincide with his will, I can accept gratefully and continue the great search a day at a time.

V.C., Venice, Calif.