The theme of this section is "what you live with you learn, what you learn you practice, what you practice you become, what you become has consequences." We all need to love and to be loved, and to feel that we are worthwhile. So, to feel worthwhile, we learn early on in life to do certain things and follow certain rules in order for someone to make us feel worthwhile; this is precisely where our habits and patterns come from.

Eight specific self-defeating behavioral patterns are defined: that of
(1) the caretaker, who always feels responsible for others,
(2) the baby, who refuses to take responsibility or do anything remotely uncomfortable,
(3) the people pleaser, who never wants to make anyone mad lest they be left alone,
(4) the martyr, who doesn't believe life should ever be too good,
(5) the abuser, who has learned to take any conflict out on others,
(6) the work-o-holic, who puts work or projects in front of others,
(7) the perfectionist, who believes nothing they or anyone else does is ever good enough, and
(8) the tapdancer, who doesn't feel it's ever safe to make a commitment.

The stress in this section is that, in order to attain high-level recovery, one must clearly identify their self-defeating behaviors and begin dealing with them