Step One: Point Out the Wrong (Without Pointing Fingers Too Hard)

Ah, Step One — Point Out the Wrong.

Sounds simple enough, right? Until you realize… there are two people in this step: the pointer and the pointed. And both have jobs that are not for the thin-skinned or the heavy-handed.

Let’s start with the pointer.

This is the person who’s noticed something off — a wrong done, a word said out of place, a promise broken, or a pattern that’s quietly corroding the relationship. The pointer’s job is to shine a little light, not swing a flashlight in someone’s face.

Think of it like saying, “Hey, I think you stepped on my foot,” not “You’ve been trying to crush my soul since 1997.”

Tone matters. Timing matters. And definitely, place matters.

Pointing out the wrong at the wrong time is like saying “Happy Birthday” at a funeral — it may be technically true, but emotionally tone-deaf.

Now, on to the pointed.

This role takes real humility. Nobody enjoys being told they’ve messed up. But if we see the moment as a chance for growth instead of defense, something powerful happens.

Being the pointed means you resist the urge to argue, justify, or turn into a world-class attorney overnight. You listen. You reflect. And if you’re really advanced, you say, “I didn’t realize that. Thank you for telling me.”

That line alone can turn what could’ve been an argument into a doorway for healing.

Let’s be clear though — Pointing Out the Wrong isn’t about badgering someone into submission or making them “act right” according to your standards.

And it definitely isn’t about using the process to clean up a situation that started wrong from the beginning.

For instance:

If the “wrong” is that the thrill wore off from something illicit — say, fornication or an entanglement you knew wasn’t right — then atonement isn’t about fixing the relationship. It’s about fixing the intention.

You started off wrong — maybe out of loneliness, thrill-seeking, or survival — but Step One invites you to see how that choice came from need, not from principle. And when you can name that truth, you’re already halfway toward freedom.

In the Self-Improvement Study Guides, the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan teaches that struggle is ordained by God. It is through facing our difficulties — not running from them — that we develop our character and rise toward our divine potential. The same is true in the Atonement process: you can’t correct what you refuse to confront.

As the Minister reminds us, each time we turn away from the struggle to overcome difficulty, there is deterioration of character and destruction of the will. To point out the wrong, then, is an act of courage — not to shame, but to strengthen; not to punish, but to purify.

When we face the wrong with humility, honesty, and a desire for truth, we become like that piece of steel in the blacksmith’s fire — shaped, cooled, and strengthened for higher purpose.

So in Step One of Atonement, we don’t point out wrongs to win an argument or to control another. We do it to help one another face the fire and come out refined — stronger, clearer, and closer to God.