"Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character"
Step Six is necessary to spiritual growth. The beginning of a lifetime job. Recognition of difference between striving for objective - and perfection. Why we must keep tying. "Being ready" is all-important. Necessity of taking action. Delay is dangerous. Rebellion may be fatal. Point at which we abandon limited objectives and mote toward God's will for us.
At Step Six, many of us balked - for the practical reason that we did not wish to have all our defects of character removed, because we still loved some of them too much. Yet we knew we had to make a settlement with the fundamental principle of Step Six. So we decided that while we still had some flaws of character that we could not yet relinquish, we ought nevertheless to quit our stubborn, rebellious hanging on to them. We said to ourselves, "This I cannot do today, perhaps, but I can stop crying out 'No, never!' "