When I was on my cruise last week, the first few days of it were quite a challenge for me. In fact, you might say that I was in the doldrums somewhat during the initial sailing. That seems pretty hard to believe given that I was doing something so luxurious and in such a tropical climate. But, I’ve come to see that the final stages of this healing process I’ve been enduring these past few months aren’t going to be a walk in the park. That being said, I’m amazed how the God of my understanding always seems to send me just what I need to get me through each of those dark moments when they happen. And one of those moments occurred directly in the middle of that cruise.
By Day 3 on this past cruise, the ship I was on was stopping in St. Thomas for approximately 10 hours. When I awoke that morning and saw that we were docked in port, I had already been dealing with an incredible abundance of pain and low energy over the previous few days. A large part of me wasn’t having the best getaway, and ironically I was thinking more about just wanting to return home. But as I had been doing on each of the previous days, I did my best to be grateful for what I had and tried to put a smile on my face, as I got ready to go into port.
By the time I stepped off the ship and on land for the day, I was really missing my daily routine back home of going to recovery meetings and working with my sponsees. Normally, on a day-to-day basis there, I’m trying to do what the 12th Step says by practicing the principles of recovery in all my affairs. Most of the time that helps me to curb some of my pain and take the focus off of it for small periods of time. On a cruise though, there’s very little ability to partake in 12 Step recovery related things, especially when out at sea. Sure there are occasional AA meetings that happen onboard, in fact I went to all three of them. But at home, I am regularly getting together with my sponsees, working with my sponsor, going to various 12 Step meetings, and making use of telephone therapy. On a cruise, I’m cut off from using each of those tools. Thankfully, all that changed temporarily in St. Thomas because the island is also a U.S. territory, thus my cell phone was in network.
The moment I realized that, I connected into it and saw I had several e-mails to open. That’s when I noticed one had come from a person I barely knew from a group I had been regularly attending back at home. It was from someone who had less than 30 days of sobriety that I had given my business card to and said to contact me if they needed any help. But ironically, they weren’t asking for that in that e-mail. Instead, they were reaching out to make sure I was ok because I hadn’t been at that meeting for the past week and a half. I immediately felt a sense of love and comfort from that relative stranger in my life. And from that point forward, I felt completely lifted out of some of that depths of despair I had been feeling.
It’s funny to think how even a simple e-mail from someone saying hello and wanting to make sure I’m ok, could totally change my outlook. I call these things the small gifts from God and I look at each of them as unconditional acts of love. When I returned to that meeting the following week, I thanked this person for reaching out to me and let them know how grateful I was for them.
Sometimes I wish the rest of the world operated this way by offering those small unconditional acts of love regularly. I know that if all of us could do things like this every single day, then our world could become a much happier, and more loving place to live in.
So the next time you find yourself thinking about someone you haven’t seen for a while, try reaching out to him or her through e-mail, a text, or even a phone call. By letting them know you care, not only are you doing a Light filled action, you may find it’s exactly what that person was needing to keep going, just like it was for me during my cruise.
Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson