Month: June 2020

Daily Reflection

“Regret is the only wound the soul does not recover from.” (Sarah Ban Breathnach)

It is said that living with regrets isn’t healthy for any individual’s spiritual growth, yet many of us still harbor one or more of them for days, weeks, months, years, and sometimes even a lifetime. I’ve been guilty of living with regrets, especially on days when I find myself wallowing in self-pity and pain.

Regret is defined as a feeling of sadness or disappointment about something a person has or has not done in life, which is something I most definitely have grappled with. Over the years, I’ve found myself struggling with regret for all the addictions I succumbed to and the plenty of harm they caused others including myself, for all the friends I’ve lost due to the many selfish actions that came out of an addiction-laden life, for all those I could have had a relationship with but never invested or devoted enough loving time to, for all the business ventures I pursued that led to one financial loss after another, for all those negative things I said to my parents, especially during my final conversations with them before they abruptly died, for all the money they left me that I wasted after their deaths on so many needless things, for all the years I could have been working my 12 Step recovery program but opted to be a dry addict instead, for spending my entire college life getting drunk and high and having to live with fuzzy memories and lack of long-lasting bonds because of it, for all the people I sexually chased after who were so unhealthy for me that I allowed to lead me down such dark paths, for the computer career I once had but never felt passionate about that I spent 15 years in solely for the pursuit of money, and for how poorly I treated my sister for most of her life that caused many of the very problems we still have in our connection today.

I’m sure this list could go on and on, but here’s the thing when it comes to each of those regrets. They’re all in the past and I can NEVER change any of them, so it’s completely pointless to keep dwelling on them, because doing so only leads to greater suffering, something I don’t want or need any more of in my life. Equally as important is that each of those things that led to me feeling regret are things that helped me to become a far better person, a far healthier person, a far more caring person, a far kinder person, a far more selfless person, a far more devoted person, a far more loving person, a far more compassionate person, a far wiser person, a far more generous person, and a person I like far more than I ever used to.

The way I see it, instead of looking at all those things as regrets, maybe it’s better I see them as lessons learned. Maybe each of those things needed to happen exactly as they did for me to become the person I am now who’s full of heart and truly does his best to see the good in everyone, including myself. And maybe I just need to consciously choose now to live in acceptance of all of my past actions, knowing that doing so will lead to greater self-compassion and greater self-love. Because the greater I cultivate self-compassion and self-love, the lesser the chance I’ll find myself living with any regrets…

Dear God, I pray to live a life without regret over any of my past actions, just awareness of lessons learned and the wisdom of how to proceed forward with greater understanding and love for myself.

Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson

Silly Joke Friday

Silly Joke #1

Phillip and Phoebe are parked in Lover’s Lane. He embraces her with one arm, and begins to explore with the other hand. Looking over her shoulder, he sees a policeman approaching. “Awwwww Hell !” he murmured, “Fuzz!!!” “Well, what did ya expect?!” Phoebe says, “A perm?”

Silly Joke #2

There’s a man named Ralph that goes into a bar, looking very depressed. A friend approaches him and asks, “Why the long face, Ralph?” “Oh, I’m just bored. I know every person in the entire world now, and there’s just nothing left to challenge me.” His friend says, “No, you can’t know everyone. Do you know Paul McCartney?” He says, “Sure, Paul’s an old friend of mine. Here, I’ll show you.” He goes over to a phone, dials a number. His friend overhears a British accent, “Hey Ralph, how ya doing?” He talks for a while, but when Ralph hangs up, his friend is not really sure that it was Paul McCartney on the other end of the line, so he asks him if he knows the president.Ralph says, “Sure, we go way back.” This time he lets him listen in as he calls a private number. It sounds like the president on the other end of the line, and they go into a big discussion of the current economic scene, and Ralph offers a few suggestions. Drawing the conversation to a close, Ralph wishes him well and hangs up. His friend is a little dumbfounded at this point. “Well, there must be someone that you don’t know.” He goes over a few more people in his mind, and thinks, ‘He can’t possibly know the Pope. After all, he’s a Protestant.’ But Ralph claims to know him, so to convince himself otherwise, his friend decides to fly both himself and Ralph to the Vatican to get positive proof of Ralph’s conviction. So they arrive at the Vatican, and Ralph suggests that his friend wait out in St. Peter’s Square until Ralph has cleared things with the Pope. He’s standing in the courtyard, when who walks out onto the balcony of the private residence, arm in arm with the Pope, but Ralph. Ralph looks down, sees that his friend has apparently passed out, and runs down to see what can be done for him. “What happened to you? Couldn’t you accept the fact that I really do know the Pope?” “No, I’d begun to accept that possibility. But what really took my breath away was some stranger standing next to me who said, ‘Who’s that guy standing there with Ralph?'”

Silly Joke #3

A woman from New York was driving through a remote part of Arizona when her car broke down. An American Indian on horseback came along and offered her a ride to a nearby town. She climbed up behind him on the horse and they rode off. The ride was uneventful, except that every few minutes the Indian would let out a ‘Ye-e-e-e-h-a-a-a-a’ so loud that it echoed from the surrounding hills. When they arrived in town, he let her off at the local service station and yelled one final ‘Ye-e-e-e-h-a-a-a-a!’ and rode off. ‘What did you do to get that Indian so excited?’ asked the service-station attendant.  ‘Nothing,’ the woman answered. ‘I merely sat behind him on the horse, put my arms around his waist, and held onto the saddle horn so I wouldn’t fall off.’ ‘Lady,’ the attendant said, ‘Indians don’t use saddles.

Bonus Silly Joke (2 short ones)

Little Johnny was being shown the shape of the earth on a globe atlas by his mother. After pointing to all countries with unusual shapes, she asks: “Now Johnny, what shape is the world?” Johnny, looking very wise and happy, said: “Daddy says it’s in terrible shape Mommy!”

A man and his wife were sitting in the living room discussing a “Living Will” “Just so you know, I never want to live in a vegetative state, dependent on some machine and fluids from a bottle. If that ever happens, just pull the plug!!!” His wife then got up, unplugged the TV and threw out all the beer.

Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson

Question For The Day

Today’s question is…

What do YOU personally think needs to be done to reduce the police brutality and excessive use of force in our country?

Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson

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