Month: May 2022

What A Mid-Life Crisis And Acceptance Of Life On Life’s Terms Have In Common…

I have occasionally met people in this life who seem to be truly accepting of every part of themselves. They accept themselves so deeply that whatever their “conditions” of life are, they don’t let it faze them. They accept life on life’s terms so gracefully that they can move through life with far more peace. As I am about to turn 50, I feel like the mid-life crisis I’m having is all about a recovering addict’s last stand of truly letting go of control and finally accepting life on life’s terms.

Why I say this is because something so simple and unaffecting to another continues to affect me greatly. Take for example me coming home late one evening recently, after having left earlier in the day to my extremely well-groomed yard and swept-clean driveway, only to see a gazillion whirlybirds from all the maple trees surrounding my home covering it all. Immediately, my OCD kicks in. My mind quickly races ahead to all the work that will be required to clean it up, including whether my partner will even help me with any of it. I spin out of control in the process and feel a total lack of control. Instead, my lack of acceptance becomes quite apparent and creates the exact opposite of peace within me. I then enter my home feeling charged, where having acceptance of life on life’s terms would have another individual entering their home without having given any of those whirlybirds even the slightest bit of negative thought.

The idea I’m turning 50 in a few weeks has really shed light on a part of my recovery from addiction. I still worry far too much in life because of my lack of acceptance with living life on life’s terms, and I lose an insatiable amount of peace in life because of it. I don’t want to spend what life I have left beyond 50 being like this. Yet, I haven’t been successful moving beyond it either. Maybe that’s because I frequently find myself thinking more about what it really means to accept life on life’s terms than just doing it? Instead of just doing it, I mind screw myself by constantly asking questions like, “Does me accepting this mean it’s always going to be this way?” or “Will me accepting this lead to feeling some sense of loss somehow?” or “Is me accepting this simply giving up in life?”

Being raised in the dysfunctional addicted family I was created this pattern that became the exact opposite of accepting life on life’s terms. And becoming the addict I became in life for as long as I was only made that worse. I spent decades not accepting life on life’s terms and instead striving for this, and striving for that, fighting for this, and fighting for that, believing I deserved this, and believing that I deserved that, all for what? It’s done nothing for me in life but stress me out immensely, which in turn has only stressed out everyone that has grown close to me. It’s affected my partner deeply at times, and my closest of friends as well. All because I never truly learned how to just accept life on life’s terms.

Turning 50, what I desire the most for the rest of what life I have ahead is to learn how to fully accept life on life’s terms. I want to be able to look at things like whirlybirds falling everywhere in my yard and driveway and not be bothered by them at all, instead having a sense of peace surrounding it, a peace that can only come from having acceptance.

Acceptance is such the foreign thing for many-an-addict, especially for those who come from addict-based families, as addicts in general tend to try to control everything rather than accept them as is. Finding recovery from addiction is about a lot of things, but one very important one is learning how to accept life on life’s terms, instead of always trying to control life. I’ve been in recovery long enough now to realize it’s the one area I could still use improvement in. I really just want to let go of whatever control I think I still need and instead leave it in God’s hands.

So, I pray God helps me find this as I turn 50. I pray God helps me move beyond this mid-life crisis, a crisis of my own making, one that’s very much due to my lack of acceptance of life on life’s terms, and directly based upon me not feeling in control. Because letting go of that control and accepting life on life’s terms will actually allow me to see something like whirlybirds falling from the sky as a gift of creation and a beauty of nature, and not solely as another angst in life…

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

Silly Joke Friday

Silly Joke #1 (2 Little Johnny quick jokes)

Teacher: “Does everyone know what a headache is?”
Class (in unison): “Yesss!!”
Teacher: “Great. Now then, what does your mother do to make her headache go away?”
Little Johnny (blurting out his answer as always): “She sends me out to play!”

Teacher: “Okay, class. Today we’re going to be talking about the tenses. If I say ‘I’m beautiful,’ which tense is it?”
Little Johnny (yelling out as always): “That’s obvious, it’s past tense!”

Silly Joke #2

A frustrated wife was talking to her blonde best friend. “I don’t know what’s wrong with my husband. He put a slice of cucumber up his nose, a piece of carrot in his left ear and a dab of banana in his right ear in our last few meals together. What do you think is wrong with him? The blonde replied calmly, “I think it’s pretty simple? He’s not eating properly…”

Silly Joke #3

Two young adult males were talking over a beer one night. Their conversation drifted from politics to cooking. “I got a cookbook a few weeks ago,” said the first, “but I wasn’t able to do anything with it.” “Way too complicated of recipes I bet right?” asked the second. “Nah. It was because each said you start by taking a clean dish….”

Bonus Silly Joke

A wealthy woman was sure that her wealthy husband was cheating on her with their live-in maid. So she laid down a trap. One evening she suddenly sent the maid home for the weekend after her husband had already gone upstairs for bed. When she turned in not too long later, the husband soon gave her the same old story. “Hon, I can’t sleep. I’m going to go downstairs and watch some tv for a little while. But first, I need to go to go to the bathroom.” As soon as he had left and went into the bathroom, with her assuming he was freshening up for the maid, she promptly ran into the maid’s bedroom and closed the door. She switched the lights off and got under the covers of the maid’s bed. The door to the maid’s room opened not too long after that. When he crawled in bed next to her and rolled on top of her she immediately screamed at him, “I knew it! You cheating louse of a husband!!!” She then switched on the light and saw their live-in gardener with his mouth gaping wide open in horror.

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

I Have A Dream With Phi Kappa Psi…

I have a dream, and I just want to place it out there today via this piece of writing, simply to claim it, knowing that even in this small action, I’m setting a ball in motion in a world where I believe anything can be possible, so long as I leave it in the hands of my Higher Power, whom I choose to refer to as God.

Look, I’ve spent much of my life trying to control my future. I’ve had many dreams and taken so many actions to make them come to fruition, except those that have, were never fulfilling, which is why I’m trying to do something different now by leaving this dream I have right now in life entirely within the control of God.

My dream is to work for the national side of my fraternity, Phi Kappa Psi, with my fraternity’s headquarters in other words, where I would be sent around the country to each of our active chapters, presently there are over 83, to tell my story of addiction to recovery and all the trauma I experienced in between, a story I continue to tell here locally in the Toledo, Ohio area, day in and day out, as a volunteer.

I love what I do as a volunteer. I love helping out at detoxes, halfway houses, sober living situations, with the nursing students at the University of Toledo (UT), with UT’s Phi Kappa Psi chapter, and with those I sponsor in recovery as well, sharing my story of addiction to recovery from the depths of my heart, as it seems to truly be helping others, providing many a healing path from their own traumas of life and one that also leads them away from a life of addiction.

The idea of going from chapter to chapter, meeting with brothers around the country within my very own fraternity, who are just beginning their lives really would be a dream come true for me. My only hope in that job would be that in doing it, I could help many avert going down the long, dark, and circuitous path I went in life that took me nowhere but into the depths of despair and addiction. I honestly believe that doing this work would be invaluable with all that’s going on in our world right now.

The fact is alcohol and drug use are both rapidly on the rise throughout college campuses across the nation. Addiction continues to increase as well amongst the younger generations. Combine that with the hazing that still keeps happening in various social organizations, especially with fraternities and sororities, and terrible tragedies continue to happen. Each year it seems as if another death occurs due to this. A number of my own chapters over the years have lost their affiliations with their respective campuses due to these circumstances.

Most of my descent into addiction began during my collegiate years after I entered Greek life. There, I always felt like I had no one to talk to, no one to relate to, no one to open up to really. If I had just heard a story like mine from a fellow brother, it might have planted a necessary seed that could have sprouted far earlier in my life, preventing a lot of the pain and hardship I placed upon my life by living in so many addictions. This is precisely why I have this dream, because I’ve seen how my story has helped do this very thing within many individuals over the years and I give all that credit to God and not myself.

But a few years ago, I became overzealous and tried to control this dream by sending out 20 personal letters to 20 different Phi Kappa Psi chapters within driving distance of my home in Toledo. I was quite bold in those letters and honestly, I don’t think I was coming from a humble space at all back then. It’s probably why I never heard from a single chapter. Not one. So, I took that as a sign from my Higher Power that maybe it wasn’t the right time, or wasn’t my path, or I just needed to get humbler. Regardless, I backed off, and continued to do my volunteer work ever since, always hoping in the back of my mind, that one day I might work more closely with my fraternity I have come to love far more deeply, especially recently.

Nevertheless, I may not have a specific degree in what I’m doing right now in life by telling my story of addiction to recovery to everyone that I do. And I may not have a certificate that backs any of what I share from the depths of my heart each time either. But, what I do have is a passion and gift to speak, one I feel that comes from my Higher Power, which is why I’m leaving this with God, who knows I’m ready to go wherever and whenever it is I’m meant to go to help others. If that somehow, one day, can be with all my brothers of Phi Kappa Psi around the chapters of our nation, I truly would be finally living out a dream that I know would be 100% fulfilling…

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