Author: Andrew Arthur Dawson

A teacher of meditation, a motivational speaker, a reader of numerology, and a writer by trade, Andrew Arthur Dawson is a spiritual man devoted to serving his Higher Power and bringing a lot more light and love into this world. This blog, www.thetwelfthstep.com is just one of those ways...

“If Nothing Changes, Nothing Changes…”

For years, I was a chronic complainer, constantly grumbling about the state of my life to whomever would listen. There was always some type of drama I had going on with my intimate relationships, friendships, places of employment, social clubs I belonged to, family, or with my health. Every conversation I had with anyone was usually about how life wasn’t fair. When I first entered recovery some 12 years into my sobriety and began using my sponsor for guidance in my life, I can remember her offering me plenty of invaluable advice, much of which I often had the tendency to ignore. Because of that, there came a point where my many 911 calls to her to deal with the latest drama saga of my life began to be met with her jokingly responding that I needed to call the “Waaambulance”. But there was one priceless piece of advice she gave me and something that I also heard quite often in most recovery meetings I attended, and that’s “If nothing changes, nothing changes…”

For years I didn’t really grasp the meaning of that phrase. Today, I know the reason for that is because my ego was so caught up in selfishness and self-centeredness for way too long. Thankfully, that’s not so true for me anymore as I’ve come to turn my entire will over to the care of my Higher Power. Now I understand the fact that for years, all I really did was complain about my life and rarely did I take any action to change it. The result for me was just as that phrase stated, that nothing changed in my life.

It really is easy to complain about everything that goes wrong in our lives isn’t it? And isn’t it just as true that there seems to always been someone willing to listen to our grumbling? Doesn’t it always feel better when we find that person or persons who emphasize with our frustrations, especially when they too join in our pity party? But what good does any of that do, if nothing changes as a result from all that complaining? I know for myself that I stayed for years in that quicksand of complaints and self-pity and rarely did anything about it. I often just went from meeting to meeting, therapist to therapist, partner to partner, or friend to friend, to whine. As soon as anyone suggested some positive changes I could make in my life, I’d make excuses on how difficult they would be, then I’d get angry at them, and more than not, I’d find a reason to move on to somewhere else or someone else that would join in my grievance sessions of life.

I’ve had many people throughout life tell me that no one really significantly changes from the core person they are inside. This is so far from the truth given how much I’ve changed from the person I once was. The real truth is that those people who say that no one really changes are the same people who don’t want to do the hard work necessary that comes with changing and growing. And because no changes are ever made by them, then nothing will ever be able to change in their lives for the better.

The real truth is this. On the one hand, people can choose to spend the rest of their lives holding onto the idea that no one ever really changes. They can continue to find fault with all the things they perceive to be going wrong in their lives indefinitely. And they can spend countless hours complaining and maintaining the belief that it’s just the cards they were dealt. In doing so, nothing will ever change for them and the only result will be a downward spiral into more and more negativity. But on the other hand, for those who do want to change, I encourage each of you to take a moment, breathe, and seek your Higher Power to ask for the strength for that to happen. Know that your Higher Power will come forth in response and propel you into action to making those changes. And rest assured, the result will be much brighter, and more positive then for anyone who chooses the other hand, because for them, if nothing changes, nothing changes…

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

Another Character Defect – Making False Accusations

Have you ever accused someone of doing something that you were absolutely convinced they were guilty of it, only to find out later that it was of your own doing all along? A few days ago, I was helping my partner to assemble a tall, metallic, border fence in his backyard when I did this very thing to him. While I could bore you with all the details of what led up to this, I decided it was more important to go right to the end of the story instead.

By the time we had finished with this project, it was starting to pour outside so we quickly cleaned everything up and moved it all into the garage. It was there that I discovered one of the stakes was missing from those that we knew were going to be leftover. For the next twenty minutes, I proceeded to accuse my partner of forgetting where he put it. As we searched in every nook and cranny of the garage and then got wet outside while we looked entirely there too, I grew more and more flustered. With each passing moment, I continued to poke and prod him for his apparent memory loss of where he had set it down. After hearing him defend himself so many times from my constant barrage of senile comments I was making towards his way, it hit me. It wasn’t missing at all. The truth was I had only just miscounted on how many were supposed to be remaining in the first place. And it was then, that I felt truly terrible. I promptly admitted my wrongdoing to him and apologized several times over. After he accepted it and went into the house, I sat down and took a few more moments to pray to my Higher Power about another of my character defects that I was suddenly much more aware of now. And like I do with any other character defects that still emerge from me every now and then, I asked God to do what’s necessary within me to remove it and prevent the situation from ever happening again. A few minutes later, I felt a whole lot better and was actually extremely grateful for having been able to admit so readily that I was wrong. Not too long ago, I probably wouldn’t have done so.

The moral of my article today is relatively short and sweet. Don’t always be so sure that someone else is to blame for something that’s happened in your life, even when your ego is screaming at you that this is definitely the case. Frequently what can occur in those moments, like it did for me, is that a person doesn’t take the time to slow down and breathe deeply before making an accusation. Because the truth is, that it’s in those moments one chooses to slow down, where they can often wake up and realize their accusation is going to be a false one, as the only one to blame all along was just themselves.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

Love Won’t Ever Come From Spitting Fire From Your Tongue…

Have you ever wished you could go back in time to prevent yourself from saying something that was said during the heat of a moment? In those situations, were the words that came out of your mouth downright nasty and unloving towards someone, maybe even towards someone you care about?

It’s so very easy to react to someone we love with a tongue that can spit fire when we’re at the height of an argument and our anger gets the best of us. I’m sure you’ve had at least one of those moments where your ego was feeling backed into a corner. It’s usually in those moments where the only thing to do seems to be the drawing of a dagger through extremely hurtful words where they’re aimed at this person’s heart. Everyone usually has at least one thing they could say in those heated moments that they know will stop the other person from cornering them, but yet they also know deep down it will truly hurt not only that person, but also themselves. In the long run, when the dust settles from that argument and those awful words have had some time to linger in the air, the damage is done and they can’t be taken back.

Some say that those words which are thrown like daggers in any heated argument are really the truth on how someone feels inside. Based upon my own experiences in life when I’ve said those kind of words that I’ve wished I could take back, I’d have to agree. A good example of this was with my ex partner. He and I had so many arguments while we owned and ran a bed and breakfast where the both of us found the deepest of ways to always wound each other with our words. The biggest dagger I always threw at him was about his financial instability as he had declared bankruptcy years earlier. When much of our business started to go belly up, I used that data from his past to blame him for what was happening, so sadly, this was my truth back then to how I felt inside about him. And usually, I had regret after each time I said it because I saw the pain in his eyes it caused. The truth was that my spiritual place in life was so low back then and I had no resistance to my ego’s process of lashing out.

The sad part about allowing one’s tongue, like my own once did, to spit fire is that sometimes it has such a damaging effect, that it can end a relationship for good with whoever they were directed at. Other times, while they might not permanently sever the connection with that loved one, they leave a scar behind that is often revisited down the road in another heated argument. With my ex partner and I, eventually there were so many scars that all we could see when we looked at each other was total ugliness and it was then that our relationship ended. But the unfortunate reality was that the true ugliness we were seeing in each other was actually within ourselves.

When words are spit with that fire from our tongues, where the only intention in saying them is to inflict major damage and wound someone else, it really shows just how ugly our insides have become. What comes out of our mouths is a great representation of what exists within us. When a person throws hate towards another during any heated conversation, it’s because they are filled with so much hate inside towards their own self. When I threw all those daggers day in and day out at my ex partner, I really hated myself. I hated who I had become. I hated what I was doing with my life. And I hated that I had become so unspiritual, unloving, and selfish. Thus, the words that flew out of my mouth in all those heated moments where really just a representation of all the hate that lived within me. And the more that I said them, the more I filled myself with hate. And the more I filled myself with hate, the more I became even more unspiritual, unloving, and selfish. It wasn’t until I met several more people down the road after that relationship who were filled with as much hate as I was, that I figured this out.

I went through several years of being close with those people who were great mirrors for myself. During those relationships, they threw out many hateful, spiteful, and damaging words in my direction and each landed with a gash to my heart and tears to my eyes only to get suppressed by my own hatred, anger, and rage. It was then that I began to see that no one wins when words like that are said. The person saying them loses out because they become filled with more and more hate as they say them. And the person receiving them loses out as well because they get wounded, then they start to despise those people saying them, which then turns into more hate from within.

The bottom line is that any dagger based words that are said in heated moments are only a reflection of the insides of the person saying them. They do nothing more than create more hate in this world both inside and around that person saying them. Unfortunately, there are no time machines that can take someone back a few minutes to prevent them from being said, but there is this thing called grace that my Higher Power helped me to develop which has helped in the total prevention of this behavior. Because of that, I’m no longer filled with hate inside nor do I have any desire to ever inflict again that kind of damage to any of the souls on this planet.

Maybe the next time when you are backed into a corner, you might try to take a moment, breathe, and ask your Higher Power for spiritual help in the situation. Realize that anything you are about to say in that heat of the moment could have potentially long lasting or permanent damage to a person who has a soul just like you. Whether they are someone you are close to or not shouldn’t matter. What does matter is that if you want this world to be filled with a lot more love and a lot less hate, then you can do your part by asking your Higher Power to guide you away from spitting that fire from your own tongue ever again.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson