Category: Daily Reflection

These entries focus on a quote that spiritually inspired me. Each are followed by a personal experience in my life that relates to the quote and are concluded with a closing prayer.

Daily Reflection

“The greatest gift that one human being can give another is unconditional love. It’s the only thing, ultimately, that really matters.” (Joy Gardner)

I have a friend in recovery who I feel has truly been demonstrating what unconditional love looks like. For almost a year now, he’s repeatedly commuted two hours back and forth every other Saturday to visit someone he’s sponsoring in recovery that was incarcerated back in 2016. While that may not seem like a big deal at first glance, it’s important to note that he’s only allotted up to twenty-five minutes of time to connect with his sponsee once there and that can even turn into as little as eight minutes if others travel with him for the visit as well. But that seems to matter very little to my friend. What matters more is showing his sponsee that someone actually loves them unconditionally, which is also done in between his visits, by paying for his sponsee’s phone calls to him and by writing frequent letters to them too.

My friend has no hidden agenda for any of his actions here nor does he have any type of angle. It merely is something that comes from his heart and I have seen it plenty of times myself during the few years I’ve known him thus far. I was pretty impressed when I listened to him share with me recently a story where he had worked 12+ hours one day and was totally exhausted. As on that day, he chose to still stay up and launder his partner’s work clothes, seeing how they were already fast asleep and how their clothes had special cleaning instructions. And then even after that, he made sure to be awake a mere four hours later just to see his partner get to their new job on time.

To me, my friend’s actions speak to much of what I believe Christ attempted to convey two thousand years ago when he said the most important lesson was for us to love each other. I feel my friend’s actions are definitely doing that, as they seem to arise deep from within his heart and soul and emanate outward with nothing but a pure joy for serving others.

I really admire this friend for his daily actions that resonate on a frequency I feel would make God proud. I personally strive these days to live like this as well, but have struggled at times to fully make the shift, seeing how long I lived with either conditional love or no love at all. Sadly, there was a time where I wouldn’t have driven even 10 minutes away to visit a friend in jail, let alone stay up past the point of exhaustion to take care of anyone’s laundry. So, thank God for people like my recovery buddy, who day-to-day remind me of what unconditional love looks like. Because it’s people like him, who more than not, serve the world before themselves, and that keep the teachings of Christ alive and well in a world that ultimately needs it now more than ever.

I pray I may be filled with Christ’s unconditional love in all my thoughts, in all my words, and in all my actions, and that I may be emptied of everything else.

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

Daily Reflection

“The more anger and resentment one carries around their heart, the less capable their heart becomes of truly loving anyone or anything unconditionally.” (Unknown)

 My partner has been going through a very rough time in life over the past few years. Unemployment, estranged family, the constant strain from the health issues I continue to face, and a number of other things from both his past and the present has caused him to become a lot more angry and resentful in life. Thankfully, he’s starting to realize that all that anger and resentment is poison to his heart, only making it more and more hardened the longer he carries it around. He’s also beginning to see how difficult it is to be comforting, compassionate, and loving to those he’s around. The reality for me though, with my own spiritual journey, is how much I can actually relate to this.

I used to live with such a level of anger and resentment that I felt the need to constantly point out what was wrong in the world. There were always bad drivers driving, governments doing terrible jobs governing, co-workers working lazily and being ignorant, employees at stores doing poor jobs in their employment, neighbors slacking off from their neighborhood duties, bosses doing terrible jobs at bossing, weather weathering my moods, friends not being friendly enough, doctors not doctoring me thorough enough, and well, I’m sure you get the point. The fact is, I walked around with so much anger and resentment that it made it virtually impossible to be comforting to those who needed comfort, compassionate to those who needed compassion, and loving to those who needed love. Instead, I became self-absorbed and carried all that poison around every day until it finally left me alone with nothing but a hardened heart. That’s why I’m grateful I work hard these days to not hold onto any anger or resentment, to always forgive, even when my ego doesn’t want to, and to unconditionally love, even when faced with hate.

So, it’s my hope that my partner will continue on the path he’s on now, one to become free of all his own anger and resentments, as I know in doing so, it will not only strengthen our relationship in God’s love, it will also do the same for anyone or anything else that ever walks with him on part of his journey in life as well.

I pray to release all anger and resentment from within me and to forgive all those I may hold any of that towards as I do. And I pray that what remains behind after all that is gone is nothing but an open and loving heart for everyone and everything.

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

Daily Reflection

“Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to the mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move.” (Matthew 17:20)

A close friend of mine asked me recently “Has your suffering been eliminated by your faith?” While I couldn’t give him an emphatic “Yes!”, like I really wanted to because I know it wouldn’t be true, I was grateful I could honestly respond by saying at least some of it actually has been.

You see, without faith, which is pretty much where I was at in 2011, I was living in a constant whirlwind of a sex and love addiction that eventually led me to attempt suicide. That was definitely the worst feeling I’ve ever had in life and the most intense suffering I’ve ever felt as well. Life without faith ultimately led me to believe that there was no other solution than to either continue living in the sick addiction I was or to kill myself and I opted for the latter. Thankfully, I didn’t succeed and have lived to write about it many times over in this blog ever since.

Look, I may not regularly be experiencing the happy, joyous, and free feelings yet that recovery and a life of faith are said to bring, mostly because my physical pain seems to block me from feeling much of that. But I do have at least enough faith, a mustard seed sometimes at best, to keep going, to not take my life, and to continue remaining sober from not just an addiction that almost took my life, but also all the other addictions I once fell prey to. And that alone has moved an incredibly tall mountain out of my life that I never thought could be moved.

It’s also the suffering I’m speaking of, that my faith has eliminated thus far. And without it, I know my suffering would be so much worse. So, in light of that, I’d rather take my life of faith any day, then a life without, because a life without would be sure death for me. And at least with that mustard seed of faith I still have living within me, one very large mountain hasn’t returned and I know the others will eventually be moved away as well.

I pray I may always hold onto at least a mustard seed of faith God, to help me to keep going, to keep believing, and to keep trusting in You, as I know the suffering that comes from without it leads to nowhere but a very dark place, and that’s something I never wish to experience again.

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