Category: Daily Reflection

“As psychiatrists have often observed, defiance is the outstanding characteristic of many an alcoholic. So it’s not strange that lots of us have had our day at defying God Himself. Sometimes it’s because God has not delivered us the good things of life, which we specified, as a greedy child makes an impossible list for Santa Claus. More often, though, we met up with some major calamity, and to our way of thinking lost out because God deserted us. The girl we wanted to marry had other notions; we prayed God that she’d change her mind, but she didn’t. We prayed for healthy children, and were presented with sick ones, or none at all. We prayed for promotions at business, and none came. Loved ones, upon whom we heartily depended, were taken from us by so-called acts of God. Then we became drunkards, and asked God to stop that. But nothing happened. ‘Damn this faith business’, we said. When we encountered A.A., the fallacy of our defiance was revealed. At no time had had we asked what God’s will was for us; instead we had been telling Him what it ought to be. In A.A., we saw the fruits of this belief; men and women spared from alcohol’s final catastrophe. We saw them meet and transcend their other pains and trials. We saw them calmly accept impossible situations, seeing neither to run nor to recriminate. This was not only faith, it was faith that worked under all conditions…” (p. 31, 12 Steps and 12 Traditions)

My faith has definitely been wavering tremendously lately with all the intense mental, emotional, and physical pains I’ve been struggling with. I’ve prayed and prayed and prayed to God for a very long time now for my suffering to end and have yet to see that come to fruition. While I may not understand why, I still continue to trudge forward, waiting patiently, and constantly asking for God’s will to be done in my life. That’s only because I grew tired of waiting on God to answer my prayers just over four years ago, when I spent an entire year taking matters into my own hands. That year didn’t end well, as that bout of defiance only caused me to have a nervous breakdown and attempt suicide. I have since spent almost three and a half years now trying to become more and more reliant on God. But it’s truly hard sometimes, especially when great pain is involved. I mean who really wants to walk through pain on a daily basis anyway? I sure don’t, but I continue to do so anyway, because I know exactly where defiance led me the last time I grew impatient and stopped waiting for the miracle to happen. It will happen though, in fact it is happening, because I know with me writing about it here that it’s helping me to remain reliant on God, and ultimately, I believe that’s the only solution to finding eternal peace and serenity for all of life’s impossible situations.

I pray I keep the faith that God will eventually deliver me from whatever troubles I’m going through. And I pray I remain fully reliant on God, and never return to a life of defiance, even when my mind may try so desperately to tell me otherwise.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

“If you are as seriously alcoholic as we were, we believe there is no middle-of-the-road solution. We were in a position where life was becoming impossible, and if had passed into the region from which there is no return through human aid, we had but two alternatives: One was to go on to the bitter end, blotting out the consciousness of our intolerable situation as best we could: and the other, to accept spiritual help.” (p. 25 Alcoholics Anonymous)

I’ve often been told throughout life I was too much of a black-or-white thinking individual, constantly going from one extreme to another. It was repeatedly suggested to me because of it that I should try finding more middle-of-the-road solutions to my problems instead. I actually spent greater than two decades trying to find exactly that when it came to recovery from an addiction-based existence. It never worked out quite well though because I always seemed to end up right back in the same addiction or just engaging in another. It wasn’t until I asked my Higher Power to help me find freedom from them all did any of this change. Thankfully, I’ve been able to go for over three years now without partaking in any of my former addictions and I know the only reason why is due to the spiritual help I continue to ask my Higher Power for on a daily basis. So when I awake in the morning nowadays, I make sure to consistently pray to remain clean and sober from all addictions and that each of my thoughts, words, and actions follow only my Higher Power’s will for that day. It appears to be working far better than all those years where I tried to moderate each of my addictions or find solutions to them that only occasionally used spiritual help. While I may have found plenty of healthy middle-of-the-road solutions to other dilemmas in life over the years, I have to agree that at least for this one, an addiction-based existence, the only one that’s achieved any success is having 100% total dedication to my Higher Power, whom I choose to call God.

I pray to be able to differentiate between the problems in life that would benefit from a middle-of-the road-solution from the problems in life that wouldn’t. And I pray that for each of those that wouldn’t, that I fully seek spiritual help to find total freedom from them, once and for all.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

“People cry, not because they’re weak. It’s because they’ve been strong for too long.” (Johnny Depp)

Crying is something I’m trying to do a lot more of lately, but unfortunately I’m often finding it quite hard to do. That’s mostly because I programmed myself over many years to believe it was weak. I’m sure you’ve heard that old saying that “Grown men don’t cry.” Well I’ve learned in recent years how very wrong that is. In fact, these days I’m more inclined to believe crying is essential to any healing I’m going through, as well as to my soul. Nevertheless, I’m grateful for when any of my tears should arise, like I was recently when I went into my backyard to pray early one morning. There, I watched as a young robin tried to fly up onto the safety of my fence when I got closer. It appeared to be injured, as it truly struggled to do so or even move. I could see it was very scared, even when I attempted to comfort it with a little love. After giving it some distance, I sat and observed another robin approach and feed the fearful robin with a berry. It was then, for whatever the reason, I began to cry. I’m not exactly if that was because someone was still watching over this injured robin, or if it was because I identified with it on where I’m at in life at the present time. Regardless of whatever the reason, it truly felt good to cry. I’m so grateful for each of my tears when they fall, because I know now that each are removing that false programming that made me think I had to be strong all the time.

I pray my body, mind, and soul each become more and more open everyday to crying, as I know my tears can truly be healing for each.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson