“If I Won The Lottery, I Would…”

Have you ever said those words? “If I won the lottery, I would…” I lost track of the number of times I said that in the past. I don’t say it anymore. And there’s a reason for that.

I grew up in a family that was middle to middle upper class. My father was a worker for IBM earning a considerable wage as compared to most others his age in the town I lived in. Other than having the responsibilities to raise two children, my mother also worked as an assistant librarian at the local public library in my hometown. I was raised in a mid-size single family home with a pool in the backyard. From my perspective as a dependent child, I was never poor and my parents never spoke about not having enough money to do the things they wanted. When I left home and went to college, they even paid in full for my tuition. I was only responsible for my day to day fun expenditures which a part-time job afforded me those things.

I never thought about the lottery until my parents cut the umbilical cord of financial support when I graduated from college and was on my own in my first corporate job. In January of 1995, at the age of 23, I was earning a pretty substantial wage of $34,000 a year. Except as I soon found out, my brain said that it wasn’t enough. Some may say I had a silver spoon childhood. Truthfully, I probably did. My parents tried to make up for their dysfunctional state by having the best of the best things for themselves as well as for my sister and I. When I became independent from them, I still wanted all those “nice shiny things” as I like to put it. That’s when I started playing the lottery, especially on those weeks that it passed the $100 million mark.

While my spending habits never got out of control, I daydreamed often of having more. Sitting in a sea of cubes and staring at a computer monitor all day, I wished for a better life never realizing that I had a pretty decent one.  I sat and socialized at times with my co-workers about what I’d do if I won the lottery. Everything I said was self-centered. I’d buy this, I’d buy that. I’d travel here, I’d travel there. I’d retire early. I’d have my own personal cook. And until those numbers were announced, I’d hold my breath and convince myself that I was going to be the next multi-millionaire. I never was. But something else happened…

My grandparents and parents all passed away between the years of 1996 and 2005 and each left my sister and I their life savings. While it was not the $100 million lottery winnings, it was quite substantial. Suddenly, those “nice shiny things” were within my grasp.

I bought multiple cars and multiple houses, new clothes, travelled the world, purchased the latest and greatest gadgets, and soon found myself with the same feeling I had when I sat in my cube wishing I would win the lottery…empty. Having the best of the best where I was in charge of my own money flow and not waiting for each paycheck didn’t bring any more happiness. If anything, it drove me to worry more about not having enough money and still thinking about winning the lottery. And yes, even with all that money, I continued to play the lottery.

It’s one of the greatest illusions in this world. When I didn’t have enough money, I did what I could to get more of what I want. And when I finally got more and really have enough, I worried about losing it, hoarded what I had, and chased after more.

Having all the “nice shiny things” in the world never did make me any happier. Instead, it made me more miserable. People stayed in my life because of what I had, or could give them, and not for just being a good guy with a good heart. The real truth though was that the more I had, the more I didn’t live in my heart and the more I lived that way, the more I became selfish and self-centered.

Along the way of living like that, I began to lose everything. First my heart and soul broke apart, then my mind, then most of my possessions, then my friends and relationships dissipated, and finally my health deteriorated. People say that when you really hit a deep bottom in life, that it’s the best place God can come in and do great work. I had no where else to turn, and I had lived in so much self-will and indulgence with no peace that I felt God would be the only one to show me what true peace really was. So I prayed.

“Dear God, I’ve had a taste of just about everything and never found any real happiness. I’ve been addicted to so many things and hurt myself and everyone around me in the process. My health has deteriorated and I’m lost and I’m broken. Please put me through whatever it is that I need to go through to find everlasting peace and happiness with You at the center of my life and to become a more selfless person in this lifetime. Please place the broken pieces together as You see fit. May Thy will not mine be done. I love you. Amen.”

That prayer changed my life. Words are a powerful thing, but so is a selfless prayer to God.

While I’m still in the throngs of the energetic shift that’s happened since that prayer, I don’t daydream anymore about what I’d do if I won the lottery or had a lot of money. I know what I did when I had enough. I squandered it, lost myself, and my way. My viewpoint has changed now. I’d rather be poor in finances and rich in spirit. I’d rather have a friend or two who love me for me rather than a ton of friends who want me for what I can give them. And I’d rather have old clothes and old possessions, and a new heart and new soul supercharged with God at the center.

I starting to have a much better outlook on my life today and beginning to feel more at peace. I still have rough days with my health and with this shift I’m going through. In fact, as I write this, I am enduring physical pain. But I’m looking at the bright side of it now. I know it’s not pain coming from what I’m doing anymore and I believe it’s all what I did that is leaving me.

Having all the money in the world did nothing other than make me more miserable. What I seek today is to heal from all of what happened when I thought I had everything and to have a richness in a God-centered life. For what money that still becomes part of my life, I’m living day to day in a more conservative fashion. Ironically, I’m still using an Iphone 3GS that was manufactured in 2009. Go figure.

I’ll end with this…Occasionally, when the lottery gets into the $250 million plus range as it sometimes gets, I still purchase a ticket or two. I do it more out of fun knowing I don’t have a remote chance to win it, and never really did. And I do it as well for I know that if I for whatever reason did win, there would be a lot of people in this world who have next to nothing that would benefit from it more than I would. In a spiritually centered God driven life, money has become only a tool to survive day to day and to give back with it as God sees fit.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

“This Year Will Be Different!”

How often is it that we start a new year and tell ourselves that this year is going to be different?

I’m going to lose weight.

I’m going to quit drinking.

I’m going to get healthier.

I’m going to become more spiritual.

I’m going to take some vacation time.

I’m going to spend more time with my family.

I’m going to be nicer to my friends.

I’m going to find a new job.

I’m going to move to a new home.

I’m going to start saving money.

I’m going to…

Is this you?

I know it’s definitely been me.

Year after year, a new cycle of calendar year would begin with the ball dropping on New Year’s Eve and I would take a fresh outlook on the next 365 days. And somewhere along the lines, I would find myself again watching the next New Year’s Eve ball come down and telling myself what happened to this past year, why didn’t I do any of those things that I said I wanted to do.

Why did I always live for tomorrow? Why did I live for how much better my life might get tomorrow? Why do I long for what the future may hold instead of working on myself in today?

I’m sure for each person it’s different. There were times I stayed in jobs hoping that it might get better one day. I stayed in relationships hoping that they might improve over time, that the person might treat me better, might love me more, etc. I made plans to get healthier and take care of myself more but felt the task was too daunting to take the first action in achieving it so I’d sit back and do nothing but watch TV.

That changed because I was given chronic pain to endure for awhile. I been living with it now for just about 3 years. When it first started, I sat on the sidelines and thought it was just going to pass over time. I figured if I did nothing in my life different and just kept going on with how things were, it would slowly dissipate. I waited for God to basically just come in and fix me. What I didn’t realize is that there were actions I needed to take too. Things that were coming out of my self will that God had given me free will to do in the first place. There were actions I was doing in my life that were keeping me perpetually in pain. Much of it was due to the people I was spending time with, the actions I was doing with them and the way I was treating everyone everyday. My life was totally self-centered and I only thought of what I could get out of everything instead of what I could put into something.

About a year ago that began to change. My chronic pain hadn’t alleviated. If anything it had gotten worse. So when 2012 began, I took action. And that year began something new for me. I stopped living for what tomorrow was going to bring me and I started living in today on how I could be a better, healthier, more God centered individual. In doing so, I removed all those toxic people from my life, I prayed more, meditated more, spent more time at recovery meetings and places where I could share my own experience, strength and hope, and learned how to spend time taking myself out and doing things that I still could in the pain I was in. “Take yourself out on a date” my therapist had told me more than once. So I finally did. And I still do.

I’m getting healthier each and every day now. Spiritually, mentally, and emotionally I have definitely gotten relief from the levels of pain I had once felt in those areas every day. And physically, well, I know that relief is coming soon. I believe that because I place God first in my life, and am taking actions each day to get healthier, that the physical pain will leave me when it’s meant to.

Do I hope for a better tomorrow, one where I don’t have as much physical pain? Of course. I have hope. It’s what keeps me going sometimes. My hope is with God though, that I won’t be left in this place of pain. BUT, I am not sitting on the sidelines just wanting everything to be better because of God snapping His fingers or the universe aligning just perfectly for Andrew to have a good life. I am doing my part, to take action, to set plans, to lay forth a better tomorrow, a better week, and a better year, one where God is at the helm.

That age old adage is true…don’t wait for tomorrow for what you can start doing today. If you have a goal for this year, make a plan to achieve it and start doing actions towards it every day.

Today is all I have. I may not be here tomorrow. So, I try each today to live it to the best I can, the fullest that I can, where God is driving my bus.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

The Difficulty With Removing Some Addictions

Working through addictions can hard, especially depending on what the addiction is. Some are much harder to remove than others. While some are as simple of never consuming or doing again the thing itself one is addicted to, others aren’t that simple.

Drinking alcohol, taking drugs, smoking a cigarette, having a caffeinated beverage, eating chocolate, and gambling all fall under one side of the spectrum in addictions. For me, those were easier to remove the phenomenon of craving that went with each of them. Why? Because I didn’t need any of them to function in this lifetime. None of them were life essential and after removing them from my system and going through withdrawal for each, life went on.

Unfortunately, my addictions transferred to ones that weren’t as simple as to just remove them from my life. What about overeating, codependency, and sex and love? A human being has to eat to sustain life. Unless a human being goes into the wilderness or a monastery to be away from people, being in connection with others is next to impossible to avoid as well. And as for sex and love, I have found this is a part of being human and even with long durations of celibacy and withdrawal from others, the drive never went away.

Codependency for me is something that took an intensive amount of therapy to get to the source of why it was that I ended up in relationships with others that I felt I couldn’t survive without. Ultimately it was the fear of being alone. No matter how bad the relationship was, I seemed to always stay in it because the idea of being alone was worse. Working through this one is an ongoing thing for me. Spending time alone and doing things in life by myself is a big part of my recovery with codependency. I’ve learned I can be happy by myself doing things such as puzzles, watching movies, reading, writing, going to the beach, and even traveling. Making sure I spend time alone and learning to have a healthy relationship with myself has led to me being able to be in healthy independent relationships with others.

Overeating is a little more challenging in that I know starving myself won’t make it go away. Slowing down in my life through meditation and working with a counselor helped to see this addiction and its triggers a little clearer. For me at least, the main reason why I overeat was to feel an endorphin rush that I got from the food itself. I know that might sound crazy but food can make one feel good when eating it. I love pizza for example. When I have a single slice I really enjoy it. It’s when I have a whole pizza in one sitting when it becomes a problem. Economics labels it as the “law of diminishing returns”. With each amount of consumption, less satisfaction happens. Sadly though, an addiction based mentality doesn’t think that way, they think more is better and creates more of that good feeling. Being mindful as I eat is the only way I know how deal with this. I watch my portions. I try to stay away from buffets. And I do my best to eat as healthy as possible. I’d rather overeat carrots and get a little bloated then eat several large fries at McDonalds and feel depressed the next day.

Then there’s sex and love addiction. I put this last because it’s the hardest for me. To be sexual truly is a part of being human for almost every person in this world. To fall in love with someone is many a person’s dream. Even worse, one can’t go anywhere today without seeing sex or love plastered in your face. Billboards and signs, racy commercials, TV shows and movies continuing to take it one step further and push the envelope, and God forbid one mistypes on an internet search tool that might result in over a million pornographic websites returned in the listings.

Unfortunately, my first sexual/love based experience in this life was when I was molested at 12 years old. While I had been attracted and also a friend to this much older adult prior to the incident, I never deserved to be taken advantage of by this person and I was never given any counseling around it after it happened. To make matters worse, my family never helped me to understand my sexuality or my hormones that I was feeling which had preceded even before that tragic event. So I was left to believe that what I experienced was normal. My life pattern became a stream of dominant, abusive men that I allowed to take advantage of me both sexually, monetarily, and emotionally and sadly, I felt excitement around those terrible relationships because it was my “norm”. When someone came into my life that really was a healthy person who could love me for me, I’d run away. True love was foreign. I didn’t experience it as a child. Deep sexual intimacy was also foreign. I had never experienced it from the time I first had a sexual encounter nor in any of the people that followed.

I’ve been working on removing the effects of this addiction for the past nine months. I’ve lived for more than 27 years of my life with that addiction in charge of me. It’s been over nine months now where I’ve not let it be in control. There are many actions I’ve had to take to no longer have it in charge of my life. Cutting ties with those that triggered me was one of the first things I had to do. I had so many people in my life that were either lustrous objects or friends with benefits. All of them are gone now. Staying away from any type of pornographic material was another. Sadly it’s everywhere now. So many magazines are incredibly racy now and like I had already mentioned, it doesn’t take much to find images on the internet. I avoid today the places that triggered me as well like bars, or rave scenes, or house parties. I used to fantasize and daydream sexually a lot in my life as well. I don’t anymore. I don’t allow myself to. All of it perpetuated the downfalls of this addiction.

I am happy to say that I am finding a lot more freedom today from the burdens of this addiction and really an addiction based life. My body is still recovering on every level from living so long in so many addictions. I know it takes time. Snapping my fingers and wishing all of it would just go away hasn’t happened and probably won’t ever happen for me or anyone else. Removing any addiction takes a lot of hard work, prayer, meditation, and focus. It is possible to find freedom from any addiction. From my own experience, the solution was putting God at the center of my attempt to heal from any one of them. When I tried to find healing on my own, it never happened and I just went right back to any number of them. Living in God’s will or as a 12 step program puts it, a Higher Power’s will, has brought me more peace than I ever experienced when I was active in any addiction.

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson