Spiritual Investments - The Rewards We Don't Ask For

July 19. Well friends, I hope your weekend was spectacular & that your monday kicks off in a spiritually good pace. One more day until I am officially sober 1 year & I am amazed, one day at a time a huge accomplishment in my life is occuring. Not only is an accomplishment in my life, but it has truly given me life again. It's important I mention that because it will later tie into my topic, but a little more about my weekend if I may. I worked both days & made a modest living, not a great nor poor turnout at the marketplace so I had made a few extra dollars in the process. I was glad to have that extra money because it turned out that it came into play by helping a friend. In their recent need to get to meetings & a few minor areas of financial struggling as well, I was able to help get her to meetings this whole weekend. If I were not sober & in the spiritual position I am today, this would have been an impossibility for me. We got to have dinner while attending a meeting on saurday & I had it to spare to pick up the bill. To be completely honest I feel a spiritual connection to this friend & so long as they are doing what's right by the higher power & herself, helping is the only moral option in my mind if my higher power wills me able to do so. I truly am endebted to the 12 Steps & spiritual guides I have met along my journey this past year, for helping bring to shape the person I always had been when my alcoholism was not running my life. The unfortunate reality is though that before sobriety it consistantly ran my life & I missed out on many opportunities to help people before this. The fortunate reality is in retrospec, that I live one day at a time & today was able to help again. We went to another meeting sunday evening & an amazing thing happened there that enriched my soul & spirituality by a huge margin, I will later explain. When I dropped my friend off I got to see some more of her artistic creations, having seen some saturday, this time it was jewelry. Being right in my profression & the work being done in an amazingly skilled level, I knew that this friends who I am spiritually invested in could one day soon be also a financial investment as I would love to sell her jewelry creations at my own jewelry store. Time will see where either or both investments will lead, I do know that right now I must remain a true friend & gentleman despite how dazzled I am by this talented & beautiful free spirit.

With the weekend recapped, I want to revert back to the sunday night meeting for a moment to explore the topic for tonight. Some of you may remember a while back about me talking about taking a commitment to chair a 12 Step meeting at one of the local hospitals, for those who could not get out to a meeting & were interested in learning or staying connected to the fellowship in some manner. I recall tellin on here about how I was nervous to the very moment that the meeting started, but when it did I suddenly was empowered & spoke from the heart & with the conviction I had never seen in myself as the program I follow indeed saved my life & the quality thereof. A specific man was in attendance there that night & got to hear my story, his name slipped past me & he had looked much different recovering form illness issues there in the hospital. At tonight's meeting a confident, healthy & strongly built young man came to me and introduced himself, asking if I remembered him. The face was familiar, but the size of the man threw me off, muscles & health showing in each direction he existed. He said his name, explaining that he was at the meeting I chaired at the hospital some time ago. "I remember your story Jim, I related to so much, that was me I heard in your own words. It inspired me to find this fellowship when I left there & here I am sober, thanks to you & what you did there at the hospital."

I merely did my duty, as I am helping my friend in her current situation, just spiritually invested in good people that wish to help themselves grow as well. I cannot take any credit for this man being sober today, his higher power has performed that miracle along with his own desire to allow it to happen, to want sobriety. Although forced to accept the flattery, I was immediately transformed to what some describe as the 4th dimension of existance. I was for certain a spiritual being on a human journey, confirmed & convinced. I want to thank my higher power for helping this man find something in my story that verywell may transform his life beyond his wildest dremas. There is no greater feeling of wealth than to be able to help someone in need & to do it because your most inner desires are to do so. For so long my deepest desire was to get high or drunk, to feel nothing, to chase that dragon to fly me higher out of my real self. There is no feeling of euphoria, no amount of adrenaline, & no substance or chemical that could ever match the feeling I felt when this mad thanked me for what he saw as a miraculous awakening & I saw as my mere duty to my fellow man & woman on earth; sick, well, or in between. I thanked him for all of his kind words & I passed along my phone number, hoping he will utilize it in the future & help me by allowing me to be a friend & equally a part of his support group in the future.

My higher power gives me gifts irreplacable by any material things I could seek out myself. My friend whom I have been taking to meetings gave me a gift, although its material I did not ask nor expect it, to date it is my most valued "physical" posession because it came from her heart & out of an act of spiritual integrity & genuine friendship. That gift must have my higher power's works intertwined with the metal upon which its crafted from, it was a perfect fit & no measurement was done to asess if it would be. In turn the gift of assuredness that this program does work if we honestly & thoroughly pour ourselves into it, including into others who show they want it as well, I am ever convinced that this process is divine & a model I wish to use for the building of current & future life alike. Thank you both of my friends, your gifts are irreplacable to the heart, mind, & spirit. Although I feel a spiritual attachment to the friend I have been helping the past few days, greater options than being a selfish persuant have come to mind. I did also give her a gift which reminded me of her free spirit, her spiritual beliefs, and her talents. She is a gift to the world. I have the option to be a true gentleman, a real friend through and through, to be true blue & outwardly/openly myself as a giver & a man who rejoices in he smiles of others. I hope that I can make many more smile in the future, and to see her smile many more times in my deeds of an authentic & mysterious affinity towards her. May her talents & kind spirit be a blessing to all around her & may my selfish desire to one day see her be more than a friend only ever arise if she too wishes the same. To my new found friend at the meeting tonight, may he continue to listen to others as I have learned to do & find even more worth the efforts it takes to transform one's life from tragedy to triumph. I hope he uses that telephone number I passed onto him, he knows not how much he helps me by reaching out. We can do amazing things for others, and when we are looking for nothing in return somehow our higher power can reward us. It has already done so in my case with continued friendship with my anonymouse fairy friend & her treasured gift I wear honorably, as well as the flattery of a man who once lost, has been found & is sober, healthy, and on his way to a new life. I hope this inspires many of you to be spritually invested in people worthwhile out there, they will show themselves, you need only have your own "house" in order to be able to help them along with their own. Good Night.. Good Morning.. <3 Jimmy