by Michael Dixon, Lismore, Australia
When I was 15, a friend of mine offered me a cigarette. I tried smoking it, coughed a lot, got about half way through it, then threw the rest away, spending the rest of the day trying to get the horrible taste out of my mouth. At that age, smoking was cool; all my friends seemed to be doing it, even cigars on special occasions. I wanted to feel like I belonged to the club, so to speak, and by the age of 16 I was hooked.
Drinking and being as drunk as you could be was also part of growing up throughout my teens – and into university, where it was easy to do thanks to tequila nights and the yearly beer festival with that extra-strong beer that was always a challenge to drink. I never had the stomach for alcohol, and despite my continued efforts to be one of the boys who would drink all night long and then eat kebabs at 2am, I would frequently end my evenings vomiting up my student grant into the gutter and packed off home in a taxi.
I survived university, and not knowing what to do with my life went back to college to study some more. It was here I discovered ecstasy and other drugs. I would go out with my friends almost every weekend to London clubs; first a Friday night club, which then extended into Saturday; then within a few years we were staying out from Friday night to Sunday night non-stop – no sleep, just moving from night clubs to day clubs then back to class on Monday.
It’s incredible to look back at the abuse I have put my body through with no real consideration for it at all – it must be a truly amazing piece of equipment to have been able to survive all of this. I passed my degree, but I can’t even imagine what I would have accomplished if I had actually applied myself whilst I was there.
Later still, I worked on my relationship with marijuana. We had quite a deep connection together, and it was one I could never see falling apart. I spent many years in a hazy, blissful cocoon with no responsibilities for myself or anyone else. Come to think of it, I had never felt responsible for anything, I had always felt essentially indestructible no matter what I threw at myself, and as long as I had some sort of drug to mask my depression and general discontent with life, I felt I was doing OK.
And then quite possibly the best thing happened. The drugs no longer seemed to work. I had the most profound realisation that my life was not working. I had not stopped long enough through life to make any connection to anything, much less to myself. At this point I was being made to STOP. I tried and tried to make it up with marijuana but she was no longer there for me, and I was well and truly on my own. I’ll admit I was looking for help at this point. Admitting I needed help was huge because it was admitting that something was wrong, and I never liked to do that – I thought I had all the answers. But now I knew I needed some help in making sense of the rawness I felt life to be.
I was recommended an Esoteric counsellor by the name of Janet Williams, who provided me with a soft pillow to fall upon. I was bowled over by the beauty I saw in this person and the simplicity of what she offered me: a space and an acceptance of me just as I was, a simple understanding and now, as I see it, a reflection of what I am also. I knew the work Janet did drew much from what Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine presented. I had seen Serge in a private session some years prior for an asthma condition, but it wasn’t until this time that I truly appreciated what Serge was offering.
After some time I started to attend some Universal Medicine presentations, which have served me in reconnecting to myself. Quite simply, I have learnt to become more aware of my own body and how it feels. With this awareness, I am able so see how my choices affect my body. Some of my choices make my body and my mood feel like crap, and some of my choices make my body and my mood feel amazing.
Universal Medicine supported me in taking more responsibility for my life, rather than being in a state of reaction to it. This is a work in progress, and it is a work that I am now engaged in – rather than the unaware state I had been in for much of my life.