Speaker 1Ultra running shoes are all about space. The space to go further, to feel better, to do something you never thought possible. And this space starts with UltraFit. Unlike traditional running shoes, UltraFit gives toes more room to move naturally, so every step is strong, balanced, and comfortable. Whatever you're lacing up for, stay out there. With Ultra, shop now at ultrarunning.com. That's A-L-T-R-A running dot com.
Speaker 2Tammy regularly hauls stuff to her kids at college. That's why she shops at BJ's Wholesale Club, saving up to 25% off grocery store prices. Beef jerky, microwave meals, laundry pods, even they can't screw up.
Speaker 3Have you met my kids?
Speaker 2And with BJ's gas, she gets there for less.
Speaker 3They call me the road warrior.
Speaker 2This is your home, road warrior mom. Home of the Save. Join for just $20 at bjs.com slash mesquite and save 10 cents per gallon for six months. Open soon. Limited time offer, new members only. BJ's. Home of the Save.
Speaker 4Hey everybody, welcome back, or welcome to Recovering Out Loud, a podcast where we talk about raw, unfiltered truth about addiction and fight for freedom. Today's guest is John C., sober since June 3rd, 2024. John gets into his 25 years of chasing highs, battling ego, finding redemption through humility and spirituality, from losing a college scholarship to rebuilding his life. John's story is in a rollercoaster of grit and grace. Plus, in today's episode, we're tackling a listener's burning question. How do you support? Someone whose ego is sabotaging their sobriety. Performing in recovery versus practicing recovery. If you like the show, please subscribe and follow on all social media platforms at Recovering Out Loud Pod. If you have a topic or question you'd like discussed on the show, please send us a message on any of these platforms. We appreciate you. Thank you for listening to Recovering Out Loud Podcast. We'll see you next time. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. See, how you doing, buddy? Not bad at all. Thank you so much for coming down here. I know it was a bit of a hike, so it's good to have you here. You know, I really appreciate you, man. You sent me a message while we were doing this and you basically said that, uh, you know, you enjoyed the material, the podcast, and it was helping you. And, you know, we love those messages. We get, we get quite a few of them. And, you know, I heard, I listened to a lot of podcasts, but I heard, um, the guy that does Diary of a CEO. I don't know if you guys heard that podcast. I forget his name. Just bring the mic a little bit closer to your face there. Yeah. We want to hear your beautiful voice. There you go. Um, he said he measures the success of his podcast by the amount and length of messages that he gets from people. And I, I love that. It's like, you're actually detailed there. Right. And like, you're actually affecting. People by putting this stuff out and, you know, I try not to think in monetary success and my ego has other plans usually, which we'll get into in this episode. Cause I want to talk about that. You know, we got a really beautiful message, which I'll read, uh, from one of our listeners, but first I want to hear, you know, tell the audience a little bit about your story and how you got into recovery and, okay.
Speaker 5So, uh, my name is John. Um, my sober date is June 3rd, 2024. And, um, I have been, um, pretty much, uh, an addict and an alcoholic for most of my life. And my story is one, um, you know, sometimes I actually think is my story like dark or is it enough? Yeah. Yeah. Compared to some of the, some of the ones that we hear.
Speaker 6Right. Yeah.
Speaker 5That's funny. I be thinking that sometimes too. Um, I had a great childhood, you know, uh, if you think about it, um, son of two immigrant parents, uh, played sports on my life growing up and, um, you know, I, I, I was just lived in a great neighborhood, went to Catholic Catholic school, um, elementary and high school. But I think that, you know, a lot of the time, um, I didn't think that I would be able to make it. Um, I just felt like I was always trying to be someone I wasn't, and I'd never really felt authentic at any point. Um, I kind of went which way the wind was going. If the kids from the, from the neighborhood were, uh, making choices that I knew were wrong. Um, I would still kind of follow in that path. And unfortunately for me, um, you know, when I was a kid, um, you know, I didn't know what to do. And I used to get caught, which was nine times out of 10, um, the punishment was always pretty severe. And I come from, uh, an Italian household where, um, sometimes the punishment didn't fit the crime. And so, uh, you know, I was, you know, I, I need to prefix this by saying if I'm, if I, if I could be half the father, my dad was, I'd be an amazing dad, but at the same time, you know, like. Yeah. I got, I got pretty beat up. Um, and I used to, I used to think that, um, that was going to be my life, you know, and a lot of the time I, that forced me into lying. That forced me into trying to get away with shit that, um, and, and, and that started what I have learned now to transform that kid. Those characteristics. Those characteristics of being, uh, not authentic. Right. And when I think back, you know, constantly having to, to lie and to, um, try to be somebody else is a huge component to, to why I chose to escape my reality using drugs and alcohol. And at the age of 15. Um. Um. I remember my first time taking ecstasy and for like six, seven hours, I was not me. And I chased that six, seven hours high that first time for the last 25 years. So I'm going back a little bit. My first time trying alcohol was in the seventh grade. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. My parents, mine's parents went, uh, down south and, uh, the parents brought back like a bottle of Cuban rum or Dominican rum or something like that. And me being the, you know, bigger kind of, I was always a lot taller and I was captain of the basketball team, captain of the volleyball team. I'm not surprised. Track and field. Right. I, uh, star baseball player growing up. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. To fill the cup up with rum to the top and see, look, look at me, look what I could do. Took the whole cup of rum and I don't remember the rest of the night, but I do remember the punishment and that stuck with me for a long time. So, you know, um, high school came around and right from the first day of high school, I felt a little bit inferior to some of the older kids. Um, that desire to want to fit in burned so, so like, I was just constantly wanting to hang out with the older kids, do what they were doing. And what were the older kids doing? Smoking cigarettes, you know, skipping the bus and getting in cars and going for rides around neighborhood and stuff like that. Even though I knew it was wrong and there was a punishment waiting for me at home, that's what I chose to do. But, um, baseball was always my, was always my, uh, strongest, um, sport growing up. And I ended up getting a scholarship to university. And, uh, after grade 12, um, I, uh, I signed my letter of intent and I went to the States to play baseball, which wasn't really popular back in 98, 99. And I remember, um, you know, I was a kid. I remember, um, you know, in my household, it was like curfew 11 o'clock. You're not home. Like I was home 1130 curfew was 12. I was home with 12. I was always trying to push the envelope. But when I went away from my first year of university, it was like letting a dog out of the cage. Yeah. Right. It was like, and sure enough, freshman year, that's what they call first year in the States. Freshman year. We were in, I was in Buffalo. So we would, uh, you know, load a car full of cars. Yeah. We would load a car full of, full of the girls basketball team, girls volleyball team, hot guys, hockey team. Some of my teammates in baseball, we'd load up a car and we would drive to Toronto, two hour drive, hour and a half, two hour drive. And we would party and then drive all the way back. And because I knew a couple of people here in the club scene and stuff like that in my early years of university, like I felt like I was significant, something to offer, you know?
Speaker 6And you guys were coming back here because the age limit? That's what I was thinking too.
Speaker 5Yeah. Not only the age limit, but back in 2000, uh, I don't know if you guys remember, there was a nightclub on Sunday nights used to have $2 shots. Hmm. shots canadian these americans were like oh my god it's like 15 bucks i'm off my rocker right yeah so yeah we i that was my and then i i gravitated towards that kind of acceptance always trying to um and and i was trying to always one up the weekend before so there was a lot of um trying to
Speaker 4get creative with how we had fun right yeah and like perform in front of an audience almost right
Speaker 5but the thing is though is that my focus when i was there in university was supposed to be about education and baseball and partying took over right from the and i was 18 at the time so sure enough um i got uh i got i got my scholarship taken away because my grades suffered um and um i saw the at a very early age in order to achieve something or to keep that scholarship or whatever it would require work my story gentlemen i'm the 51 effort kind of guy yeah so if you look at all my report cards growing up it was always um john shows excellent um uh you know attributes and it has has can can really perform in in a group setting although
Speaker 4he achieves below potential potential that's what i was going to say this word of potential for an
Speaker 5addict and alcoholic is like the scariest word right every single report card john is achieving below potential ability because on the surface when i went home i had to play that person that gave a fuck but at school i i just wanted to have fun right so that you know only gets you natural ability only gets you so far eventually you're gonna have to put in some work right it's probably why i would say that recovery for me uh today relapses in a part of my story today because for the first time in 40 plus years i'm actually putting in the work there's been some significant things that have happened in my life that you would think would say okay john it's time to it's time to straighten up it's time to get your shit together i.e um uh relationships with with girls um maybe marriage having kids um and i actually verbally said it to myself i'm like all right you got a kid on the way or you know you're getting married like it's time to it's time to straighten up become a man and i promised myself i would but it just i just went deeper and deeper it's a progressive thing and i'm like oh my god i'm so um until uh i met my uh now wife um it wasn't i didn't have a doc it was just like when was the next time you have to be responsible so however long i had to be responsible i would just right ecstasy um mdma cocaine always alcohol um later in my 20s and well into my 30s but i could i'm a i'm in the catering industry i went to culinary arts school so i could go out the night before drink you know take part in in extracurriculars and still make it to work for 8 a.m i wasn't the best version of myself but i'm the 51 guy remember you're still there so i could be there and give it 51 so you know um what cocaine is is the is the constant and then there was always like those weekends where if i had a saturday night offer or something i would give it a go and do like all day saturday go out saturday night to the club after hours go all day sunday usually i had mondays off um and then try to figure it out and then back i work on tuesday and that was my life from you know 23 24 until about a year ago 42 now gonna be 43 in a month nice
Speaker 4yeah and you're coming up so you're coming up on a year in june you were just telling me about that congrats man that's huge huge man yeah um you mentioned a lot there's a lot in there that i can relate with you know the getting disciplined at a young age and i've come to the realization too that um i lie cheat and steal in life because i was always afraid of the consequence always there was always a consequence waiting on the other side and um you know i always say this but my parents said the best they had with the tools that they they had at the time the best
Speaker 6they could with the tools they had something else you meant about potential it's funny i was told my whole entire life i oh you got lots of potential you got lots of potential and like i always thought that was this great thing like a great compliment but i actually heard this the other night i was at a i was at a meeting and i heard something like this and i was like oh my god i'm gonna go to a someone say that same thing they're like i was my parents told me my entire life you have all this potential you have all this potential and then he started to realize once he started to go to recovery he's like wasn't actually a compliment and you really think about it they were telling me this because i wasn't doing what i was supposed to do so this guy he like he he described us the actual definition of potential and it's just funny how like i remember the same feeling when my parents would be like you have oh you have so much potential kid you could do this you can do that but they were telling me that because i was fucking up i wasn't using my potential right it was like a compliment yeah that's exactly it you're here and you could be here yeah it's like could should would it's like those dangerous words and i would think oh i got potential though like i'm good i got potential right and i would use that one and really slide with it yeah but meanwhile it's like yeah
Speaker 4you could be here right you could be and and a lot of people come into recovery and they kind of reach their potential and and exceed it because you can really do anything you put your mind to and i truly believe that today um a lot of it is fear right just fear of the unknown fear of making the wrong decision fear of fucking up fear of looking bad and that's i want to get into this this ego topic because i think you know i got a message last night from one of our listeners as i was mentioning on facebook um at recovering out loud pod and i want to encourage people that are listening you know if you have a question or you're going through something and you want us to talk about it like please like do this because i was so inspired to do a podcast on this and i'm happy that you agreed to it and the first thing you said to me was oh man i struggle with that so much right so i'm going to read this this is from a user that i i was with last night hi i love what you're doing do you think you could do a show or have a discussion about how ego plays into addiction and recovery a friend of mine is two and a half years into sobriety he uses recovery words and mantras and on the surface seems to seems to be changed in great ways unfortunately when digging deeper i realized he really isn't genuinely practicing key principles like accountability humility compassion consideration others and consistency he continues to only seek out people who give him attention and praise him he shares at meetings in order to be looked up to and feel important he'll say things and commit to action but rarely does he follow through if he doesn't perceive a benefit for himself he's unable to sustain relationships with people if they have boundaries as he does not have control over those as he does not have control over those boundaries and those boundaries often don't feed his ego so he doesn't like that and then the second part too which this is the part i love right um it's very easy to point fingers and there's a lot of finger pointing here right and and i do this all the time right but the second part is i just think there's something to be said about surrendering one's ego and when entering sobriety i'm not an expert though just like to share that idea and then um she goes on to say i'm also wondering and this is the part i really love actually i'm also wondering if you or your guests could offer insights on how to best support someone still thinking and acting through their ego in unhealthy ways how to address it validate progress valid sorry validate progress and show care without further perpetuating their facade encouraging them to just be genuine and find balance in how they show up for both themselves and for others i'm also curious about when if ever it is best to walk away if they avoid accountability or act inconsistently
Speaker 5consistently jesus i can't sounds to me like she's describing an addict yeah i mean we're all like that
Speaker 4right so let me i'm gonna i'll tackle this first and then i'd love to hear your guys um experience with this i want to preface this by saying i am not an ego expert i am not an expert in addiction right and i think we we kind of forget to mention that this is only my experience i'm an expert in my experience and i have a lot of experience with ego my own ego of course um the first part of this i want to dive into is like yeah we know every one of us has had a lot of experience with ego and i think we've all had experiences with ego and i think we've all had experiences with ego and i think we've all had experiences with ego and i think we've all had experiences with ego and i think we've all had experiences with ego and i think we've all had experiences with ego they're sharing about these like beautiful quotes they've heard and you're like oh man that guy or girl really gets it that person got it together you know their recovery program is amazing and they smile and you know i was always told it's so easy to like show up at at recovery meetings at at fellowship at whatever show up in group settings and like smile and nod and kiss babies and you know what i mean but the real work is as soon as you leave that room right that one hour two hours whatever it is in the day it's easy for you to be able to show up and show up and show up and show up for me to go in there and be like man my recovery is great everything's amazing i'm tackling life i have challenges but they're not bothering me everything's great on the surface you know And at the end of the day, yeah, it's ego. Like I, I, that's how I relapsed the first time. I always say that I had this secret where I was using Adderall and, and other drugs, but I was managing my ADHD. That was my justification. I wasn't bouncing it off anybody. So I'd show up, I would say, hi, my life's good. Everything's great. And people that love and know me, right. And I wouldn't stay after I would leave early and, you know, I was checking the boxes. As I always say, I was checking the boxes. Right. So yeah, we, I all, we know this guy, right. The beautiful part here is that she's recognizing that she has a part too. And that's what I want to get into.
Speaker 6It sounds like she's actually a great person. She cares about her. Right. She cares.
Speaker 4And so, you know, we'll get into the second part, but the first part is like, yeah, I can think of many people where I've gone in and been like, man, that fucking guy. Has it all together. But also too, when you get to know them, you're like, this is bullshit. Yeah. Like this is bullshit. I can see right through it. You can feel the fake. Right. And it always goes back to, for me, the resentment thing is like resentment, drinking, it's like drinking poison and hoping the other person dies. What's my part. What's my part in this. Right. And so when I'm sitting somewhere and I'm, you know, whether it's in a meeting or anywhere and I'm hearing someone bullshit and I can just feel the fake, it's like, well, how do I change my perspective of it? For one, this guy is a great lesson into what I don't want to do. Right. And also too, at least he's recovering or he's trying. You know what I mean? Like he's not out there drinking. That's another thing that I can look at. So, you know, who, what do you guys think about that?
Speaker 6Well, I'll say this to this day, like right now in my sobriety journey, ego is my biggest is the biggest thing I'm struggling with. Enemy. Yeah. No, I'm not struggling so much with the using. I've been clean, but I'm very lucky because I have a good circle of people around me and all my friends know me. Like I don't really hang out with too many new people, the people that I am surrounding myself, but with, they know me pretty well. Right. So I'll use you for an example. If I'm come around you, which I don't and pretend like everything is good. But if I would say I do come around you and I see some stuff that no, you don't necessarily agree with, you're going to call me out and you're going to say, Hey, right. And I have other friends the same way, but right now, for an example, I'll use it as my job that I'm going back to. Right. I feel a hundred percent going back to mining, which I did when I started when I was 18. Right. But when I was in mining, the people that do know me, like my family, they're a little bit worried because I was using drugs. Right. And I was surrounding myself with not so great people. So there are people that are worried, but my ego. My ego is so high. I'm like, have you not just watched what I've done for the last six months? You know, I have a podcast. I went to rehab for three months. I'm living in Toronto. Like you really think I'm going to use drugs now. Right. That's my ego though. That's a hundred percent of my ego. Right. And, um, it, it bothers me because like I say, like, I just want to like point to all these things that I've been doing, but that doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter. Right. And that's why at the end of the day, it bugs me at the time, but I'm also very thankful I have those people in my life that keep me in check. Right. Um, but yeah, I, I will say this. I do go to. Um, I know some fellowship programs and meetings and, uh, you can tell not clearly, but sometimes more clear than others when someone shares and says something and they just sound very, very fake where it's like, Oh, it didn't like, like the, like the reading says about like the mantras and the way they talk and they sound so good on the outside, but like, can life really be that great? You know what I mean? And like, it can be great, but as I said, I believe in the last podcast or the one before that I said, um, I just wanted people to know, especially people that know me personally that are. Watching this podcast. Now I have a lot of people reaching out, right. And I just don't want them to think like, okay, on this date, I stopped using drugs and the last, you know, six, seven months of my life have been perfect. Perfect. You know, Scott free. That's not at all. What's been going on. I mean, yeah, they've been great. You know, I have a relationship with my family. I'm clean. I haven't been using drugs. I'm making new friends. Things are genuinely going pretty good, but like there are things that pop up every single day, multiple times a day that aren't great. You know what I mean? That aren't great at all. And I just, I I'm vocal about that. Um, yeah. Um, but it does bother me to a certain degree when I see, and that's probably just my ego too. Thinking, well, you know, this guy sounds like an idiot. Why is he saying that? You know, why doesn't he just be real and tell us how you really feel. Right. And you know, I'm sure that guy's going through something that he's deep down inside that he doesn't want to put out there. Right. Cause maybe he thinks people are going to judge him. Right. Cause I know myself when I'm, when I'm feeling a certain way about things, right. Like I don't like, I don't always feel comfortable sharing how I really feel. That's been something I've struggled with my entire life because I don't want, you know, Jimmy over there to judge me. Right. But sometimes it's, it's a lot easier said than done. But I mean, I think for this person that sent us this, I think that it sounds like you really care about this person. Like, I think this person is really lucky to have you in their life.
Speaker 5Um, but you think she's building resentment though?
Speaker 6Yeah.
Speaker 4Yeah.
Speaker 5I think that's dangerous too. Right. So from what, you know, from, I mean, it is, it is great to care about your fellow, right. It's, that's one of the promises, right. Um, but at the same time, I think that. If he's staying sober, if he's, if he's doing what he needs to do and he's staying sober, then that's good on him. She needs to do what she needs to do in order to stay sober. What he's doing and how he's doing it is none of her business. It's ultimately right. So, um, I'm all about, you know, it's great that, you know, she, she reaches out and gives feedback to the pot and stuff like that. But I think that's, I think that's, I think that's the best response is pray for him, man.
Speaker 6Yeah. Yeah. But I don't think there's anything wrong with her maybe having this conversation with him and being like, Hey, like, is that like, is there anything you really want to talk about? Like, you know what I mean? Cause I, I do wonder, I under, I think what you're saying is a hundred percent true as well. If this keeping the guy sober, great. You know what I mean? If you got to do 25 pushups in a puddle of mud every day to stay sober, do it. I don't care what people think. Yeah. Yeah. But at the same time, I think that maybe this, maybe this individual is going to be a little, maybe this, maybe this individual thinks there's something wrong with her, with this guy or girl, whoever it is. And she, and, and, and she's concerned that, you know, maybe that it'll get worse over time. I'm not too sure what the exact scenario is, but I think that this individual should maybe have a conversation before she builds a resentment, right? Because it's easy to build resentment. But same time, I do think what you said is very true. If it's keeping this guy sober, if you got to go to a meeting every single day and say, my life is great, I love life and it's going to keep you sober, go ahead and do it. At least you're doing it.
Speaker 4And so, and I always say this too, is like, just because I'm not enjoying this person's experience doesn't mean everybody else in the room isn't getting something. Very true. You know what I mean? I've been so many times where I've been like, that was terrible. I fucking hated that. Oh my God. I can't believe he said this again. And then the person beside me is like, that was the best fucking talk I've ever heard in my life.
Speaker 5Yeah. They'll go up to them and be like, Hey man, thanks for sharing. I really like.
Speaker 6You saved my life today. Something pretty interesting. I can relate. Actually, his name is Johnny C2. Johnny C is one of my best friends in recovery and I've been, there was going through a period of meetings and I was hearing lots of like trauma dumping, lots of negativity to the point where I was almost, I was like shelled away from sharing about my positive life because life is going pretty good. You felt bad. Yeah. And I felt like I don't, I feel bad saying my life is good because I don't want these people to be like, you know, fuck you, you're like, you know, my life isn't good. So as I called my buddy Johnny C and he said to me, he said, you know, you should not, you should not shy away from sharing. And I said, you should share how good it is because that's going to encourage people to keep coming back because they, maybe they want that. Right. But at the same time I do go to, and when I do share, I genuinely try to keep it pretty positive. Right. But you know, sometimes I'll, like I just said the other night, I cared at a fellowship meeting. I said, I care too much about what people think. Right. I said that out there and, and you know, I didn't say, oh, well like my life is shit, but I said, sometimes this is something I'm struggling with. Sometimes I care too much about what people think, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Right. But I do understand.
Speaker 5I go to meetings all the time and I hear people. So for the, you know, going back, I think my response to the individual that you're sending, this message would be just to like, take a step back, pray for your friend, right. Check on your own recovery. So, you know, worry about your own recovery and, uh, you know, God's got a plan, right.
Speaker 4Yeah. And, and who's to say that this individual is not going to change, like maybe he needs to go through this, this ego deflation process. And I guarantee you, there will be a person that will go up to him and be like, Hey, you need to shut the fuck up. Cause that's happened to people that I know there's people like that, that will go and be like. You're not doing any good, you know, or, or, you know, you need to check yourself. Right. Like, and maybe he'll hear that one day and change, you know, you never know. Right. Um, I think it's important to know, I should have probably said this before, but I was looking up ego before I came in here because I I'm obsessed with this idea of ego deflation. I think it's extremely important. You know, one of the opposites of ego to me today is humility, right. Is being teachable, right. Um, going into every situation and not thinking, you know, the biggest, the biggest feeder and, um. Like fuel of ego for me today is I'm right. Yeah. But I'm right. Yeah. But those are like, those are so dangerous. Right. When you're telling, when I'm, you know, when I'm taking criticism or someone's trying to help me and I'm like, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5Step one. Right. Step one is we got to admit we are powerless. We need help. We cannot do this on our own. Ego is I got this. Yeah.
Speaker 4I got this.
Speaker 5There's another one. Exactly. Right. So if you, it's, it's back into your self-centered, selfish, self self-will. Um. Lens. Right. Frame of mind control.
Speaker 4Yeah.
Speaker 5This control idea. Humility for me for humility has been a massive part for, for me, like being able to get comfortable in the uncomfortable has been a massive, massive part of my last 11 and a half months. And that comes in conversations with loved ones, um, at the, like I, like some of my employees, you know, it's just, uh, doing it's part. It's part of what I would call doing the work.
Speaker 4Right. Yeah. Um, I love that. It's, you know, and I, I, I wanted to mention too, it was like, I'm, you know, I've been I was looking up ego and, you know, there's a lot of definitions about it, but I, one of the, you know, I've, this guy, Ryan Holiday writes a lot of books on stoicism and he talks about ego is the enemy. He has a book called Ego is the Enemy, but he calls the ego is like a, a false or inflated, I'm paraphrasing this, sense of self, like a false inflated sense of self where, you know, I think I'm more important than I am, or I have control, like we said, or I'm different. You know, I'm not like you. Rules don't apply to me. Yeah. I'm different. You know, I, and that's a dangerous thing too. We all come in here. Yeah. But you're not as bad as I was. Yeah. But you never did, you know, heroin, so you don't get it. You know, it's like, no, it's all the same shit, man. We use drugs. A lot of us use drugs for the same reason is to either change for me. It's to change my inner state. It's simple as that. I use external things to change my inner state. Right.
Speaker 6So, and I think ego is such a, it's such a like important thing to recovery because I think a lot of people that are in recovery, especially after they get a few months under their belt, their ego just goes. Cause they just went from being these empty, shallow human beings that everyone was so disappointed. And then, especially at the beginning of your recovery, your family is so proud of you. Your friends are so proud of you. You're starting to get some things back in your life. So you just feel like you are on top of the world. Right. I know I did. And I, I, I think that's a huge part of the reason as to why my ego got so high. But cause I remember I had this conversation with my father in the vehicle and when he picked me up from rehab, we were driving to my family's house and we had about an hour drive. And. I was like, I had so much humility when I was in rehab, right. Because I love to help people in there and have conversations. And I'd really opened up to my parents about that in the vehicle. I'm like, you know, I really liked the feeling of helping someone when I was in there. It felt so much nicer than putting someone down. Like I've done my whole life. I've always been an arrogant person. And I remember my, my father saying this to me, he's like, it'd be very easy to lose that humility being out here than it would be in there. Right. And that's such a good point because like, since the, since I've been out of rehab now, like I've got. I've gotten my jobs back. I've, you know, friends hanging around women, going out and doing things. And I've lost a lot of my humility. Right. And it's so easy to do that without even trying. It's so easy.
Speaker 5And my, my experience and it's, and it's still to this day is that people in my life, they trust me currently to be an alcoholic and an addict. So when, when that red carpet kind of, um, like me expecting the red carpet. To be laid out because I went to treatment, that wasn't my experience, but sometimes it hurts because, you know, on the inside, how you feel and how different you feel, but the people that love you and that you've hurt the most, they still trust you to be, especially I'm only, I'm not even a year. Right. They're still healing themselves. Yeah. They still have to do their own healing. Right. That's a huge part of my life right now. There are people in my life that I love dearly that are need to heal themselves. And everyone's doing the, like at the end of the day, the people that you've hurt in order to heal, they need to do what's best for them has nothing to do with me.
Speaker 4And that hurts. Yeah. That's tough. That's tough. Because we want to control and speed up the process, right?
Speaker 5It's like, I'm getting better. Why can't you get better? Yeah. But at the same time, dude, at the end of the day, we're addicts and alcoholics.
Speaker 6Yeah. And I don't know about you guys, but I can speak for myself. I've put a lot of people through hell. Drag them through the mud. I always say that. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 5Yeah. If you were to look at my 2020. 25, all the things that have happened to me in 2025. So like, you know, six, six months and on in, in, in, um, recovery, I have every reason to like, go back out and use like 2025 has been a tough year for me. Um, but it's been humbling. And in that, in that pain is where the growth happens. Right. So.
Speaker 4Yeah. Pain is the touchstone of spiritual development, right? A hundred percent. You mentioned. Um, God, and I want to make sure that we don't really talk about God a lot on the show. No, we don't. But I want to get this out to, if that word bothers you, like the listener, that's okay. You know what I mean? I want to very clearly reiterate this, that for me, spirituality is not religion. It's not the same thing. It's very different, right? A hundred percent. Spirituality for me is, is the answer to ego, which is what, you know, I really wanted to get into. Um, it's, I don't have the right answer. And that's okay. And I'm going to look to this, this God, this higher power that we talk about as the guiding force, the inner teacher, right. You know, first thought wrong. I was taught, you know, in recovery, but it's like a lot of people get really hung up on this God word because it's linked back to this Judeo Christian, like guy in the sky. And I'm happy you brought it up because that's the answer to my ego today is like, you know, uh, one of my favorite acronyms is like God, uh, sorry. Ego is education. God out, right. E-G-O edging God out. I love that. It's like, no, no, no. I've got this today. You know, whatever you call your higher power, it could be the universe. It could be group of drunks. As people say, great outdoors, this kind of guiding force. It w it is, it was, and continues to be the most important thing in my life today, because at the end of the day, you're not always going to be there for me. You're not always going to be there for me, my parents, my wife, they're not going to be there for at the end of the day. I'm stuck. I'm stuck at the end of the day with, do I pick up this bag of cocaine or this drink or whatever, or do I not, and nobody can make me do either one. I'm the only one, but I shouldn't even say that I have to look to this, like power of like, maybe I shouldn't do it this way. Maybe I should pause and ask for the right answer. And that's where prayer meditation comes in, right? It's like, I'm not praying to this guy in the sky when I pray, it's basically, I'm just saying, Hey, guide me through this. I need help. I don't know what I'm doing. Help show me the next right thing. And it's, I don't expect it to like happen, you know, as a miracle or anything like that. But what it does for me on a scientific level, and I'm not an expert again, but it puts me in this mindset of like trying to change and, and it opens my mind to like other possibilities. And then what I find happens and I'll, I'll finish my thought with this. What I find happens is people, God for me speaks through people and people will show up in my life and like have an answer to my problem. If I'm listening, right? Yeah. These are always out there. They're, they're, they're in here, but I have to listen to them and notice them.
Speaker 5Right. Right. And, and so like a little, like when I talk about my story, you know, when my, I lost my father at the age of 22 and that's when I turned my back on anything bigger than myself. That's when I totally took over my own life and look where it got me. Right. At the age of 22, I turned my back on spirituality. I turned my back on, I was raised Roman Catholic. And I had that mentality of like, if there is something out there that's bigger, how can you put me through this? How can you have taken my, like my dad was like, you know, Superman in a, with a, you know, a little Italian hat and a mustache and a, you know, he was, he was my, he was my Superman. Your hero, yeah. And at the end of the, and at the end of the day, like I let that one little thought, I let that control. It didn't spiral me out of control.
Speaker 6You hear that so much. You hear, I've heard lots of people say that, right? Like about the whole God thing. It's like, well, if God is real, why are they, why is this happening to me?
Speaker 5So the cool part about sobriety is that I can now look back on certain things that have happened since I was 22 and I have awareness, which you can't have, which I didn't have when I was drunk and, and, and, uh, hi, I have the awareness. To now see that even after the age of 22, God was with me every single day. The whole time, certain things have happened in my life over the course of the last 20 years that I now have the awareness to say that he's been with me. He never, he never turned his back on me, even though I chose to turn my back on him.
Speaker 6I ran away from, from, from, I'm going to say this because like, and I don't try and overthink the situation. I don't try and listen to too many things, but I just try and keep it real simple because I'm, I don't know what to do with it because the second I start breaking it down and analyzing
Speaker 4it too much, that's when I'm going to think, Oh, you've become this detective with like
Speaker 6all the yarn and figuring out the murder. To be honest, like, I don't really, I don't really care what works for someone else. I'll tell you what works for me. I remember when I was having, when I was in treatment, I heard so many people come in with sobriety and come tell us their story. Every single person. Every single person talked about God. And I just thought to myself, like, no, what if Caleb, you actually don't know everything. And what if there is someone that's a little bit greater than you are? I don't know what to do with it. And I just, I remember I, I took that thought and I ran with it and I started praying. And the spirituality, I look, that's the squashing of your ego, right? That's the squashing of my ego. Right. Cause I mean, the type of person I was before I went into treatment and recovery, if you had ever told me I would've been praying to something greater than myself, I wouldn't, I wouldn't even entertain the thought. Right. But the thing is, is, is cause like truthfully guys, I, and I still struggle with it to this very day being sober, like my arrogancy and my attitude, like it's just chip on my shoulder. Right. Like I it's, it's something I struggle with. But that thought that's that, you know, the spirituality has really helped me. And I remember shout out Dave W. He told me this, he said, religion is for people who don't want to go to hell and spirituality is for people who've been to hell. He said, and I was like, wow. Right. And don't want to go back and don't want to go back. And you know, I listened to, I listened to lots of other podcasts and one of my favorites is Joe Rogan. He talks about spirituality and just, there's something great about being connected with something and truly believing in something. Right. And that's why I said at the beginning, if I don't try and depict it too much or analyze it too much or or think about what other people are believing in because then then i start to overthink and i'm like okay this is all bs i just i know what works for me right and like i said i don't know if his name is god i call him god i don't know if he's white black yellow red i don't know if he's seven feet tall or five feet tall i don't know and to be honest it doesn't really mean anything to me i'm just telling you that that's how i stay connected every day and there's just some type it kind of goes back to the humility part right it brings humility in my life to just being like okay i toss my hands up wave the white flag i wave the white flag i don't know everything help me and the reason that i know i truly believe and this is something that's kind of funny to me is i remember when i was this has happened also in treatment there was there was a situation going on right where i knew i shouldn't have been doing something but i was doing it anyways because my heart was telling me to do it and i remember people were telling me to pray about it i was like too scared to pray about it because they said the prayer that i used to say was just guide me give me whatever guidance whatever you think is right you know make me do it and i was too scared to say that because i knew the right thing i knew the right thing wasn't what i wanted to do so i wouldn't pray i'd be like no if i ask him to to make me do the right thing then i'm not going to do what i want so that's how i know okay maybe you do believe right and that's just the the the strength of spirituality in my life today i love
Speaker 4that and that's why i say inner teacher i heard that from somebody because it's it's like true it's it's in there somewhere yeah right you know when you're doing something wrong you it just
Speaker 5feels wrong especially now yeah the more you stay sober my god consciousness now is pretty italic bold underlined like i know that i feel um today uh that you know i have that god consciousness that's um i feel blessed to know that i'm trying to do the best that i can yeah
Speaker 4that's all i could do right it's um i i'm gonna butcher this quote but i was in in utah at my treatment center and on the wall it said um i trust the process because i know the author right and it's like it's that blind faith of whatever happens i'm gonna be okay and every single piece of adversity i've ever been through my life sober or in active addiction i've been
Speaker 5okay at the end i thought i was gonna die and if you're not okay it's because the story's not over
Speaker 4yeah yeah there you go right you said i'm not okay i'm not okay i'm not okay i'm not okay i said it perfectly i love the life is lived forward and understood river in reverse you look
Speaker 5back now and you're like oh it makes sense now so like a lot like you touched on before so when i went into treatment and i started to like have that i was a little bit of clean time you know a day a week a month everyone that had quality like time not so much quality time but anyone who had time what did they do what did they do they they joined a home group right they did the steps and um they gave it back and service right and so and so that were whatever their higher power is in my recovery it's god but what if if people were struggling with that i i would just tell them i'm like try my creator like try using the word creator yeah yeah you know something that something else that's not you and i man this is my whole life my whole life i never listened to anybody right i always i always always always thought that i knew best and i got into treatment and someone told me to you know start journaling so i started journaling someone told me to hey pick up this book and read something read this and i did that all these people that have been through the program you know they just they keep these little like bits of of information and everything i've done has led me up to treatment which in pain now it's time to listen yeah and that's i think the biggest part of of of uh you know why i can say that relapse today isn't a part of my story it's because i've been able to listen yeah i love
Speaker 4and you both mentioned this that i love too and i said this the other day as well is like you hear all these people talking and you're like no no but i i have the answer i'm i'm right which i said earlier today all you needed and all i needed to was that little window of willingness to be like huh maybe i'm wrong yeah maybe maybe all these people aren't wrong maybe they're right and maybe i'm the one that's wrong and in that moment it's like yeah your ego just shatters right yeah but it comes back because you know you want you want things your way and that guy's not driving the way that i want him to drive right and he just cut me off and you know all these these things that happen um that kind of bring it back right i want to touch on this this is jumping out at me but i love this it's like red flags of ego and recovery and we kind of talked about this but you know if these things come up in my life it's time to pause and be like what's this about right reluctance to apologize or take responsibility yeah been there breaking commitments that don't serve the ego so not doing things because i'm not going to benefit from them that's the opposite of service in my opinion is like only showing up to things where i'm going to benefit somehow financially uh morally you know i'm going to get recognition recognition something like that alienating people who have healthy boundaries right so fuck that guy you know when meanwhile they're just trying to create a boundary right um and then this is what i love talking more than listening in meetings or or in life right if i'm talking a lot even on this podcast sometimes when i catch myself talking a lot i'm like maybe i should be quiet and listen to another perspective right and you know one more thing is the the spirituality the god thing for me too is is just a little shift in perspective sometimes right where it's like hey you're looking at the glass half empty all the time maybe and you kind of just maybe it's half full right maybe it's half full right and it's just that window of like
Speaker 5shifting perspective you know i always like that i always like to think of this right it's like active active addiction you're on one side you're on one side of a door right and freedom is on the other side of the door so like everything you do and you know going maybe going to treatment it's like you know or step one you know admitting you are powerless it's putting your hand on the knob and then you know you got to be able to start to believe in something bigger than yourself and then doing it and then doing it and then doing it and all the work is what's going to get you to open the door and walk through it one step closer every
Speaker 4time one step closer every time jay talks about sorry uh depositing or withdrawing into your spiritual bank account right so i cut someone off in traffic i just withdrew from my spiritual bank account i hang out with using friends just withdrew from my spiritual bank account i go into a recovery fellowship and i i ask someone how they're doing and actually listen depositing into my spiritual bank account it's like did i deposit more or am i in the negative today i can ask myself at the end of the day right i love that ultra running shoes are all about space
Speaker 1the space to go further to feel better to do something you never thought possible and this space starts with ultra fit unlike traditional running shoes ultra fit gives toes more room to move naturally so every step is strong balanced and comfortable whatever you're lacing up for stay out there with ultra shop now at ultra running.com
Speaker 2a l t r a running.com tammy regularly hauls stuff to her kids at college that's why she shops at bj's wholesale club saving up to 25 off grocery store prices beef jerky microwave meals laundry pods even they can't screw up have you met my kids and with bj's gas she gets there for less they call me the road warrior this is your home road warrior mom home of the save join for just 20 at bjs.com slash mesquite and save 10 cents per gallon for six months open soon limited time offer new members of the community only bj's home of the save
Speaker 4i think to what the other thing that i i loved everything we talked about but you mentioned what's my part in this we talked about that from this this girl's perspective right i can't i i wanted to i can't control what other people do or say ever i can't control what other i've tried many times i've tried i've tried to control a lot of things in my life and that's ego again you're not living according to my script it's like the actor in the play that's trying to be the director trying to be the fucking janitor trying to be every no you're not doing it right you're not doing it and taking everyone's job right my job today is to be an agent of my higher power that's a vessel i call it a vessel yeah i'm you know uh an like an employee almost right i'm not you know to i i was taught by by a mentor of mine to do god you know higher power to do god's work not his job it's as simple as that right just do the daily work that's in front of me and leave the outcomes up to the universe to the higher power to god leave the outcomes because i tried to control outcomes my entire life you know you know though i i honestly struggle with
Speaker 5one of my one of my when i when i do pray and meditate one of the the constant sense in my prayer morning and night is i ask god if i'm doing this right am i doing this right am i account am i being held am i holding my myself accountable am i um living in his will you know and then i can't really i can't really explain it but at the same time i catch myself when i'm not right and being having that awareness being able to have that awareness to be able to take a step back there's times where i'll be in my like at work where i'm just like yo i need five minutes i'll go sit in my car turn the radio off and i'll just like five minutes i need five minutes alone just to give myself that spiritual reset you know that's how simple of a person i am i need to only i i need to almost do this in like minute by minute five minute ten minute hour when i can you know see it's for me like
Speaker 6that i like that title that's your that's your coping mechanism right for me i have like my coping mechanism uh let's say something's bothering me throughout the day i call someone and i got about like four or five people that i'll call right and uh unfortunately sometimes they don't tell me what i want to hear you know sometimes they'll tell me i'm wrong or sometimes they'll be like no what you're actually right that guy's you know he's out of line he's out of line right but i find that helps me so much because it goes back to like my will and my power i did never used to do that when something would arise in my my day i would deal with it how exactly how i thought i should do with it right but now i think that's one of the things that helps me most is the people like my circle of people yeah your fellowship my fellowship right yeah and people that i've met that have just become really important players in my life now that i'll call them and i'll be like anthony can attest to this i probably call this guy so much he probably thinks about blocking my phone number i call him all the only once no right and uh yeah sometimes and it's still like it's still sometimes i'm like this is kind of like i almost feel embarrassed to talk about this you know i don't even what's he gonna think like and this is my one of my best friends what's he gonna think if i ask him about this but you know what who cares because after i talk and i get get that out there he tells me back whatever he thinks and i bounce a couple ideas off of him and then i call another person and at the end of the day you find the solution i find the solution through my peers right yeah that's one of the greatest things in recovery for me because i
Speaker 4never ever ever ever had that ever before is that not praying though like it's up your it's a power greater than yourself your circle of people is a power greater than yourself that's another way to you know what i mean it's not exactly praying but it's another form like not acting on ego so i love that yeah and trust me like i said that's probably the biggest
Speaker 6thing i struggle with is my ego yeah 100 that's that's a very cool message that uh yeah i really
Speaker 4yeah i appreciate that thank you and i i want to say this like any more messages that you can shout out to us or or you want us even just a topic you want us to talk about because you know i know that this was big in in your life and uh it affects a lot of people right so hopefully something we said here can help one person i always try to think like that and um my ego always like on the way down here i'm like oh man i hope this episode blows up yeah and it's just like i just want to look cool and i want to mention too to the people watching
Speaker 6i appreciate and i know anthony appreciates so much all the positive messages i've gotten so many of them every time a video goes out i get so many messages from from especially from like my hometown and like they never get old and sometimes i'm not the greatest at responding to all of them i try but like it does mean so much and it's it's crazy about the like some of them even addicts but some of the things we talk about on this podcast are they're like wow i actually feel that way sometimes too or i know someone who feels mental health man mental health right crosses and i'm someone just to get this out there i'm someone who like shunned on mental health before i went to treatment and got help i thought mental health was fake you're just being a bitch denial yeah man up that's what i thought right until i realized like no like you struggle
Speaker 4with mental health right every day every single day so let's uh let's end with this johnny what what would you say to the person struggling in self-will right now or even you know something that helps you get out of self-will i know we talked a lot about it but one final thought maybe
Speaker 5um i think for i've learned that um our fellows who aren't in active addiction or or even that might be in in recovery or are in active addiction they're sick people and they're not going to be able to be able to get out of self-will because they're sick people too so we're able to understand and know that as long as we try to do our best to live in god's will and not our own that we can we can pray for those people that are still trying to figure it out on their own and just i can trust that uh god's got a plan for them yeah love that yeah so that's what honestly that's where my to simplify to at this point it's just that because there's there's one of these guys in my
Speaker 4in every home every yeah everywhere in every home group yeah even the world yeah right and so and so
Speaker 5you can spot them right you you spot them right away but to to our role is to be able to bring anyone we can through an act of service bring anyone clan closer to their higher power and pray for them and that's as simple as i can put it yeah thanks so much johnny i appreciate you yeah no when i when i got the when i got the uh the invite to do this and it was just the way the our outside world's connected and stuff like that i was like you know what this is in i'll be honest with you about a month ago um the thought of actually probably right around the time that we met the thought of not going public with my recovery but at the same time doing a little bit more than meetings or or sponsoring or you know the thought of being able to go out there and just try to if we if this one episode helps one person that's what he says all the time we did our job yeah so you know i'm stepping outside of my comfort zone i'm sure there's going to be people that have no idea about my recovery that are going to be that are going to watch this episode and tune in and um you know i i'm a grateful alcoholic and addict because everything that's happened in my life up to this point has led me to where i am today and um i'm a grateful alcoholic and addict because everything that's happened in my life up to
Speaker 7i wouldn't change it for anything thanks for listening please help us grow the channel and like share and subscribe for more content the discussions and stories shared on this podcast are for informational and motivational purposes only this content is not a substitute for professional medical advice addiction treatment or therapy if you or someone you know is struggling with addiction please consult a licensed physician addiction specialist or mental health professional you are no longer alone
Speaker 2tammy regularly hauls stuff to her kids at college that's why she shops at bj's wholesale club saving up to 25 off grocery store prices beef jerky microwave meals laundry pods even they can't screw up have you met my kids and with bj's gas she gets there for less they call me the road warrior this is your home road warrior mom home of the save join for just 20 at bjs.com slash mesquite and save 10 cents per gallon for six months open soon limited time offer new members only bj's home of the save
PodcastTranscript AI