Mike Majlak Gets Brutally Honest About Faith, Addiction, and Still Having Demons (EP 219)

late night bites with friends already hard to beat that first too hot bite of fries you couldn't wait for followed by ice cold pepsi now that hits different suddenly the energy kicks back in the night goes longer and the laughs don't stop because pepsi brings out more flavor more fun and more of the moment food deserves pepsi grab a pepsi zero sugar today 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 only bj home of the save we were 16 years old we were full-blown opiate addicts um probably like 40 or 50 percent of my class was addicted to doxies i have seen this life from incredibly different perspectives of uh the the lowest lows and and now some of truthfully the highest highs i was a a heroin addict and and and crack cocaine in the end addict from the ages of 16 until i was 25 oh my goodness what was the scariest near-death experience that you had using at some point while i was driving home i fell asleep at the wheel or not at all because i was on so much drugs i was covered in blood like it was just absolutely pouring out of me i drove my car off a cliff completely totaled it and it didn't even stop me for a second so what led to the moment that you decided to get clean then in 2010 i was supposed to just spend a few hours a day taking care of my grandfather i was supposed to just spend a few hours a day taking care of my grandfather and there was a night he had somehow fallen out of his chair he was downstairs like begging me to come help him and he was like screaming and i was too paranoid because i was smoking crack in the attic and i wasn't able to get down there to help him that was i mean that was probably like rock bottom for me i hated that i was being buried and i was still alive i am so it's one of the reasons why i became so much reattached to my faith and and there were so many times where like that light got so dim and i was just like god keeping that little flicker of light on would you say that you're happy now um i'm not unhappy i deal with a lot of demons still a ton of them do you still feel like you're chasing something it's funny you say that because i don't think i'm chasing anything i feel like i'm running from stuff what do you feel like you're running from um hey before we dive in if these videos have meant anything to you if they've helped your faith or you closer to god in any way make sure you're actually subscribed a lot of people watch every single week and still haven't hit that button it only takes two seconds and it helps us reach more people with the gospel also i have an announcement i've been waiting to make and i'm really excited about this one open heaven our biggest live podcast event to date is happening november 8th at the pavilion at toyota music factory in irving texas right outside of dallas it's going to be a powerful live podcast experience centered around faith purpose real and connection alongside live worship throughout the night and i'm pumped to share who's going to be leading worship with us it's aaron tedeschi and upper room worship this night is going to be a night that i'm not going to forget and you're not going to forget either tickets are on sale right now at bryce crawford.org slash tour or click the link in the description below to grab your seats and please the only way to buy us through this official site i recommend not trusting any random resellers i genuinely believe that this is going to be a night people care with them for a long time and i'd love to see you there all right let's get into this episode all right what's going on guys welcome back to another episode of the bryce crawford podcast i'm bryce and today we're with mike malak let's go hey thanks for having me man i i gotta say first thank you for getting me into my first ever fight event ever in vegas for the reason i was able to go to uh my first ever live boxing match and it was uh johnny mansell versus bob menry that's my first ever fight ever it's only uphill from there yeah thank you for getting me in there that was so fun we we me and chris had the best time like what'd you think of the fights um it was awesome i've i i love the ufc yeah i i have a paramount plus subscription i watch a good bit and uh but i've never seen anything in real life so i was really really pumped that was definitely a great one to start listen aiden aiden does a really good job with brand risk he puts together really strange fights that make sense i think the next card that he has coming up have a couple really good fights on him but um that was that was interesting i think bob menry is gonna fight again so he's yeah i know after watching the first time you may not think that that's such a great idea but i think he has found a lane of kind of like being the like quote-unquote punching bag okay um and so he i think is it gonna fight again and uh i hope he does well i you know i i listen i he's he's he makes money doing it it it uh gets him to like lock in and focus on the gym and work out and and and train and um so yeah so i think he's fighting again on this next card which is coming up pretty soon oh that's fun yeah yeah i genuinely had such a good time and it was a cool location ufc apex was so sick crazy no that was that was nuts i mean aiden obviously has a ton of connections dana loves him and uh so it was able to happen but um that that was a good event there were some good fights on that card there was some funny stuff that happened you know manziel got the win uh money manziel and uh he looked good he was he was kicking he'll never fight again yeah he only did that because he was he was called out yeah you know and saw a bag and was just like i'll take it yeah for sure yeah that was that was so awesome um dude yeah thanks for coming on i so like i know people may know you for a whole lot of different stuff you've been on the internet for a little bit but i'm sure you've been on the internet for a little bit and i'm sure you've been on the internet for a little bit and i'm sure you've been on the internet for a little bit and i'm sure you've been on the internet for a little bit and i'm sure you've been on the internet a while but like exclude you out of you being on social media for a while being a co-host on impulsive who is mike malek oh that's a good question to start off with um i'm truthfully uh one of one of the people watching this episode i mean that that really is like the way that i try to live my life um i have seen uh this life from incredibly different perspectives of uh the the lowest lows and and now some of truthfully the highest highs and i try to stay as grounded as possible um when i lose that relatability i ask my team to beat it back into me like really to pulverize me and be like yo what you just said is ridiculous like make sure you check that um and so i try to as much as possible remain the i've done a good job of that i really do and i i believe that if if you if you message me if anybody messaged me asking me for help on a topic and especially anything related to substance abuse or mental health or or mental illness which are you know two things that i um hold near and dear to my heart like i'll give you that time i really will i i pride myself on that i pride myself on stopping and talking to people whenever they stop me and um spending time with people who who need need me um and that's how i've always been i've always kept myself on the line and i've always cared very deeply about other people um it's made uh it's made this current climate that we're in right now very very difficult for me to navigate mentally um and it's one of the reasons why i don't produce the uh level of content in in terms of like quantity that i would if if things were a little bit different just because i just really um detest the the uh climate of hatred that has has been uh elevated so deeply over the past you know six to eight years um it just doesn't appease me i don't i don't like it at all i like bigging people up motivating people to do better pulling people out of dark places um and more than anything like the one thing that you could always expect from me is like a positive spirit even in my even in my worst days i'm coming in i'm smiling i'm trying to lift the room up yeah um as much as possible and it's just not it's just not really uh attractive these days people don't like that as much as they like um whatever the alternative is yeah dude i i totally agree i feel like you know maybe 2020 you'd be like oh don't read your tiktok comments they're brutal and now it's like don't read any comments period it's like from platform to platform it's progressively worse yep and uh and that's like the only thing that really sells you know like one plane crashes and every plane is crashing across america so people are like i don't know they absorb and are attracted to suffering and division and just want everybody wants to tear tear everybody else down and i think um i don't even dislike those people like that doesn't that doesn't make me dislike them i i understand what it feels like to see others succeed and to be in a in in the worst place and to just be somewhere in such a terrible place for me personally it never made me want to do that it never made me want to go and be negative to other people i um have this uh you know somewhat religiously based karmic responsibility in life where i feel like you'll you will never ever see me especially right now in 2026 say any anything negative to anybody else. Like it's so rare. Like sometimes I'll, I'll comment if I get a really nasty comment to me, I'll comment something kind of tamely nasty back. I delete it immediately. Like I just cannot do that to people because whenever I see a comment directed at me that that's rude or, or meant to try to tear me down, I always put myself in the shoes of that person. No one that's doing well in life. And you hear this so often nowadays, and it's so cliche to say it, but no one that's doing well in life and performing well and making money or being successful or doing whatever it is that they deem to be good for their life is, is tearing other people down. It's always a reflection of that person's life. It's always a projection of that person's insecurities and internal sadness to be saying the things that people say to others online. And so it makes me really like, I just always feel bad for the person. And I know that's weird, but like as a Christian, as someone who believes in God, like I, I don't want to pull that person down further. If that makes sense. Do you, do you do like it? Do you listen to a lot of Tony Robbins stuff? I mean, I love Tony. We've had him on the show, dude. He, they have this thing. I have a life coach that used to work for Tony Robbins. And, uh, he taught me the, one of the first things he taught me was this triad talking about how like a stimulus happens. So like, I don't know, I punch you in the face and then you give that thing meaning. And then that meaning, uh, you give like, it like affects your physiology. And, uh, so kind of what you were saying, like, I actually feel bad for the people that are negative or hateful that idea. I learned from my life coach. It's so funny how you learn from different people and taking a different thing of going, Oh, this person feels like this way towards me. Then everyone feels this way towards me. So I should be like sappy and sorrowful instead of being like, Oh, well maybe they just like had a hard day and they took it out on me. Well, then that makes me have compassion on that person. I love that. The issue is, is that the algorithm, um, this is part, partially the platform problem, the algorithms have, uh, rewarded negativity. And so generally speaking, when you see a piece of content, if you go to the top comment, that's been voted up and, and elevated by the community, it's generally some maybe comedic, but like kind of nasty thing about whoever posted it, right? It's always like the, you'll notice it's always the counter angle to whatever the person, uh, was trying to convey in the content. Somebody always wants to counter it with the exact opposite viewpoint. There's very little, acceptance, very little, Oh, I see your point. Like, let's have a conversation about it. It's always whatever the exact opposite is. Right. And the platforms have elevated that type of negativity. So people know I will be rewarded. If I, if I see, uh, uh, uh, a Bryce or I see a Mike post or I see any post online, if I present the alternative angle or an, or a hateful viewpoint, I will be rewarded for that. But with likes for some of these people that those likes are the only satisfaction. Or positive sentiment or acceptance they have in their life. And so they're rewarded for posting negative sentiment online, you know, and, and, and, you know, you get to the point where, you know, we're at, I don't, when did you start? Well, I, I, we started like the stuff that people see now in February of 24. Okay. But you, but you were creating before that. Yeah. I was doing like iPhone videos, like teaching the Bible and stuff like that. But still like you have some like, but I've been doing this since 2016, maybe even 2015. Right. So very long time. And wait, really? Yeah. I mean, I started, I was in like the sixth grade. I know. Yeah, I know. Congrats. Yeah. I mean, we started the podcast in November, 2018. I had my YouTube channel going before that I was in Logan's vlogs in late 2015, 2016. Um, so, you know, you get, it batters you down, dude. You know, even as a, as a 40 plus year old, you mentally, mentally, semi-mentally strong person in terms of other people's opinions. Um, it, it just, you get to a point where you're just like, you start to almost like not love creating as much as you would have if you didn't have to see that stuff. Now, what I do love, and you probably get this too, is creating for your audience. When you post on your channels, like this show that people are watching right now, it's such a different sentiment than when you, because the YouTube algorithm really just promotes to your, your people for the most part. It's, it's your same people every week to like great episode, man. Or like, this is what I like this, what I didn't like. Yeah. But when, but it's not as much of that random viewer that just wants to come spew hatred, you know? It's a little bit of both. Like we, I definitely like, like this stuff right here, like long form conversations talking about faith, life, spirituality, everything in between encouraging people that want to like grow deeper. Like I do like that, but our whole vision of starting was in 2023, like all the clipping was going around, like Andrew Tate and all those guys were like starting the clipping. Yeah. And it was like, you couldn't escape an Andrew Tate clip, even though he wasn't, he was banned on social media because of the clipping. And, uh, I remember thinking to myself, if there are people that literally won't even go to church because they've had like a negative interaction with Christians or a bad experience, or they're just, they grew up an atheist, they don't care. We can infiltrate their phone with like the love of Jesus. So there is like a part to it where I'm or whatever it may be. They catch the stray or something like that. Yeah, no, a hundred, a hundred percent. I, I, I see that part completely too, because I've been able to reach a whole new era of audience through Tik TOK and through Instagram reels that has more of a wide open algorithm. And so I hear you on that for sure. So take me back a little bit to when you were growing up, like what was your childhood like? Uh, great for the most part. I mean, I, I grew up in, uh, in Milford, Connecticut. Um, it's sandwiched in between Bridgeport, New Haven, um, two not so great places. Um, you know, New Haven has Yale, but it's got a lot of crime and Bridgeport has a lot of crime as well. Wait, does New Haven really have a lot of crime? A ton, dude. We've been there like so many times. I love it. It was actually the fourth ranked, uh, most dangerous city in America for a while back a couple, few years ago. What? Yeah. Yale is really the only thing that holds New Haven together and pizza. It has the best pizza in the, in the world. Yeah. You know, but, um, so I grew up in Milford, which is a, you know, a, a lower to middle class, um, city, uh, and had a great childhood for the most part. I mean, I was in, I would go to Vermont, Orlando with my family. We, we didn't have a ton of money, but we had, you know, enough and we had a roof over our head and we had food tea. And, um, my parents got divorced when I was 15. Um, that definitely changed the trajectory of my existence a little bit as my father was definitely. Like a necessary part of the household and he was gone. Um, and so once he left, I started to definitely go off the rails a little bit. I left a Catholic, um, private school that I was in and, and, uh, went to public schools, which I'd been in public schools before. I just did one year of high school and Catholic school. Um, and, uh, this so happened to line up with, uh, this, the release of a drug, um, called OxyContin. And so, so when I was, when I was 16, we all started experimenting with weed and the other stuff that kids that age experiment with, we happened to kind of, um, fall into experimenting with this, with this drug called OxyContin. We didn't really understand what it was or what it was going to do to us. And no one had really taught us because we'd always known people try pills and our parents had tried pills and it was just another pill. But the difference with OxyContin was one OxyContin 80 milligram had 32 normal strength Percocets in it. And so it's the strongest, the strongest pharmaceutical opiate that's ever been released. The perfect lunch combo, that first bite of your favorite sub followed by ice cold Pepsi, add a couple of friends. And now that's next level. Suddenly the laughs get louder. The stories keep flowing and the food tastes better because Pepsi brings out more flavor, more fun, and more of the moment food deserves Pepsi. Grab a Pepsi zero sugar today. Hey, it's Kelly Rowland. You may not know this, but I have a Pepsi. I have a Pepsi zero sugar today. So I get how it can steal your time, but why let eczema take over when you can talk to your doctor about EBCLIS. EBCLIS, labrakizumab LBKZ, a 250 milligram per two milliliter injection is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema. Also called atopic dermatitis that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals or who cannot use topical therapies. EBCLIS can be used with or without topical corticosteroids. Don't use if you are allergic to EBCLIS. Allergic reactions can occur that can be severe. Eye problems can occur. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with EBCLIS. Before starting EBCLIS, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection. Paid partnership with Lilly. Respect your time. Ask your doctor about EBCLIS and visit EBCLIS.com or call 1-800-LILLY-RX or 1-800-545-5979. So you, so, so that drug was new. Holy smokes. So, how did you get introduced to drugs? Um, I think like, dude, when I was, when I was coming up, um, when I was 15 or 16, it was a little bit different. We, you know, like we knew some stuff and the DARE program taught us stuff, but it wasn't like nowadays where everything's like online. Like it kind of had a little bit more of like an explore and figure it out yourself kind of thing. And so I remember like the first album I ever, ever bought was, um, Eminem's Slim Shady LP. And so that was like how I was introduced to like my high school career. And it was very like drug heavy, like sexually, you know, heavy. And, um, you know, my high school that I went to foreign in Milford, Connecticut. It was a really heavy party school. There was keg parties every weekend and that had never caused much of an issue in the past. You know, the East Coast is a drinking side of the country and a lot of people drink there and smoke weed and so on and so forth. But no one had ever, you know, there hadn't been like that real heavy drug use in the schools. But Oxycontin hit like a tidal wave and there was a company called Purdue Pharma in Stanford, Connecticut that created this drug, the Sackler family. And it was created to be used by terminally ill cancer patients at first because it was so powerful. But they marketed it as less addictive or non-addictive substance. And now they've been sued completely into oblivion for billions and billions of dollars. Yeah, because that wasn't the truth. I mean, that thing is. And they've made movies about it, Dope Sick and some other series and movies that have come out. But anyways, when we were introduced to it just through a couple of kids who maybe their grandma had a prescription or whatever, we tried it. And it was, I mean, as someone who's always dealt with anxiety and other diagnosis my whole life, it was the first time I ever really like felt safe. And felt like my mind slowed down a little bit. And the things that I. I had struggled with in my early teens and adolescence and the negative thoughts and emotions that I'd felt were blunted a little bit. So you found comfort in the drugs, like, I don't know, like finally the chaos kind of. It just slowed things down. Yeah. And I remember I wrote about this in my book, but the first time I used it, it was like, you know, the Beatles song, Here Comes the Sun. Like, it was just very peaceful and very. It just calmed down a lot of those negative thoughts that I had and a lot of that pain that I had. I'd been through some accidents. I'd broken my femur. I'd ruptured my spleen. I've had a bunch of surgeries. And a lot of that pain and a lot of that mental anguish kind of went away. And so I watched a lot of the kids in my high school start to try this drug. And at first we would go to these keg parties and we would do like, you know, a quarter of the pill and everybody would get high and we'd all just like hang out and party. And then a week would go by and we were like, yo, can anybody get any oxy? Like, let's do this. Let's do it again, you know? And then slowly but surely, like three days would go by and be like, damn, man, like, it'd be nice to get some oxy, you know? And then before you know it, like every single day, you had to have it, you know? Otherwise, like we started waking up and like sweating and like withdrawing and like being sick. And it happened really fast. Like, we didn't really understand like what was happening or why it was happening. And we were still very young. So your whole friend group was like struggling with it. Yeah. And it just started as like, I don't know, like a fun game. I guess, because that was the party culture. It was just like, it felt at first like another drug, like our parents might've done Quaaludes or like maybe like a Vicodin or something like that here and there. But the difference with this drug is it was just so powerful and so addictive that you just didn't have the, you didn't have the leniency or like that, that like zone to kind of like not get addicted to it. And so within like, you know, a few months of it hitting the streets in Milford, I would say probably like 40 or 50% of my class. How long did you realize, or how long was it before you realized you couldn't stop? Probably, I would say probably like a couple months. Okay. A couple months of like at first going to parties and just being like what we call like a weekend warrior and just kind of doing it and then just pulling it together. But then slowly but surely, like we, people started like using in school and like I would have to go to the nurse's office and like break up pills on the back of the toilet in the nurse's office because the door would lock and it was the only place where the door would lock. Yeah. And then by the time like I really got going, like I would wake up and I would already have it broken up on like a CD case in my drawer and I would have to drive my sister to school. So I would do it and then I would walk out the door so that I wouldn't get sick in school. And so we were 16 years old. We were full blown opiate addicts. Pretty early, like a bunch of my friends started like robbing houses and pharmacies and stuff like that. So they went to jail and these are kids I knew my whole life, played intramurals basketball with. They were great kids and came from good homes. And, um, I mean, this thing hit like a, like an absolute, uh, tidal wave, dude. It was one of the worst things I've ever seen. How were you funding the drug addiction though? At first when it was, when we were just using it, um, very like small amounts of it. Like we would just get money wherever we could, like, you know, do chores or like get money from our parents or like borrow money or whatever. But then, but then slowly, um, you know, when it, when we started doing more and more of it, I started selling it as well. And then you said you guys were rough. Was it robbing, pharmaceutical stuff? I'd never gotten to robbing. For me, it was more sell. I sold weed for a long time. So I got to a point where I was selling like quarter pounds, half pounds of weed. So I'd pick up like probably the most at a time. Half pounds of weed? Yeah. Oh my gosh. Yeah. I got to the point where I was, I was, the most I ever got to was like a pound, which like nowadays looking at it, it's not like an insane amount. But at the time when it was fully illegal in every state in the country, like this is 2003, fully illegal, every state, like there was no state where it was legalized. Um, it was a lot more. And then, and then after that, I started just selling oxys. And so I was picking up oxys for, uh, about $35 a piece and they would sell on the streets for 60. So I would just sell them for 60 and then I would end up just sniffing all of the profit. Oh my gosh. Yeah. So, so my mentor, like I, I have a, uh, like a, uh, Christian mentor, his name's Marcus McFalling and he was a drug addict. He was like a pro football prospect, NFL prospect, did a workout for the Dallas Cowboys. And like, I was like a pro football prospect and like tore and broke a bunch of stuff at his shoulder and just from getting the surgery and started the painkillers. That's where his addiction started. And I'm totally going to butcher this, but he got like 58 prescriptions from 39 doctors in less than six months. Yup. Yup. Like that blew my mind. And he was like, I was drug seeking behavior and they watch the doctors nowadays watch for it. Now that I'm sure that happened to him some time ago. Yeah. Yeah. This was, uh, in like the 2010s. Yeah. So that was probably like, so, so things have changed dramatically. Okay. And, and this was so prevalent, man. Like it got to a point where, so this, if, if anybody watching this is familiar with the story behind Oxycontin and, and Peru pharma, this period of time in the early two thousands kicked off the greatest drug epidemic that the United States or the world has ever seen before. Okay. So the, it created the great opiate epidemic that really lasted from the early two thousands all the way until I would say probably about two, the numbers are just starting to come down now. Yeah. Um, you're starting to see overdose, overdose deaths drop down a little bit. There's a lot of, a lot of, uh, a lot more awareness around fentanyl, a lot more being done to stop fentanyl from being put into the heroin supply, but it was all kicked off by this one company and one pill. It wasn't like people were going to this deal or that deal. Purdue pharma, the Sackler family out of Stanford, Connecticut and Greenwich, Connecticut created an opiate epidemic that killed millions and millions of Americans. Wait, I'm just realizing that was literally where you grew up. Yeah. That is insane. Well, you know, and, and it, that's a weird part of it, but really the, the, the hardest hit states were, were Appalachia, Pennsylvania, um, Vermont got hit very hard. Ohio got hit very hard. Um, a lot of those, uh, East coast states got decimated and I'm talking to a point where. Uh, there was, there was a period of time where they were driving a freezer trucks to the, to the hospital because they couldn't store the dead bodies. There were so many dead bodies. They had to actually have refrigerated trucks brought into Pennsylvania to actually store the bodies. And because there were so many overdose deaths. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Hey, real quick. Have you ever been reading your Bible and you hit a verse that just doesn't make sense? You read it three more times and you're still lost. That's the exact moment Logos was built for. If you haven't heard of it, it's not just another Bible app. It's a full study library. Commentaries, original languages, and centuries of trusted scholarship all in one place. So instead of an hour of internet searching or asking some AI and hoping it's theologically solid, you can take that question straight into Logos. It's not a chat bot that's guessing. It's trusted scholarship answering you. You get the real context, what the original language says, and what the church has said about that exact passage. It doesn't replace time with God. It's a companion for it. And I'm really excited to announce that we built the Bryce Crawford study bundle to go with it. This is my personal study library. 61 books I handpicked worth $911. Yours for only $89.99. Commentary study tools plus books that genuinely shaped me and how I follow Jesus. Start your exclusive 60-day free trial and grab it all at Logos.com slash Bryce. That's Logos.com slash Bryce. Take your hardest question into it and see what happens. All right, back to the episode. I didn't know that the overdoses were coming down, so I had a coworker when I was 18. I worked on boats in Florida. Yep. He was a really bad steward with his money, had a bunch of problems, drug problems, alcohol problems, gambling problems. He could barely pay his phone bill every month. And he got a bad bag of cocaine laced with fentanyl and died in an instant. And that was the first time I had ever had a close friend die from an overdose. I've had friends do drugs growing up. I never got near drugs personally. I've never even drank a sip of alcohol. I had other friends. I had other vices that just weren't drugs and alcohol. Yep, of course. But I had friends that did drugs growing up. And it was like the closest thing I would hear someone do is like maybe cocaine or something. you know and then transitioning into out of high school working it was like my people i knew of down where i was working were doing crazy stuff and it was just it was kind of surreal losing a friend to to like a drug overdose and it put the reality of the terror programs like back into in your you know into your head going oh yeah they tell you don't do drugs it's not cool don't do drugs you're like yeah whatever growing up and then you lose a friend to drug overdose you're like wow this is insane did you ever have a um a near-death experience using drugs more more than i could ever so my book i so i wrote the fifth vital when i got clean so i got clean in on june 23rd 2010 so wait how long were you using drugs so i i'll give you this so i'll give you the rundown so i used oxycontin i graduated high school 2003 uh barely uh you know i was i was allowed to walk with my class um me and my girlfriend at the time and my friends were completely high out of our minds when we walked at my high school graduation um nodding out on oxycontin and and uh made it through that over the next years um continue to to dive deeper into the streets and in with real serious dealers in bridgeport new haven um people that were you know gang members people in the mob i was kicked out of my house i lived in in in you know trap houses people's bases i was kicked out of my house i lived in you know trap houses people's basements for years i caught numerous felony charges i was a felon in the state of connecticut uh multiple times i was on probation um and when it got time for me to uh this this i mean this lasted for probably nine years eight or nine years you you being addicted to drugs yeah almost an entire decade yeah you were using and and keep in mind like my formative years like the years that like you develop every develop every skill you know emotion attachment friendship and all of that yeah i was i was a uh a heroin addict and and and crack cocaine in the end addict from the ages of uh 16 until i was uh 25 oh my goodness so really like the the years that you form yeah the crucial years yeah the most crucial years of your life but like not like like in all honesty because i i mean i don't have to say this to you like you don't know like drugs jack you up you're really sharp intentional joyful like if you would have told me this and i knew nothing about you i wouldn't know that you would use drugs i uh it is one of the reasons why i am so it's one of the reasons why it became so much reattached to my faith honestly and um there's a there's a pastor a place called are you familiar with vu church in florida one of my favorite people he's one of the best and um i saw a sermon recently from him and he was explaining um about uh people who feel that they're not good enough in the eyes of of god and he talked about the people that jesus was jesus was surrounded with in the bible and he talked about all the different people and basically led him to saying something that's very had a very profound effect on me which was um god does not call upon the what is it oh yeah i wrote it down uh he god does not choose the qualified he qualifies the chosen meaning he the people that god uses to deliver these messages to deliver messages of hope or positivity or or or perseverance are not always the perfect they're most likely never going to be the perfectly packaged people the guru the person that you know the high school quarterback they're going to be the people who are battered and beaten down and and taught and empathy and, and perseverance through fire, right. Through beat, through being, you know, broken as a human. Um, and that was something that really, uh, touched me because I, I feel like that. Yeah, I really do. I feel like that. I was, I was, um, I mean, I can only, there's, there's only so much I could really share on this because we have of time constraints, but I mean, I, I, I've seen everything. I've lost so many friends. I've hugged so many grieving mothers at, at overdose funerals. I've broken bones. I've been in ICU. I've lost organs. I've been in, you know, near fatal car accidents. I've been a felon and I've now been brought to the other side of that to tell that story and to tell the people, because there's really truthfully, there's a lot of people, the majority of the country are not ignorant in a bad way to the underworld that is addiction, but they just don't really know that much about it. And there's a whole segment. There's a whole segment of this country that are lost to addiction, to, to, to, to substance abuse and, and to the, uh, attached mental illnesses and the reasons that they use drugs. And so I've always, you know, felt like it was my duty to take this second chance that I was given at life to tell the story of those people, you know, in, in the gospel of Matthew, there's like a, after Jesus calls Matthew to like follow him, Matthew, I mean, he was a tax collector. So he had probably like the biggest house. The city, you know, ripping off his friends for money. He threw this crazy party and there was like a bunch of prostitutes and, you know, people over there hanging out with Jesus and the Pharisees showed up and they basically were like, what is a guy like that hanging out with people like this? And, uh, Jesus was like, well, go tell me what this means. I desire mercy, not sacrifice. And then he says that healthy don't need a doctor. The sick do. It's like, I'm not going to come for people that like you to think you have a big ego. I've come for the most broken people. Like, yeah, in my own eyes, like I've made never have never done drugs and alcohol before, but dude, I had a porn addiction since I was in the fifth grade. Like I've made bad mistakes with women before I've, I've torn people down with my words. I was very prideful and, and, uh, guilty. I wanted to literally kill myself. You know, there's, I, I have my own jar of a bundle mess and there's sometimes that I even feel guilty and shameful of sitting here and be like, Oh yeah. Like I'm the guy that's supposed to be telling people about Jesus. And like, we're going to have the conversation. And I know, I've made a lot of mistakes. I've made that you don't even know. I feel there's like a somewhat kind of guilt there, but at the same time, it's like, no, look at what Jesus has done in my life. He's totally transformed me from that way. And, um, I really admire that about you. And it's, it's cool to see you stand on top of that, that, um, trial and season of life, almost a decade of dealing with that. And you said you lost friends. Oh yeah. A ton of, a ton of friends, man, multiple, um, probably, probably more. than 10. I mean, people that, you know, Oxycontin, heroin, Xanax, the mixture, you know, um, a ton, I mean, very, very close friends, um, and, and having to go to those wakes or funerals and see the families. I mean, how did you process that knowing that you were doing the same things that they were doing, but you got a chance to live and they didn't, you know, there's a lot of trauma that I've not, um, processed. Um, and it's, uh, something that I do think about from time to time, because if, if, you know, if, if you ever do get a chance to read the book, I mean, it is, it is mind blowing, mind blowing the amount of things that I saw and, and, and dealt with, um, and, and friends that I lost. And even honestly, after crawling out of it, you know, the, the people that led me to my new life of, of, of loving cycling and going to the gym and eating clean, you know, my, my, my good friend, Mike Crocky, who I, I got clean and he was the first person to hold his hand out and be like, come to the beach with me, ride a bike with me. And he knew that I wanted to be on the bike and be outside. So he'd take me and show me new routes and, you know, tell me how he stayed clean. He would show me, I remember he would bring me to the edge and he would show me how to work out. And, um, even, even like that, like in like 2021, he, um, he, uh, had a motorcycle accident and passed away. And, um, there's, you know, it's, it's, I don't, I don't ever, I know everybody goes through stuff, you know, but I, I, I certainly have seen a lot of stuff in my life that, um, that I have not processed and it, and it continues and, and stuff happens now and people have overdoses now. And I have regrets about how I've shown up for those people. And, and I deal with other, intricacies of life that we all deal with. But, um, I don't know that I've processed a lot of the trauma, you know, because honestly, one of the reasons why I sometimes find it hard is because I'm, I'm always so, I'm always so enamored and thankful for the gifts and the positive side of things. And I know that that's a double-edged sword because we have to find a way to find, to, to, to come to peace with and come to terms with the things that have happened to us in the past. But I, I try to really like focus. And I'm so thankful that I've been able to do that. And I'm so thankful for the blessings that God continues to give me and the people around me every single day that I, I generally have my, my, my eyes in the windshield as opposed to the rear view mirror. And so, um, I, I, you know, it's therapy has been, that has not made therapy easy because I am, you know, it, it sometimes feels a little bit foreign to look back to me. Yeah, for sure. Now you said that you'd had a bunch of different near-death experiences, but in regards to like using drugs, like what was the scariest near-death experience that you had using? The perfect lunch combo. That first bite of your favorite sub, followed by ice cold Pepsi. Add a couple of friends, and now that's next level. Suddenly, the laughs get louder, the stories keep flowing, and the food tastes better. Because Pepsi brings out more flavor, more fun, and more of the moment. Food deserves Pepsi. You may not know this, but I have eczema. So I get how it can steal your time. But why let eczema take over when you can talk to your doctor about Eblis? Eblis, Leberkizumab LBKZ, a 250 milligram per 2 milliliter injection, is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema. Also called atopic dermatitis, that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals or who cannot use topical therapies. Eblis can be used with or without topical corticosteroids. Don't use if you are allergic to Eblis. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with Eblis. Before starting Eblis, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection. Respect your time. Ask your doctor about Eblis and visit eblis.com or call 1-800-LILLY-RX or 1-800-545-5979. I mean, I'll give you one. I mean, I was. Near the end of my use, I fell into a really bad crack cocaine habit. And so I was still. By this point, I was prescribed methadone. I was on methadone, which is an opiate replacement that I was on for six years. It's basically a liquid opiate that people use to deal with the withdrawal so that they don't have to use street drugs. And there's a bunch of different opinions on methadone. But I was on methadone for a long time. I was prescribed 90 milligrams a month of Xanax. So I was a Xanax addict. I was still using heroin even when I was on methadone. And because I had switched to heroin, OxyContin was taken off the streets because eventually the government found out how dangerous it was and took it away. And I started smoking crack. And so this was probably 2008, 2009. And one night, me and two of my friends were in New Haven. And I had lent my car to my dealer in New Haven because he would take. He would take it to do dangerous stuff. So he was in someone else's car in case something happened. And he had given me like a quarter ounce of crack, which is an extremely. For a personal use, it's a ridiculous amount of crack. It's a big rock. And between me and my two friends, we had smoked the entire quarter ounce in maybe a couple hours. And so what you would do is you would utilize a stimulant like crack or cocaine, and then you would use another drug to come down, whether it would be dope or Xanax. So I had just gotten my prescription of Xanax that day, about 90 milligrams, 91 milligram footballs, as they call them. And my car came back after we'd finished the crack and we had started sniffing the Xanax. And at some point around 4.30 in the morning, I decided that I was going to drive home. And I had this Infiniti G35 that my grandmother had paid for or leased for me or whatever because she would do anything for me. And I put her in a horrible position to do things that I shouldn't have asked her to do for me. And at some point while I was driving home, I fell asleep at the wheel or nodded out because I was on so much drugs and drove through a guardrail, two telephone poles, and off a cliff into a ravine, so into a river. And by the time I hit a bunch of trees on the way through, telephone poles, whatever. So by the time I got to the end and really made big impact, the airbag had already. Really deflated. So I made direct impact with my face and steering wheel. Came to, I was covered in blood. Like it was just absolutely pouring out of me and rolled out of the car. I kind of woke up the next day in Yale New Haven Hospital and had two milligrams of Xanax left out of the 90 milligrams that I had picked up that day, which is, I don't know how that happened. But so basically I drove my car off a cliff completely and totally totaled it and it didn't even stop me for a second. I mean, within a few hours of being out of the hospital, I'd probably be smoking, cracking and doing drugs. So what led to the moment that you decided to get clean then? In 2010, my grandfather had come down with Parkinson's and dementia and had some other problems. Some other issues that he was dealing with. My mother couldn't take care of him because we didn't have the money to put him in a home. And she asked me to move in with him and take care of him. And so basically I was supposed to just spend a few hours a day taking care of my grandfather. Him and I had never really been super close. I was really close with my grandmother, but my grandfather was a World War II veteran. He fought in the Pacific. Just a really admirable person. Just a really good guy. My mother was obsessed with him, but she was a single mother and she had to continue to work for herself and for everyone else. So she asked me to move in with my grandfather. And there was a night when I had been smoking crack and I was in the attic and he had somehow fallen out of his chair. And he was downstairs begging me to come help him and he was screaming and I was too paranoid because I was smoking crack in the attic and I wasn't able to get down. So I had to come down there to help him. And that was probably rock bottom for me. You know what I'm saying? It was just a moment that I was not. Another trauma that I really haven't been able to process. I talk about it because I think it's important to talk about it for other people so they know that maybe stuff that they've seen or done or aren't proud of happens to all of us. And so that was kind of when things were at their lowest, but the cleanness. The clean moment was a bit more triumphant than that. I had been going to a probation officer in Milford, Connecticut for years. I was on probation for years. I would have to check in all the time. And since I was on methadone and I was at the clinic when I would give dirty urines at probation, because normally if you give a dirty urine at probation, you go to jail. You just go straight to jail. There's no questions asked. But since I was technically in a program, they kept giving me like another chance, another chance, another chance. And I had a bunch of. I had a bunch of different probation officers who continued to give me chances. And one day, you know, they were like, "Hey, you're getting transitioned over to a new officer." And they were like, "Her name's Ellen Ferrari." And I was like, "Sick girl, like nice. "I'll be able to like really like, you know, "woo her up and stuff, right?" And I got to her a couple of days later. She was like, "Yeah, go down the hall, pee in the cup, "whatever, I come back, I pee in the cup, "I give it to her, she's like, 'I'll call you.'" And so she calls me and she's like, "Hey, Mike, it's Ellen. "I'm Ellen from Milford Probation. "I just want to let you know your urine came back "positive for opiates, cocaine, benzodiazepines. "And so here's what's going to happen." And then I, well, actually at first I was like, "No, it's not possible." I was like, "There's no way, like clearly you mixed up." Drug addicts are the most resourceful finessers in the world, which is why when you get clean, if you get clean, you will be incredible at whatever you do next. We are the most, like there's no one that can finesse like an addict. It's what makes our world work, right? So I started to do my normal finessing. Oh, you mix the cups up, you got somebody else's pee, like that wasn't me, whatever. And she caught me off and she was like, "Mike, Mike, Mike, tomorrow morning, 10:30 AM, "you're going to come here and you're going to tell me, "A, you're going to detox and you're going to go to detox "and then you're going to follow that up "with 40 days in rehab, or B, you're going to do "your five-year jail sentence, suspended sentence." And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, don't, like, first of all, we just met, don't try this. And she was like, Mike, 10:30 AM tomorrow, hung up the phone. And I was like, dude, this is bad. This lady's not playing around. So went in there, she was like, what's the plan? And I was like, what do you mean, what's the plan? Five years, I'm not doing five years in jail. So June 23rd, 2010, I go to SCRC detox unit in New Haven, Connecticut. State-sponsored, no private insurance, no cash payment. This is the warrior camp to detox in. I mean, you are surrounded by actual criminals, homeless, concrete, real deal detox. And for six days, I detoxed off methadone, Xanax, crack cocaine, heroin. I threw up all over the place, I all over the place. Sorry for my language. - No, no, no. - And I saw things that weren't there. I talked to people that weren't there and I had a full-on detoxification at SCRC. I left there, I went to Connecticut Valley Hospital for 35 days, CVH, which was a similar program, but a little bit nicer. Jail diversion, that was similar. And left there in August of 2010. And now I'm on this chair. - And never looked back. - Yeah. - Happened since then, but that's where it started. And you didn't have like any like prior attempts to get clean? I did. Oh, you did. Many, many, many, many. What about this one made you sick? I had noticed that the people around me were losing hope. And it made me really sad. I noticed the look in my mom's eyes when I told her that I was going to not go to rehab. I was just going to go to do the detox. And she said, you know, whatever you think works. She didn't believe me. She was just saying it to, everyone had moved into self-protection mode, which is where the families of addicts usually go. They go to self-protection mode because they have to. They're not to blame for it. At some point you have to, it's a really sad thing to say, but a lot of times you move into a place where you've mourned the addict. You've already said, okay, like this person, we're not fixing this problem. And that really affected me because I hated that. I hated that I was being buried by, and I was still alive. And that's what I really felt. Like I felt like, and I didn't blame anyone for it, but myself. And so, um, I got out, I already felt better than I'd ever felt on any of the other attempts because I'd put together so much time, you know, I was 40 plus days deep into the, into getting off. I was starting to get some motion back and I was, I was, dude, I was 290 pounds. Okay. I was dramatically overweight from, from heroin and Xanax and eating. I was eating fast food for five. Five times a day. Um, pretty much all of the teeth in, in, I am still on this side. I really have no teeth in the back. I have a lot of crowns and, and I was missing a ton of teeth. They were breaking off all the time from the methadone and crack. Um, I had, uh, fell in, I was a felon. I was, I had a, I had a, uh, sub, you know, 400 credit score. I was, I had not a dollar in the bank. Everything was repossessed. I was 25. 26 years old at the time and I had nothing and I got out of rehab. Um, I moved back into my grandfather's house where he still was and he was approaching his, his kind of like, and, and days of his life, but I, I went back in there and I decided that I was going to go for it and I started going to meetings. I went to 90 meetings in 90 days for NA, which we call 90 90, which is a mandate for people as they get out of detox. And more than anything else, I, um, I discovered. Uh, cycling and I discovered, um, and I discovered moving again and feeling, feeling good without the drugs within, you know, not too long. I lost a bunch of weight and I started to feel better again and I started taking care of my grandfather and I started feeling pride and I started feeling, um, like maybe I was actually going to be able to make it. And so it was a really, really important time, pivotal time in my life. And it's the time that I talk about the most to addicts and people watching this because, um, it's possible for all of you, it's possible for anybody watching this, that man, there are people that have been addicts for so long, dude, I friends, my childhood friends, some of them are still addicted to heroin. They've been, they've been addicted to heroin for 25, 30 years, bro. It's insane. But there's, there still is hope there still is hope. I was an addict for a very long time and when you, when you get some clean time and you start to feel. What it's like fully clean time, fully clean, not, I'm on a little bit of methadone or I'm on a little bit of Xanax, fully clean, fully of every substance and you feel what it's like to look in the mirror and see the color come back in your face and start to form sentences that w and, and find words that you couldn't find. And you look in your parents' eyes and they're smiling for the first time ever. Your mom is looking at you like, wait a second, there's a chance he's going to make it through this. Yeah. Your dad's looking at you and they're smiling and your father's looking at you and he's smiling like, wow, this might work. Yeah. And you get a couple of those days dude under your belt and you feel what it's like to ride a bike with the, with the breeze hitting you and listen to a Mac Miller song about getting out or you know, someone, some other artists that you've, and you feel the sun on you, bro. And you start to feel the things that you haven't felt in so long because you've been in a basement or you've been in a jail cell or you've been in a detox or a rehab for so long that you forgot what it felt like to live. It's just, it's magic. It's magic. And it takes a little bit of time to get there, but when you finally get there, there's, it is, it's the most freeing thing and the most beautiful thing ever. And then you start to pick up a hobby and maybe that hobby makes a little bit of money for me. I wanted to get a camera and I bought a camera and I started posting on Instagram. And then I, I, I had this camera and I remember I saved up some money to get this, this Canon camera and I started taking pictures at the duck pond. Yeah. It's like random stuff, just pass around. And uh, this girl, this girl came as such a funny story. This girl came up to me and she was like, Hey, nice camera. Um, do you, uh, do you do weddings? And I was like, as an addict, I said, of course I do weddings. I was like, I'm one of the, I'm one of the, like, I'm one of the bigger wedding photographers in the area. You know? And she was like, and she was like, you know, what's, what does it cost? And I was like, God, no idea. I said, what's your budget? And she was like 750 bucks. I said, perfect. Nope. I probably never made 750 bucks in my life. And by the way, I was certainly not qualified, but I was qualified to do a $750 job because you know, wedding photographers are good ones are 10 grand, right? So I went to this wedding, I shot the pictures. Everybody was laughing. When I would take the picture, I was having fun with everybody, you know, smiling. And I took that money and a little bit more money I had, and I used it to buy DJI drone, the first one ever, a Phantom drone and I went down to the beach and I was flying the drone around and doing these. The swerving maneuvers and like messing around with it. And then I, this is real. A girl either came up to me or messaged me on Facebook or something and said, have you ever flown a drone at a wedding? And I said, well, it's funny you ask because I'm one of the foremost wedding aerial cinematographers. And I'm pretty sure I was the one of the first, if not the first person to fly a drone over a groom, bride and groom walking down the aisle. And it was, and she had asked me, you know, she had asked me at the time too, she was like, what is it costs? And I said, what's your budget? And it was at, it was like, I think three grand. I think she paid me to do it. Her name was, her name was hope Carter. I re this is all, these are all real stories and, and so I, and then I use that money to do this thing and do that thing. But the storyline there is, is that you start to find things and you start to discover things about yourself that you like doing. And I started posting on Instagram and this might be a good segue. That first bite of your favorite sub followed by ice cold Pepsi, add a couple of friends. The stories keep flowing and the food tastes better because Pepsi brings out more flavor, more fun and more of the moment food deserves Pepsi. Hey, it's Kelly Roland. So I get it. How it can steal your time, but why let eczema take over when you can talk to your doctor about it? Eczema. LBKZ a 250 milligram per two milliliter injection is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema also called a topic dermatitis that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals, or who cannot use topical therapies ebolas can be used with or without topical corticosteroids don't use. And if you're allergic to ebolas allergic reactions can occur that can be severe eye problems can occur. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems, you should not receive a live vaccine when treated with ebolas. Before starting ebolas, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection, paid partnership with Lily, respect your time. Ask your doctor about ebolas and visit ebolas.com or call 1-800-LILY-RX or 1-800-545-5979. Wait, wait, wait, you just straight name drop this girl. Carter. Carter. Did the footage at least look okay? Yeah, it was all right. I think there was, I think I, I think I like blew some stuff off the seats with the drone and like, it was like, but the reason why I felt okay about it was because the rates that they were paying were not like, they made me happy, but you know how, you're married, yeah? Yeah, yeah. Well, you know how much this stuff costs. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're not getting a wedding photographer for $700. No, no, no, no. You might, but they're just, it would be me. Yeah. Do you know what I'm saying? So like it would be me in 2010. So, so, um, so I, so I did all this stuff and then I started to like put together a list of things that I thought I was good at and I started doing Instagram and I put my drone photography and videos on Instagram with songs in 2012 and I think around 2014 maybe, um, I, I read this ad in the newspaper and it said, you know, Stanford based company, uh, looking for. For social media manager and PR person. And it was a company called love sack that made these giant bean bags. Yeah. Yeah. And I was like, Oh, I don't know, whatever. I'll just apply. And months went by and I was at subway one day with my friend Patsy and we were talking about like penny trading. Cause that's what scheme we were on at the time. We made no money. We would lose all our money. And, uh, Shaw and I got a call and I didn't know who it was, but I picked up and he goes, Hey Mike, this is Sean Nelson, CEO of love sack. And I, I ran out of the subway and I went outside and he's like, Hey, can you tell me more? You know, I'm looking for Phil's position. You tell me more about your skills. I'm on Google, dude. Yeah. Uh, mostly awareness, you know, conversion is something, dude, I am just fully just BSing, right? But I, but he, through the call, realized, like, okay, this is a high energy guy, he's positive, he's motivated, like, he got those things from it. Not too long after that, I go down to Stanford, I have this meeting with him, and I remember sitting there in Stanford, and he, he asked me, he was like, I had this old peacoat that I had, like, found in my closet, like, my mom gave me or something, and I sat down, and he was like, what do you want for lunch? And I saw the steak salad on there, and it was, like, 22 bucks, and I was like, well, I would, I would get the steak salad, but that's all right, because I was like, he's not gonna spend 22 dollars on my lunch, and he was like, do you want the steak salad, dude? You can have it, it's fine. I didn't know anything about this life. Yeah. So, anyway, so we had the meeting, and then not too long after that, he hired me as his own, you know, attache at Lovesack to run his PR and his social media, and I did such a good job for him that not too long after that, the brand hired me as the head of social media. So, I was like, okay, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do this, at Lovesack. Wow. And I had the most viewed branded video in Facebook history in the first 24 hours, 44 million views in the first 24 hours on a Lovesack beanbag for Facebook. I had some of the most viewed imagery, some of the highest converting ads in Facebook ads and Instagram ads history. I met every celebrity, every athlete, whoever, and then in 2015, we were working with an agency called Mullen. Well, I mean, with the photography and drone skills that you have, no matter where you got this job. Yeah, and by the way, hey, and trust me, I brought those to the conversation. Well, I would hope so. I said, hey, listen, if you need photos or drones, I got you. I would hope so. You were bringing it to the table. Yeah, exactly. 2015, Mullen Law reaches out, and this is where things got really exciting. They said, hey, we um, we have an influencer who wants to talk to you about Lovesacks. And I said, what is an influencer? 15, this is like the beginning. It's like Jen Seltzer days, dude, like real early. Who is Jen Seltzer? Don't worry about it. Someone in your audience will know who I'm talking. Like the early, early influencers, like when it was brand new, right? And they were like, yeah, we're gonna, we'd like to connect you with this influencer. I was like, okay, cool. And they were like, yeah, okay, his name's Logan Paul. We're going to introduce you to him on text. And so I get this text one day from this random Ohio number, and it says, hey, Christian show. All right, I'm gonna go for it. You call it what you have to. He said, hey man, what's the deal with these Lovesacks? Can you on them? That's what he said. Right. And I was like, I don't know how to answer this because I'm working for a company and this is like a big influencer, but everything in me is telling me to answer it the way Mike would. Right. So I said, all right, fine. So I said, well, the covers are machine washable. So then we'll actually wash right out of them. And he just wrote a ha ha ha, like a thousand, like the longest ha ha ha ever. And that text message and the way I approached it, it, you know, this is a story we've both told a million times. He said, like, I knew immediately this wasn't just some marketing guy that I was dealing with. This was somebody that I actually was going to like. And so a little, you know, slowly but surely we started texting more. I sent him the product. We met up Travis Pastrana's house in 2015. Were you, were you already living in LA or no? You were still in Connecticut. Yeah. Yeah. Sanford, Connecticut. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So you, so you did after post-sobriety picking up a hobby, dude, dude, ripping off some girl from some wedding photos too. I gave her those wedding photos. Right. They were a little, the flash could have been a little, but they were usable. They were usable. Yeah. To, to securing a job at Love Sack to then being introduced to Logan. And now, I mean, you go from getting, getting clean, being broke, not knowing what to do to then now you're a co-host of one of the biggest podcasts. And so we, so at first we did, we did content together. We messed around, we shot videos. He had Tokyo happen, uh, beginning of 2018. I was very friendly, friendly with him at the time and already a part of the business to an extent, but just from a, just as a friend, I was helping him clean some messes up, bringing my corporate experience in. Tokyo happened. He asked me to stuff wasn't happening and that things were more tightened up. Uh, and then in late 2018, he approached me and was like, Hey, do you want to start a show together? Podcasts are about to be a thing. And I said, yeah, let's do it. Yeah. It was history. And now here you are. Hey, quick break. Let me tell you about today's sponsor upside gas, groceries, and eating out three things. 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Download the free upside app and use promo code Bryce to get an extra 25 cents back for every gallon on your first tank of gas. That's an extra 25 cents back for every gallon on your first tank of gas using promo code Bryce. All right, now back to what we're talking about. Would you say that you're happy now? Um, I'm not unhappy. I'm not unhappy. Um, well, I feel like your hesitation kind of answered the question. What makes you hesitate to say that you're happy? I am. Uh, I deal with a lot of demons still a ton of them, not a ton of them, but very specific ones. I've, I've been, uh, I've been diagnosed OCD since I was very young. Um, and for anybody watching who understands OCD, it is, it is a monster, a terrible, terrible monster. It's, um, honestly, one of the more, one of the harder, um, illnesses on the mind. Um, it, it can lead you to believe things that aren't true about yourself. It can, it can really torment the mind. Um, and, uh, so I deal with that. I deal with some, some anxiety as it relates to the OCD. And I still also have habits, that I'm not proud of. And the, the, the thing about it is, and it's, this is very important for anybody who is watching this right now, who deals with mental illness or, or is working on bettering their mental health. Um, your habits are very, very important to, uh, facilitating a better mental health, your physical habits, um, and creating boundaries. And so the way, uh, my therapist likes to explain it, shout out to Rosh, if you're watching this, um, is, uh, or your mind is protected by, uh, like a border. Okay. By border guards. Okay. And those border guards are kept alive by the habits that you use in your daily life. And so any bad habits that you have, whether it's everybody's different, you know, for some people it's, it's substances, it's alcohol, it's drug use for other people. It's, it's having sex a lot for other people. Bad eating habits, whatever it is. Um, when you exercise those poor habits, you're taking those, those guards off. And I say you're shooting those guards. So every time you, you engage in a bunch of rampant sex, anytime you engage in, in gambling and lose a ton of money, those guards aren't there anymore. And so what happens is those are the times when your mind starts to be infiltrated by negative thoughts, by negative emotions, by negative feelings. Um, so you need to exercise very positive habits in your life, in your real life, your actual, like you can touch and feel life to protect your mind. And so as long as you are getting your sleep, hugely important, getting your sleep, getting your eight hours, drinking water, eating properly, not abusing substances. If you, if you have OCD or you have anxiety or you, you have depression and you're using drugs or alcohol because you think it blunts that and which it does, it will help you. But just understand that rebound you're dealing with is never going to go away. Every time you wipe those guards out the next three or four or five or eight days after you do that binge are going to be when you're going to feel those emotions start to start to happen and your mind's going to start to melt down. And so if you get serious about, um, facilitating a better mental health for yourself, um, you, you get serious about positive habits in your life. Yeah. Or do you feel like that even with, I mean, getting clean, with career, everything that you're doing now opening two burger restaurants, which is amazing. Congrats. All that. Do you still feel like you're chasing something? It's funny you say that. Cause I don't think I'm chasing anything. I feel like I'm running from stuff. What do you feel like you're running from? Um, I don't know exactly, but, but I, uh, I'm D I've done for the, probably on 150 flights a year for the past four years. years I'm never ever anywhere I'm just always I'm like a like a ghost almost sometimes like I just feel like I'm dude I've been in the number of countries I've been to in the past two weeks is like staggering like I just am I was just in six different countries probably I was in what Spain I was in France I was in Switzerland I was in UK I was I've been all over the place Turkey I was in three different cities in Turkey over the past like couple like over the past month what I've been doing this for a long time and um the even that lifestyle has gotten monotonous to a point where that now feels like the routine so I'm very much right now focused on like forcing myself to settle down here in LA routine yeah working out eating properly that's why I'm here right now that's why I'm on this podcast because I because I'm like forcing myself to not do that because it's just not it's not working for me it's not fulfilling me yeah wow dang I appreciate that yeah like I I can kind of relate like when I was 18 I'd been following Jesus maybe a year and I graduated high school within three days I moved to Florida and was working on boats that's where I met that co-worker that overdosed yeah and I was like literally running from problems and I ended up backsliding in my faith really hard distracting myself with work I was working seven days a week 13 hours a day and not going to church not even reading my bible and I was starting to fall back into ungodliness and I was like I'm not going to church I'm not going to godly habits and just broken and lost and confused just from running and I I mean you know this I I'd realized that my problems had followed me to where I was at and I was like this is 10 times worse than before I was following Jesus because now I feel conviction for the crap that I'm doing now when I like didn't feel conviction before and I just felt like I was digging the hole deeper and deeper and deeper and yeah dude I totally understand that's how I yeah that's how we we travel so much too and like right now like Maddie and I are at home right now the longest that we've ever been home in a while and I'm trying to get back in the routine thing and the structure part I mean I know you got so much going on now but even you you even said that the getting clean off the drugs helped like faith was a big part of that but but where are you at with Jesus nowadays there's there's generally not a day where I don't hit my morning and even if I don't hit my morning and evening prayers um so it's it feels slightly it definitely could be more creative in the way that I'm speaking with him um but I'm I'm I'm always get making sure that I'm thanking him for for his blessings and for and and asking him for the things that I need in the morning um I I could be doing far better I could be now here's here's where I do here's where I would say that I am doing okay for me I'm not doing anything wrong I'm not doing anything wrong I'm not doing anything for me um a large part of how I view my not not not only religion but just spirituality in general is is in my treatment of others and I do um I do believe that the the the great me personally the greatest measure of a man is is in the way that we treat our brothers and sisters and so are there are there ways that i could be worshiping more um being in church more reading the scripture more absolutely right but i do feel very good about how often and how intentional i am about helping people and that never turns off i mean it's something that's just with me all the time every meal i eat if i see someone outside like i'm going out there and saying like hey do you want this do you want some of this you want to come in you want to drink do you want this how can i help you how can i sit with you how can i talk to you if you message me i'm getting that message as much as i can yeah um and that's always that's always been you know helpful for me i mean we're we're working on an organization right now called mike's bikes um which is ironically not named after me but named after my friend who passed in in the motorcycle accident because he was so um so helpful to me in in in getting me on the bike and and riding with me when i first got clean and i promised his mother that i would that i would start the organization and um that org is going to get bikes into the hands of people in early recovery um so that they can get to meetings so that they can get their self-worth back through exercise so that they can feel what it's like um to feel what i felt when i got clean um and it will also be a program to sponsor people who need rehab and detox and and will give me a stage to speak on for for people with substance abuse and mental illness um and so um i know that's only one part of the pyramid but in my eyes you know if if jesus were to come down to us today you know and and and and speak with us i i in my eyes i would assume the thing he would say is you know be good to you the perfect lunch combo that first bite of your favorite sub followed by ice cold pepsi add a couple of friends and now that's next level suddenly the laughs get louder the stories keep going and the stories keep going and the stories keep going and the stories keep flowing and the food tastes better because pepsi brings out more flavor more fun and more of the moment food deserves pepsi grab a pepsi zero sugar today hey it's kelly roland you may not know this but i have eczema so i get how it can steal your time but why let eczema take over when you can talk to your doctor about ebglas ebglas labrakizumab lbkz a 250 milligram per two milliliter injection is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema also called atopic dermatitis that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals or who cannot use topical therapies ebglas can be used with or without topical corticosteroids don't use if you are allergic to ebglas allergic reactions can occur that can be severe eye problems can occur tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems you should not receive a live vaccine when treated with ebglas before ebglas tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection paid partnership with lily respect your time ask your doctor about ebglas and visit ebglas.com or call 1-800-lily-rx or 1-800-545-5979 each other like treat your brothers and sisters with love and and care for them you know what i'm saying and so it's it's it's the one thing that i tried to live by even though there are several other things that i wish i did i was doing better yeah the i mean the second greatest commandment jesus says is loving your neighbor as yourself like one of the most pivotal scriptures that has changed my life is matthew 25 where jesus says uh he basically says on judgment day i'm separating people into two groups sheep and goats and he's going to look at the goats um or he's going to look at the sheep and he's going to say well i was hungry and you gave me food i was naked and you clothed me i was in prison and you visited me all these scenarios and the goats are going to say well jesus like we never saw you in that scene and i'm going to look at the goats and i'm going to so like why can you you're you're setting yourself for failure right now and jesus says well what you do to the least of these you do unto me because the way you would treat them you would treat me and like yeah that is like a total like true aspect to it i've come to find in my life that if i'm not following the greatest commandment jesus says which is loving him with my whole heart i i ain't even making it to the second thing like point blank period i i can't even i don't even have the capacity to like love you as i would love myself if i'm not even seeing god sees me and i can't even get that if i'm not loving him with my whole heart that was the biggest game changer for me and my faith was like dude i grew up in private christian school i grew up going to church i'm from the bible bell i'm from georgia like i had heard about it all but my my hang-up was hypocrisy i had seen and stuff like that and so when i'd finally met jesus in waffle house at 17 it was kind of like oh god jesus actually loves me because i i thought you had a million other things on your plate you didn't know that you had a million other things on your you wouldn't care about me i've done far too many worse things and you like chose to intervene in my life like what you you care about me um which i thought was fascinating you mentioned something earlier that i actually want to ask you about you said that there's like this part of you because you kind of were hinting on this a little bit about the beginning about the hate comment thing um that there's this like little like karma like thing in you that makes you want to treat people kindly do you ever feel like because you have that inside of you or that point of view that if you do something wrong god's gonna like scold you a hundred percent a hundred percent it's been a it's been a really really tough battle for me and i and i do appreciate you bringing up um you know that first pillar and first commandment and it's it's it's i i have felt like that a lot of my life i've certainly felt like that now and i am i am a sinner still you know what i'm saying i i am here you know and so i i i repent for my sins i do and i and i and i've gotten better and i like i like that i like being able to say that the trajectory is promising yeah i'm saying like i continue to get better i've gotten better you know i was i was a major you know i love sex you know what i'm saying i still love sex but i have gotten better you know what i'm saying so um but i i think um that's certainly something that i think about and it's something that i've been able to do for a long time that i've talked to pastors about it's something that i've talked to you know people the church about and they've definitely tried to like dissuade me from that way of thinking, you know? Well, it may be like, no, I'm not even like trying to like be, I'm just being serious. Like it may be the OCD in you. That's like, I have to be so perfect that if I screw up one time or like, oh crap, I'm trying not to cuss. And if I cuss one time, I'm like, dang it. Like, I get like, God's going to scold me. And it's like, I, I, I think anyone with two cents in their brain, that's like trying to get right with God screws up one time. They're going to feel the same way, you know? Like, and, uh, like my dude, I, cause I, even now, like there are moments where I'll even think a thought, right. And then I'll feel so shameful for that thought. And, and, uh, I'll bury myself in shame. Or I even now struggle with sometimes like staying up late at night and feeling guilty from my past that like, I haven't even like, just like thinking about how many people I've, I've hurt or like visiting my hometown and seeing people like in, in a store, at a restaurant, knowing that I like, I've hurt them and like having to live with that. And, um, like literally it sounds silly, but you know, looking back at the garden of Eden, when, you know, Adam and Eve, they're like hiding from God. In my mind, God has every right to be like, you idiot. I told you to do not to do one thing. And you did the one thing I told you not to do. Now, look what you started. Yeah. You, you, they screwed it up for us. And, uh, he, the first thing he says is, uh, where are you? Not like, uh, why the crap did you do that? It was no, like, where are you? Cause the whole time they were literally walking with God every day in the garden. And then he shows up at their 12 o'clock session and they're gone. And he doesn't go, oh, well, I know what they did. In fact, he, he did know what they did because he's all knowing. And he, the first thing he's like, where are you? And that has been like, still to this day, one of the hardest realities for me to grasp is going like, well, God, like, I don't want you to think I'm using you because I'm not using you. Like I I'm trying to grow with you. Like I'm trying to understand you. And yeah, maybe sometimes I fall flat on my face and I do that more when I try to take it into my own hands. And time and time again, I think to myself over and over like, Jesus, I'm trying, I'm trying, I'm trying. And sometimes it's hard for me to receive that love. Like, like I talk about Jesus for a living and like, I will stay awake at night going like, God, how, how am I even worthy to talk about you? Cause I I'm broken and I, and I feel guilty and shameful and I feel all these things. And he's just like, man, I just want to spend time with you. And I, I care about you. And all the times that I, you know, accidentally slapped God in the face, he's like, not mad at me. He's just like broken hearted. That I chose that thing over him or that, that, uh, I w I would look back to something or, or think that thought he's not like mad. He's just, man, like, you know, come to me for that. And instead that's all God wanted to, it was like Adam and Eve to run to him, but they're like hiding in the fickle bush over there. Like, oh yeah, God's definitely, God ain't going to see us over here. You know, like, like, so I, I, I totally understand. And I, I, it's easier said than done. You know, I don't expect to convince you. Yeah. No, no, no. I mean, it's, it's, it's just something that like, there's, there's definitely like a level of fear and like not an unworthiness that like I feel in, in my relationship. And it's, it's, it's weird how sometimes like your relationship with God, like kind of like reflects your, like your feelings about life. And it's like almost sometimes like you could, you could trace like your feelings of like unworth, unworthiness in the, in the real world, in, in how you feel in your relationship with God, you know? And it's like, I don't know. I, there's just, there's just so true, you know? No, that's so true. I'll apologize eight times for something that like doesn't even matter. Yeah. Because I just feel really guilty that like, oh, I accidentally dropped your pen that you let me borrow to like write my name in this book that I just bought. Like, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. And they're like, why are you apologizing for that? You know what I mean? And that reflects over to, wow. Like a piece of crap. Sometimes knowing that you've forgiven me for stuff that I'm thinking about, you know, like, like I'm not, I haven't even done, like, I'm just thinking, I'm thinking about crap I did eight years ago. And I get that too. Like, that makes sense to me too. Like that part of just like having thoughts and you're already apologizing for thoughts and like, you're already like, sometimes like you're already like repenting for sins you haven't even done yet. And you might not even do like, it's, you know, it's, it's, it's tough, dude. It's, that's the thing that I think people, like lose track of whether you're a praying Christian or you're not, or you're an atheist or whoever you are watching this show is like, man, life is complex. It's hard. It's hard. Even if you don't think it's hard, even if you feel like you've had a pretty easy life or you think you've had a really hard life or whatever, it's not easy, man. It's really not. There's a lot of, there's a lot of factors, which is why like going back to what we talked about in the beginning of the show and, and, and how people treat people online and the comments that they leave, they don't, they don't know anything. They don't know anything. They don't understand that the immense complexities and, and pressures that other people are under. It's like, like how, how everyone has gotten so obsessed with this idea of just being obsessed with the actions of others, you know? And, and, and without really understanding, what that person might be going through. And so it's just, you know, it's tough. It's tough. You, you do your best or you don't even, but like for me, I try to do my best, but I falter and I always have, dude, you know what I'm saying? And I, and I always will, you know, but I try to do my best. I try to, you know, it, it, maybe this isn't the best thing or the worst thing or whatever, but I try to overcompensate in areas that I am good. I try to help out my brothers and my sisters and do good deeds. And, and sometimes it's, maybe I am doing it because I fell short somewhere else, but a lot of times it's because I want to, and I, it makes me feel good. And I know that it's helping them. And I guess we're all just, we're all just, you know, works in progress, you know, we're all just doing the best we can and trying to figure it out. And, you know, nobody's perfect, you know, at the end of the day. So I like asking everyone, I sit down this question, um, on a scale of one to 10, 10 being like absolutely certain without the shadow of a doubt. And then one being not certain at all. How confident are you that if you died right now, you'd go to heaven? I would, I would do, they usually give an answer like in between somewhere. I would say like, is somebody like ripping a 10? I'm sure someone had, I mean, I mean, I, I guess the, the weird thing about it is in a long form, as I usually answer things, the biblical answer to that would be 10. I mean, I've accepted Jesus into my heart. I've, I've, I pray to him. I accept him as my Lord and savior. And, you know, I like, so I would, I would hope it would be a 10, you know what I'm saying? Like based on what I've learned about, you know, the, the, my, my, my God, you know, but I, I, I don't know, dude, I, I have really tried to turn my life around. I have really tried to give back to people. I've really tried to be a positive influence in the world. And even, you know, even nowadays with like, oh man, I can't tell you how many gambling deals I've, I've turned down, dude. Like I, I, I, and I had a, had him for a while and I know what it's like to make $400,000 a month. I know, I know what it's like. And I, I don't do it anymore. Can't do it anymore. Can't watch people. I can't watch that happen to people anymore. They're in my inbox constantly. Hey, we have this deal for you, you know? Um, so I, I'm trying to be the best person that I can be as much as possible. Um, but I don't know. I would say maybe like an eight. Yeah. Yeah. I love, I love your honesty. Cause it's like, yes. Like I would sit here and say, I'm a 10, not like an ego thing, but you're right. It's almost a sin to say anything else because the teaching is if we accept the Lord into our heart, we are saved. Well, I love that. You were like, you were like, is anyone ripping a 10? Typically, no, no one's ripping a 10. Typically, uh, like everyone is an eight, but I like your honesty because even you say like, are they ripping a 10? It's like you want to, cause you know, that's what you're supposed to say. But deep down you're like, I feel like an eight. Yeah. And, and, uh, by more like a good friend of mine uses that analogy. And I love it because it like, let's say you're an eight. Then we would sit here and say, well, did Jesus only die for 80% of your mistakes? You know, did he leave out the nine years of opioid addiction? It's like, no, he didn't like he died for it all. And, uh, and I was like gauging where people are at. Cause it's just interesting to hear how people wrestle. And like, sometimes like me knowing like right now, confidently am I a 10? Yes. But like, if I stay up at 1230 and like sit and stare at the ceiling, like, will I feel like a six? Yeah. Maybe I'll feel like a six. Yeah. Really late at night. But, but like, I love that. Um, when I, when I do that, I'm banking my entry into heaven off of like myself. Yeah. Like can Bryce build Jacob's ladder to heaven when I'm thinking about being a six versus no, like Jesus is my ticket and I'm straight punching that thing. Cause I can't, I can't get in any, any other way. Yeah. I can't, there's no way I'm getting in unless it's him. Have you ever read, uh, are you a big reader? Cause you wrote a book. I know I'm a writer. You're not a reader, though? No, but I don't read as much as I wish I did. I've obviously been, like, walked through the Bible many times. I was in Sunday school as a kid. Do you have a Bible? Yes. Do I know where it is right now? No. All right, I'm going to get you one after. I will get back into it for sure. In fact, there's a friend of mine that I met at Voda Spa yesterday. He's now a friend. He's putting out a new book. It's just a scripture a day with a kind of layman's terms meaning to it, which I thought was very cool. I'm sure it already exists, by the way. I'm many times over. But I do have a desire to get back into the scripture, to be honest. Dude, that's awesome. I'll give you one in there. Not like you can't go get another Bible, but I got some study Bibles in there, some are for men. So they have, like, notes and stuff on the inside, too. Not my notes. They're way smarter people than me. But there's a book. There's a book that you should totally read. It's called Confessions by St. Augustine. And it's basically this guy's personal journal. And he's wrestling with becoming a Christian. And he basically, like, has a sex addiction and, like, basically can't give up sexual desires. And the most famous quote from it is, grant me chastity, but maybe not yet. Like, he's, like, talking to God. Like, I can't. I can't. Like, I don't know. Like, I'm wrestling so hard. I know what it's like to take one more hippie for rehab. Trust me. You know, he's, like, that is what I'm struggling with. And, like, we're laughing because that quote applied to not just sex addictions, but, like, everything in between is so true. 100%. And when you read it, you're just like, wow, I, like, love this guy's honesty. And I feel like I'm reading my own life. Yeah, like, about whatever. X applied in that like X part of my life. And that stuff, I honestly, genuinely not saying this, this has been one of my favorite conversations because of how honest you are. And a, that's like what people in general want to hear because like what people do is like, Oh, like the person right now that relapsed into drugs after like trying to be clean, they want to hide and shell up because they think no one else is struggling with it right now. And you're just like, no, actually like I struggled with it for a long time and I have friends that still can't get clean. And that helps them break out of their shell a little bit and go, Oh, well maybe I need help. Yep. Or, Oh wow. I'm not alone in this battle. And most importantly, there's hope. Yeah. That's like the, that's like always the main thing that I'm trying to deliver is like, dude, I fell, I touched that burner for years, man, years and years and years I lost. And, and there were so many times where like that light got so dim, but I always had a way of keeping it on. It was, it was God. It was God. Yeah. Like it was God. It was God. It was God. And he gave me a bunch of different manifestations of God here on earth, but it was God keeping that little flicker of light on. And for some people, it goes out. And I just, I always try to encourage people to keep going. And I know like, dude, there's people that are watching this right now that are so tired. Cause that's what it is. It's exhaustion. You get to a point where you just can't do it anymore, bro. You can't do it anymore. Do it anymore. But a lot of times that, uh, that dawn is like right there. It's right after that dark, dark period. And you're going to, something's going to happen for you and it's going to change your life. What would you tell the person that's one month sober right now? You're just getting started, but you're, but you're on the way to greatness. That's like, that's like the part where like things really start to get excited. If you have like 30 days, if you can get to 60 days, 90 days, and then truthfully six months, that's when things really start to lift up because your starts to, your mind starts to change. You start to get faculties back that didn't, that didn't exist. You start to think in ways that didn't exist because you've been under the influence for so long. Um, and some of the issues that you have in your life start to fade away. Maybe you get your, maybe you start moving around a little bit and that's where I, oh man, that's what, that's like the main thing I would encourage to everyone, anyone watching this, whether you have an issue, a mental health issue, a substance abuse issue, a God issue, whatever it is, move your body, please, please. There's never a day when you're and you're going to get up, go for a walk, go for a bike ride, put the phone down, go to the gym, whatever, where you're going to go back to your house after and be like, wow, I feel worse. It's not going to happen. This is the one thing that you can do to 100% feel better, not a hundred percent better, but to feel better in some way about your life, your, your, your, your day, your time is to, is to move your body, get your blood flowing. If you can do it in nature, fantastic. If you have to do it in the city, do it in the city. That is, if there's anything, you know, after finding God, finding that relationship with God and having somebody to talk to and having the hope that God gives you, it is, it is moving your body. It's just so, it's just so important and has become such an important part of my life. I've been in the gym every single day for, for 15 years. I mean, every single day. Wow. There's not a day goes by on vacation, whatever I'm going, I'm finding a gym. I was just in Ibiza this last week. I'm finding a gym. Yeah. Every. So I get how it can steal your time, but why let eczema take over when you can talk to your doctor about Eblis. Eblis, labrakizumab LBKZ, a 250 milligram per two milliliter injection is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children. 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe eczema also called atopic dermatitis that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals or who cannot use topical therapies. Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems, you should not receive a live vaccine when treated with Eblis. Paid partnership with Lilly, respect your time. Time. Do they just not exist out there, gyms? You have to, you'd have to drive a little bit. It's like 15 minutes. It wasn't, they exist, but there are some that you go to Iceland, you know, they might not exist. You said you had to drive a little bit. I think it was like an hour plus. You're like, yeah, it's 15 minutes. I shouldn't say we had a gym in the villa, but it didn't have the things that I needed. I'll be honest with you guys. So, so what actually matters to you now in this point in life? You're, I hate to do this to you. How old are you? 41. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you laugh first, so I'm going to laugh. If the internet doesn't know by now, there's something wrong because it's on every comment section video that exists in the world. So like what actually matters to you right now? Continuing to improve myself as a human. Continuing to evolve myself as a human. Um, and that means, and that means doing my best and doing even better than my best, like really doing it to, to leave behind some habits that are not, um, that aren't, that aren't good for me anymore. There's not, you know, and just being in places with people that just don't make sense. And, um, I, my family, you know, my parents spending time with my parents and my sisters and my nephews and nieces and nieces and nieces and nieces and nieces. I just, I just baptized my, uh, my niece saw in I'm a godfather now as of two weeks ago, which was an incredible experience. And like, talk about like just light, like just like baptizing a kid in a, in a daytime church on a Sunday, it's like gotta be one of the highs of the church state. Right? Like, it's like you put it right up there with Easter because Easter is obviously such a joyous day. Right. And it's springtime and everybody's like, oh, I'm going to everybody's celebrating Christmas is a little bit more solemn, but like, man, baptizing a kid, especially when you're the godparent, it's just a cool thing. And I can only imagine what it would be like being a parent. And so on that note, you know, I'm, I've, I've dealt with, you know, significant, um, struggles as it pertains to my relationships. I have a lot of trauma and a lot of demons there, you know, as it pertains to my ability to, to be in relationships, but I'm working on doing the thing. Living a life that facilitates relationships right now. That's it. Like no promises to anyone, but I'm putting myself in better places. I'm doing healthier things so that when I do meet someone, it's someone else that's healthy and someone else that does those types of things, not someone that parties and does that. Um, and so a funny thing that's going on right now, or it's not funny at all. It actually is terrible, but it's a, it's a funny story, I guess, for you guys. Um, I was on, I've been on testosterone for the past, uh, years. Uh, so I started in my late thirties. Um, and that was due to, you know, they were telling me like, listen, we swear by this stuff. I did a bunch of research on it. My levels were not low, but they could have been, they could be better. Um, and it's, it's, it is an incredible thing if you need it. I really do believe that. Um, I didn't, I think I could have waited a few more years. So I got on it in about five years ago. It's been great. It's great for muscle mass. It's great for mental clarity. It's great for a lot of stuff. One thing it's not great for is sperm. Okay. Because it takes all of it away. Like you have zero. And so I hadn't anticipated getting off of it because I do feel very good on it and very locked in on it um and it's not easy it's not fun to get off of it because your levels plummet because your body stops creating natural testosterone um but recently i had a calling to get off of it at least long enough to produce a frozen sample which is what i'm doing right now and so i got off of it about a month and a half ago maybe about 40 days ago and so right now i'm in like what's called the trough of the testosterone meaning my body is not producing its own and i'm not giving it exogenous testosterone so i'm in a very uh it's a funky place right now so you want to like save that for when you get married and then have a kid correct yeah yeah okay cool yeah i know it's i don't know that this has got it intended but it's uh you know i might be able to do it the natural way too at the time i just i want to make sure that i have the option to do it in general sure that's where i'm at yeah you know yeah i don't know i don't know a lot about it i don't really have like an opinion on yeah yeah that's that's amazing that's awesome i i didn't know like does it affect your um well actually i'm asked this question but you're like a very high energy person i'm assuming it doesn't affect your energy because you're more high energy oh really so this is me off of it so like you know but i i am definitely like it's probably it's probably puts me at a more normal place but when i'm on it i'm even higher energy yeah it gives you more energy more libido more gotcha a clearer mind more muscle mass um it's it's it it honestly is a it's pretty good for you um if you don't overdo it so your so your levels are between like 200 and 1100 probably or 21200 for your testosterone and if you're in your 20s and you should be you'd probably be testing like 700 800 600 700 800 for testosterone nowadays it's going down because all the stuff in the food and just how the environment is um when i tested i think i was around 500 in my late 30s and i started taking enough to put me up to about 1100 so i've been pretty on the high spectrum for some time now um which has been cool it's been good and your body runs really well and you you know you you operate well but now i'm in like the threes or fours it's been a big drop off hey well you can't tell and you look great how dude before we close uh because i want to pray for you and and just thanks for coming on it really if there's a person watching right now and they're currently using they're struggling with addiction what would you tell that person just that there's more for them that there's more there's hope out there for them that there's a life out there for them that the the the baseline and where they think they're gonna go is is really just the bottom floor and and i hope they just look at me i hope they look at me and they and they know that there's never been a time like right now to escape the the the the bounds and the confines of addiction and and make it out and make something of yourself and make your parents proud and and and be more than you currently think that you can be yeah um and and and really just hopefully look at me and just see me as like a sign that it's possible you know that there's a way out and there really is there's people who love you there's people who care about you and there's people who care about you and there's people who really no matter how lonely you feel maybe your parents have have had to turn their back or maybe your friends have you know i love you god loves you um and there's people out there who care about you and and the people that you've harmed will still be there for you when you start to better yourself and um you know i've seen so many people after so many years make it out people that had completely given up and and found you know god and found a way and and and are doing so good now and doing are doing even better than me there's business owners out there who have had addictions in the past who have hundreds of millions of dollars there's never been a time like right now to to make it out of um of the struggle and so um just keep the light on and keep going man i love that well i'd love to pray for you before we close i appreciate you a ton yeah jesus thank you so much for today thank you for mike and our conversation god i'm just so encouraged by mike's transparency and what you've been doing in his life lord would you just continue to bless him and bless his family bless his new restaurants coming up and bless his relationships and every friend that comes his way lord would you give him this more hunger for you god we thank you for this this honest faith that he has with you god would you just continue to fan a flame on the hunger for you would you give him and speak to him and give him revelation when he reads the word and he picks up your bible he feels like you were speaking directly to him off the pages and god we love you so much we thank you in jesus name amen amen