Speaker 1So today I want to talk about the opportunities that you might have missed out of you getting sober. These are the things that might have gone overlooked that are beneficial to my recovery and that should be celebrated. It's a reminder to be grateful. These are things that you might not think about often, but nonetheless have helped build my recovery and help me stay sober. I'm offering today a perspective change and that's all recovery does for me. That's all this power greater than myself, spirituality. That's what it is. I spent my whole life looking for power in drugs and alcohol, in money, in material things, jobs. I'm always looking for power and I didn't know that until I came into recovery. Today I have that power and it doesn't involve material things. It is within me. It is a power greater than me. It is an inner teacher. It is guidance. It is a set of principles. It is a belief, a faith in the universe, God, whatever you want to call it. It is just a power greater than me and it places me in a place of a position of humility, which is to be teachable. Maybe I don't have all the answers here. So today I want to talk about all the hidden opportunities in your recovery. Things that you might have looked at one way and I'm offering. A shift in perception. And that's all recovery does. Like I said, it shifts my perception because that's what drugs and alcohol did. That's what the power does. It shifts my perception. Alcoholism addiction is a disease of perception. I am unable to look at things from another lens. I am obsessed with my view and my view only. So let's get into it. Welcome back or welcome to recovering all out podcast. My name is Anthony. I'm an addict, alcoholic and recovery been in recovery since 2015 had a relapse at about seven and a half years. I'm grateful to be alive. I'm alive today and I'm glad to be doing this episode with you. So let's get into it. The quiet window right after a hard feeling passes on its own. The rep that builds the muscle feelings and urges work like a wave. They build, they peak, they fade usually on their own, usually faster than you'd guess. If you don't feed them, there's a name for writing that out. Urge surfing. It's a real studied technique. The magic isn't the wave. Passing it's the proof you collect when it does. I survived that without using, that's a rep. That is a repetition. That is a practice run that is benefits. Your, the outcome of your recovery, the trajectory of your recovery. Most people miss the window because they're so relieved the feeling's gone and that they didn't stop to clock. What just happened? Name it out loud. I just did that. And the, and you bank the rep instead of losing. I can think specifically of a time. I was living at the sober house when I was in my room and I was having crazy using thoughts. I was obsessing about using cocaine and I couldn't get out of my head. It was eating up my entire bandwidth, my mental, physical, emotional bandwidth. It was like a itch. I couldn't scratch. And so what did I do? I was, I did what I was taught in recovery. I went to a meeting. I looked up a meeting right away and I went that night. And I talked about it with the people that were living in my sober house. I let the wave ride, pass, ride, whatever you want to say. It always passes. The urges always pass, just not in your time and not the way you think they will, but they do pass. This too shall pass. It's what you do with the thought that matters. What I do today with the thought that matters. Am I keeping it up here in my head and spinning it into a story about why it makes sense and why it's justified and why I deserve it and why I should do it? And this will help. This will help me not hurt me and I can just have one, or am I getting it out there and telling somebody about it? This is for the everyday hard feelings, the cravings, the resentments, the 4:00 PM dread. It's not white knuckle through a mental health crisis alone. Some waves need a lifeguard, not a surfboard, riding it out and reaching out are both strength. No, which one the moment calls for. You don't build the muscle in the calm. You build it in the 10 seconds after the storm. If you notice you're still here, catch that window. That's where recovery actually gets stronger. Recovery is trading instant gratification for delayed gratification. I used to search for that bandaid Keurig coffee solution my entire life, and it was in the form of drugs and alcohol and the problem with drugs and alcohol for us is they work. They make the problems go away. They shift my perception. Now I need to find something, another power that shifts my perception. I need to find something that works as well, if not more, and it is better in the long run because this is a, like I said, delayed gratification, it's compound interest. You do these things over time, they build, you've flexed the muscle of recovery, the recovery muscle, and eventually it gets fewer and fewer and fewer, and I'll be honest, I'm sitting here today, I can't remember the last time I honestly processed a long thought about using or drinking. You know, I have fleeting thoughts every once in a while, being at a concert thinking, oh, that looks fun. They're probably having fun. I wish I could drink like that, but it's fleeting. It doesn't rent space in my head for hours on end or days. It comes and it goes, and it's a lot faster than it was, and the voice is a lot quieter, and I laugh at it now because it's hilarious. It's hilarious. I am entertaining something that almost killed me multiple times, ruined my life, got me into rehab, and I'm thinking it's a good thing. It's a good idea to go and do it. Because why? Because it'll relieve this pain that I'm in for 30 seconds, a minute. It's insane. Insanity. Doing the same thing, expecting different results. Just laugh at it. It's hilarious. Boredom as data, not a threat. I got smacked in the face with a quote last night. I was listening to a podcast, not addiction related, but they were talking about, it was Jimmy Carr, and he said, he has a lot of bangers. They're one-liners, but he had one that said, boredom is just simply serenity, unappreciated. Boredom is unappreciated serenity. Maybe you're not bored. Maybe you're just unable to see that this is a perfect moment of quiet.
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Speaker 1And ease and comfort and serenity. Perspective shift. Why do I keep thinking I'm bored when my life is just calm? I didn't even know. What calm was in active addiction. There was no moments of boredom or calm because I was always manipulating my emotions. The research is clear that boredom isn't good or bad. It's a signal. It's your brain telling you your current engagement isn't meeting a need and nudging you to go find something more meaningful. It's information about a gap, not a threat to escape. For us, that reframe is huge because boredom is one of the most reliable relapse triggers. There is when you treat it as data instead of danger, you get to read it. Ask yourself, what am I actually missing right now? Connection, purpose, rest, stimulation, food. The boredom was pointing at the answer the whole time. When I came back in after relapsing after seven and a half years, the first time I had three months and I share this story a lot because it was a monumental in my recovery and my relapse. I was so bored one day. Driving home from the cottage, it did really feel like I was going to die. It felt that dangerous. It takes over your mental capacity, your bandwidth, your emotional capacity. It hijacks your fear and you never think you're going to get out of it. That's the problem with boredom and anxiety is when you're in it, you feel like it's never going to end. You feel like it's never going to pass. And you feel like it's always been this way too. How long have you been depressed for? Oh, I've always been depressed. Really? Have you? Because I just saw you last week and you were laughing at the meeting. You were talking to that guy and joking around and having a great time. Are you, have you always been depressed really? Or do you just think that you've always been depressed and bored? The person you resent is showing you exactly what you're afraid of. Here's an uncomfortable one. The people who get under my skin are usually holding up a mirror and I hate the mirror, not them. Resentment burns hottest when someone has something you want, does something you won't let yourself do, or reflects a trait you can't stand in yourself. Wow. How powerful is that? Does something you won't let yourself do. A perfect example of this is when people get pissed about people going on social media and starting posting and then they just call it cringe. You're upset. Maybe you're upset. at that person because they're doing something that you won't let yourself do. And it's not you want to become a content creator and you're mad that you're not a content creator. It's deeper than that. Whatever the thing is that you're afraid to do, I project it onto that person doing the thing they're afraid to do. Oh, I would never do that anyways. That's so embarrassing. It's just an excuse to keep you stuck so you don't have to face your fear and do the hard thing. Just my opinion. Resentment is expensive and you only pay that price when something's getting poked. So the reframe is, instead of why are they like that, ask why does this specific person cost me this much? Why are they renting so much space in my head? Why does this bother me so much? What is this about? The answer is almost always a fear or a want of yours in disguise. The guy who's too much, maybe you're afraid to take up space. The person who has it easy, maybe you're afraid to take up space. The person who has it easy, maybe you're afraid to take up space. Maybe you're afraid to take up space. The person who has it easy, maybe you're afraid to take up space. You're scared you'll never catch up. This turns your resentment list from a hit list into a treasure map. Every name is a pointer at something in you that wants attention. Yeah, every behavior is an unmet need. I had a therapist tell me that one time. Every single action behavior is an unmet need. A resentment I've been, I carried for a long time and not today. I don't carry it anymore because I've, I've talked about it. I've done the work. You might've heard me talk about it on this podcast is the resentment of successful, rich people, materially successful people. I used to get so angry and so resentful. And now that guy's must've, you know, he's never worked a day in his life. Look at him. He's just lucky. Whenever someone had an expensive watch or an expensive car or expensive clothes, I found that it was me not doing hard things and me grieving the old days, but financial stability. It was me grieving the fact that I had spent all that money in my addiction, resenting the fact that I had blown up my life financially. And today it doesn't rent space in my head. I can simply say, Hey, I'm working, I'm doing better. I'm working on it. This too shall pass. But that resentment will kill you, man. It it's so powerful. I always talk about it. I know, but it's so powerful. It's like a poison inside your body that just compounds every day. Every time I hold a resentment, it's like, I'm just pouring more gas on the fire. The more I don't deal with it. And eventually it just explodes on the people in my life or on myself. Sober firsts, nobody celebrates first sober funeral, first sober breakup. Everybody claps for the first sober birthday, the first sober holiday. Nobody warns you about the first sober funeral, the first sober breakup, the first time your heart breaks and there's no more exit. We celebrate the milestones first, but the ones that actually forge you are the ones nobody throws a party for. The first grief, the first heartbreak, the first genuine crisis you walk through with nothing to numb it. These are hidden opportunities because they're brutal. The first time you feel the full weight of something and don't reach for anything. That's when you find out recovery isn't a theory. It's load bearing. It held. Your foundation worked. It held up. Naming them ahead of time is a gift to you because the unwarned about firsts are where people get blindsided into relapse. I think the, so to reflect on this personally, the first time I lost somebody in recovery was about, I don't know, a year, maybe after my first rehab in Minnesota, I was on a golf course with my dad one day and I got a phone call from somebody from Minnesota at the old treatment center that I went to. And they had informed me that one of the guys there had passed away from overdose. And I remember thinking to myself, because he was doing really well when I was there and he was one of the leaders in the treatment center and the group that of guys that I was in there with. And I looked up to him a lot and he was so positive. His name was Joe. I hadn't thought about him in a while. He was such a positive kid. And I say kid because he was, you know, 20 something back then. And he was so talented musically. And I miss that guy. Now that I think about it, he used to play guitar for us in a group and he was really good. And I remember when I got that phone call, I was just shocked and in denial. And I told my dad about it. And, you know, little did I know that that would be the first of many phone calls that would go like that, unfortunately, but that was, that one hit hard. It hit hard because I hadn't expected it. And I didn't think that somebody like that could relapse that was doing well. in treatment and seemingly had it all figured out and together. And it just reminds you that this addiction thing is not a switch that you turn. This recovery thing is not a switch that you turn on and then it's just set on for life. It's a daily switch that has to be pushed to on often. Sometimes I go and it just shut it off and I stop, I disconnect and I take back my will and I do things that I want to do. And I do things that I act on old behaviors and I do things that don't benefit my recovery. And it's my job to go back and notice that and then turn the switch back on knowing that it'll turn back off at some point or I'll turn it back off at some point. Yeah. I'm the only one that turns it off. There's no, and I'm also the only one that can turn it on too. Interesting to think about. Nobody's going to get you sober. Nobody's going to save your life. No one's coming to save you. No one likes hearing that, but it's true. All you have is your actions today. Using the 2 a.m. scroll as a check-in instead of a spiral. It's 2 a.m. you're scrolling. That's not the problem. The problem or the opportunity is why. The scroll is a symptom. What's it a symptom of tonight? Everybody knows the doom scrolling pattern. Hours go by, you don't even know what happened, how you got there. My brain literally hurts sometimes when I scroll for too long. The 2 a.m. scroll almost never means I love my phone. It means something else is running. Loneliness, dread, avoidance, a feeling you don't want to be alone in the dark with. The phone is just the nearest exit. The reframe. Instead of hating yourself for the scroll, which just adds shame to the pile, use it as a built-in check-in. The scroll is your body raising its hand. Ask it. What am I actually avoiding by being here right now? That question turns a spiral into a data point. How many people just have a hard time sitting in silence with themselves? I know I do. It's gotten better and that's why I started meditating every morning for 10 minutes. It's hard. It's hard to just sit with your own thoughts. It's loud. I don't want to hear half the shit I think about. I am not my thoughts. I have no control. First thought wrong. I have no control over my thoughts. They just pop into my head and that's why I make the video. It's hilarious. I want you to do this. Next time you sit in silence, you can even maybe do it right now. Sit and think, just sit quietly and notice the thought that comes into your head. And then when that thought comes into your head, try to look for the thinker. Okay. I want you to do it now. Look for the thinker. You might want to close your eyes, but look for the thinker. Who's thinking the thought? And do it in the snap of a finger too. Where's the thinker? It's not me. I don't manufacture my thoughts. Sure. I can direct them and start to purposely think of something. But when I sit in silence, a random thing I have to do next week will pop into my head. Or I'll think about something that happened last night that just so irrelevant to the current situation. You didn't come up with that. Where did it come from? You are not your thoughts. Stop identifying with them. What you can build in the hours you used to lose. Do the math on the hours, the using, the recovering from using, the planning, the next, the hiding. That was a part-time job. I would say full-time job, honestly. Recovery didn't give me my life back. It handed me back the clock. Yeah. When you first get sober, you get so much time on your hands. You don't even know what to do with it. I think an alcoholic alone is not a good thing. You don't even know what to do with it. You don't even know what to do with it. You don't even know what to do with it. You don't even know what to do with it. You don't even know what to do with it. You don't even know what to do with it. You don't even know what to do with it. alone is is a very dangerous is an alcoholic and bad company you hear that a lot but it's also you know it's good to sit with yourself sometimes and to be okay with the craziness i don't recommend doing it often and turning it into isolation but there's a lot of power in solace and being able to just be okay with silence no distraction it takes practice but it's worth it it's fun i wouldn't say it's fun but it's fun to try and do it because you realize just how wild your thoughts are and how distracted you want to be and how uncomfortable silence is for us active addiction is a full-time occupation the time spent using is only a fraction of it add the hangovers the scheming the isolation the cleanup the sleeping getting sober doesn't just remove the substance it dumps a pile of reclaimed hours in your lap you and that pile is terrifying because empty time is where a lot of people relapse but it's also the single single biggest hidden opportunity in recovery those hours are raw material, a skill, a body, a business, a relationship rebuild, a podcast maybe, a hobby, drawing, art, making music, journaling, helping others. The reframe is don't just try to fill the time so you don't drink. Build something with it. The goal isn't a busy calendar. It's a life that's actually worth staying sober for. That's it, man. I'm building a life I don't need to escape from today. Sorry, I don't want to escape from today. I don't want to escape. There's nothing for alcohol and drugs to fix right now in this moment. Tomorrow, I don't know. I might spin out and something might be crazy. Hopefully not. Right now, today, as I'm recording this podcast, there is nothing in my life for drugs and alcohol to fix because I realize that my problems are all manageable and that they're not real problems. It's just a perception, lack of perception. I'm just spinning a story as per usual. We are storytellers. I want to challenge you, the listener today, to try this week and just sit with yourself for 10 minutes. No phone, no TV, no distractions. Maybe go to a park if it's tough to do it at home or do it at home. Sometimes I go and lie on my couch and I put my phone on do not disturb and I put a timer on for 10 minutes. I just sit there and I watch my thoughts go by like trains at a train station, like clouds passing. It's amazing. If you continue to do this, what happens? You really start to detach from your thoughts and watch them. Be an observer of your conscious reality. Thoughts are a part of the conscious reality. It's all one. When you realize that, it's very freeing and amazing to be in that space of the sound of the traffic outside. It's in the same moment, happening in the same moment as my thought and my voice coming out of this microphone, into this microphone. It's all one moment. The air conditioning running in the background, which I forgot to turn off, which might make some noise. It's a part of this moment. It's a part of consciousness. Everything is happening right here, right now, around the world, everywhere. This is the only moment that it happens in. The next moment, it changes. Today, this moment is the first time. This moment has ever happened. We're getting deep and philosophical here. Man, I love recovery. Some days are hard, and some days I don't want to do this stuff, this recovery stuff, but most days are just amazing, beautiful gifts. We could have missed it all.
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Speaker 1We could have missed it all. Don't take it for granted. Whatever you're going through right now, whatever you're dealing with, whatever you're feeling, whatever you're not feeling, try to shift your perception on it. Where is the opportunity here? What do I need to work on? Or maybe what do I need to leave alone? Where am I trying to run my life too much? Where am I trying to control too much? Maybe I should just let go. Maybe I should just surrender this thing, this outcome. Maybe it'll happen the way it's supposed to, which will be better than any plan that I had in the first place. Perhaps. It works for me. Turning over my will and my life to that power, is my thoughts and my actions. And turning over my life without turning over my will is easy to do. Turning over my actions. I can do the recovery things and leave the results up to the universe, up to God, up to higher power, whatever you want to call it. But when I don't turn over my will, my beliefs, my thoughts, my opinions, my conclusions, my perspectives, when I don't turn those over and I only turn over my life, my action, the results, it's kind of like me handing the universe, handing God a piece of paper saying, here's my life, God, universe, do with it what you will. But if you, when you get a second, I have this, this is how I think it should go. Just follow my script and then everything will be okay. Okay. God, power greater than myself, universe. I'll turn my life over, but here's how my life should go. Thanks. If no one has told you I love you. And remember, recovery is simple, not easy.
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