The Sober Experience
Recovery and mental health, spirituality and life. We will be sitting down with people in and out of recovery who have helpful tips and shared experiences to provide better love and understanding on this earth. There will be a wide veriaty of topics discussed and after each interview there will be another reflection episode where I can analyze what we spoke of and what sticks to mind.
The Sober Experience
Embracing Authenticity: A Journey from Street Life to Sobriety and Spiritual Growth
Tupac Shakur once said, "I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not." As your host Jay Luis, I've lived by these words, and in this episode of The Sober Experience, I open up about my journey toward authenticity and the resolve it takes to remain true in a world rife with challenges. Through introspection and the power of Tupac's philosophy, I navigate the rough tides of life, sharing my steps to maintain peace and equilibrium. You're invited to listen as I candidly discuss the impact of sobriety on personal accountability and the poignant lessons learned from resisting the seduction of the streets and the instant highs they promise.
The tapestry of my life is woven with vibrant threads of cultural dichotomies, a Puerto Rican Jew finding his footing between the allure of street life and the structured aspirations of my Jewish heritage. I reflect on the pull of immediate gratification and the long-term ambitions that tug in opposite directions. This episode sheds light on the stark realities of street codes, addiction, and the complexities of money, offering a raw narrative of the struggle to carve out an identity and find true purpose. Here, you'll witness the convergence of contrasting worlds, and how they've sculpted the man I am today.
Embarking on a transformative journey from chaos to clarity, I explore the path from substance abuse to sobriety with the guidance of the 12-step AA program. The transformation wasn't just personal; it rippled outward, making me a better friend, son, and father. In a heart-to-heart, I share the profound influence of spiritual living and the music of Drake and Kendrick Lamar on my life, along with the intimate joys of fatherhood. As I recount the pride in my son's growth and our shared experiences, I also highlight the significance of supporting others through recovery, a testament to the healing power of connection and mentorship. Join us on The Sober Experience, where transformations are not just shared—they're celebrated.
Hello and welcome to the Sober Experience, formerly known as the Spiritual Experience, where we share stories of overcoming problematic situations in life through triumph and working together, as well as recovery topics and all other forms of spirituality, self-help and the like. I'm your host, Jay Lewis, and here we go.
Speaker 2:I'm your host, jay Lewis, and here we go. I can't explain why I shine and no one else shines. I think everybody shines in different things. I know how to go to that true spot in myself because I'm there every day. I can be me. I can be whoever. Because I'm true to me, I can go to neutral easily.
Speaker 2:A lot of people black, white, mexican, young or old, fat or skinny have a problem being true to their self. They have a problem looking in the mirror and looking directly into their own souls. The reason I am who I am today is because I can look directly into my face and find my soul is there. It's not sold. I didn't sell it. It's still within me. I still feel it. My heart is still connected to my body. I have to repay for that blessing. It's from God. I have to pay for that by shining. If he gives you the voltage and you waste it, that's the curse. He gave me the voltage. I'm going to shine. It's not mine, it's from God. It's God. All of our gifts and blessings and our strengths and our weaknesses come from God.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man, powerful stuff by the King, tupac Shakur, tupac Amaru Shakur. Yeah, I wonder what he would be saying about all this stuff. It's going down. Hope you guys have been doing well. I know it's been a couple of weeks.
Speaker 1:I took a week off. Yeah, you know, get myself together, give myself a little bit of a break. You know we got the next leg of this year coming up, some more interviews. I hope you guys have been enjoying them. Also, you know my Babylonia sessions and, yeah, what's been going on, man, what's been going on?
Speaker 1:I've been really, you know, only having like a few moments of disturbance, but really I've really been in a good spot. You know, I've been in the grace, you know, and I try not to what. I've been in the grace, you know, and I try not to. Uh, what I've been trying to do is try not to let myself down too much. You know, I a lot of my problems. I, you know, most of them I I do to myself. So I've been doing that and, uh, I've been enjoying, um bro, I've been enjoying the rap battle between Drake and Kendrick Lamar and also all the shit that's been going down in boxing. Yeah, man, ryan Garcia congrats to him, beats the shit out of Devin Haney and then pops for steroids and it just goes to show you, man, there's no listen, there's no like big conspiracy.
Speaker 1:Sometimes, like you know people, they don't want to believe the truth. The truth is is that you can. Just because you didn't get caught with something doesn't mean that you got away. I think that's an important thing that I had to learn in sobriety. Other thing is yeah, man, there's.
Speaker 1:You know, once you surrender to this life, that spiritual life, a life driven by, you know, just like really playing the long game, doing the right thing, trying to be the best person you can be, being accountable, being responsible, you know, and just having like a lot of faith. You know faith not like, oh, you know, I know. You know faith not in the sense of, like you know, the white man in the beard in the sky, but faith in the fact that, like, dude, you got, you know these principles that you want to live by. And, um, I don't even know if you want to live by them or if I I'm going to say you, you means we, means me. I don't know if we want to live by them. I mean, I spent the first good portion of my life, having no faith in any good principles. Like two, you know, good parents, I guess, if you want to call them, you know I just had two humans as parents, you know, which means they did some shit, good shit, some shit, bad shit.
Speaker 1:And you know I was thinking about this the other day because, um, you know, I became very susceptible um to to just all the negative things that bring instant gratification Meaning. You know, when I was a kid, you know I always talk about this, like when I was a kid, I just wanted to be noticed, I wanted to matter. You know, that was it. I always talk about this, like when I was a kid, I just wanted to be noticed, I wanted to matter. You know, that was it. I just want to matter.
Speaker 1:And I didn't know that that's what it was. But that was like this thing that was inside of me. And you know, I don't know if it's that I don't think that I got enough of that from my parents. I had a very overachieving older sister and she was showered with a lot of uh attention, and rightfully so Um me. So, in order for me to get that attention, like I w, I didn't have the same. I didn't. I didn't have the same natural gifts as her. She's way more intellectually, uh, she's way smarter than me. You know and um, you know, I couldn't um yeah, I couldn't.
Speaker 1:I couldn't wait for my own um, you know, my own gifts to unfold. So what was I doing? Anything to get attention. And you can get instant attention with negative stuff, which is why I was like a rotten kid. You know I was a smart ass. Yeah, I was like a rotten kid. You know I was a smart ass. Um, yeah, I was like phony in a lot of ways. It's like, how can somebody be phony and uber sensitive at the same time? That's what I was, you know, because I was just so. I don't know if they didn't teach me or I wasn't willing to learn, or they, yeah, to just the negative attention. It's like, you know what do they say? There's no such thing as bad press. That's what was in my mind. There's no such thing as bad press, you know, and you know that's just what it was. And I was wrapped up in this identity crisis. You know, the identity crisis. It's funny because I'm thinking about it now In a roundabout way, because you know the beef that's going on with Drake, who I love.
Speaker 1:Drake the rapper has, like all of that, bro His, him as the rapper, the persona, whatever, is completely undeniable. The songs are great. His rap lyrics are fucking great, whether he has people writing for him or not or whatever. Yeah, it's great, but then out of the studio, off of the record, he's like the biggest fucking herb. You know, he's like the biggest herb, one million percent. Like you can tell he does not, he's not from I'm going to use air quotes the culture. He's not, even though, like he has brown skin and he talks a lot of. You know what he raps like and I used to say this to my son. I was like he raps like a snotty, rich kid but really really good, you know, except because he's, uh, black, um, he can say the n-word. You know, I wonder what it would sound like if he just never said it, just never said it. I wonder if he would be as famous, because the rest of his raps are like really, yeah, yeah, just like a snotty. You know what he raps like, let's swear to God. Like he wraps like all the public swagger of, like a prep school Jewish kid, and that's because that's what he was. You know, he was a Jewish kid, you know, and I identify because I was a Jewish kid and this is why, like you know, this beef with him and Kendrick is so you know it's so, like I'm all the way in, like I'm watching record by record, record by record, because I know what that's like.
Speaker 1:You know, to have that identity crisis for me as, like the Puerto Rican Jew with white skin, as a white man you know what are they called Like somebody who, like you know, like the trans people or whatever they want to present masculine, like I present as a white person. Meanwhile I am a double minority and I laugh at my kids. You know they're like whatever, because you know they think society just treats me like a white man and in some cases, I'm sure that happens and in whatever privilege that people think that I get, I don't know, maybe I get it, what do I know, but it doesn't mean that's like who I am. Like who I am is a kid that grew up with a Jewish dad, a Jewish grandpa, one Jewish cousin Well, three actually Shout out Stephen and Craig also, but Glenn who's left A Jewish aunt, and that was it. Everybody else was black and brown in my whole family, you know, and my family at the time was very, very close. Now people grow up and they do whatever and they be whatever. So, like as a kid, you're like yo.
Speaker 1:No, no, I'm not white, I'm Puerto Rican, that was my whole story. And I'm not Catholic, I'm Jewish. My sister not Catholic, I'm Jewish. My sister was Catholic. It's bizarre.
Speaker 1:I don't know why my parents did it that way, but that's the way they did it. They raised me in. You know, they didn't raise me. I went to a temple, but I ate. We definitely didn't keep kosher in the house and I ate. I definitely, would definitely, keep kosher in the house and I ate a lot of pork. I still eat pork to this day and you know when you're just starving for that attention.
Speaker 1:You know it just led me down the wrong path and I made a lot of. You know it just led me down the wrong path and I made a lot of silly choices. So then here I find myself in the midst of all those silly choices. Right, I shouldn't say silly choices, but I should just say, yeah, they were just misguided, yeah, misguided choices. So then I start to matter, like you know if you want to use another set of air quotes like in the street.
Speaker 1:So to me, the street is whatever non-conventional, you know, environment, like I wasn't going to school, I was in the street. And when I was in the street, I was having the time of my life. I was having the time of my life because then I felt like alive, it's like dude. Now, yeah, I'm there, I'm like Puerto Rican Jared, I guess, if you want to say it like that, you know whatever. But meanwhile, but I also like, really identified and got exposed to I'm not going to say like Jewish, like religion, but like a lot of the cultural things that Jews live with or that they're taught, you know, but I just couldn't shake the street. I just couldn't. I couldn't because it was just, it was instant gratification where, like you know, jewish kids that I knew from Hebrew school and then eventually a little bit of high school, like bro, they were like playing the long game because their parents told them like dude, you got to stay out of trouble, you got to do good in school.
Speaker 1:You have to start a business or you have to become a highly functioning professional and you got to go after that fucking money. You have to go after that money and you have to stay localized as far as your dating preferences, you know whatever. Like dude, you got to marry a Jewish girl, you got to start a business, you got to be successful. You got to send your kids to summer camp, like all of that stuff. The pressure was really on them.
Speaker 1:But they're in an environment, insulated that's what I meant to say. Insulated in that environment where everybody else is doing that and there's very few Jewish kids that I grew up with that didn't marry Jewish people. You know, and I know because I'm a motherfucking Jew and you know what? None of them, uh, ever really rejected me. You know, which was cool? Because they were, I mean, technically. You know, my mom is a Catholic but when I was born they converted me right away and that's how I became a Jew and yeah, and that's how I was raised.
Speaker 1:So, just in that environment, in that cultural environment, you know, there are people who end up also being susceptible to veering off of that path because their parents have some bread and they spoil them. And there were kids that I hung out with, that I went to school with, that had fucking credit cards in high school that their parents paid for and had brand new cars and their own phone line and all this other stuff. And I know it may sound silly, but this is like in the 90s, in the mid-90s, a kid having their own phone line. Forget about having a cell phone or a beeper that I went out in the street and that I got, but because my parents would never buy me that. But, like you know, yeah, they had their own phone line. So weird, so yeah.
Speaker 1:So spoiled Jewish kids who ended up getting hooked on drugs and drinking and thinking that they could just party their way for a while and then somebody would from the community, because of who their dad is or who their cousins are. They would wake up and it would be like a phase for them where partying and being wild was actually my family's. It wasn't a phase. That was what my family was, you know. That's just what it was, and they never. That was our lifestyle. So I was, like you know, exposed to all of these things and still craving for that attention, which is why I ended up the way that I did.
Speaker 1:Now there were people in you know who are in the street, you know in the city. They call you know, I'm from upstate. So upstate was like oh, I was in the street. In the city they call like oh, you know I'm from upstate. So upstate was like oh, I was in the street. In the city they call like oh, you know, off the corner. Like there were people who were, they went on the corner and they stayed on the corner or whatever right.
Speaker 1:So there were people who were in the street that had because they had to survive in that street and it wasn't just like you know some kind of layover. You know some of them. There was a code and there were principles that people allegedly lived by. Now there's always a lot of principles that they all get broken and there's consequences when they get broken. You steal from your friends, friends, they fuck you up, you know, and not like a little bit, they beat the shit out of you. You know, you violate, you know this code and there's immediate repercussions, you know, just immediate.
Speaker 1:And I violated a lot of those codes because that that street life, like I didn't have it all the way inside inside me. You know I stood next to people who had it all the way inside of them, but there were definitely because I was addicted to drugs. When you're on drugs, the whole code goes out the window. So I was just taking hostages with friends, girlfriends, ex-girlfriends, sister, like whatever, and that's a huge no-no. I was doing that kind of stuff. So I was like doing that kind of stuff. So I was like you know, I was just, I was a sad case because there was no way if I would have stayed moving like that, something bad would have eventually happened to me. Um, you know, I stood next to people who really stood tall and that's another reason why nothing really happened to me by even the little community in my family, like my dad and my cousin Glenn, and just the other kids that I knew that I always figured out a way to make money. I figured out I could always figure out a way to make money. That was the good part. The bad part was what to do with the money when you make it. So the money that I would make, I would never really get into too much trouble. You know, obviously.
Speaker 1:You know I've been arrested a few times here and there, whatever. It's funny because I say it like it's not. I've never been to prison. I mean, I've been to jail, but I've never been to prison and I've never been convicted of a felony um or misdemeanors. Maybe, I don't know, I'm trying to remember whatever, maybe the drinking and driving stuff with misdemeanors. So what I'm saying to say is that like I was never all the way in anywhere Never, you know, because that would require commitment and that would require dedication, and the only thing I was dedicated to was alcohol, drugs and self. You know, self-preservation.
Speaker 1:I can say one thing of the G-code, the street code, whatever, that nobody could ever say that I was a snitch. I never ratted on anybody in my life. Now, it doesn't mean I never stole from anybody. There were people that definitely that I stole from, um, mostly people who loved me. I'm trying to remember if I ever, really, really well, no, I never really stole from anybody who I considered a friend. So I didn't do that. That I didn't do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I guess you know I find my way into recovery, you know, with this huge identity crisis. You know I'm working a white collared life, living a blue-collared life, both of them illegal. I wasn't doing anything crazy in the street, but I was hanging out in the street but I was definitely doing crazy things for work that could have landed me in a lot of trouble. So that duality or whatever that I had, I wrote it and it got really exasperated and I had arrived, I made it and it almost killed me, literally almost killed me. I was just like suffocating, you know, suffocating from self, and how many more, you know.
Speaker 1:When you live that kind of life, it's just there's deception around every corner, masqueraded as you know the next right move, and just slime and filth. Moral filth, you know, emotional filth, slime. What do you call it? You know I had at that time the code was no code, you know, and there were people who loved me and I don't know why, because there was something in them. There was something in them. So then I get sober, I join 12 steps AA. I got good sponsorship. Sorry about that. I just touched one of the buttons. Yeah, I had good sponsorship, and the program worked and I read a lot of books and I started to do the work on myself.
Speaker 1:Now, what ended up happening for me was, you know, I ended up learning a lot about who I was, who I wanted to be, who I wasn't and what it was going to take for me to get there. Somebody with principles, somebody who can stand on their word, you know, somebody who has integrity, regardless and looking for and searching for all of these things, somebody who's a good friend, somebody who's a good son, somebody who's a good dad, a good human, and without getting, because the thing is from doing that being that it was an introduction to that kind of spiritual life there's no immediate gratification, it's all like long-term shit Like this is just going to be who I am and I ain't going to get famous for it and aren't going to know. Anonymous people aren't going to know, like when I was a young kid and we were doing donuts with my car in the middle of the street and I was hanging out the window or the sunroof holding on with a bottle of Clico, shirt off, chain out people who don't know you will notice. But when you're just like staying low, pain out, like you know People who don't know, you will notice, you know. But when you're just like Staying low, one foot in front of the other, outside of the mayhem, outside of the the arena, and you're just Like a farmer Just doing his thing, the only people who know Are the people you're with.
Speaker 1:And going back to that battle beef, I identify with who Drake is, as he is my former self, which is why I love his songs. You know, I love his songs. It's all theater. And then, with Kendrick Lamar, he's the guy up until now who has the principles and not the principles of perfection, like when he's talking, it's about the pillars of what it is to be a stand up, to be a man, and he's trying to live like that and he's trying to raise his kids that way, even if one of them allegedly may not be his, you know he's giving them the wisdom as he's getting it, and that's the thing that was happening with myself and my son as I was raising him.
Speaker 1:Some of you guys know or don't know, if you're new listeners, my son is 29 years old and I got custody of him when he was about 8 years old. So he lived with me full time from 8 until he moved out, which is not that long, you know, 8 to whatever. From 8 to, I don't know, maybe 24, 23, 24, when he finally moved out of the house. From 8 to I don't know, maybe 24, 23, 24, when he finally moved out of the house, you know, after he was done with college and he was fucking around, whatever right. Then he got his own crib with his girl, you know. But as I was learning how to be a farmer, like my son saw both dads. He knew the first years of his life.
Speaker 1:Those aren't things that go away. That I'm, that I was rolling hard with with my friends, that they also had kids the same age, and we all had babies young, and we all drank and drugged every day and we all left and we, you know, yeah, we just lived that life, the life of any one of my cousins. Same life. You know the ones that chose that path. Same life, you know. My son grew up when he was a kid. Until I got custody of him, he grew up in a house where the people rolled blunts in the kitchen and there were pit bulls downstairs and people played video games and some people were in and out of jail and there were kids running around and not a lot of supervision and a lot of uncertainty. His mama loved him. I know that. I know that, you know, and she's also evolved into a good woman, you know.
Speaker 1:But the good thing about having kids when I was young, having a son when I was young, is that, as I transformed, I got lucky enough, by the grace of God, to get sober and to be around men who would really challenge me In the ways that I moved, like you know. Yeah, challenge me in the ways that I moved, in the decisions that I made While sober, and as I was evolving, I got to teach my son all of those pillars that maybe you see in movies about street guys. You know the integrity. You stand on your word. I was telling the same thing. Stand on your word. Be good to your people. Stand on your word. I was telling the same thing. Stand on your word. Be good to your people and love your mama. That's it. You know what I'm saying. And just by being like what's the four, one of the four agreements? Be impeccable with your word. You know, do that, live like that, be that. You know.
Speaker 1:So, while I've turned into that and that's who I am right now, the biggest blessing that I have is that my son has been that person. He just has, and he's not been in the street. You know. He's been able to be himself. Just like Pac said, he can look in his soul and know who he is and know that he's evolving, knows that he's changing. But he started at a way higher plane than me. It didn't help I mean it didn't help. It didn't hurt that he's a strikingly handsome kid and he's been like that his whole life, like he probably never had to put on a show to. You know, get to first base with any chick Ever.
Speaker 1:Meanwhile, I always thought I had to. Whether I did or not is up for debate. Obviously, some of you have seen my wife. She's a motherfucking 12. So there's that. So, even when I got introduced to the love of my life, to my wife and she is the love of my life the amount of change that I had to do then that I talk about all the time he got to witness that and I got to tell him, look, talk about all the time he got to witness that and I got to tell him, look, this is where I was wrong, not only the way that I spoke to this person, but the way that I thought about this person and I kept him in tight with me the whole time. There's nothing that has gone on in my life that he doesn't know about Whether the bag was up, where I had good money, where I lost all the money, where I had crazy chicks, where I was the crazy person and the chick was the same person, aborted babies. All of that, everything and every mistake and every lesson, like I gave it to him, and I think him living through those lessons with me really helped him in ways that number one.
Speaker 1:It makes it harder for him to connect with people his age unless they're also like emotionally advanced, even his own partner. There's a disconnect, and I understand it, and it doesn't mean that she's a bad person because she's not, and I understand it and it doesn't mean that she's a bad person because she's not. But you know that he got to, yeah, he got to live that experience that I believe wholeheartedly that if I started to have kids now maybe 45, maybe even 35, you know, by time, then the lessons would have been learned. And then I'm just preaching to my kids and wondering why they don't fucking hear me. When my son was right there with me when electricity was getting turned off, you know, when, you know, electricity was getting turned off and we were eating canned chicken from Costco in the pan. He knows how to make all that shit.
Speaker 1:Because I was turning over a new leaf and it took me a while to learn how to get on my feet financially without cutting a corner. And he was with me and I would never completely, completely drown because I have a family who also believed in me. But I would, but I wanted to stand on my own feet, not like in an ignorant way. Like you know, I don't want to take advantage of people. That's what I did my whole life. I took advantage of people who love me, of people. That's what I did my whole life.
Speaker 1:I took advantage of people who love me and so, like I could dig myself in a hole and guess what I could call my mama and my mama can help me get out of the hole, and then I could do it again and woe is me. And oh, I have this. Yeah, I didn't let you know it's. It's hard not to. Uh, you know it's hard to. You know, the likelihood of that happening is very small for people who don't have that kind of safety net. You know that they don't have nobody to come save them. So I had to learn how to be that person, how to act like nobody was going to come save me, like nobody was going to notice me when I was doing the right thing, when I was being the right person, you know.
Speaker 1:And that took a lot of faith and I built a huge relationship with God by making those choices, one choice at a time and not all of them the right ones, specifically when it comes to the romance and finance. You know, until now. And now, even now, I'm like I beat myself up over the money, shit, you know. But meanwhile I'm doing okay, I'm pretty okay, very okay, you know. But you know, you make those choices and you become that person. It's taken almost 21 years, you know. And now the people who are in my life, they don't even know that other guy, they don't. They never met him. They never met Unreliable. They never met unreliable. They never met full of shit. They never met taking advantage. They never met him. And it feels good, it does feel good, and then I get the. You know, now I'm getting these kind of like I said little accolades.
Speaker 1:When they asked me to come speak at this event, they elected me to be the president of the Coney Island polar bears. I ran unopposed. I don't know why. In my mind, maybe nobody else wanted the job. I didn't want the job, which is why I was perfect for the job. Somebody nominated me. They thought I'd be good for the job as a vice president. I was like all right, cool, I'm down to serve. Then, at the last minute, give me the switch rule. Like no, we're going to make you the president and it's not because I was the last one on the list or because I'm a funny person or none of that. I don't even ask them why, but apparently I'm worthy, apparently I'm worthy, and I get these messages. You want to know what makes my day? This is what makes my day. Shout out to my boy, matt, you know, sent me a message on Wednesday, you know, says just wanted to give you a shout out. I remember when you came down here, which is Florida, that you don't drink. I've been sober for two years and you've helped with that process. Thanks, sir. That was like 10 years ago that I was down there.
Speaker 1:I don't know what kind of impression I'm leaving on people about who I am. Maybe they're watching me, maybe because they see me on social media, that that's really me when they hear these shows which have been going around the country and around the planet a little bit at a time, and then they come across the kid, it's really me and I let him know. And I've been. You know, I've had a few rough days, you know, just mentally, nothing bad going on. I get this depression because I'm supposed to be responsible and I hate doing that, but I, I push through and I try not to go crazy. And then so I said my brother, you just made my day. And then I said, seriously, I said I was angry because Ryan, ryan Garcia, you know he tested positive for the Haney fight and now I get this. It's beautiful, you hit me up if you ever need anything B, even if you wasn't sober, but I'm glad you are.
Speaker 1:And that's somebody that I knew from motherfucking junior high school that 10 years ago, whatever, I was down in Florida and I was in Palm Beach. No, it was eight years ago. Seven, eight years ago I went down there to do some leather restoration classes with my boy, diego, and then I met up with him because he lived down there in Palm Beach, and there was another guy that lived down there that I went to high school with, but him I didn't motherfucking like, so I made no, we make no attempts to be around each other and it's, we would probably get along really well. And this guy, matt, he said, he says I don't know why you don't get along with Zepa, and I'm like dude, fuck that motherfucker. And maybe because I'm a khaki at Brave all the way inside my heart. And that guy went to Pomona and that was our junior high school rivalry and I will be a khaki at Brave my whole life, all right. So that was like on Wednesday.
Speaker 1:And then, you know, shout out to these are like little love bombs, you know. And then my boy, ken, you know, sent me today, 926 AM. Hey brother, I hope all is well. Today is my one-year anniversary. Sober Wanted to let you know that you're a huge part of me getting here. I'm always here for you, but I'll always remember being five days and that meeting with you. Appreciate you, but I'll always remember being five days in that meeting with you. Appreciate you, brother.
Speaker 1:Somebody else who reached out to me after listening to these shows and seeing my social media posts, somebody that I went to high school with. That I fucking love this guy and he's struggling and I went all the way upstate in the middle of the week to be with him, take him to a meeting, sit down with him and guess what? I haven't been able to make it up there since, so 360 days. But I've been texting him and calling him and talking to him and it's a beautiful thing and he made it. I said the same thing you just made my day and I'm so proud of you.
Speaker 1:I said now, you know it can be done, you can help anybody else. And he says, yes, sir, I love helping other people, so that's the payoff, man, it's not about me. My son gets to be the person who I always wanted to be on the inside. He gets to be him, and I get to see that. And that's what my name rings out because of who he is, not because of who I am, and I just wanted my whole life for my name to ring out. And when these people who I help on my way, when they touch me with these messages letting me know the impact I had on them, yeah, man, that's what we do it for, because it's for them, it ain't for us.
Speaker 1:My boy, doug, he's probably got 100 days now. It's amazing, but we've got to stay close and we got to stay consistent. You know? Look, he just texted me 11 am Greenwood tomorrow. Yes, sir, you know. So anyway, polar bear season's over. I love you guys. Um, like and subscribe on all podcast platforms, yeah, you know, including our YouTube channel, the Sober Experience. I'll be sure to keep everybody posted about what's going on. I love you all, peace.