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
Owning Who We Are When We Become Aware.
This episode invites you on a heartfelt exploration of learning from both personal missteps and the experiences of others, all while embracing shared vulnerabilities. I kick things off by sharing my personal journey toward positivity and gratitude and how these practices shape mental and emotional wellness. The episode also teases the potential introduction of interviews with loved ones, adding a layer of depth to future discussions. Together, we navigate the complexities of maintaining positivity in our daily routines and underscore the significance of spiritual and emotional wellbeing.
Reflecting on my early sobriety, I delve into the transformative power of recovery retreats, including the invaluable Matt Talbert retreats that provided a sanctuary for connection and guidance. These experiences were pivotal in my journey of choosing sobriety to be present for my son. Through stories of temptation and self-discipline, I highlight the importance of community and the ongoing quest for personal development. My narrative emphasizes how listening to impactful talks and working through recovery steps can open new avenues for self-reflection and personal insights, driven by a sincere desire for growth and transformation.
The episode closes with a poignant examination of memory, identity, and the longing for connection. Through the lens of capturing fleeting moments in photographs, I question personal beliefs on privacy and the sanctity of memories while grappling with feelings of vulnerability. A heartfelt plea for understanding and acceptance from family underscores the universal necessity for connection and reassurance. As we ponder the shared human experience, the episode offers comfort in the reminder that we are never truly alone on our journeys. Each chapter weaves together themes of accountability, growth, and a deeper quest for meaning, inviting listeners to reflect on their own paths with intention and empathy.
When men fall, don't laugh. Learn. Learn Because you're on your way up and the things that tempt people to fall. You and I are not free from that temptation, nor from the weakness that will cause us to stumble and fall. When you laugh at somebody else's fault white or black, rich or poor, your enemy or your friend you are laughing and opening a way for your own demise. When you do that because to laugh and not learn, to make mockery and not to understand is to make the same mistake yourself. Did you hear me? Yes, sir.
Speaker 2:All right, all right, sober experience. We are back. That was this week's words from the minister man, powerful Jesus. I know he don't really believe in Jesus, but me neither. Maybe he's around, I don't know. I'm sure he was somebody important. Excuse me, we're all somebody important. Yeah, yeah, man, that was powerful stuff. Anyway, hope you guys are doing great. Hope you guys enjoyed the first step workshop that we did together.
Speaker 2:I don't know how many weeks that was, it was a bunch of weeks and yeah, we're gonna put the step work down for a little bit. I'm just gonna do like a little solo dolo. You know, check in with you seeing how you's doing. And you know I was asking I actually asked my boy, doug, if he thought, yeah, maybe we should throw in like an interview in between each step. It's been a while since we had somebody come sit down. You know I'm like milling around or whatever. People are talking, people are squawking. You know we'll get a guest. I have like one or two in mind that I really want to sit down with and I'm going to. It's always a little bit, you know, it's a little bit strange. I wouldn't say strange, I'd say it's a little awkward when I ask people to come and be on the show, because typically, almost every time it's somebody that I know, it's somebody that I know, somebody that I love, somebody that I respect, and that love and respect sometimes doesn't make it easy for them to say no, which I understand Completely. But yeah, yeah, I think I should still do it.
Speaker 2:Anyway, it's been a pretty crazy week, pretty good week. You know, I had a God moment. You know that lasted a few days and I'll share it with you guys and yeah, it was pretty serious. I thought, you know, I, I don't know, I don't know what to say. Really, I just I was listening. You know, I was contemplating, not even sharing about it, which means that that's exactly what I should do is I should share about it, right? And the thing is, this is not really a meeting. Well, it's a meeting. In your ear it's not really a meeting, but maybe it can be helpful for somebody. And I don't have to get too specific, I can just kind of lay the groundwork of what transpired between Tuesday and today. So, anyway, I was listening to one of these AA speakers. I listen to AA NA every.
Speaker 2:You know I run, right to when I get up in the morning, you know I run right to when I get up in the morning. You know I run in my YouTube. Well, after I, you know I pray, you know I touch my wife appropriately, skin on skin, and I just thank God. I say God, thank you, this is my wife and this is my life and thank you for sending her here to take care of my fucking crazy ass. That's one. Two thank you for another opportunity to do you proud.
Speaker 2:Today, boy and I hop out of bed, feed the cats, do a little coffee and then, you know, but almost instantly, right away, I go. You know my YouTube algorithm is just positive things. I have to start my day on a positive note and not always like on a motivational note, like you gotta go out there and kill. Today, you know, really just spiritual wellness, mental and emotional wellness. I need that stuff Instantaneously. So I'm running right to my higher power, running right to God, by just getting my mind right away, you know, right away, and it's very, it's impactful, because when I deviate from that thing, from that recipe, you know, then it turns into something else. I don't fall apart the first day, you know, just like anything else, I don't. It's easy for me to be good, but I have a hard time staying good, if that makes sense. I heard that too and I really identified with that. Yeah, I can be good for like a day, but I cannot stay good on my own. Don't ask me how I know. So I have to really be consistent because I have all these emotional and mental hang-ups that don't allow me to have peace without all of you, me to have peace without all of you, without the king, and without acknowledgement of all the wonderful opportunities I have in my life to be impactful on people that I come across, on people that I come across Saying that, to say this, I'm listening to one of these speakers and it's like a two-guy speaker thing and it's funny because they were recording the speakers at a retreat that I've been dodging for I don't know how many years.
Speaker 2:I used to go on these retreats all the time. These AA retreats they were Matt Talbert retreats, so they were technically not AA and they were a huge part of my early recovery to be with guys over the weekend, three days, just AA meetings, and like no-butt stuff. Or maybe there was, but you know, whatever, I don't know, I don't know it wasn't no-, no butt stuff. For me, point is is that you spend three days no phones, no, nothing, working on yourself and getting a lot of guidance from people who've been around for a long time. You know I technically have been around for a long time. You know I technically have been around for a long time 21 years.
Speaker 2:On the 29th of this month, my boy Jim made a joke in the meeting he's like who got sober on October 29th? And the truth is is I was bouncing in and out of meetings that my boy Jay Jigga was bringing me to and you know something stuck that my boy Jay Jigga was bringing me to and you know Something stuck, and what stuck was, if I drink on the 29th, I have to take my kid trick or treating In two days, which I will not show up for, and I will leave that little boy At the time I think he was seven or eight years old. I will leave him Somewhere, somewhere in my mom's house, in his mom's house, like wherever he would be at with my sister in a costume, waiting for his dad. You know, reminding me of that little ghost kid that is in that movie with Kevin Costner which the name escapes me, but it's a beautiful movie where he played this guy Butch and he was like an outlaw and he just like had this little kid with him and I think the little kid was like maybe a born again Christian or something or Jehovah, and he, you know, the kid never had Halloween. It, it's a great film. It's a great film. Um, I hope you guys need to google it. It was really good. He played a guy butch.
Speaker 2:Anyway, point of the story is, you know, I drank on the 29th. I'm not sober. The 31st I I'm not even around. I'm laying face first wherever I'm at, hopefully with whomever I'm with, or many times by myself. Okay, so what I'm saying is that this retreat that I've been dodging they record these two guys at and then they put it on YouTube and it just happens to show up in my algorithm and it's pretty fucking good and it's really straightforward and deep and all kind of stuff.
Speaker 2:You know, similar to what the minister was talking about, that at any given time, there will always be temptations and not just temptations for like blowing everything up at once, but like temptations to deviate. You know, and this guy and the more that you surrender to those temptations to deviate from the discipline of just trying to be the best or trying your best, yeah, and seeing that God is on the other side of that, your connection with God is on the other side of you trying your best. And for somebody like me who is an addict, alcoholic, addicted to self-destruction in all these little ways, addicted to wasting my own time, yeah, you know God is on the other side of that. When I don't do that, oh my God, it's incredible. But on my own it's impossible. But that's just me. Some people, they have it all. I don't have it.
Speaker 2:So these guys are yapping and it's getting so deep that I can't listen to it all the way through. And then I send it to my boy, ben, and my other boy and Doug, who I talk about a lot, who I love a lot, boy ben and my other boy, uh, and doug, who I talk about a lot, who I love a lot, and um, when he gets his year he's gonna be on this show and um, he will deserve that and we will be grateful. We are grateful for him. Doug is a fucking man, bro. He really is a sweet, sweet kid anyway.
Speaker 2:So about halfway through I have to stop and like it's so impactful, the guy's speech is so impactful and for me he touched on something that I don't know if I've been avoiding it, but it's been like. It's kind of like when there's a light in a room and the light is kind of flickering, but not bright off. Bright off like brown, like a little dimple, I get these little signals that maybe I should look at something, and it's painful. And this guy hit the nail right on the fucking head he did. What he said was that he was working his ninth step. I don't know what part of his recovery this was.
Speaker 2:When you work these steps, you know you work them, so you learn how to work them and then, as things unfold because we're a lot of times we're the last to know you can utilize the step of like oh my God, I forgot about this. Oh, it didn't dawn on me that this is what was going on, because your perspective changes on your life as you evolve, and then you can look back and be like wow, man, you know people say that you know the story of how I grew up changes the longer I stay sober, and that's the truth. You know, it wasn't all crazy, it was a little crazy. It's a little crazy. You know, I come from a wild family. You know, if you shake the family tree, you know, bottles and cocaine packages fall out of the tree, and some crack cocaine vials too. It all falls out. So we're littered everywhere with it.
Speaker 2:Point is, the longer I stay sober, you know, the more perspective I get and the more things that become. Um, it see, it seems like it's brand new information to me, but it's really not, and this was one of those things. So the guy, he's sober for a while and he gets to his ninth step or whatever, or he's doing a ninth. Whatever he's doing, he's making amends, made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. I said that off the top of my brain Because I'm the motherfucking man, bro. Anyway, now in this guy's history he terminated some pregnancies, or he participated in the termination of pregnancies, or he participated in the termination of pregnancies, meaning that, you know, he was with somebody, they were pregnant and between the two of them they came up, or maybe it was her choice or maybe his coercion or whatever, but he aborted some babies and and I was like fuck man, I know I've done that, I've been a part of that, you know I have, and it was, it was heavy. So what he said, and he said this specifically he said he had, he, you know, he didn't know how to cry, and then he is, it hurt him when he thought about it and I'm thinking about it now and it hurts, and I'm thinking about it now and it hurts, you know and he said that he went and he wrote that baby a letter Making an amends, saying sorry, and, bro, I had to stop the fucking thing right there. Boom, holy shit. That was one of those things that I wish I never heard, because now I can't make pretend that I don't know, right, I can't make pretend that there's not a way of acknowledgement, not just to myself but to them, to them. And man, it was. It's still tough now thinking about it to them. And man, it was. It's still tough now thinking about it.
Speaker 2:As I was going through it when I'm listening to this guy and I made myself, it took me like, I think, the whole speech, the whole story, whatever I mean, that was a piece of the story, but I was a heavy piece, man. It took me like three hours to listen to something that's only an hour Cause I had to keep stopping and keep pondering and keep connecting and keep asking myself questions that I already knew the answer to. How many times have you done that and were cavalier at the time? How do you live in peace, knowing that you ended a life. Yeah, so that was on a Tuesday, right, and there was not one instance when that didn't like.
Speaker 2:It's when people say stuff about abortion, like people using it for birth control, in a very negative way. I don't know about anybody else, so I'm going to speculate from my own experience. I never completely walked away from those situations when they were finished, like I never like skipped away happy. It was always part of me that believed that I did something. I can't say something wrong, but something not right, if that makes any sense. So that was on Tuesday and it stayed with me and I didn't want to share it really with my wife and who wants to get into a whole conversation about that with with them, you know, because it's been, you know, throughout my life.
Speaker 2:And, um, so on the next day, which is the wednesday, where I go to my men's meeting, where I've known these guys for a long fucking time, basically almost the same group of guys I share about it, I was like this guy said this thing, this motherfucker, you know, and I know that the obstacle is the way if I want, what did I say? This motherfucker, you know, and I know that the obstacle is the way, like that's the way. If I want what did I say? If I want to get closer to my higher power, get closer to peace, I need to walk through. I can't even say walk through that fire, because that's bullshit. I need to stand up and show up and fucking pay what I owe and I owe at minimum acknowledgement. That's the foundation, the ground floor. I owe acknowledgement. I already live with remorse to some degree, yeah, but I owe that.
Speaker 2:So I tell them about this thing and I'm like this fucking guy, you know Jesus. So he says that, whatever I share about it and the room is heavy, you know, because there's not too many guys that I know I'd say 70% of people that I know have aborted a child, aborted a pregnancy whatever language that you need to know Aborted or pregnancy, whatever language that you need to know. You know they have this thing where people will say, like I saw this guy who's like this kid, like a snarky kid, interviewing people on the street. You know young people talking about abortion and there and there was young girls and they always do this shit. They get to like these little gotcha moments with like these young college kids, and then those are the ones that go viral.
Speaker 2:I'm like, dude, you're talking to a young person who is inexperienced, because if they are experienced they can say which is what I've known any person to say who's been through this situation that it fucking sucks, bro, it fucking sucks that you leave a piece of you wherever that is. Anyway, so he says to this girl, like this young girl, he's like. You know my body, my rules, it's not a baby, you know. They start arguing whether or not it's a baby before this, try me before these weeks, before this that. And then he says he's like. You know, in California if you kill somebody who's pregnant, you get charged with double homicide. Do you know why that is? And the girl was like I don't know, I don't understand why you're asking that question. It's like because the state of California believes that that baby is a life enough to give you some prison time for extinguishing it. That's what he said to the girl.
Speaker 2:And it wasn't on accident that none of this stuff is on accident that I listened to this speaker. You know I go to this meeting. I share about it because it's so impactful. Then I happen to see that real in my algorithm. I don't know why, but it was just whatever in my twitter thing and I'm like I and I'm like what you know, god, are you how many fucking times you're gonna throw this in my face in three days? I know it's a life, man. I know it's a life and I know it's not 100% my choice, but I know I participated in it in many ways. In many ways I participated in it.
Speaker 2:I didn't just leave it up to somebody else. I was Putting my foot down and being like we can't have a baby, I don't want a baby. We can't have a Like I don't want a. You know, I already had my son when I was Fucking 15 years old and it was so. It was a fork in the road when my life went that I wouldn't be here with you if that didn't happen. But there's no way that I could have and raise one more kid than the one that I had, and my kid was a beautiful kid. He is a beautiful kid, you know. Oh my God, I would make a hundred of them. My son is everything to me and I don't know if I have any more everything to give, because at the time I was still giving my addiction everything More than I was giving my son yeah. So there's that and I was conscious of that. I was conscious of that and I didn't even want my son when he came.
Speaker 2:I've shared this many times before on this show. You know the circumstances for his arrival were, you know, as best decision making as a 15 year old kid could make With, like an 18 year old girl. Nobody's telling anybody's parents. It's a fucking whatever. I'm thinking that she's going to terminate the pregnancy. She ends up not doing it, like whatever. It doesn't matter. I don't blame her. I have a lot of love for her to this day. You know it's my son's mama and he loves her and I love her for that. You know. I do so Saying that, to say that I had a role to play and I had To start sweeping up my side of the street and God is Fucking backing me into a corner With this stuff.
Speaker 2:I don't know if maybe I ignored or just yeah, if I just kept it hidden in this little box, but it was time. So now we get to Thursday and I call Yariv share about. I'm going to have to go and meet God and I got to face these children and I'm going to take a page out of that guy's book and I'm going to write these letters. Now the guy said that he never cried in recovery and he started writing these letters and tears started falling out of his face uncontrollably, because he realizes how much he loves his children now and I know how much I love my son and I know how much I love my other two kids, my stepkids, but they're my kids. You know, the step part is I don't know what do you call that, whatever. You know the step part is, I don't know what do you call that, whatever, it's a label, but I love them, I do and I torture them because I love them.
Speaker 2:So I tell Yariv brother more has been revealed and he's like Jared, it's beautiful. Oh man, it's beautiful. Heavy stuff, good stuff, heavy, yeah, good. So I tell him, and this is what I'm going to do, because I commit to him, I say it in the meeting the day before like it's an idea, and the next day when I commit to my sponsor, that means I'm committing to myself and to another human being and to God what I'm going to do, you know. So I say to myself okay, and the whole time I'm still showing up for life and I'm not letting this impending experience hinder me from it's actually propelling me a little bit to be consistent. You know I've been consistent with be. You know to be consistent. You know I've been consistent with the working out. I've been consistent Preparation I've been preparing myself because I know I'm going to go into that dark fucking corner. Bro, I'm going to go there and I know because this is the fucking way and this is part of who I want to be and and who I want to be is accountable to other people that they deserve that dignity, they deserve that respect. Yeah, and at the same time, I'm like not trying not to be strange about it.
Speaker 2:In my home and at work or whatever, I'm playing it cool, sean, playing it cool. Saturday morning comes. I'm like, okay, I'm going to go to my shop on Saturday and because I pawned out the work to one of my guys so I didn't have to work Saturday, I knew I had time to do what I had to do and that was good. It was going to be like the big fucking brouhaha, right, whatever, I'm going to make a thing out of it. And Saturday starts off in the morning and the day went how it went, and I'm thinking to myself, as I'm going to Home Depot, getting this, getting that, whatever, doing some stuff, dropping off laundry, I was like I don't have to go anywhere. I can just go and go to the Chinese dollar store, get a marble notebook. Go to Dyka Park park my van up. I didn't have to make it this whole ceremonious thing. I'm thinking to myself, I'm about to write a letter to my other children and that's heavy. And I'm thinking to myself, I can get a big cup of coffee and a cigar and turn it into, quote unquote, an event. Right, I didn't do any of those things, minus the Dyka Park part. What I did was oh, one more thing. This happened before that happened. I'm sorry I'm skipping around.
Speaker 2:So on the Friday before the Saturday, I am sitting in my van and I'm preparing myself. This is part of the preparation I said I need to do like a in between Wednesday and Friday, when I'm speaking to Yariv, you know, and I'm telling him, I'm like dude, you know what? And this is coming on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, the holiest of holies from my birth people I'm a Puerto Rican Jew that this is all culminating on these days. And he's laughing. He's like, oh, because you know he's Israeli and he's a Jew. He's like you're getting in touch with your roots and I'm like whatever you know, because I'm not super religious, but it doesn't mean that I don't belong to a people, because I do, anyway.
Speaker 2:So I'm sitting in my van and I'm saying to myself this is on Friday, sorry, we'll get to Saturday. So I'm saying to myself I'm like dude, I should do a meditation on this, because it's starting to weigh a little bit on me, because the next morning I'm making the plan to go do the thing. So I go and I put on like a 10 minute meditation. I said let me find now I'm feeling extra hebrew. I said let me find a jewish meditation, 10 minutes, whatever, and it's in english, but it's talking about there's only one god and that's what the whole meditation is.
Speaker 2:And within the first and it's only 10 minutes I said I could do the 10 minute meditation. Then I have to go do this other thing, this work thing. This is after I went to a meeting. So I'm setting the stage, you know, because I know that this is a big thing. So I went to a meeting at 3.30, this is like now. It's like and I had some sushi at 5, so by 6 o'clock I'm sitting outside this UPS store where I have to clean the carpet. Whatever I said, okay, I'm going to do this meditation.
Speaker 2:So what happens is is that maybe I don't know a minute into the meditation, the guy's like okay, take your hands and put them over your eyes. If you're sitting up or if you're laying down, put both hands over your eyes, like your palms. And he just keeps talking and keeps talking. And the whole time I'm saying to myself my arms are getting tired, I don't want to do this, I don't want to be here, I don't want to be me, I don't want to be myself, I want to be somewhere else something I want to quit. Sorry, and it's fucking torture, and all we're talking about is holding your hands over your eyes, your palms over your eyes and then fingers on your forehead right.
Speaker 2:And I just started praying and I started talking to God. I started talking to all of my children, the ones that are here and the ones that are not, and I was just like you know. Are you telling me that I can't hold my hands on my eyes for 10 minutes? But I'm over here talking about that. I can do this other stuff. It's a physical manifestation of my willingness and it was tough, and that little orb of God's presence and that light it came when I was done, because I made it the whole 10 minutes and I felt good that, yeah, my mind is not my friend, there are some things that I cannot do, but there are many things that I can do. That, yeah, my mind is not my friend. There are some things that I cannot do Something like, but there are many things that I can do. So that happened right, setting the stage. Okay.
Speaker 2:So Saturday, boom, I do all the things I just said. Instead of the cigar and coffee, what do I do? I call my boy, liam, and do very old school AA stuff, which is I'm going to bookend something. That means I'm going to call you before I do it. I'm going to do the thing and then I'm going to call you when I'm done, you know. So that's what I did.
Speaker 2:I went to the Chinese dollar, bought a black marble notebook, bought a pen, went to the park, parked the van up, opened up the pages and I just started writing One at a time, one letter at a time. And you know, each situation was different, each partner was different and they hurt more as I got through them. You know, at the end I was talking to all of them, even though they all got a different letter. I did it. And then I called Liam and said that I did it, he was texting. I called him at the moment that he sent me a picture of him. He was going to go buy a rug. I'm like, dude, do not fucking buy that rug. And then I called him and we had a talk, you know briefly, and then, uh, I told him I said now I'm gonna go for a jog around the park to kind of cleanse myself a little bit. And I did.
Speaker 2:I went for a light jog, put on 90s alternative. I told them I was going to listen to REM, because you guys know I've been on the REM kick and that's what I did. I jogged around Dyka Park. I think it's 2.1 or 2.2 miles. I know I used to run around that park all the time when I was preparing for races. So while I was running, you know, I felt them with me and maybe that's my piece is that now I feel them. I feel them with me. I don't know if they forgive me when I get to wherever I'm going hopefully, if I go to the attic and not to the basement after I take this dirt nap or whatever if they're there, it's not going to be an introduction, because for the rest of my life they have been acknowledged, they are loved and they're with me and that's how it's going to be going forward.
Speaker 2:Like and subscribe on all podcast platforms. Share with your friends. Sorry, we got a little heavy this week, but I mean boo-hoo for you. If you thought I was going to read the letters, fuck that I still have them. I don't even. You thought I was going to read the letters Fuck that I still have them. I don't even know what I'm going to do with them. Yeah, and I went for a swim today in Coney Island with some of the polar bears, and that's it, a day at a time. You know, one challenge at a time. It all gets better and it gets better because I get better and I feel good about honestly. I feel good about what I did, because who I was before this week is different than who I am now, and that's what this whole thing is about. Who do we want to be? Anyway? Sober Experience, youtube channel. We want to be, anyway, sober experience, youtube channel, all podcast platforms, meaning apple spotify, all these schmoes and um yeah I'll see you guys on the other side.
Speaker 2:I love you peace.
Speaker 1:I wake up my airplane. I wake up my airplane, my skin is there, my skin is, my skin is. I feel like a newborn and I feel like a newborn.
Speaker 2:I wake on my airplane. I wake on my airplane and I feel so alone. This is for them. Take my picture, cause I won't remember.
Speaker 1:Could you take my picture, cause I won't remember? Yeah, I don't believe in, I don't believe in your sanctity, your privacy. I don't believe in. I don't believe in Sanctity or hypocrisy. Could everyone agree that no one should be left alone? Could everyone agree that they should not be left alone? Left alone, yeah, and I Feel like a newborn. And I Feel like a newborn Shaking and screaming, and soon I you take my picture, cause I won't remember. Could you take my picture, cause I won't remember? Yeah, I won't remember. Yeah, die, die. What do you think about your son now? Hey Dad, what do you think about your son now? Could you take my picture, cause I won't remember? Could you take my picture, cause I won't remember? Could you take my picture, cause I won't remember?
Speaker 2:Yes, Just a reminder that you guys are not alone, we are not alone. Alright Peace.