The Sober Experience

From Emotional Hangover To Spiritual Principles

• Jay Luis

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Joy can be just as destabilizing as pain, and that’s exactly where our conversation begins: a full-heart night with friends, followed by an emotional hangover that tempts every old shortcut. From there we dig into Step Six with both feet—what it really means to be entirely ready to let go of defects, why analysis can become avoidance, and how the right opposite action builds results that relief never will. We use real stories to make it stick: the urge to keep score, the comfort of self-pity, the social pull of outrage, and the quiet power of refusing to “steal the moment” in a conversation.

We get practical about spiritual principles. Courage means showing up to conflict. Leading with love means staying human when it would be easier to be right. Generosity means building systems that help people thrive, even when a spreadsheet says otherwise. You’ll hear how a business transformed by putting employees first—shorter days, paid travel, trust with the tools—ended up creating more profit and less chaos, and how the same shift works at home: honesty without cruelty, accountability without paranoia, and the humility to stop setting the stage before the five‑alarm fire.

Through it all, willingness, faith, trust, and self-acceptance do the heavy lifting. Willingness is acting differently before we feel differently. Faith is trusting that a Higher Power won’t swap dishonesty for harshness. Trust is calling someone who can spot the pattern we can’t. Self-acceptance is how we keep going after a stumble without turning recovery into perfectionism. If you’re navigating sobriety, parenting, leadership, or just the daily grind of being a person, this one is a map for choosing results over relief and connection over control.

If this resonated, follow The Sober Experience, subscribe on your favorite podcast app, and share this with someone who needs a nudge toward opposite action. Leave a review to tell us your biggest takeaway.

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See you on the flipside !!

SPEAKER_00:

Welcome back. Over experience, know the deal. Alright, welcome back, Sober Experience. Hope you guys are doing well. Don't forget that's how you shut off the speaker. Um, share and subscribe on all podcast platforms. Um the sober experience also on YouTube. We got some good stuff cooking, because I got some good stuff cooking. And uh yeah, man, we're back in action. And um, yeah, holidays are coming, Bo. Uh excuse me. Um, yeah. I hope you guys getting your turkey on. We're getting whatever. We just came out the spooky season. Shout out to the uh the young girl Maria. We just celebrated together this past um Monday at the Greenwood group. My brother Hiram came from upstate and sprayed the whole freaking corner, bro. And it was beautiful, man. And I got to um yeah, I got to surprise him with my our other homegirl who we grew up with, uh, yeah, Jen. Man, the queen of BLB, aka the bad liver bitches. Yeah, I had her give me my coin, man. I love that girl so much. And it was nice, she finally got to meet my wife. My wife was there, it was beautiful. Things are things, people are people. The answer is love. That's it, man. Got a new mayor, everybody's crying on the computer. Let me adjust the mic. Hold on. Get this thing in my face. Yeah, what was uh everyone's crying? Welcome I'm Donnie. Yeah, that's my shut up, bro. Who fucking cares? I mean, you care a little bit, but I should have actually adjusted all of this before I started, but you know, I'm a schlub. But um, yeah, I mean sh dude, there none of these fucking people can do anything. You know, you gotta take control of your own life. That's it, man. You can't rely on anybody. You can rely on the Lord and on people who either believe in the Lord or people who um, you know, the goodness of other people, man. I'm sure there are great people who just don't believe in God, and that's okay. But I, you know, my God is like that big love, man, that happens between all of us together, and I've seen plenty and plenty of that uh in my life. You know what I'm saying? Just like other people who believe in goodness and they're good, and then I'd be good, and we'd be good. And we'd be good. So it was it was um it was just a great uh it was a great celebration. So much so, bro. I was like hung over for like a fucking whole day, like emotional hangover, like, dude, it was just so much. You know, all the love, man. There was a sitting, not, you know, sitting room only, not even standing room only. He couldn't even stand in there anymore. The people were sitting on the floors. It was it was wild. But I told people get there early, son. Anyway, so the next day I had like emotional hangover, like way over stimulation, and I was just like, bro, how do I fuck this up? Let me go eat this, let me go do that. And whatever, I allowed myself a little bit of um, you know, I don't try to uh beat my own ass uh with that kind of stuff. Uh my boy Amer came, he got me this uh kefir, which I've been uh I've been drinking half a cup of that stuff every day to get the gut in check, man. And um who knows if it's placebo or if it's whatever, but I'm in half a cup every morning, you know what I'm saying, to get the gut right. Because uh, you know, I'm trying to do everything I can to live as comfortably as I can while I'm here, because you never know what you uh don't know. And that's it. And it could all uh could all go away at the blink of an eye, you know, all of it. Anyway, so I appreciate all of you. I love all of you. I hope all of you love each other. And uh we're gonna get back into the work, into the wake. Um, we're still doing step six. Let me see where we are. I think we left off uh yeah, we don't uh we don't get that much far to go. It says our defects of character. I think uh have got to remove, yeah, boom. Our defects of character. And again, I told you I don't really like that term, you know, like how can we be more effective? Um how can we be more effective when we're moving around? A lot of times, this is not in the book, but I remember I texted my uh my sponsor the other day. Uh where is he? Yariv Yareev, you know. Because most of the advice he gives me at the end of a problem that I that I give to him is uh step one is to be courageous. Right? You gotta show up to every conflict. You can't be hiding. You know, you gotta show up, so you gotta be courageous. Then lead with love. Lead with love. And uh lastly, uh be generous. You know? At the end of every like 10-step inventory that I call him and I share with him shit that's going on, if I'm having uh difficulty surrendering to what's what's happening, if I'm being ineffective, you know, it's normally because I'm scared of something. And I'm either letting something ride too long, or I am acting impulsively based on that fear, and I'm saying shit that I shouldn't really be saying. You know, nobody's perfect, whatever. I can clean up the little dust-ups that I have with people, and I don't have that many. Most of the time I just be quiet, you know. Again, there's people crying all over the all over the world about uh the mayor of New York City. Guess what? If you are not in New York City, he is not your mayor. So guess what? We don't care. We don't care what you think. I know that you think we care what you think, and maybe some people are appeasing you, but if you're in Florida, you're in, they're like, oh yeah, but he's the you know, it's the greatest city in the world. And like, listen, there are people, no offense to other people at all. But like either you can do it here or you can't. And it doesn't mean that you're bad if you can't make it here. It is very hard to to make it here, you know? And depending on your circumstances, probably a lot better that you're not here. But I'm just saying that if you are not here, who cares? Shut the fuck up. It doesn't affect you in any way. You just need something to cry about. I don't understand all that. Like, like diving into the negative, the the negative uh end of the swimming pool on purpose. Like, who wants to spend their time with any of that stuff? You know? Yeah, it's just so wild. Anyway, so it's uh let me make sure I'm in the right spot. And I believe I am. Yeah, steps because we're in step six, which isn't ha being entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character. Like, I cannot remove these things uh uh on my own. These feelings of inadequacy, you know, these desperate cries to matter to the point that it's actually not helpful because then I I live in a space where everybody's trying to get me and I'm gonna lose stuff. And I'm likely gonna lose stuff anyway. That part is out of my control. But what's in my control is like if something is gonna leave, whether it's a job, uh money, a relationship, this, that, whatever, I need to really enjoy what I'm doing now, then until the day it's not here. And that's it. You know what I'm saying? Instead of just worrying. But whatever. Anyway, I'm gonna start reading now. By the way, again, sidebar, we're reading out of the uh NA step working guide book. Alright, here we go. Our defects of character. Even after all the work we've done in the fourth and fifth step, we're still not entirely clear at this point about the nature of our defects of character. We're probably wondering where precisely our character defects and our character uh end and our character begins within the complex structure of our personality. Why do we do the things we do? Is it someone's fault? When did we first feel this way? Why? How? Where? If we're not so if we're not careful, we can become so self-obsessed that we lose sight of why we're working the sixth step. We need to focus our efforts. Our goal is to raise our awareness of our character defects so that we can become entirely ready to have them removed. Not to analyze their origin or indulge in a bout of self-absorption. That's a good statement. You know, a lot of times, you know, when I have uh conflicts, you know, specifically if I'm saying like with my wife, you know, over the years that we've been together, and we're very, I'm very grateful. And she expressed gratitude to me like a week ago about like we are really in, you know, two people who are in love with each other and are having, you know, ninety, over ninety percent like a good time. You know, like realistically, you know, like she's not like to me all the old ball and chain or whatever. Um, but you know, one of the things where if I said or did something that bothered her initially in the beginning, like I wouldn't even understand why it bothered her or why I stepped on this landmine. And I would just say to myself, like, dude, I can sit here for three hours starting at 11 p.m. till 2 a.m. and never understand. I just I don't get it. And I can't I can tell you, okay, yeah, I get it. But then if she's like, what does it mean? I'm like, I don't fucking know. But if you tell me to just don't do this thing anymore, I can work on stopping that behavior. You know, and that's it. And if I don't do that behavior, we don't have to dive under every fingernail of our lives, our life history with and without each other in order for us to re- Oh my god, you really have to get me. Like, dude, I don't fucking I I barely get me. How the fuck I'm gonna get you, you know, but I can just stop being this way, and then over time, you know, uh the answers will come to me. And normally it's just I'm being, I need to just be more considerate. But a lot of things are an accident, you know, because I don't have uh I've grown out of the intention of protecting myself anymore. I don't have that, I just don't have it, you know. It's just so much more freeing to be like really free and say, fuck it, you know, if this person's gonna run me over, they're gonna run me over. Whether it's the guys that work for me, whether it's uh my wife, whether it's my kids or whatever, dude, they're gonna do whatever they're gonna do. I gotta be who I am. You know, I can't be like, well, if I do this, then they do this. And if this, this, this, then this and this. You know, it's different maybe a little bit when it comes to the kids. As I was raising the kids, like I have to raise them based on principle. Like you behave good, you get good. You behave like shit, you get shit. Because guess what? I have to, I'm responsible for teaching you on how the world works out there, which is the world doesn't reward it barely rewards good. Being good in its own right is its own reward. Nobody's gonna, you know, give you a you know a basket full of goodies because you did the right thing. You know what I'm saying? But if you do the wrong thing, you can't expect people to just, oh yeah, you, you know, you dick me over a little bit, but it's okay. And I'll just give you whatever you want. Nah, it's not the way it works, you know. So that's different when I'm trying to teach my uh my kids the principles of survival on this earth. I don't, I'm not in the business of teaching that to anybody else. So I don't have uh I don't have the same kind of um, you know, I wouldn't even call it a reward system, but some kind of system of of teaching uh these life skills, like it's not my responsibility. So bro, you don't get it, you don't get it. You know, but my kids, like I was always uh I was always on top of that stuff. You know? So there's that. Okay, yeah, so what I'm saying is that, you know, you gotta have these principles, and then that's what you stem from, that's where you live by. And my principle is like, look, you know, whatever, regardless of what people do, I have to be who I am. And I don't and I can't handle being negative for too long. I just can't. It's it's just it's it's a waste of time and it it I can become a sucker to that and it consumes me. You know, and I just spend all that time in pain. Just being like, no, they don't understand you know, being so dependent on other people's uh things. You know what I'm saying? On how other people are for me to feel good or bad about myself, you know. And it doesn't mean situations are 100% uh perfect, but it just means that, you know, if I'm doing my best, what else can I fucking do? Alright, continuing on. Our character defects are indicators of our basic nature. We are likely to find that we have the same basic nature as anyone else. We have needs and we try to get them met. For instance, we need love. How do you go about getting love? How we go about getting love is where our defects come into play. If we lie, cheat, or harm others and degrade ourselves to get love, we're acting on these defects. As defined in It Works How and Why, which is another uh uh piece of literature, our defects are basic human traits that have been distorted by our self-centeredness. That's a very important thing. You know, they're just us being human, but you're blowing everything way out of proportion. You know? When I used to steal from all the jobs that I had, it's because I was so insecure that I would I thought I would need the money, A, number one, and B, uh I th my ego was like, dude, they're not paying me enough. Meanwhile, you know, if I want to be really super spiritual, whatever, you know, I I do a dime's worth of work for a nickel. You know what I'm saying? That's how I have to think about all this stuff in order for me to, you know, to really be at even than everybody else, because I'm so uh obsessive and and needy when I feel threatened in any kind of way, whether it's my financial security, my emotional nature, my emotional security, you know, all of that stuff. Whenever it's threatened, brother, if I'm not, if I'm not in touch with the Lord through you guys, with you guys, with the other humans, with my sponsor, brother, I will start to put a plan into play to just to just destroy everything that uh was given to me. And it was only given to me based on the actions that I've that I've been taking. And, you know, a little bit of luck that that comes along the pike when you're doing the right thing. That part I believe. You know? Continuing on. With our sponsor's help, we need to list uh each defect we have and describe in which uh in the ways which we act on it. Look at how the defects uh affect our lives, and more importantly, find out why we're feeling uh what we're feeling when we practice it. Imagining what our life would be without such defects will help us see that we can live without them. You know, that's what I'm saying. Like I I've evolved past a lot of some of this stuff where I've had a severe and serious uh psychic change where I'm changing I changed the way that I surrendered to the good in on earth. That that's what makes me be good, because I'm just like I just surrendered to the good of that, you know, and it's not perfect. Periodically, look, I want to throw a rock at somebody. And sometimes I fucking do. You know what I'm saying? And sometimes I don't care, and sometimes I do care. And be like, all right, look, I'm sorry, I threw a rock at you. Sometimes I'm like, fuck it, you get what you get, bro. You know what I'm saying? But either way, uh, you know, I've really changed my outlook on how I feel on the inside, um, after years and years of practicing of just doing the right thing as best I can, trying my best on the outside and not sure changing myself. You know, there there's always this saying, like there's uh there's power in the last rep. You know? I don't know what the last rep is, but the last bit of effort, but there's power in that. And when that thing goes, you feel uh different. You know? And it takes a lot of faith to even try that. To just try and put your uh own biases uh aside and be like let me love somebody who doesn't believe what I believe. Are they bad because they're not on the same side as me? Or what side am I even on? Am I on the side that just loves either side? That's the side I want to be on. You know? And that's the side that I find the most rewarding is not when I like you know, not when I have my own God, but when I'm one of when I'm one of uh I mean yes, but not so much that, but I'm one of God's like good guys. You know, when I feel like that, like I'm just trying not to disappoint the big guy every day. You know, I'm out here on a mission. And the mission is um community, it's acceptance, you know, it's togetherness. That's what it is, even if it's just one person at a time, but that's what it is for me. You know? That's okay. That's what I imagine what my life would be like without it. Yeah, some of us uh take practical action by finding out what the opposite spiritual principle is for each character defect. Okay. Pum ba-pa, these questions I already just answered, you know. So let's move on. Wa wah wa. Okay, spiritual principles. Yeah, that's um yeah. Those of you know me know that that's my my little uh noise that I make when I'm excited beyond what my body can control. You know, I make these little noises. It's an expression of joy. Because spiritual principles, oh my god, I freaking love them, bro. I freaking love them. There's nothing more endearing and warming to other people when it's just like how about I just try to be cool, you know? It's not easy, but why don't I just try that? Okay, here we go. Spiritual principles. In the sixth step, we will we'll focus on the commitment and perseverance, willingness, we will focus, wait, focus on commitment and perseverance, willingness, faith and trust, and self-acceptance. At this point in our six-step work, we should be acutely aware of our shortcomings. In fact, we're probably so aware of them in the course of our daily lives, we can see them coming even and even stop ourselves from acting on them much of the time. It's not always the case for me, man. When I was, I told you I had that emotional hangover, and dude, I was like the next day I was ready to just pull every lever. I was just, I don't know, man. My mind was just fucking with me, bro. It was just fucking, and I just had one of the best uh evenings ever. And I think maybe because it's easier for me to show up for other people than than to see all people show up for me. That's just my thing. You know what I'm saying? And there's a lot of uh people who are in my life that uh that are in the program that are young kids, and you know, I was hugging them and telling them, listen, you need to stay around because we need you. You know what I'm saying? Like we we freaking need you, bro. Or sis or whatever, like we need you. And they were like, and I meant it, and I wasn't saying it to be nice, I was saying it to be real. And they were like welling up that that I told them that. You know, you're important. We need you. Not we don't want you, we need you. You know what I'm saying? But like, yeah, I was ready, oof, my God, all the things, bro, the fucking food, you know, I could have pulled every lever, the food, the porn, the fucking fuck the gym. I like dragged myself through uh the workouts. I did them. You know, tonight I got uh I got a little yoga action that I gotta do, which is good because I like I did so much uh deadlift yesterday, my back is a little bit whatever. You know, so um, so there was that. But like, yeah, it was fucking loud in between my ears. Maybe it was just all my the demons and the sickness saying, you do not deserve any of that shit that you got yesterday, and nobody liked your fucking cake. Even though I had chocolate cream pie, which is amazing. But yeah. Anyway, so whatever it was, it was talking to me, and I was ignoring it because it was telling me to do things that I did not, uh, that I knew were not serving me. All they were gonna do is make me feel worse. Like make me feel good for that split second when I go do that, whatever it is, um, but make me feel worse after I did it. You know, there's a difference between relief and results, and I would just I spent most of my life just going for relief, relief, relief, relief, relief, relief. You know what I'm saying? And then just like everything was just built on my whole life, my whole persona, my whole character was just built on you know, nothing substantial by any means. It was just built on, you know, little little glimpses of goodness. But like very little. Mostly it was just like, hey, this person is this person means well. That's what people how people would describe me based upon how I behaved that I meant well. And this is with drinking and without drinking. And that's the truth. I was trying to break it down at the anniversary, like, dude. You know, it took me, I was telling all these people, like, you have to do this kind of work just to get the tools. Now, applying them is so freaking hard. Yo, it's so hard to like, you know, where is the line where you're standing up for yourself? You know what I'm saying? Like, what is it? Yeah, where's the line where you're standing up for yourself or where you're being like overly aggressive? Like, where's that line? I used to not know that there was a line. So the only way I would stand up for myself was to do something to you. And then my paranoia would have me do something to you first because I knew that you were gonna do something to me eventually. So I set myself up based on uh by taking actions based on that that stupid belief. And what I did, I set uh a train of stuff in motion where I hurt somebody else, and then of course they're gonna hurt me. And it guess what? It would be even worse if I just hurt them and they didn't hurt me. Oh my god, bro. That's the fucking worst. That is the worst when you do something to somebody out of what you feel is self-preservation, but nobody's coming after you. Maybe you keep something from them. Maybe you don't not just saying outright lie, but you know you do something to them because this is how you live. You know, and you have a whole life that is all of that, and it becomes unbearable to hold. And then you have to change that where like it doesn't matter that this person even did something to me, I cannot do anything to them. And then eventually it grows into you know, I mean, then there's still that trepidation where like it becomes an injustice. That's a good word my sponsor uses, an injustice. I fucking did everything, and you still did this shit to me, like it's gonna be some sort of equation, or like you're on the seesaws or whatever, right? Like, no, man. No. You know, and um, you know, you graduate from not wanting to hurt people because you realize you're hurting people to not even worrying about whether or not they're gonna hurt you. I don't really like I said, I don't really have that um I don't have that in me anymore. You know, it took so long to really turn that corner. So like the first, you know, five years or more, five years of my recovery, you know, I was living a life not based on spiritual principles. I was doing the step work and whatever, but I still had this job that was not uh or career that was not a hundred percent uh spiritual in any way. It was just like, how can I get more? How can I be more? And fuck them. I'm gonna get whatever I think I need or whatever. And it just took maybe two years or three years for it to bother me all the way till I I stopped doing that, you know, but at the same time, you know, I was uh applying good principles, you know, with raising my son. And yeah, I can only change some parts at some times. I can't change everything at once. You know, so the first three or four years of my recovery, even though I had all these tools, but really applying them a little bit at a time until you really get faith. Because guess what? They're not gonna work right away. Just because you take the opposite action, it's almost like, all right, well, I'm not going if I if I don't eat, I'm just gonna use food because I don't want to be offensive in any other ways. Sorry. Um but if I just don't eat shitty food, what am I gonna replace it with? Right? And then you can go all the way in the other spectrum where you just become a About, like every day I gotta check the scale, and what am I eating? And I'm weighing my and all this other stuff. There's no joy there either. You know, I mean the absence of pain is not help. You know, and then over time you just learn how to find a way that works for you. So the first time that you try some of these changes, it still may not go your way, you know. But as long as you're walking that path, eventually you'll get to a place. And I've gotten there. And that and I I've gotten there if you say that right now, like I've gotten there right now, like at when I was at three years or five years, I thought I had it. I did not have it. Not what I have now, but at that time I thought I had everything. I was like, oh, by five years, I was uh you know, I was a single dad, you know, uh yeah, I was a single dad, and I stayed a single dad forever. From yeah, from three years all the way until I met my wife. You know, which wasn't even that much longer than that, actually. But what are we talking like I like I spent ten years in the jungle? Like, no, like I did three years, and I think I moved in, you know, and I had relationships with people, but nobody there were there were, you know. Yeah, there weren't really relationships. There were two people uh hanging out, you know, and umbody lived with me. It was just my son and I. And that was it. And as soon as any kind of work had to be made, I was like, nah, I'm out of here. So I'm too busy raising my son and trying to straighten out my life financially, you know, practicing those principles in my financial world where, you know, I had to learn how to make, you know, had to make like legitimate, like good money and how to learn how to live within my means. And I got myself in an insane amount of debt. Well insane for me, it was like$25,000. That's how much the debt was. And I had to settle with all these credit cards and all this other stuff because you know, I wasn't drinking, then I start spending. You know, and then my income went down because I had like a good job, and I went from robbing people uh to robbing a bank and doing like some Robin Hood shit where I was giving you know, whatever, socialism. I was like robbing the bank that I was working from and giving that money to regular people. And I don't know how much it was. And they didn't really catch me, which was great because I was a good uh, you know, I don't know. I was good at I was good at some stuff, you know. I had good instincts when it comes to cutting corners because I'm a good addict and I'm a good alcoholic. So that's what always gave me good instincts about making money. But I had to find like legal ways to do it. And then so, you know, after that job went, you know, I got fired from there. You know, I keep saying, you know, I'm gonna work on that. I went through a lot of uh, I would call it trauma, but it's just the trauma is really what happens before surrendering. And he's like, oh, I just actually learned a lot of lessons. You know, I learned a lot of lessons. And then eventually, I, you know, I was telling these guys on Monday that all of the good stuff is on the way, but more opportunities came. Now, there were plenty of opportunities that were there for me to practice these principles, and I blew them all until I was ready. Who knows what kind of career or other thing I could have done, but I wasn't ready to do it honestly, so I chickened out or I dropped the ball or did something else. You know, that's just how it was. I definitely wasn't I wasn't attracting or being with the right people in order to bring the willingness for me to become the best person that I could be. I wasn't attracting that on any level. I was like a good, like a like a flyer to a good party. That's what it was. They're like, oh, oh wow, man, this guy, look at him. Wow, he's sober. You know, and back then being sober when you're in your 20s, sober, single dad, got his own apartment, and had a nice apartment, got his own shit, whatever. I wasn't, you know, like it's it sounded like like wow, this guy's got his shit going on. But it wasn't all the way held up uh legitimately. You know, I still had a lot of work to do. So I was attracting uh people who would be attracted to something like that, but within a few months, they you know, you have a couple of spats, a couple of arguments, and like, yeah, but and I'm in my mind, like they would just find out, you know, how unprepared or unwilling I was to really maybe put in some work, and I would just light them all on fire. Get the fuck out of here. Next, you know, because my f I had a good flyer, you know, but again, it wasn't it was no substance. You know, and then I started my business. And then in the beginning of my business, yeah, man. I mentioned it on Monday. I knew how to make money and how to how to build something. I didn't know how to be a good boss. I didn't know how to be a good owner, I didn't know how to respect my workers. I didn't know how to do any of that stuff. So in the beginning, you know, I was I was horrible at it. You know? I barked, I yelled, I thought or I believed, you know, these guys gotta do whatever I say because I pay them, they gotta work however. This is completely unfair, you know. Like completely. By that time I had met my wife, once I started getting some workers. You know, we started dating, and I was just uh still flying solo. Now I was doing good with the clients. All right, so not stealing from clients, not doing I'm doing good with that. But then what happened was I had a mishap and I broke my heel trying to uh do some Spider-Man shit from my now sister-in-law's apartment where I dropped down from the fucking from the uh you know, from her balcony to my wife's balcony to open the sliding door because my wife be forgetting her fucking keys. And at that time I was wearing some cute little fucking sneakers that were like barely sneakers from Daffy's because they were fuck- I thought they were fucking dope and I thought who I was, yeah, and I broke my heel. And then eventually that led to me not being able to work. Then I had to hire a helper. Who did I hire? My sponsee. Fucking uh, I can't, I don't want to say his name. And he was my first guy, and uh I worked him crazy, and then he we needed another guy because the business kept building because I was smart at building. Again, I can put together a good flyer, that's what I'm how I'm gonna say it. I can. I can ring the bell, like you know what I'm saying? I can do that, and I can put on a good show for clients. And uh now I mean all of it, but at the time, you know, I didn't even know how to do my job very well. I didn't. But as it went along, he lobbied for another guy that we knew, and uh he came and he worked, and then I got another guy. So, you know, I was building my stuff and we're making money. I moved in with my wife. My wife actually and I moved together. We tried to get into the apartment that I was in, but my landlady uh did not didn't want any kids in the apartment. And I had a dope ass apartment and it was very inexpensive. So we had to get our own space. And it was funny because my boy Gizeppe um he went to speak to the landlady because she didn't speak English and he spoke Italian. And mind you, this whole time, as I was evolving financially now a little bit, when I first got that apartment, I was scared to death of her. Because I'm like, this lady could kick me out at any moment if I do the wrong thing. And number one, I don't have any more money to move. At that time my credit was like shit, like whatever. Subpar credit, and I had 25, 30 grand, whatever it was, 20 grand in debt. And I wasn't, I was barely making enough money to pay the bills, and I wasn't really even doing, you know, I was just wasn't doing all of that. You know, some shit was getting shut off sometimes, but I was sober enough that I could borrow money from my dad if I was short on rent, and he'd give it to me and be like, all right, I see you're trying to do the right thing, and blah, blah, blah. You know, so a little bit at a time, those relationships were being built. But what I'm saying is that like it took so many years for all of these defects, these ineffective ways of instinctively being. Like, how many times am I gonna run my head into the wall? You know, and that's what happened over time, and you know, I started doing this kind of work and say, okay, what is the opposite? Let's just talk about the business stuff. Like, I have the opportunity to create an environment where people will want to come and work. Well, even if they don't want to come and work, they don't mind being here. That's what I tried to do. And I started to run my business by putting the employees first. What can I do to make things easier for them? And start just changing things that I did, and then eventually it led to me changing my attitude towards them. Looking at all of us as like partners. An example is like I would get a new vehicle or something, and it would go to them, it wouldn't go to me. We started changing the schedule. Now, even though my wife like sometimes she throws like jabs at me, whatever, because in my company, dude, nobody besides the king, nobody really works past four o'clock. It does not exist. At four o'clock, you are going home. Or you should be on your way home by 4 30 or whatever. Five would be the big bad. Then I'd be like, okay. But I try to set up all the the work so that they're done at least by four. Meaning the last stop that they do starts at 2 30. Now, it could also mean like that I try to make that last stop, you know, not on the upper west side. You know, maybe uh so that way they can get home easier, because sometimes these guys both live far. But guess what? Um, they both drive uh vehicles all the way home. Like they don't have to stop here, drop off stuff, and then go. Like, no, they just go. And they can go straight from their house to the first job. Back in the day, I would have them park near my house, they'd have to drive to my house, pick up the shit, and like, you know. So I'm paying in gas, toll, mileage, everything for these guys to get to and from work. You know? And my wife makes fun of me, it's like, eh, nobody works past four. Like, yeah. That's it. I don't really I try not to keep score with them. They're doing stuff that I don't want to do anymore and that I cannot do while running a successful business. Because I can't do all the work. And I pay them as much as I can pay them. And I always try to find ways for them to make more money. You know, I always try to find ways for them to make more money. And they do pretty well. But I give them high quality of life. You know? But changing that kind of change happens over time. And yes, does that mean I make technically less I make less money off of them, but I make more money. Because I just do. I don't know how that that's how the math works. Like I don't I don't drill them for every dollar, and I make more money, and I do less work. It's insane, you know, and I and I started to see the results of that kind of mentality. And I started applying that in all areas of my life. But it took so many years, because then when I moved in with my wife, I mean it wasn't World War III, but it was world world war not world war, but let's just say the Spanish American War or Korea or Vietnam, you know. We went through so much. I had to do a lot of changing, and so did she. And you don't even know what kind of change changes you have to do until the circumstances present themselves. And then when they do, how do you even change? Like that's what this whole program is about. How do I even change? I need like an equation. And I need something that is beyond me to to reach for for courage when I'm trying one of these new things. Like being accountable and being honest, not lying. Not just like, oh, being faithful. That's like, you know. It's not a really it's not a thing for me. It's just not. But um, you know, holding the collective of the universe, not just my family, not just my business, not just the but the collective of humans as the higher focus than myself. Like not what can I get, it's what can I bring. So we can get. Like it feels just so much better when you give somebody else a good experience than when I get what I want. And then eventually you change what you want. It's like actually what I really want where I get the most juice is when I give somebody a good experience of being with me. And it doesn't matter who it is. If I give them a good experience, you know, I'm sure that there are some people who do not like me. And that's okay. There are some people that I don't like. But if somebody thinks that now, in this moment, if somebody's like, oh yeah, he's a piece of shit, they're actually wrong. And it's nice that I know that they're wrong. Well, before it was questionable. It's like, well, what do they know? Like, no, actually, I'm not a piece of shit. If you think I'm a piece of shit, that just means that you have you're fighting what you're you got beef with yourself. So I don't have beef with you, you know. And I know what how my behavior is. So, so there's that. But yeah, just so just you're never all the way there. But each each time that you have the opportunity to grow closer to somebody else, you're actually me, you, me, we, you actually have the opportunity to grow closer to God. Because you're gonna need something outside of yourself in order to be brave enough to try something new. Because for me it's impossible to do on my own. You know, there's a little scared fucking weasel that never gets enough. And sometimes his voice is loud. You know, but I have to ignore it. And it's fucking hard when he's because he's uh like I I think I might have shared this already. I was talking to my boy Paul, uh who has uh podcast also on a YouTube channel, uh three legacy recovery recovery recordings. It's really good. And um, I was telling him, dude, that self, when it's like, what about me? That guy, he shows up unannounced with a motherfucking whistle. And he's like, when is it gonna be my turn? I I'm the scorekeeper. I did all of this stuff, I'm giving out the merits. How dare you? Whether it's how it's like, how dare you world. You know? I just don't have that uh kind of energy anymore. Let me continue on just so I can uh finish this thing. Okay. Oh, pu-pa-pa. Okay. At this point, uh, we should acutely be aware of our shortcomings. In fact, we're probably so aware of them that in the course of our daily lives we can see them coming and even stop ourselves from acting upon them much of the time. That I read that already, that's true. Um at times our awareness may fade and we may no longer be as vigilant in watching our behavior. It takes an incredible amount of energy to monitor ourselves every second and curb every impulse to act out. We'll relax into everyday life until all of a sudden we'll be left feeling sick and ashamed and wondering how, after all the work we've done, we could have possibly done that again. Whoosh. Say it. Yeah, when you have like uh here's my old friend, um sloth. Or uh what's the other one? You know, you know what I mean. All of these sins are all self-absorption. You know? How can I feel bad about self-pity? That's he's my favorite. Oh my god. That's self-pity. Dude, that's crazy. When that guy shows up, I'm like, yeah. Let me just lather myself in it like a fucking bar of soap. And just like, oh my god. Yeah, it's like a warm shower. When I was basically I'm just pissing all over myself. That's my favorite. Okay. However, we do not give up. Instead, we make a commitment to our recovery. We maintain our newly emerging principles despite our setbacks. So even if you fall short, you'd be like, yeah, no, I'm not gonna throw it all away. No, I get back on the horse and I fucking try again. And you can start your day over at any moment. At any moment. You know, we keep taking steps forward even though we've taken one or more backward. We're looking for gradual improvement, not instant faultlessness. Applying the spiritual principle of willingness means very simply that we are willing to act differently. It is not necessarily, oh, it does not necessarily mean that we will act differently or even are capable of doing so. We can perhaps best illustrate this attitude by an example, uh suppose we've been dishonest in any way, dishonest with our families, with our employers, with our friends, in many ways, ranging from the minor to the severe. While it may seem better to become willing in layers, what does it say? While it may seem better to become willing in layers, focusing our willingness on the worst or the most destructive forms of dishonesty first. All right, so that's what I mean by layers. This step says that we are entirely ready to have all of our defects removed. That means being willing never to be dishonest again, even in a minor way. This may seem like uh more than we can expect of ourselves, but we only have to do it for today. It's like how how it's like how long can I go in a day without lying? Even like a lie that doesn't hurt anybody, but just a fictitious lie that I can tell, I can spin a lie to make myself fit in with somebody and do that kind of stuff. Like stealing the story or stealing the moment, like somebody else has a good moment and they're sharing something with me. I can just say, wow, that's incredible. Wow, that's very powerful, thank you for that, and then shut the fuck up. Instead of adding, oh, well, you know what happened to me? Like, you know, and using a way to try to connect with somebody. Meanwhile, they're trying to connect with me. I'm already connected. I don't have to connect with them anymore. And basically, I'm shitting all over their moment when I do stuff like that, when I can just be cool. Mm-hmm. Okay, let's keep going on. It's hard to have this kind of willingness, especially when the apparent consequences for mild dishonesty aren't so severe. What did I just say? That's so good. That's so good. The consequences for mild dishonesty aren't so severe. We may be aware that we're not being entirely honest, but we think we're not hurting anyone and we're getting away with it. So why be so concerned about it? Huh? Brother, how do I fucking know what's going on? All right. But it's this kind of thinking that has perhaps the most severe spiritual consequences. It may turn out that no one is obviously harmed by our dishonesty and that no one ever finds out. But the dishonesty reverberates, reverberates, sorry, reverberates in our spirits from then on. Even if we're not consciously aware of it, even if we sleep just fine that night, the result of acting on a defect when we have the ability not to is an impairment of our spiritual growth. If we continue being unwilling, we'll eventually paralyze our spiritual growth. Question, am I willing to have all my defects of character removed at this time? Yes. And what have I done to show my willingness today? I've shared with you guys about, you know, what they are and you know how I just try not to uh indulge in them. Okay. Moving on. Let's say, okay. The amount of, I know we're going long today, I'm sorry, but we're at 55 fucking minutes. All right. The amount of willingness we have to develop in this step requires a correspondencing, a corresponding amount of faith and trust. We have to believe that a higher power is going to work in our lives to the exact degree that's necessary. Continuing with the example of dishonesty, we have to trust that our higher power isn't going to remove the defect of dishonesty from our lives to such a degree that we become brutally honest, incapable of remaining silent, even when speaking the truth would hurt somebody. Whoosh. What do they say? Say what you mean, but don't say it mean? That kind of thing? You know? That's crazy. That's crazy. I used to live like that. Well, I gotta be honest with you. I love you, so I gotta bullshit. I couldn't wait to bully somebody with honesty. Yeah, I can't do that anymore. You know, little times when I feel it welling up, it never makes me feel good. As long as we get out of the way so God can work in our lives, we'll experience the exact same degree of spiritual growth we need. All right. We only got a couple questions left. To what degree is my fear of what I will become still present? It is not, but it used to be a paralyzing fear. It even says so in the book, like, what will become of me? I'll look like the hole in the donut. Yeah, if I if what will happen to me if I just do the right thing? If I don't have a backup plan, if I don't cheat on this girl, what will happen to me? How will I feel safe? And if I don't do that, how about I don't snoop through her fucking phone or do some shit online or whatever? Try to break into her emails or whatever. You know? Anytime I went looking for through somebody's stuff, which it's been so long since I've done it, like I can't even remember. Even with my wife, I probably looked through her phone in 14 years, maybe that we've been together. Dude, I think like maybe two or three times. And the amount of anxiety that I had while I was doing it was unfucking bearable. If she would have seen me, she would have been like, holy shit, bro, what are you doing? Watching fucking the what's going on? That it's so I can't handle it. So I'd just rather not do that stuff. You know? Yeah. Oh my god. As long as we get out of the way so God can work in our lives, we'll experience the exact degree of spiritual growth we need. Okay, I read that. Yeah. How am I increasing my trust in God and my understanding by working this step? I have to have him or invite him, her, it, whatever, the higher power, in between me and the next wrong action. And sometimes I don't have it, so I make phone calls to people that I know that I can tell of myself and say, listen, I'm about, I feel like doing some shit, and the stage is set. So sometimes it used to be this, I'm doing, I'm about to go do some shit. And now, like, and that's like a five-alarm fire. And now I have enough people in my life that I check in with on a regular basis that they see like, like, dude, you are setting a stage. So now they get me doing the stage setting uh thing. You know, let's go. Keep going. With words like entirely and all playing such a prominent role in this step, it's easy to become overly self-critical and perfectionistic. We need to remember that even though our willingness must be complete, we're not going to become perfect. Not today, not ever. When we act on a defect against our will, we need to practice a principle of self-acceptance. We need to accept that while we're still capable of acting out, we're also going, we're also still willing to change. With that acknowledgement, we renew our commitment to be changed. We've grown exactly as much as we're supposed to for today. And if we were perfect, we would have no other further need to grow, which is bullshit. Do I accept myself today? Yes. Impulsively answer, yes. What do I like about myself? I like the fact that I know that I, you know, as far as I've come, and I could keep telling stories about all right, this year I did this, this year I did this, this like I've been on this journey for you know now 22 years. Um, I'm still not there. And I'll think that I that I've arrived now, and at 25 years I'm gonna be like, dude, at 22, I was like, shh I wasn't there. I wasn't here. I'm gonna be a constant road on self-improvement. You know, the only way you can coast is going downhill, and I re I don't want to do that. Uh, you know. So I accept I like what I like about myself is that I continue on the path. And the areas that I fall short, I'm willing to pay the price whatever they're on until I'm willing to change. You know, but there's very few things that that I have going on that um, yeah. I'm just, you know, I'm basking in the grace of the glory of the Most High of the Lord. You know, I've got enough proof in my life that God is the greatest and he loves me and he's taking care of me. He sent all these all you people to come and help save me from myself. That sometimes it's just I don't want to let you down. And that's enough if I don't care enough about myself. What has changed since I've been working the steps? My whole life. A little bit at a time has changed. And it's gonna keep changing. And I'm excited about where this uh where the it's like a never-ending love song, this life. You know? Let me mark this book here. Oh, actually, is this the very last paragraph? Oh no, there's more shit on the back. Alright, so we'll uh we'll pick this up in a week. Yeah, so you know, stay on it. Do not hurry, do, but do not rest. Uh be good to yourself, but also be you know strong on yourself. You know, discipline. Get some community, get some people to help you, uh to help hold you accountable. You know? And with love. Like, there's nobody that that is in my life that is in recovery that, you know, when I did some fucking foul, fucked up shit, nobody was ever like, oh, I'm disappointed in you. Not once. They were like, all right, man, you're gonna pay what you owe. But I love you. And if you want, we can help so you don't become a repeat offender. So share, like, and subscribe on all podcast platforms, the sober experience, please, uh our YouTube page as well. And I'll see you guys in another week or so. Oh, polar bear season has returned. Woohoo! Water's getting cold, you know. So, um, yeah, I'm excited about that as well. Second year being the president. We're not fucking around, man. All right, peace.