Recovering from 2020 (Ep. 157)

Speaker 1 (00:00:01): You know, we live in a time where we are sensory overload. I mean, from the minute we wake up, we're getting on our phones and checking our emails. And so I think that's why it's so important for me to have my eye at 10 in the morning. I never miss it.

Speaker 2 (00:00:18): When people are jobless, they lose their spiritual direction. They start behaving in ways that they normally wouldn't all of the routines and constraints that they had on their lives before kind of fall by the wayside. And so now you see some studies with separate people, half of Americans, daydreaming at home,

Speaker 3 (00:00:39): Self-authoring your own story. If your stories sucking like a lot of people will make a lot of different excuses for a lot of different things, but when they write down the truth, it's really just the story that told him that it's not the actual circumstances.

Speaker 1 (00:00:58): Thanks for tuning into the elevation recovery podcast, your hub for addiction, recovery strategies hosted by Chris Scott and Matt bench.

Speaker 3 (00:01:09): So here we are, ladies and gentlemen, I'm just kidding. We're not going to open with

Speaker 1 (00:01:13): That,

Speaker 3 (00:01:16): But this today is Tuesday.

Speaker 2 (00:01:19): This episode is going to come out Thursday, which is new year's Eve. So I thought I'd start at least by doing a 20, 20 kind of recap. And so it's not going to be long, 2020 absolutely sucked in many ways. But the good news is, is it's almost going to be 20, 21 and a few days here. And then everything kind of gets to reset. And cause I don't know about YouTube, but when 2020 start, I was like, this is going to be the most Epic year. And it was a really good year for me, but I rarely think about things in that way. Now I'm got more of a view to where I'm looking at 2020 for our country and it's been pretty bad for the whole world really. But the good news is, is there have been so many new addiction modalities that I've learned about reading articles and listening to podcasts.

Speaker 2 (00:02:15): And there's been a lot of policies that are kind of moving in the right direction, but there's still way slow in this podcast. I think we have somewhere around 140,000 downloads. Um, think this is like episode one 57, I think. And it's only been a year and a few months. What do you guys think about that? I think it's awesome. And I, I don't recall exactly when we started this podcast, but just so everyone knows, we have three people today and the people watching YouTube, which I assume we'll put the signs are too narrow, but it's me, Chris Scott, uh, Matt Finch and coach Tana is where that's today. I re figured out the technological challenges to doing. Um,

Speaker 4 (00:03:00): But yeah, I think this has been the most bizarre year that I've ever lived through by a long shot. Um, probably with, with September 11th being the second most bizarre. And in terms of bad things happening to people sort of lucking out that it didn't directly happen to me in this case, by some miracle I haven't gotten COVID. Uh, my MMA coach did my training partner has the antibodies, which is very odd. So maybe I, I did have it at some point, although I tested negative three times and I just feel horrible for everyone negatively affected by the lockdowns. And obviously the people affected by the virus itself. Um, it's a very nuanced issue and I haven't wanted to, you know, it's like the second you start talking about this type of thing, you become political. And then half of the people who used to look up to you on subscribe and all that, which at this point I'm, I'm probably about ready to say that.

Speaker 4 (00:04:00): And this is not by any means a, uh, I'm not the first person to say this, but I think the lockdowns are causing more harm than good. And I see this from the lens of all of the people who are emailing us, sending us messages, you know, who have relapsed, who are having serious mental health issues. You know, you see the rates of suicide going up when people are jobless, they lose their spiritual direction. Um, they start behaving in ways that the, normally wouldn't all of the routines and constraints that they had on their lives before kind of fall by the wayside. And you know, so now you see some studies with, with people, half of Americans day drinking at home, and it's kind of like despair. I don't know if we've ever seen anything like this. Maybe not since the great depression where it's just widespread despair.

Speaker 4 (00:04:51): And yet we also live in this cyber high-tech cyber bubble where you can waste a way with this brilliant piece of technology, but, you know, I smartphones, but it's really easy to spend your time watching stupid meme videos. Not that the best of us don't watch memes, but you know, being unproductive and, and all of a sudden just fueling whatever the negativity might be, um, or just not being proactive. It's really hard. Uh, so I think it's been tough in some ways. It's been an incredible year for me personally, you know, despite everything that's going on, but I, I don't have to go to work to go something, you know, I, I mean, I have to work, but luckily it's not like favorite cover is not a location that gets closed. Right? And so that's something I'm, I'm extremely fortunate that I get to work with U2.

Speaker 4 (00:05:42): Um, and the other people who make all of this possible and we get to help people. But honestly, you know, because not my enjoyment of what I do is driven by fulfillment. First. It pains me more to see infinitely more people needing help. Then it makes me feel good to help the number of people that we reach. Um, and you know, it keeps me motivated to wake up every morning and reach more people. Uh that's for sure. But, you know, it's, it's kinda like I, and I'm trying not to make this rent too long, or this is the last thing I wanted to put here. I've always said there's like a vibe in the air that even if you insulate yourself emotionally from external things, and that's something we've talked about, you know, being able to stay calm or stay stable, amidst chaos, or Mister rationality or amidst drinking culture.

Speaker 4 (00:06:36): There's still a vibe such that even though I don't have a typical Monday through Friday nine to five job, I do, for some reason, find it easier to relax on Saturdays and Sundays, cause I'd go out and people are kind of moving a little slower. They look all happier. Maybe they're smelling the flowers, they're enjoying a little bit of sun, uh, and in, in a similar way. And then Monday through Friday, I sometimes get a little more stress because people are driving faster than they need to get home from work or whatever. You know, people are stressing them out their, of their boss. So there's something in the air. Similarly in a macro sense, there's something that's been in the air with these lockdowns, with the virus, with the, the panic. And that's been palpable to me. And, and that's something that, you know, is, uh, you know, you try not to let it affect you. You try to do your best, but I can't wait until the day when we don't have that hanging over us like a stale cloud. Um, because it's, you know, there's a lot of suffering out there.

Speaker 1 (00:07:37): Yeah. And, you know, I wish that we had a location that we could all go to with like a big white board. And I think it would be fun to be able to, um, I think about that often, like, you know, would I get more done if I could go into an office and hang out with you too. Um, but talking about all of this and I think we're all kind of just exhausted of talking about COVID and the election and everything else that's going on in the world, like the riot and things like that. But I think, I believe we are giving them a role, one of the freedoms, um, that is ours to have, and that's our freedom of choice to choose how we think about all this stuff. And I've been thinking about this a lot because I came across this quote, I've wrote down, I had to write it down cause I can't remember it.

Speaker 1 (00:08:25): Um, but it's by Victor Frankl who was, um, he was captured in the Nazi, um, into a concentration camp and he wrote everything can be taken from a man. But one thing, the last of human freedoms to choose one's attitude in any given circumstance to choose one's own way. So after this man had been stripped of everything, stripped of who he was, what he did, even his wedding ring was taken from him. He said, I have one freedom. Nobody can take from me. And that's my power to choose my freedom, to choose how I respond. Um, what I think and the one freedom that we have, we're giving it away. We're giving it away to addiction, negative thinking to stress, to anxiety. And we have to sit back and realize, you know, as we're so frustrated with whatever's going on around us, maybe we should take back that freedom of today. I'm going to choose to be happy today. I'm going to choose not to drink today. I'm going to choose to be healthier today. I'm going to choose my own way because I still have that freedom.

Speaker 2 (00:09:38): I love that. And typically nowadays my emotions and my mental kind of grounded-ness and inner peace is usually 24 seven. Um, but recently like the last two days and even more so yesterday evening towards the night I was noticing like, Whoa, I'm feeling like this huge energetic kind of emotional, like outflow. Like I wasn't like sad or I wasn't anxious or anything. I've always had kind of a difficulty, um, kind of labeling emotions. That's like, I'm a very intellectual I'm, uh, I'm emotional of course too, but it's not like, uh, a topic that I'm like fluid in. I could just talk about emotions and this or that, but I did notice something was different, much different and it wasn't like, I guess it could be kind of like searching for intuition of the future. It was more like this kind of not quite melancholy, but it was just, I was feeling things.

Speaker 2 (00:10:49): And I was like remembering things from the past. And then when I went and walked last night, the moon was just like, boom. So of course I looked up, what's going on with the solar system here and it's full moon coming up tomorrow, December 30th, um, is I think they call it a cold moon or a Yule moon two in Europe because it's the full moon right after Christmas, anyways, a full moon and camper. And whenever we have those, I was like, no wonder I'm a cancer, a triple cancer actually. So I know a lot, this is very soft, not even science, but I do believe some of the stuff. And whenever there's a full moon, that's like really, sometimes I feel those hardcore, in fact, in my drinking days and drug using days, if there was crazy moon activity like that, and I was feeling all the energy, woo.

Speaker 2 (00:11:46): I would go out on the bender of a lifetime because I didn't like feeling those feelings. So the last two and more so yesterday to kind of process those feelings. I've been walking barefoot on the beach, walking around my neighborhood, not bringing my phone, not listening to audio books, not listening to music, just kind of walking and being in nature and letting those feelings come in and out and just kind of, well then today I feel great. You know, I used to stuff, all that stuff where I used to drown it with alcohol or numb it with drugs. And it was out of control back in the day I was undiagnosed undiagnosed bipolar two for all that time. Tan. I know you have some experience with that too. So it was kind of a cool reminder to be grateful for how stable my mental and emotional health is now because you know, who knows any day something could happen and all of a sudden your brain's not functioning, right? You're all over the place. And this, this type of way of landing living for me, it's so much better. I feel so much better. I'm able to be responsible, raise a kid, have a girlfriend, have our family, but with those crazy emotions all over the place, you know, a lot of people don't know how to deal with those in a healthy way. It's going for going for a walk in nature. Almost, almost always fixes things. I think people don't utilize that tactic nearly enough.

Speaker 4 (00:13:18): Yeah. I decided to reclaim my Mondays because I was starting to absorb the negative Monday energy. And one of my, my first achievements after quitting drinking was learning how to enjoy Mondays. Again, even though back then, I did have, uh, a job. I was a trainer. I was going into the gym, but I had no reason to stress the way I did when I was in finance. And I would have just drank through the whole weekend. Often I'd have to go into the office sometimes having drank and do work because that was the nature of that job. But then Mondays were the worst. Everyone was uptight. There was like, you know, no one likes Mondays. So I wanted to change that. I want it to reframe my Mondays. And I kind of succeeded in, in doing that. Um, partially when I was a trainer by setting odd hours.

Speaker 4 (00:14:04): So I started working, I would have some people that wanted to come in on Sundays and then I would just take Monday off, um, to the extent that I could, or I would just start my Monday at 4:00 PM. I wouldn't get up at 4:00 PM, but I would start the things that I had to two at 4:00 PM and have like a really good morning routine on a Monday where it was stuff for me, like stuff I gave myself permission to do for myself. And, um, you know, furthering my meditation efforts, which I've been on and off again every few months since then, uh, nearly, almost seven years ago at this point. Uh, but I, I recently revamped every six to eight weeks. I revamp my schedule, I get my whiteboard and I wash it. I get all the remnants of the last cycle off of it.

Speaker 4 (00:14:48): And all the things I was excited about, usually 75% of which I actually achieve. So there's some carry over every six to eight weeks. And one of the things on my new whiteboard was on Mondays. I'm going to go for a barefoot walk on the beach and it's not particularly warm out here. So I've gotten some funny looks from people, all bundled up with like mittens and hats and scarves on and I'm walking and, you know, basically compression shorts and a bathing suit. And that's it. Uh, I'm also, I try not to judge people on like, why are you wearing shoes? Like, even if you're going to bundle up, like just at least get some earth in it, but I guess it's not common knowledge yet. And, uh, or at least get some earthing shoes anyway. So I've started doing that. I went for a barefoot walk on the beach yesterday.

Speaker 4 (00:15:37): Um, and then, and all of this is after my MMA workout, which is normally a couple of hours long. I try to get work done in the morning and then work done after my me time. Um, that's one of the benefits of being able to control your own schedule. You still have to do your work, but you get to figure out when you do things. So the middle of the day I used to schedule work and like calls, coaching calls and stuff for the middle of the day. But then I would feel weird. It was because I was missing out on the sun and I wasn't able to get outside. I wasn't earthing. Who's going to go earthing at 10:00 PM. I've tried, but it's, it can be odd. Um, and, and so I started doing this new routine. So Mondays I do my MMA go for a bear for walk on the beach, and then I go to the range and I trained for the zombie apocalypse, which you never know if it's going to happen or not, but it makes me feel good to go do that.

Speaker 4 (00:16:25): And it's fun. And they have a guy who works at the ranch who used to be a sniper. And I learned all sorts of cool stuff. So that's been my routine for the last several weeks and it feels really good. I've slept better. And, you know, for Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, at least I've noticed palpably better sleep. Um, and I think a lot of that is just from getting some sun. Uh, my barefoot walk tends to be around 45 minutes long. So it's just enough time, I think, to get the earthing benefits. There's also something about staring out at the horizon with the ocean and just letting your mind be tranquil. I like to practice, uh, letting my, my thoughts flow without fixating on anything in particular. So it's kind of like, I'm the observer of my thoughts. I just observe what's happening rather than being really caught up, you know, object conscious with the thoughts being objects or, you know, just getting caught up in the video game of life.

Speaker 4 (00:17:19): You kind of step back and, and it really, that helps to reduce any anxiousness that might come up or, or depression. Although, luckily I haven't struggled with either of those in a very long time. Uh, and also in conjunction with those, the sleep hacks that you and I have discussed recently met, um, the glycine before bed, which I now do on and off. I like to cycle things on and off, uh, with the exception of basic multivitamin type stuff. Um, you know, I like to cycle on and off probably forever because it's hard to actually get your, the amount of magnesium you need. Um, but something like glycine, I don't know if it's been studied. Long-term like, they'd probably not studied someone. Who's taken three grams of glycine every night for 30 years. I don't want to be doing that. But, um, every now and then if I feel like I need a tune-up, I'll take it every night for a week or two.

Speaker 4 (00:18:10): Um, and the, the Zephyrus, I think it is called the Chinese herbs that helps with sleep. I got that from, uh, dragon herbs, and that is amazing for sleep. And I was starting to, uh, yeah, I was, I had another hack where I like to just sleep with my curtains open when I need to start getting up a little bit earlier. And then I, that way I wake with the sunrise, or even before sunrise, as the sun starting to, to come up, luckily I have like a big, um, like Florida ceiling sliding door, glass door, and it's, if it starts getting bright, it starts getting really bright. Then ultimately either I get up or the dogs wake me up cause they realize the sun's coming up. Uh, but the problem with that was sometimes that's still go to bed too late. And, um, I wouldn't, I wouldn't feel like going to bed cause I didn't want to cause the inner child in me wanted to hang out and you know, do stuff or go down some rabbit hole with rescue dogs on YouTube or whatever it is.

Speaker 1 (00:19:09): Right Chris, what's that more of a night out though, right? Yeah.

Speaker 4 (00:19:13): Um, but I, I, I know that I feel better at least occasionally having periods where I'm getting up early. It's just a matter of getting myself to go to bed on time when I was a drinker, it was because I didn't like to stop drinking. So I would want to stay up. I would stay up until three or four in the morning, even if I had just drinking. Cause that was my me time. Cause I had no other me-time. Um, and then I would get up at seven and go to work and feel like hell and that snow days compounding that lack of REM sleep, emotional instability, um, all of that, but now it's that. Um, and, and it's not a massive problem. It's not nearly the caliber of problem it was then, but I don't, I become spoiled. I don't like getting seven hours of sleep when I can get eight.

Speaker 4 (00:19:58): And if I can get nine, I feel super human. You know, I would never need a nap ever if I got nine hours of sleep every night, I think the optimal amount for me is probably eight and a half, which is more than some people, but less than others. Uh, but yeah, the, the Zephyrus and the glycine, um, and, and some, and magnesium have been extremely helpful in CBD. Actually, if I find myself popping up too early, which has happened, um, sometimes I'll find myself waking up at like, if I actually get to bed at 11 or 12, sometimes I want to give it five or six and a bit of CBD. And then some of that Zephyrus will just put me right back and I have, I have CBD vape pen. Um, but I like the drops. I have some pretty strong drops, a little bit of that. I keep it on my, and I just

Speaker 2 (00:20:48): Roll over and go back to sleep and I can get up if I want, I'm not groggy, you know, certain things like valerian or passion flower or a five HTP, those things will were, if I did notice, I would wake up at noon and feel groggy. Right. A little bit of CBD, a little bit of, um, there was other things glycine or [inaudible], which I feel very odd saying, um, helps me sleep for just long enough, like get the desired amount.

Speaker 1 (00:21:15): Yeah. Um, I know I need to try some of these that you guys talk about. I tried the glycine. I liked that, but, um, tarring and gather my big ones. So if I, I don't normally wake up in the middle of the night anymore, but I woke up at two the other morning and I thought, okay, well there's a weapon do work. And then I realized, Oh man, I'm too tired. So I'd take a Gabba and a Tarin. And, and then I usually just count backwards from 999 and I don't normally 700 and I'm out. So I pretty good at, uh, sleeping through the night. And that makes me happy. Um, as long as I don't eat too late, but I wanted to ask you guys, what are y'all most looking forward to coming up to the new year? Like in 2021? What, what are you so excited about? Like, is it, Oh, maybe we'll stop talking about COVID or maybe we'll stop wearing masks. I just joined a new gym and we have to wear our masks from, from machine to machine, but we can take it off when we're working out. And each machine is like, there's no space in between each. And I'm like, ah, this is so frustrating. Cause I'm like trying to breathe and the mask is going in my mouth and it's very frustrating. So I don't know. Um, what are you guys looking for the most forward to in 2021?

Speaker 2 (00:22:35): I'm looking the most forward to two things, three things. Number one for the gyms here to be open indoors. They've been outside forever and they're not only are the outside, but they're, it's just like minimal equipment. Just really not that much stuff to choose from. Um, so I'm really excited about that. I don't know if it'll happen in 2021. I live in California. The way things are going here, I might have to wait until 20, 22 before I can work out indoor to gym. We'll see how that goes.

Speaker 1 (00:23:12): You can work outdoors though and raising or too hot. I love being outside

Speaker 2 (00:23:20): Yesterday. I worked out chest and triceps in my living room with the sliding door open. I live on the third floor of a, we call it a tree house cause we're just totally in these huge trees. And I worked out with the window open. We had our first rainstorm, um, since a long time, I can't remember the last time it rain, but it was tons of rain. Uh, no thunder yet. And so I was working out, listening to trance on my smart TV, listening to rain and just pumping iron in my living room. Not as fun as a gym, but I just, and plus my gym just sent me a thing. An email yesterday, January is on us. Come back to the [inaudible] and you don't have to pay anything till February. It's probably they're super desperate. Probably there's hardly anyone going. Cause it's just, it's just kind of lame.

Speaker 2 (00:24:15): The second thing I'm most stoked about is I have a client, a client that has three homes to a second home and a third home. The third home she bought is in Palm desert, which is a few hours away from here, pretty close to Palm Springs. And she's got a nice condo that I think is 1800 square foot. Really nice. I saw pictures of it and she said that me and my family can go stay there for free. If we want to. She hasn't used it yet. She bought it right before COVID she hasn't used it yet because he doesn't want to travel. Um, I think in Hawaii too, if you do travel and you have to be quarantined for a couple of weeks when you get back. So I'm excited about going on a vacation and a beautiful, um, it's like this gated community and there's swimming pool jacuzzis, a golf course.

Speaker 2 (00:25:06): We have our own golf cart cart for it. And so that was really cool. And then finally, I'm stoked. I'm going to start body surfing again, this winter in the freezing cold water, um, with no wetsuit. Cause I used to do that when I was younger all the way up until even 34, maybe even 35. So cause that's just like the ultimate feeling. It's the best. It's one of the best workouts for me swimming in the ocean. Then you're riding waves, you're getting cold therapy. I know that is the thing that I've been, uh, not utilizing that will probably improve my mental, physical and emotional and probably even spiritual health more than anything else. Like, um, that's the ultimate workout for me. It's like circuit training.

Speaker 1 (00:25:54): Is it like surfing with a board? And what is body surfing?

Speaker 2 (00:26:00): What's that Chris had tan has been deprived.

Speaker 1 (00:26:03): I literally I'm feeling very sad right now. I want to go home.

Speaker 2 (00:26:09): Imagine on my feet, I have two long fins body surfing thins. And so then imagine me with my arms, like forward, uh, waves coming, I turn around, start kicking my fins underwater as fast as possible while you're going like this, or maybe even, um, swimming like this, then the wave starts to come and you propel yourself onto the wave with just your body. There's no board whatsoever. So you're laying down going like this or going like this or going like this. It's a truly freeing feeling. Um, someone

Speaker 4 (00:26:44): That used to be a board surfer such as myself, it's very freeing because you don't have a board to duck under, you don't have a board that can hit you. You don't have to stand up on the surfboard. So it's just a real kickback way to do it. And so those that's what I'm excited about. What about you Chris? Well, I was going to say when I was in San Diego, when was that? Two months ago, like six weeks. Wow. Time's flying. Uh, I was there for about a week and I bike surf every morning and that's why I stayed where I stayed right in Pacific beach. And I could walk right down to the beach in the morning and I always feel super responsible when I'm in California because I wake up three hours before I normally would. So it's like 8:00 AM and I'm getting into one degree water, body surfing.

Speaker 4 (00:27:33): And I just felt amazing every morning I felt super optimized. And it stays with you for the rest of the day. We have a gym here with an outdoor unheated pool that got down to it's in the fifties, I think, cause it's been pretty cold in Savannah, but it doesn't hold a candle to body surfing, uh, and, and the Pacific ocean and getting all that scenery and salt and just incredible stuff. So I'm looking forward to doing that with you and getting back out there. I'm also looking forward to you teaching me how to surf because I've been deprived I've I've not served. I think 10, maybe we'd talked about the, have you surfed or is that something you wanted to?

Speaker 1 (00:28:13): I have served one time and I need to do it again because I didn't have the best trainer who he kind of just let me on my own. And I'm, I'm like trying to surf and the waves were like, they kept knocking me over. Like I couldn't even stand up. They, every time I would stand up, they would dock me over and that I would paddle out and it was a nightmare

Speaker 4 (00:28:34): That will help us out. We'll do a finger covering elevation recovery, uh, trip, and we'll do some surfing. Maybe that'll be like a template for our retreats. That would be something at some point, it'd be awesome to throw retreats if people can ever hang out in person. And then, um, and anyway, so as far as my year, I'm, I'm excited first and foremost about reaching more people with everything we're doing here. You know, the podcast, YouTube videos, uh, I have some ideas that I won't share all of them cause I like to be full of surprises, but I guess I'll share one of them. I'm considering becoming more active on Instagram, even though I haven't historically liked just telling people what I'm doing all the time, I'm going to experiment with it. Maybe I'll give it. I'll do like a 30 day experiment. See how it goes.

Speaker 4 (00:29:24): And uh, you know, we'll see, we'll see what happens. I'm optimistic though. Cause I think that's an opportunity to, to be more involved, to give people a more interactive view of what life can look like after you've quit drinking. And after, as during the ongoing and con and permanent process of continual optimization. And I think that would be fun. So that's something I'm looking forward. I always like having a new project, especially when it makes me feel uncomfortable. And it's kind of funny that there's something that makes me feel uncomfortable that your average, like 13 year old finds easy, um, that are that's such as life and technology. Um, but I'll figure out how to take pictures and post them and do, do live stories, whatever that is. I'm still figuring it out. Um, beyond that, I'm looking forward to keeping a promise to myself that I broke in every year, since I quit drinking, which was to schedule a ski trip and go out skiing.

Speaker 4 (00:30:27): Skiing is my favorite thing. Probably ever. I grew up skiing. I've been skiing, not quite as long as I could walk, but for a long time. And I haven't skied once since I quit drinking, I used to go every year. The last time I went skiing, I was dependent on alcohol and I was a bit hung over on the slopes and I felt fat and income and competent. I didn't want to ski the trails that I used to ski with ease. And I was just kind of, um, you know, just on a ski trip and not having maybe 20% of the time that I should have had. And it's easy to enjoy great scenery, but not when you're you feel like you're living in black and white when you're not drinking. So I'm really looking forward to enjoying something that I've long enjoyed. And to be honest, I don't have a plan yet. I'm going to plan the trip in January for probably February or March, but it will happen this year. And by me saying it on this podcast, I have, I know I have to make it happen. Um, the, the specifics of scheduling, it should not be an issue even with everything going on. I'm sure there's a place I can go and just get on some skis. So I'm really looking forward to that. So yeah, reaching more people, skiing and learning how to surf slash body surfing out in, uh, California.

Speaker 2 (00:31:49): Nice. Chris, I'll keep texting. You

Speaker 4 (00:31:56): Do do either of you guys ski. I feel like I've asked you both, but I don't know. Do you ski Tana?

Speaker 2 (00:32:01): No. I want to do that too.

Speaker 4 (00:32:03): All right. I'm a good teacher for that. I could teach you both that, Matt, you said you've been skiing a couple of times, right? Well, I don't know,

Speaker 2 (00:32:11): Consider myself a skier nor a snowboarder. Although when I was a kid, probably around the age of nine or 10, I went skiing once or twice per winter for like probably three or four years. I was, I was okay at a w I was like not great, but then I started snowboarding when I was 13. And I was like, Oh, this is kind of like surfing, surfing. You puts your front foot, you lean on your front foot more snowboarding. You kind of lean on your back foot more. And I was like, Whoa, this is so weird. So since I had surfed, it was kind of hard to learn that, um, really funny, quick story when I was 20, I think 19 or 20, I went on a weekend snowboard slash ski trip with my dad and some of his friends and one of my good friends, my friend, Joe, and we, this is like five years after I started smoking cannabis.

Speaker 2 (00:33:07): We got so blazed on the lift all the way to the top of the mountain. And this is me snowboarding at 20 I'd only been like probably two or three times with years in between each time we get to the top of the mountain, big bear, mountain, snow summit. And I'm so stoned that it's not, it's like, I felt like I was in that video game on PlayStation called cool borders that had come out around the time. It was a snowboarding video game. We played a lot. And as soon as I got up there and started going and I was like stoned out of my mind, it really felt like cool borders. And it took me, I think, two hours to get to the bottom because I fell so many times and the snow was really icy. It was spring. It was like April. And a lot of it was fake snow being generated by the snow machine. Um, man, I was so bruised up after that day and that was the last time I went. I went snowboarding one other time after that. And then I hurt myself. I hurt my thumb really bad. So snowboarding is not for me. So I would definitely do skiing again. Snowboarding's too weird. I like facing forward with both my legs going down the mountain, going like that. I'm a good surfer, but snowboarding. I just suck at it.

Speaker 1 (00:34:27): See, I've always been awake border. So I wonder if white boarding would be better for me than skiing because I could never get up on skis, but I don't know. It's different when it's water, when snow and

Speaker 2 (00:34:39): Get up on a wakeboard. I've tried. I had a friend when I lived in Atlanta. I had a buddy who had a house in Lakeland ear, which is a man-made Lake about an hour North of Atlanta. And it was awesome. I felt like I was bringing the 1970s back. I was on two skis. I wasn't even slaloming it with one ski, like the cool guys do. I had two skis and I was jumping the wig with my two skis. Cause every time I tried to get up on a wakeboard, they said all that. I felt like I was dead lifting the boat sideways, trying to get up. And it looked like my head, my head was apparently skimming across the top of the water. And he was like the boats having a hard time, like moving forward. Cause I thought I was going to break my back and then I would just let go. I could not get up on a wakeboard. I'm only straight forward. That's the only way I know how to grow.

Speaker 1 (00:35:27): Sounds like we have a lot of fun stuff to do this next year. And I'm sure voice being so much more when you're sober and not stoned

Speaker 2 (00:35:35): For sure. And I judge anyone for snowboarding if that's what they want to do, um, screenings cooler, but you do what you want. No judgment zone here. Yeah. That's perfect. As long as you don't snowboard and sit on the side of the trail for like an hour and yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:35:51): How about if you did bring hot chocolate by the fire inside and walk everybody's

Speaker 2 (00:35:56): Well, you know, I actually, I have a eucalyptus, uh, essential oil and I haven't really gotten into all the essential oils. I like airy Sage. I like lavender and I like eucalyptus because the first time I ever went out West skiing, there there's a nice resort. I'd never seen anything like where I went to Telluride and um, really nice place in the steam room had eucalyptus. There was the first eucalyptus scented steam room I'd ever been in. So when I, when I just sniff my essential oil of eucalyptus, it brings me back to going in a steam room for the first time when I was on a ski trip. And all of the memories start flooding back. It's this is the coolest thing.

Speaker 1 (00:36:38): Yeah. That's quite poor eucalyptus on the floorboard of my car, but it smells so good. It's I'm, disgustedly just pouring the drops in my car, but so you could

Speaker 2 (00:36:53): [inaudible] anything meant to your fresh yeah, that's how I am too. I like minty fresh, refreshing stuff going in line with this topic too, with essential oils, aroma therapy type stuff. I haven't been using essential oils recently, but on those walks that I've been going on, which Chris, you inspired me to start going for barefoot beach walks again. It was, uh, first when you came to visit and we did it, but then you had said your new Monday routine a few weeks back since then, I've been going to Torrey Pines. I've been going to dog beach. I've been going lots of barefoot walks on the ocean. And so what I've been trying to do, remember I'm not using my phone or earbuds. Um, it's a combination of many things I'm trying to in the shortest time possible, maybe 45 minutes to an hour, get as many benefits as possible.

Speaker 2 (00:37:46): And so the barefoot walking takes care of that, especially since I'm doing it in the water and the wet sand most of the time. But then there's also, since I'm not listening to an audible and not listening to music and since I'm not with anybody either, so there's no conversation. I'm not like trying to think of anything specific, just letting my mind flow, but I'm also, so it's like a sensory, it's like a wonderful sensory experience to where I I'm really focusing on feeling the sand and the ocean and it feels great. And I'm putting my hands down and like this Cigala, this chigong position, which you can't see. So I can like feel my cheap building and then it's like shooting into the ground and then I can feel the wind all over my face and other parts I can smell the ocean in the salt water and I can smell seaweed.

Speaker 2 (00:38:42): And it's, I'm kind of just trying to notice everything I'm like tasting, you know, maybe I've got a mint in my mouth or I can like, um, it's like full on just trying to absorb all of that nature, all of that beauty, all of that goodness into all my senses, hearing sight, um, smelling, tasting, even intuitively feeling. And so I think aroma therapy is great. Like I know, uh, an aroma therapist, one of my mom's friends, she is really intelligent with that stuff. And there's actually a lot of great research and science behind, uh, aroma therapy. I think that any addiction treatment center should have like essential oil diffusers and no fluorescent lights, just like this nineties, uh, healthy lighting and great smells, big, huge flat screen TVs or complete walls that are TVs to where it looks like you're surrounded in nature. Um, calming music maybe with some binaural beats. Like if someone gave me a bunch of money and said here, I want you to help design me the best addiction treatment program, inpatient detox facility. Ooh. That would be such a fun, uh, design project.

Speaker 4 (00:40:03): Yeah. I think especially if you put it in a location that was already beautiful, not the places haven't done that. I guess the Malibu places in Malibu where it looks, it looks nice. Um, but yeah, th that's that was neglected. I'll say the aesthetics of recovery, if there is such a thing, if not, there should be, but it wasn't neglected where I went, which was otherwise a very prestigious place, uh, well known for well being, having a higher success rate than some of the other 12 step based ones. But yeah, lots of full-out fluorescent lights. I can't say that it wasn't like it was horribly designed, but, um, you know, it was very, I'll say 20th century, it's time to bring addiction recovery into the 21st century use everything we know. Um, and, and there's, I found as someone who used to be basically a science, evidence-based only rationalist a reductionist almost.

Speaker 4 (00:41:05): There's a fine line between the science and the, the intuitive, I w I was going to say, woo, but I don't like that because there are things that are real, but, uh, there are other things that science we're just waiting for the studies and we know enough anecdotally and intuitively and the cost of, of doing it is so low that you may as well put it in there, like binaural beats, you know, no one's going to get screwed up and their recovery because beats were playing or because there were, there were there, they had a nice non fluorescent lighting, uh, or because it smelled nice. You know, these are things that could be covered and I think are nice accents. Um, especially for people who are sensitive to energy and for people who are visual, uh, like myself, um, and some people seem not to be sensitive to these types of things.

Speaker 4 (00:41:55): My freshman year roommate, who's still from college, who is still one of my best friends. He, you know, I remember my dorm in college. I never turned the fluorescent light lighting on there's like hospital lights. And we had a switch for that. I don't think I've flicked the switch, flip the switch all year because I had my own lamp that I would use. I used a lamp, there's like a reading lamp with a warm glow. And then I had a, you know, all sorts of nice things, kind of cozy things to make it feel like home. My roommate had a mattress with a sheet on it. I don't think he had a bedspread. I don't know if he had a pillow to be honest actress with a sheet on it. And all of his clothes were stuffed in the corner. And he had the hospital lights on 24 seven, even when he was sleeping most of the time.

Speaker 4 (00:42:41): I don't know if he usually turned the lights off. I don't think he did, but just completely impervious to all of that. So people are different, you know, and then I was, I I've always been like an outgoing introvert or outgoing, capable introvert. I like people, I like connection, but I need to recharge alone. So I'd be in my bed reading sometimes for an hour, even if we were going to go out that night. And his, his version of recharging was walking around all the dorms and seeing all the people and just hanging out like squatting in their rooms for an hour and talking about whatever, and then moving onto the next one. That's how he would recharge if I had done that because he was full extrovert. If I had done that, I'd be drained. I wouldn't want to talk to anyone for a week.

Speaker 4 (00:43:26): You know, if that was my daily thing for more than a few days. So people really are different. I think it's worth trying to figure out how do we, um, for the sake of addiction recovery, but even beyond that lifestyle optimization disease treatment, how do we take into account people's inherent differences, which are some combination of genetic or innate and environmental or cultural or whatever, and, and use that ability to take those things into account, to further their own treatment outcomes. And I think it's, that's something that's possible. You know, you wouldn't lock an extrovert up, uh, who doesn't even seem, who seems impervious to surroundings and is not particularly visual. Like my, my friend, you wouldn't lock him in a room or not that you'd lock anyone, but you wouldn't ideally put him in a room with no one there to recharge with a bunch of Himalayan salt lamps and binaural beats. Whereas that would be perfect for me. So I think that, that one of the things that has to be done going forward is, uh, getting rid of the one size fits all approach and, and integrating modalities that we know help, but also paying special attention to which modality has helped the most for which kinds of people. That's a really good,

Speaker 2 (00:44:43): Important distinction. And there's so many things like that that are either part of our personality or, or our character, a lot of it, which is innate too. So when you were talking about that, it popped into my head, Oh my gosh, there's a genius, a potentially genius niche there for addiction recovery. If someone opened a specific, uh, inpatient rehab facility that was totally geared for introverts and marketed that way, recovery for introverts, you don't have to go sit around and do all these meetings with people. It's more like a, kind of a solo quest type thing. But so if someone doesn't know that they're an introvert or an extrovert, that's very important right there, um, for your, for your life happiness. Another thing too, you're talking about Chris, the sensitivity to things, lights loud noises. I talk about this quite a bit on my YouTube channel, which is high scent or sensory processing sensitivity SPS.

Speaker 2 (00:45:47): Um, the more popular term is highly sensitive person. I did a solo cast episode on it before it was called a guide to recovery for empath or something like that. And 20% of human beings. And as far as researchers can tell, 20% of the animal kingdom has SPS sensory processing sensitivity, which is an any biological trait that makes us faster, cognitive processing speed, sensory processing speed. So if you're going somewhere, that's just really loud and bright lights, tons of people smells, someone with SPS is going to be less comfortable than somebody without it. So it's too many people, 20% of humans and animals. That's too much for it to be a disorder. It's not a disorder. It's just kind of an innate biological trait. And it's been confused with both been confused for introversion, but that's not correct either because I think 70% of, uh, introverts have, um, 70% of people with SPS are introverts, but the other 30% are actually ex extroverts.

Speaker 2 (00:47:01): So I have kind of both sides of it. I have, um, um, introverted big time, although I can be outgoing, uh, if I need to be or want to be, but I'm introverted. And also I have SPS hardcore. I've always been like, what the heck is different about me? Like some people are like, this is fun. I'm like this can't you see how like, this is crazy. It's just too loud or too bright and loud and crazy. Um, and so a lot of people with SPS or eight highly sensitive people will take downers alcohol opioids, benzos, muscle relaxers, something to calm down that overactive part of their brain, where anytime you watch a movie or anytime you go anywhere and do anything, your cognitive processing speed for all these sensory stimuli is so fine tuned and kind of hyper active that I've, I've realized once that I learned about this trait that I had to customize my light for having SPS, because in America it's mostly a place for extroverts. Like the best way in America to be successful is to be intelligent, extroverted, and conscientious the people that are like that can dominate. And so being an introvert in America was a lot harder until the pandemic. Now, the introverts are like, Oh, stay at home. No big deal. But, you know, taking those beach walks, turning my mind off, like stopping the sensory stimuli from going into me that are from the computer and from the phone and all that. Do you think that you might have SPS to Chris? Do you think you're

Speaker 4 (00:48:47): Oh yeah. It's the funniest thing is, um, and I had forgotten this, but I remembered it while you were talking when I was a kid, um, the scariest thing in the world to me and by kid, I mean like three or four, I remember some of my first memories are going to, we're going to the movie theater and the local movie theater where we went, they had, you know, at the typical, no smoking thing and the big, the cigarette with the little smoke coming and the, and then that was fine because there was no noise and there was a dark screen. And then this, these very bright pair of lips, huge lips would cover the entire screen and a woman's finger would come up to the lips and go, shh.

Speaker 4 (00:49:35): And I would freak out and try to run out of the theater. I hated the lips. I hated the bright, the brightness of the lips and the, the shushing. I couldn't handle it. It was like the longest shush of all time. And my parents thought I was just weird and it could have been, you know, maybe because I had a hearing impairment as well. So certain things sounded loud that shouldn't have sounded loud. It's odd hearing impairment. It's not just a decibel issue, but I was sensitive to sounds but also sensitive to sites as well. But that was, I could not stand to this day. I don't love going to the movies. I think part of it is PTSD from that, from their lips, there would show up and shush me for like 10 seconds straight. I couldn't handle it. It would make my ears ring or give me tonight for the rest of the movie.

Speaker 4 (00:50:20): Um, and yeah, I mean, I definitely I've, I've never, I used to get nauseous following my mom around in shopping malls because all there's fluorescent lights and I would get, like, I feel like the mannequins were watching me. I was a borderline like schizophrenia kid. And I mean, but not clinically, but I had I'd have weird thoughts and like panicky thoughts whenever I was out in public with too much going on. I did not like it probably would start to race. Um, and I've gotten better now. It's fine. I'm centered, I've grown up. I've matured. So I don't know to what extent these things change as you get older. I, you know, I, I lived in New York for several years and I'm actually almost four years and I wonder sometimes how much I actually liked being there. I convinced myself that I needed to be in New York because I needed the energy. But at the same time, I was numbing myself with alcohol most of the time when I lived there. So I don't know if that was in part, you know, the, the alcohol numbing down that area of my brain, might've made the high energy place more livable for me, despite all of the progressively toxic and deteriorate, um, deleterious effects of alcohol. Uh, yeah, I think I'm definitely a, uh, HSP or have, um, SPS or whatever you called it.

Speaker 1 (00:51:39): Well, you know, it's interesting, Chris and I don't know about you, Matt is you and I, I'm interesting this about technology. Like we're both, we both have admitted, like, I don't want to be on Instagram, but I'm going to try it. I'd already like, I don't like being on Facebook. I don't like posting. And I feel like all of that is a little overwhelming to me. And I am very similar to you in that regards. And I wonder if that has something to do with that going in and, you know, being a part of that social media where it's, it's such a big world on there, you know, you have to post these things. Are you posting the right things? You know, you got to look at other people's posts. You gotta, now I gotta like it. Like, I like all of your posts. Okay.

Speaker 1 (00:52:22): I like you all do I have to like it. And, um, I think that that's a big trap for all of that. You know, we live in a time where we are sensory overload. I mean, from the minute we wake up, we're getting on our phones and checking our emails. And so I think that's why it's so important for me to have my quiet time in the morning. I never miss it. I never miss my quiet time. Um, there are times when I do sleep in, in my kids will wake me up, which hardly ever happens. They come in, they're like be okay, mom, why aren't you already awake? And I tell them to go have my quiet time. And they're like, okay, we gotta leave mom alone while she has her quiet time. But now my son will say, I didn't go in my quiet time because it was very similar to meet my daughter.

Speaker 1 (00:53:09): She thrives on talking to people. She thrives on being around people and having all this energy. I mean, she's one of those, I've never been one of those girls who are like, let's all go to the bathroom together, but my daughter is that way. He is mom, can you come say that? And I'm sure. And then she's talking to me and I'm like, aren't you going to the bathroom? She's like, yeah, but I want to talk to you. She's just one of those people who, you know, thrive on that, um, thrive on talking to people. But I do believe that we all have, um, a sense to want to know what our meaning and purpose is in this world. And so, no matter if we say, Oh, I'm an extrovert or introvert or whatever it is, we do need to have that time where we just put the phones away and whatever it is, whether we're you meditate or you pray or you read, or, um, you know, you just sit still or walk on the beach barefoot.

Speaker 1 (00:54:05): You know, we have to have that time to reflect and contemplate and understand what our true meaning and purposes. And, um, it is fascinating because everybody is talking about like, Oh, you have to be fast paced. You have to do all of this. You know, especially a lot of the people who I follow, you know, go, go, go from the time you wake up to the time you go to bed. And I don't necessarily believe that it, I believe when you're able to sit back and have faith and understand your meaning and purpose, you work so much better than when you're just going, going, going. And, um, a lot of my clients who are like, I don't have time to sit back and take time for myself. I tell them, listen, it's not the work that you do. That brings you success, it's you? So if you're functioning, um, well, and your brain is highly functioning, you're going to do good work.

Speaker 2 (00:55:00): I love quiet time. Um, I think many of us nowadays are addicted to thinking, um, to where something always has to be on like, you know, some people where they have to have the TV on, in the background or where whenever they're driving. And I used to be like this, not with the TV, but I used to always have my, um, my ear buds in there. My, what are they called? The Apple air. I can't even remember now, they're they haven't been charged in months and I don't even care. But, um, I used to always have to have those in, at every waking moment during the day I was either on the computer or on my phone or on my phone with earbuds, just, just trying to be productive throughout the whole day. And it was that same thing. You're talking about Tana. It was from the culture that the success porn culture, the grind, the grind includes Friday, TGI F I subscribed to that.

Speaker 2 (00:55:58): And that's how I burned out. I burn out so much. I was unhappy, you know, business was good and it was gone. You know, things were, I was very productive, but I was, uh, a father that wasn't present. That was impatient. That was irritated. That was pretty much I wouldn't w I wasn't unhappy, but I wasn't happy. I was kind of just like a robot that would get irritated, impatient. And so I like lots of quiet time. Now, sometimes I won't even go to sleep, but I'll just go lay in my bed. Not because I want to take a nap, but because my mom does it all the time. So just go lay in her bed and sometimes she'll fall asleep, but she'll just go lay on her bed or lay on the floor even next to her bed and just close her eyes and just, you know, breathe and relax and turn your mind off.

Speaker 2 (00:56:49): I do that a lot, not every single day, but so between nature walks between laying down in the bed yesterday, yesterday evening, I just kicked back on my couch and just stared at my bird. And for 20 minutes just made funny faces at her and kind of talked bird language with her. I mean, I'd never would have done that a few years ago, three, four years ago. I didn't do that type of stuff. I've been incorporating a whole lot more playtime. And since I've got a ten-year-old and her friends spent the night and as over to who's 11, and we have a bird and I got a girlfriend who's, you know, 34. So, and she's real playful too. So we play a lot around here and we make jokes with each other and we, we prank each other and stuff. And having a combination of quiet time, nature, time, play time, and like silly time, that kind of stuff, uh, that that's just ultimately important, especially for people that are kind of hardwired, either innately or by culture to, to grind grind. You got to go, you you're nothing unless you're producing and you gotta do. You gotta work 12 hours a day. If you want to launch a business and do this and that

Speaker 1 (00:58:03): Time to, uh, you know, our time here on earth is short. And you know that with having a daughter, I mean, in the blink of a knowledge, she's 10. My son's going to be 10 in February. And I just, I feel like, like I had, he sat on my lap. He's 75 pounds, my lap. And I was just looking at him and tears came to my eyes. Cause I was like, I remember when he was a baby and it feels like just yesterday. And I'm like, I can't believe soon he's going to be 13. You know, he's going the teenagers. And one 16 is going to be driving. And it's really put everything into perspective of just how quickly time flies. And I don't want to waste any more of it because I wasted so much time drinking. And whenever I first left my ex-husband, I had like three jobs. I would drop my kids off at six in the morning and pick them up at six 30 at night. I would go to bed at eight. I miss out on so much time with them and I don't want to miss out on, in more so, um, you know, it's just, it's important to be able to reflect and not worry so much about the grind. Like you say.

Speaker 2 (00:59:16): I think everything you've both said is spot on. Um, I don't know about the piece yet, and I'm not

Speaker 4 (00:59:22): Quite there.

Speaker 1 (00:59:23): So where's that dogs though,

Speaker 4 (00:59:27): Role models for anyone watching this on YouTube for a timeout time. If I do this, I love it. When you show me to have my time out and just go chill in my bed, I have two willing participants and they, I mean, it's, I, I lucked out, I don't think all dogs get along that well within, you know, a short period of time getting to know each other. Uh, but you know, I, I have, I've started doing what I used to do in early recovery, which is I called it a timeout. I would just take a time out. It wasn't a nap. It wasn't meditation. Although it could be at sometimes repeat my mantra, but it was laying down and showing rather, you know, meditation, I'm trying to have good posture and close my eyes or whatever. I'd have my eyes open or not, but I would, I'd usually light a candle put on the Himalayan salt lamp, put on a diffuser after I think my mom got me a diffuser for Christmas at some point put in some eucalyptus or Clary Sage or lavender.

Speaker 4 (01:00:33): And there, my friends by the way, would make fun of me every time I would do this, but I didn't care. And then there's some times I'd maybe go in and take an Epsom bath and then, and then continue my, my de-stressing routine. But I never saw it as a waste of time because what I realized was that I, I would have been able to justify spending hours drinking on my couch with the stress. And so then if that's true, then why can't I justify having some silly rituals that, you know, would become a new coping mechanism essentially?

Speaker 1 (01:01:10): Hey, they're silly. Well, even if they're silly, they're not normal. They're not, but everybody, well, they are normal, but they're not what everybody else perceives as normal. So I'm very unique rituals. Yes, man takes today. Yeah, sure.

Speaker 4 (01:01:30): Silly, unique, whatever it was. I still I've been, I've kept them up for years and I, I always find that my routines and rituals tend to, some of them fade out, but then I bring them back when I need them. So they're really tools for the rest of your life. That's true with supplements too. You know, we haven't talked a lot about nutrient repair in this episode, um, which is fine, cause we've talked a lot about it in the past, but you know, like when I have a stressed out period, I'll bring magnesium or B vitamins or vitamin B12 back into the mix. Maybe I haven't taken it in a while. Um, so it's good to know yourself and to know which tools help you the most. And that's an exciting thing. A lot of people think, well, I don't want to, I don't, I'm worried about the whole process of quitting drinking.

Speaker 4 (01:02:17): Cause it seems to take so much effort. It's I need to get it down to a science and I just don't have time. Cause my, my, my job or whatever, and I have so many things to do. And it just seems, um, arduous and like, yeah, maybe, maybe it's overwhelming at first there's a lot of information, especially in no total alcohol recovery, 2.0, and that course there's a lot. There's a lot of information if you pursue coaching, however, it's not just a, it's not something that you learn once and then it's obsolete. These are things that will help you for the rest of your life, whether it's coping mechanisms as biological rebalancing mechanisms or physiological rebalancing strategies, uh, you know, what price can you put on learning how to, uh, diffuse your own stress response or learning how to get a good night's sleep without alcohol or without toxic coping mechanisms.

Speaker 1 (01:03:13): Yeah. And again, you know, Chris, I'm sorry to interrupt you, but I really do think that this goes back to us, giving away that freedom of choice to allow alcohol, to control their life. That's their choice. And they're giving up that choice because they're saying I would rather have, I would rather be enslaved to alcohol than choose to go there and help me.

Speaker 4 (01:03:37): There is a point at which the addiction hijacks pretty well, but it's still within your realm of choice to use all of your conscious capacity or whatever is left of it to start taking actions to free your brain from that enslavement. And I think that's something that people miss because they say, well, either drinking's a choice or it's a disease. I don't think that active addiction is either a choice or a disease. I don't think it has to be either of those things. It's a neural pathway that is firmly in grant. And yet you still have assuming you have any sliver of freewill left, assuming that you can choose to put your left foot in front of your right and vice versa. You can choose to start doing things, start taking certain supplements, trying your best to implement some new lifestyle strategies, trying your best, to read some things, to fill your brain with information that will rewire your subconscious processing system. You do those things for long enough. You can break out of that active addiction state.

Speaker 1 (01:04:38): I liked that. You said that, that, you know, yes, we, it, it is, it can be genetic and yes, it hijacks your brain and body. And you know, we, I was probably depleted on serotonin for so long. Even as a little girl, I have just the memories of being depressed as a little girl. Why are you depressed when you're so little? You know? Um, so I like it that you say it's, you don't feel it's neither a disease or a choice because, um, you know, at the end of right when I found you online, Chris, um, I talk about this all the time. I clearly remember sitting on the edge of my bed, just praying to God, give me a way out of this. Now I don't want this. I don't want to choose the alcohol anymore. It's to the point where I say no, but then I do the opposite. And then I realized, man, there was so much more to it than just waking up early and you know, trying to get my life right. Because I was so depleted, uh, biochemically, that that was my missing link. And um, so yeah, you do have a choice to get out of the disease,

Speaker 4 (01:05:48): For sure. Yeah. And I would define addiction as a series of stubborn, interconnected, neural pathways reinforced by biochemical imbalances that can be resolved permanently. So there's no permanent disease to the extent that you have any free will, you can start taking actions to reverse that problem. But it's really hard to do it if you don't have the information or the motivation or that inner spark.

Speaker 1 (01:06:15): Yeah. And it's so amazing because when I was at my last straw, your information came and so many people who I've talked to my clients, they said all of a sudden, just out of nowhere, you popped up. I was like, that's exactly what happened to me. So if you search hard enough, if you pray hard enough, you will find answers. Um, but it's a lot of times people don't want to find answers people.

Speaker 4 (01:06:40): I didn't want to find answers for a long time. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:06:43): In either. And I even remember driving myself to rehab and telling them the right things to say so that they would tell me, you don't have a problem. You could go home. And I knew I had a problem, but, um, you know, so just it's, I mean, it's amazing to be able to go from where I was to where I'm at now. And I know you can say that same thing, Chris, and you can say that same thing to Matt is if I could do it, then you could do it because, uh, I know my own personal situation, you know, your own personal situation. Um, you know, I was at a point where I was like, this thing, addiction is going to take my life. Like I can't, I can't overcome it. And here I am overcome it. And I'm thriving without my eviction. I'm thriving without alcohol. Um, I drank, I went out to dinner last night and I got one of those big bottles of Perrier Pellegrino, not Perrier Pellegrino. And I drank the whole bottle and my waiter came by and he picked it up and he was like, you drank this whole thing. I was like, yes, I was thirsty. And I was thinking, I used to do that with bottles of wine and I would feel so ashamed of myself. And I was like, but I felt proud of myself for drinking a whole big bottle of fellow Grito

Speaker 4 (01:07:55): Oh, I crushed big bottles of color Miro and all that stuff. Oh yeah. I'll even pour it into wine glasses sometimes. Just

Speaker 1 (01:08:02): Yeah. If it was a bottle of wine, I would have probably tried it, put it in my purse. Like I did not drink that whole bottle of wine.

Speaker 4 (01:08:08): Yeah. I'm pretty sure it's Perrier. Periera you're from Texas. So that's all right.

Speaker 2 (01:08:16): Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:08:19): Chico or Perrier, whatever is the biggest bottle that they have,

Speaker 2 (01:08:23): Whatever, you know, I go to Chipotle and get a question. They'll have some prompts.

Speaker 1 (01:08:32): I said, uh, sometimes I feel like who is it? Yogi Berra. Cause sometimes I'll just make up random words and people like, that's not a word like it is now,

Speaker 2 (01:08:44): But I do that all the time. Or I like, I like intentionally mispronouncing things with a straight face to see if people catch me. Um, yeah. I, I tend to be a fan of dead deadpan humor and I haven't done a lot of it because I've realized that people don't usually know when I'm joking. So I've just haven't I haven't done it, but who knows maybe on, on Instagram live.

Speaker 1 (01:09:07): Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:09:07): Well, this'll be the year of maybe, maybe being a little more outgoing. Um, even if social media wasn't made for people like us, I bet we can wreak and hack it. That it's a worthy cause we've got to reach more people.

Speaker 1 (01:09:21): Maybe we can change the way social media is done, but that would be cool.

Speaker 2 (01:09:29): Instead of Facebook, what if there was some type of social media platform that was only for people with substance use disorders and that's all it was. And I was trying to imagine how that would be, and then I remembered that it probably wouldn't be that great. Just like, you know, if people really, really want to do something, they're going to do it. Yes. You need help. But man, the, the S the will to overcome addiction is strong Tana. When you were talking about chugging, the Pellegrino and the Perrier,

Speaker 1 (01:10:08): It reminded me of

Speaker 2 (01:10:09): When I was 24, my first time seeing a therapist and he was taking notes and I was an alcoholic at the time, big time. And I, he was like, wait, say that again. And I said, Budweiser is the nectar of the gods. That's how I felt about Budweiser, not bud light, Budweiser ice, cold glass bottles. Oh, these are the nectar of the gods. And I just can't believe how absurd that sounds. It's really like, instead of worshiping, you know, you're supposed to worship with your religion, faith worship, a person worship nature. I was worshiping a bottle of poisonous alcohol and I would pray to, I would just drink that stuff. And it made me feel so good, but now I feel way better than that stuff made me feel. And I'm drinking water, no fancy water, just some, uh, alkaline ionized water. And that's it.

Speaker 2 (01:11:18): So people, when they're, when they're quitting opioids, quitting alcohol, quitting benzos, one of the main things is, will I ever feel good? Will I ever be able to be confident and feel this way without having to use this substance as a crutch? Um, and then the longer someone does that for years and years, some people decades, the longer they've used something as a crutch, the more it makes you need that crutch. And additionally, the more it erodes your belief that someday you can feel good without that substance, but all three of us are total living proof. That it's just a matter of time. And the more things that you do to correct your biochemistry, um, the faster people can start to feel good again and feel like they always wanted to feel. I used to have social anxiety, bipolar, too generalized anxiety, um, kind of recurrent depressive disorder.

Speaker 2 (01:12:12): I w I was labeled so many different things, ADHD. Uh, I don't feel any of those things at all anymore. I don't feel, I feel like, wow, and that kicks, but it took years and years and years of this type of work. So did it take a long time? Yet? Detoxing was pretty easy. This last time off of all the stuff I was taking post acute withdrawal was pretty quick cause the right supplements came in, but man, the rest of life, the rest of the time after that, I've had to work on a lot of different other things. And then most recently to be, to be totally free of mental health issues right now. Um, and for quite some time now it's just Epic. That just shows you that if you, if you Google neuro-plasticity and addiction, you'll see all sorts of studies and, um, articles on scientific journals now where neuro-plasticity plays a huge role in how the brain becomes addicted to a substance.

Speaker 2 (01:13:16): Yet neuro-plasticity sames the same important role on how to repair your brain 120%, 150%, 200% who knows you can repair your brain to pre addiction, a prediction state, and you can repair your brain even better than your brain was before addiction. It's really, really just a matter of finding out the right information for your specific situation. And there's a lot into that. That's why we made our courses because it's such detailed stuff. That's why we made our blogs and YouTube, but it's just people can, they get so afraid? I'll never feel good. Again, alcohol gives me energy and motivates me to be happy and go do things. And our opioids do that. But after our initial detox, post acute withdrawal, man using the right protocols that are heavy on

Speaker 4 (01:14:12): The biohacking, people would be surprised at just how awesome they can fill feel even as short as four to six weeks after they quit

Speaker 1 (01:14:23): Or how awesome their organ is, the brain. That's an awesome organ that it can repair itself.

Speaker 4 (01:14:31): Yeah. And we got Oregon supplements too, including bovine brain that we can use to make our brain even healthier. Now

Speaker 1 (01:14:39): We take care of it. It will take care of us. And, um, it's uh, interesting that you were talking about, you know, you were serving Budweiser because this morning devotions was about, um, who are we choosing to serve? And we can choose today who we're going to serve, you know, is it going to be alcohol or is it gonna be ourselves? Whatever it is. Yeah, you're right. I, I, my life revolved around when I was going to drink, I was serving alcohol and I am no longer serving alcohol. Thank God. And serving him.

Speaker 4 (01:15:15): And do you have physical proof that your brain has at least done a significant amount of repair clinic as well? So that's really, really cool. And I wish I had had brain scans done from back when I was a heavy drinker. I'm sure it would have looked as appalling as the pictures of me looked, um, that everyone can see on my website. Um,

Speaker 1 (01:15:39): But you can feel the difference, you know, and, um, the brain fog isn't there anymore. I remember just feeling so almost kind of like I was out of my body that like I was having out of body experiences and it was, I mean it's night and day to how I feel and I'm sure you do too.

Speaker 4 (01:16:02): Oh yeah, no. And the brain repairs at a certain point, it becomes, um, brain optimization. I think, I don't know that I have significant brain problems cause I haven't had a panic attack in years. Um, I don't really have bad days. I have, I know when I need to shift my focus to something, when something situationally bad happens, you can spend some time absorbing or sitting in that negative energy, but it's never an intractable problem. Usually it's solved by biochemical tweaking often as simple as just eating a high protein, high, fat, good fat mural, we're hydrating, we're getting more sleep that night, um, or taking a certain supplement. But, um, yeah, it's amazing how much can be achieved naturally. And I remember before I quit drinking and going in and talking to therapists and I wish I could see the notes. I'm pretty sure my therapist was doodling because same thing I wish I could see those notes.

Speaker 4 (01:17:09): They did not like me. I got fired by several therapists because every week I'd come in and they'd say, how was your week as I, well, I've been drinking, you know, same thing. Uh, and, uh, but I remember they would always say, you know, we can refer you to someone who can give you Ambien and, um, and, uh, antidepressants, and maybe you need some Xanax. God knows where I would be if I had taken them up on all of those prescriptions. And luckily, uh, I didn't now, luckily, hopefully if I had come into contact with, um, with you, Matt, you would have helped me get off those things as well. But you know, that would have added fuel to the fire and compounded the mess.

Speaker 2 (01:17:52): I think whether someone calls it God, the universe or something for anyone that believes in that type of topic, which I do, I hugely believe in that. I think that there's been so many synchronicities like Chris, how you and me came into contact with each other and then how tan, all of a sudden just was really needing help. Then she found your stuff. And then we all came together, like looking back on the past more than nine years now, there have just been so many things that have worked out. So cool. So nowadays, when, when something happens that could be seen as bad or whatever, or like, Oh, I can't believe this had, Oh, this is going to suck. Now. I'm like, Oh, but this could be a blessing. And I'm always thinking about further off into the future, like, huh, I wonder how this is going to end up being a good thing down the line.

Speaker 2 (01:18:50): And, and Tana, this is probably a perfect place to wind up here. Tana was kind of opening the episode with the Viktor Frankl quote, author of man's search for meaning. And we can always create our own story. Like we get to be the narrator of our life story where the protagonist and a lot of people will, their story will prevent them from actually quitting drugs or quitting alcohol. They'll be like, well, I can't quit now because I have this job that I have to go to, or I can't quit now because you know, my family doesn't know and they need me to, this is all just story stuff. Anybody can quit at any time you just stopped taking the substance. Now my recommending that people do that. Absolutely not. It might is that easy? Absolutely not. But when people really realize how much their story can either trap them to doing the same behaviors day in, day out or free them.

Speaker 2 (01:19:49): When they create an empowering story. I was even thinking the other day of going, huh? In my journaling, maybe I could start doing like fiction writing that could come true. Like Matt Finch was doing this the year started 2021 and write like a full on short story of me going through 2021 and make it real detailed. So you're like visualizing it. And it's ingraining into your subconscious mind when you're doing that. And if I write a kick-ass story of how things would, how this would be a great year, that's going to imprint it into my subconscious and nervous system. And then my subconscious might even believe it to be true in which case, boom, all of a sudden, all your behaviors, actions, and thoughts start lining up to make that happen. So self-authoring your own story. If your stories sucking like a lot of people will make a lot of different excuses for a lot of different things, but when they write down the truth, it's really just the story.

Speaker 2 (01:20:50): That's holding them back. It's not the actual circumstances. You could quit a job. You could, you know, be truthful with your wife or husband or boyfriend or girlfriend. You could, there's so many things that we can do, but we're unwilling to do because then if we change our story, that means we have to, then we're responsible for our lives. And that means that we need to start being responsible. So a lot of people will put off changing for that. Very reason. I think that's a perfect place to, uh, to wind down. This has been a lot of fun. Thanks guys. And all the listeners have a safe, uh, new year's Eve. If you're listening to this, then have a wonderful new year. We'll have the next episode for you of 20, 21, the first episode of 2021 on Tuesday. And we'll see you then

Speaker 5 (01:22:06): [inaudible].