Vulnerability as a Stepping Stone to Strength and Success

Seven years ago, AA meetings set me on a path of sobriety that would forever change my life—this episode is a testament to that journey and the transformative power of vulnerability. Amidst the raw emotions that surfaced after speaking at a recent AA gathering, I was reminded of just how deep the process of healing runs. The release was both unexpected and profound, serving as a stark reminder that we're all continually growing. 

Life's road to recovery can be as diverse as the individual stories that line its path. I'm sharing a particularly touching moment of reconnection with an old elementary school friend, both of us now bonded by our commitment to sobriety. While AA played a crucial role in our lives and my father's since the '80s, I open up about the point when it was time to seek growth beyond the program. 
The importance of coaching and mentorship in personal development takes center stage, as I lay out how these relationships can accelerate progress. 

Wrapping up, I delve into the necessity of acknowledging our battles and the dire need for community support in today's world, where issues like overdose and suicide loom large. This episode is a heart-to-heart, an invitation to anyone listening to reach out, share, and remember that no struggle has to be faced in solitude.

Chapters

• 0:29 AA Meeting Reflections and New Direction
• 8:14 The Journey of Recovery
• 19:11 Sharing My Struggle and Providing Support

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:29

This past Saturday I went to my first AA meeting in almost I'm going to say seven years. Next week will be my seven year of sobriety and I went to AA the first three months because I was told to and I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what not to do. I didn't know how to do life as we knew it At that time without alcohol. I had thrown myself into such a rock bottom place Again. If you've heard my story in the past that I've shared bits and pieces, it was not a pretty time in my life and I went and it absolutely saved my life. I went every day for three months and I got put in the first step room for people like me who are just in the thick of it and really needing some guidance, some wisdom, some support and special care. So that's where I was almost seven years ago to the day and it definitely made me feel like I wasn't the craziest person in the room, like I had made myself feel like for so long, many months. I isolated myself to the point that people that knew me for over 25, 30 years had no idea what I was going through. So it's interesting and so much has happened in this past week that I just wanted to share those intuitive hits and synchronicities that happen. So I got asked to go speak. I drove an hour to this meeting too, where there's all these meetings within five minutes, but something told me to take them up on their offer to come and speak. And it was nice because it was an hour away and it wasn't any one that I'd seen before and I was one of the younger ones in the room, so it was an older crowd and it was interesting to share my message. I actually shared for about 45 minutes. It went well. I didn't go with any planned agenda, just kind of whatever came came and I knew that someone in the room would hear the message as I spoke it. So it was, all in all, good. People came up afterwards, thanked me and all I can do is be appreciative of the people that let me know that it impacted them and to the others, I definitely hope it did.

Speaker 1: 3:19

But what was interesting is on the way home, because I was alone and it was dark and I was just driving on a highway kind of more of a rural area I turned on some music and out of nowhere I just started bawling, just crying like ugly crying, like I'm glad no one was with me and it like hurt your sinuses, ugly crying, and I have no idea where it came from. You know, it was just so pent up inside of me and I'll get to get to open this awful circle for you. But that was my Saturday night. I don't know what you were doing Saturday night, but that was. I wasn't at home. Usually I'm at home, but that was my fun for Saturday night and it was a great evening with great people and it just unlocked some stuff that has been brewing inside of me. Two other things happen this past week that has to do with playing into Saturday night and maybe just my emotions.

Speaker 1: 4:27

But I met with a past business colleague for coffee and her and I were talking and decided to kind of be maybe accountability partners or business planning partners, just to go into 2024. See how we can help each other and we're both in real estate and, as you know, I'm coaching real tours on how to set up and run a successful business, whether they're a weekend or 20 plus years, and that's been fantastic and people are joining me and I just coach them For free and help them, just because of the business model we were part of. It works out well for everyone. I don't have to charge them anything. It's just a beautiful thing and she's just kind of like what you and I both want to help real tours, and we're both good at it. But is it saturated? Like what? What's your story like where? Where do you differentiate yourself?

Speaker 1: 5:26

And, as she was saying that, I was thinking about how I was going to speak at this meeting and how you know I'm. It's a big part of my journey. It's been about seven years. I would never go back to that. I don't even think about it. I've considered myself recovered All along, knowing that the beast is inside of me, and that's why they say once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic, because if you feed it it will flare up and and want more. So I totally understand that and I don't, I don't contemplate it, I don't struggle with it on a daily basis, on ever. Actually there's not anything that would get me to want to drink, you know. So it's. It's a beautiful thing where I'm at and so many people aren't there, and I'm in groups when, after 10 years, people are still struggling every day to get through the day without, without substance, without alcohol, and I just I can't imagine. And yet it's a beautiful gift every day to prove that beast wrong and to prove to yourself that yet another day you can go without it. So it was, it was, yeah, it's just, it's a gift.

Speaker 1: 6:43

And as I was talking to my new business planning partner, she, you know, it just came to me and I'm just like, yeah, I'm like my, my superhero or my strength is you know what I've been through and I'm on the other side of it and, having gone through it and so much of the story that would take days and podcast and podcasts after podcasts to even, you know, get through a lot, of, a lot of it and a lot of what I went through and what I put other people through, um, but, as I said that, I got emotional and I was just like, oh, there it is. So two times in one week I got pretty, pretty emotional about it, not as emotional as I got alone in my car. I mean, I didn't like ugly cry or anything, but it definitely kind of choked me up and she looked at me and she's like well, I think you have your answer and I know that because I coach it all the time If it both excites you and terrifies you. It makes you want to maybe throw up or run the other way. You're on to something. So it's the start of maybe a new direction for me in 2024, and who I'm helping and how I'm going to. You know, do do this thing we call coaching and showing up for others. Um, so those two things happen.

Speaker 1: 8:15

And then another thing happened where, on um Facebook and friends with the tons of people, and, uh, girl that I've known since elementary school, uh, she is in recovery too, I think about the same amount of time as me. Um, she had posted, you know, send me a message if you know any men who can help. She has someone in her life that she wants to get to a meeting, but she doesn't have any good meeting she knows of for him. And so my dad has been in the program since early eighties and he goes every week, so he's very active in AA, and so I just messaged her. On the side, I'm like, hey, you know I don't go any more anymore, but my dad is, he's local here. I'll get you guys in connection. You know, if not him, I'm sure he knows someone, because he's definitely active and unavailable, and I can't even tell you how many dozens of people that man's probably helped throughout his life.

Speaker 1: 9:13

It's just amazing, um, and much like me, my mom stopped going almost instantly as well. It's just not the right room for her. And as I was messaging back and forth with this woman that I was um, I was um that I know and I've known for many, many years, I just kind of briefly shared, I'm just like, yeah, you know, I don't go anymore. It um, I went for three months at the beginning and it absolutely saved my life. I know that, for, for, for, for a fact, you know it. And it did what I needed it to do. And I said, and it made sense, like many things, until it didn't anymore. And all of a sudden it felt heavy and it felt, you know, dark and just not like the right place for me. And she's like, oh my gosh, she's like I love how you explain that. That's exactly what happened to me and she doesn't go anymore.

Speaker 1: 10:16

Now, side note, I think if AA is the right place for you or someone you love and it works for you, I'm very happy to say that you should go all day, every day, every week, whatever works. And yeah, kevin, thank you. In sharing my story. I found another person, not even two miles away from me, that same thing as me. It's not for everyone, and that's okay too. Or it's for a season of your life, and that's okay too, and I love going down to this other group an hour away and they, you know, they have people that have been going just as long as my dad 40 plus years and I think that's amazing too.

Speaker 1: 11:01

Just like anything in life, I don't think there's any right way or wrong way to do something. As long as you're moving the needle forward and getting what you need in order to, you know, whether it stays sober or do whatever it is you need to do and you're not hurting anyone in the process, then why not? You know, think about that, think about that for you, and I just had those three things happen all in one week and it just keeps weighing on me that maybe I do need to lean into it, maybe I do need to, you know, not run from it anymore. It kind of feels like I did it. I got through the three months, I found coaching, I found Bob Proctor.

Speaker 1: 11:49

My whole life completely did a turn, like complete turnaround, and my life was never the same and I definitely did the work and I didn't do it alone. I don't know I couldn't have done it alone. And so that's why, and one of the reasons why I'm such an advocate for coaching and I love coaching and I think everyone should have a coach and I'll always have a coach, because we all have these blinders on, regardless of where it's at in your life. You can always do better, you can always expand and you can always do more. So I ask you to think about where your blinders on, where you just only see what you can see, because what a good coach or mentor does is they actually peel back the layers and take the blinders off and give you a completely different perspective and reframe the situation in ways that you will not be able to do yourself.

Speaker 1: 12:51

And in doing that, it takes what could have taken you 10 years you know five, 10 years to do or figure out and collapse that time in quantum, leap you in months. And it happened to me and it happened for me, and if I can do it, anyone can do it, and that's why I'm just like dedicating the rest of my life to doing this in some capacity and helping people, and lately, this past week or two, the whole recovery. You know it's been leaning, leaning on my heart and I've just been leaning into it. And you know, just like anything, it's one day at a time. Your habits, your building, you know the disciplines, whether it's working out or you know eating better or taking up a hobby or doing something for your business. You know, every day you have to get up and you have to prove all the habitual behaviors in that voice or that version of you that creeps up every day. You have to prove, prove wrong every day and you have to show up and choose the habits that you do want and choose, regardless of whether you feel like it or not, to do it anyway. And it's by keeping those promises to yourself every day that you know your self-esteem and image increases and we know we'll never outperform our self-image. So what are you doing for the 1% better every day and to you know, prove that version of you that's holding you back wrong. You know you are and should be the only person you're competing with. So how are you beating your best? Because if you beat your best every day, you're the worst version you'll ever gonna be in this very moment and I think that's pretty cool and so you know, I think in our daily lives we're not going to be the worst version of you every day.

Speaker 1: 14:55

My recovery and over the last seven years or so I think I in getting better and completely within a year's time, I mean completely turning my life around from biggest shit whole pile of shit that I felt like I was to really just embracing life and the gratitude and responding versus reacting and taking 100% responsibility and all the things that I coached to today, I left that girl behind and I went on and I reinvented myself and I worked hard every day to be the best version of myself and then be better. And then when I once I got comfortable, then I threw myself out of my comfort zone. I started speaking in public, which I never thought I would do. I wouldn't even raise my hand in the classroom, even if I knew the answer and it was in a book in front of my face, I still wouldn't. And then I was stretched out my comfort zone, started speaking in front of groups. So I did that, so uncomfortable and I did it anyway. And then I started this podcast really uncomfortable.

Speaker 1: 16:15

Go back and listen to the beginning episodes. I'm sure, I used to cut for hours afterwards and now literally I record these and I just publish them. I don't even re-listen to them because you just get to where you're more comfortable, because the more you do something, the more you get comfortable with it. But in leaving that girl behind, I also I left so many of the lessons and so many of the beautiful gifts that I got from that horrible rock bottom, because it was in that rock bottom for me that the beautiful gift was born and my life completely changed. And I know, without a doubt, without that happening in my life and everything that happened up to it, I wouldn't be sitting where I am right now. I honestly don't know where I would be if I hadn't turned it around.

Speaker 1: 17:19

But there's so many retrospect after the fact, once you can step away and look back so many gifts in our hardest, darkest days that come out of that whether it's losing a job, losing or leaving a relationship, maybe someone departing us for good, leaving their physical body, leaving this earth, could be moving, starting a new business, just failing and having to start over in so many different capacities. So I left the gifts behind and I just I took what I built and I just continued and I didn't ever really stop to celebrate and I mean, I still don't. I'll drop a podcast and, like my husband, will be like, hey, good job, it's seven years now. Yeah, you know, and I don't celebrate me and celebrate myself and the actions that I had to take and how I reinvented myself and how hard it was. I don't stop and think myself and pay it forward and know that all of what I went through and all that I continue to go through and how I continue to push myself See, I'm not gonna get emotional that can be someone else's inspiration, that can be someone else's starting point, and so I think that's why it's more or less leaning on me a little bit, and weighing on me is in leaving that behind and just getting on with my life and moving forward.

Speaker 1: 19:11

I know that I love so much beautiful lessons and, like I said, gifts back there with that girl that I no longer am. So maybe that's why I need to revisit it and go back and feel some of the feels and be able to share my story at such a personal level that I don't really want to share, I don't really want to connect to that anymore because I'm so far removed and yet that's part of my story and that's part of who I am and why I am who I am today. So to not honor that and to not lean into that and to not share that, well I just I think it's not right and it's not gonna help anyone if it's all pinned up inside of me and I'm not willing to not even be vulnerable but just be able to be real. You know, people want real, people want to know the backstory to some degree and understand especially. I mean, back then, in my darkest days, I felt so alone and so isolated and so fucking crazy in just like survival mode all the time towards the end, and it's just baffling that I know so many people, more than ever, are going through that right now.

Speaker 1: 20:56

And if I could even speak to one of them or if they can hear that I have been there and I did struggle and I never, ever, ever thought I would be to where I am today, that my first three days my husband just didn't even know what to do. He's like are you okay? Because I was just pacing and I was just like breathing and sighing and fidgeting and pacing and just like I don't know. You know, three days of that, three days of second to second at the beginning, and then the seconds became minute to minute and the minutes with string together to like 15 minutes to a half hour, and then the minutes became hours and you know, then the hours became half days and then so it all strings together and that's why they say it's one day at a time, because, especially in the beginning, and that's why a lot of people relapse, because it's, I think it's absolutely the hardest thing I've ever done in my life and I've made some hard decisions and done some hard things. Yeah, that's a whole other podcast and story, but it's definitely the hardest thing I've ever physically, emotionally, spiritually, faced, embattled and done.

Speaker 1: 22:25

So there are gifts, though, in there, there are blessings and there are takeaways that I should be sharing with people because, as we know, the statistics over the past three to four years and the overdose rate, the suicide rate, the I mean it's astronomical, it's more than it's ever been.

Speaker 1: 22:53

So for me to not share this or to not hopefully reach out and reach someone through this and through my words and through my struggleings and through my energy, well, it's just not going to help anyone if it's bottled up inside of me.

Speaker 1: 23:11

So I encourage you, if, if you're in that spot and if you haven't found someone, or if you haven't found your AA group or you went and then it didn't work, and again, if you have one, let me know what one you love and I'll pass it along to other people that can't find theirs.

Speaker 1: 23:29

But if it's not for you, if AA is not not your, your jam, then you know there's other ways to go about this and I just want to be able to you know, be that source or that person for people that that needs someone. Because you know, I know I needed people in the beginning and I know, without just having someone to talk to and those rooms, in those first three months I said things and I heard things that I'll never on here and I'll never probably say out loud again, but in the moment it's the best thing in the world. So find your place, find your people, find your support and if you don't have it, reach out, because everyone should have it and it makes all the difference in the world. So if you're struggling, you don't have to do it alone. You do have to do the work Absolutely and you don't, and you shouldn't and, more than likely. You can't do it alone, so I'm here to help in any way and make it a good one.