The Story of Recovery - How to Stay Stopped, The Power of Self Intimacy

Chapters

• 0:02 The Power of Recovery and Intimacy
• 8:38 Embracing a Successful Recovery Journey

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

How to recover, where to start? That's always such that important question. Welcome again to another episode of the 1% in Recovery podcast, where we encourage you to laugh every day, to work hard, work hard in recovery, work hard in relationships, work hard in your job, business, school, just work. And also to love unconditionally. Put more love out there in the universe and watch more love return to you. Just love, love, love, love, love, love. Remember, we encourage you to understand that recovery is beautiful. Your EQ is your IQ and you cannot outthink an emotional issue. Now what we encourage people to do is to join the Facebook group, recovery Freedom Circle. Within this community and this is a community everybody's given the opportunity to talk about the steps, inquire about the steps, also to talk about character, about healing, about growth, about their own experience with the steps, about the design for living, as well as anything that's inspiration, motivational. Just participate and let the community help and be uplifted as we all get to live our best life each and every 24 hours.

Speaker 1: 1:36

Now let's jump into this week's episode the story of recovery how to start? As usual, have a conversation with somebody that's going to try to tell me of what the steps truly mean. What is the meaning behind the steps. Just had this conversation a few days ago Now. This person is usually usually these are the demographics of this types of person. Person has anywhere from six months to three years clean where they're not drinking, gambling or drugging. They're somewhere between the first and fourth, probably halfway through the fourth step in this amount of period of time. Yet they're very clear on what will happen to them once they finish the 12 steps. I always laugh at these types of people because they're no different than when they were in their addiction. They're very judgmental. They're full of assumptions. They have no clue what they're talking about.

Speaker 1: 2:56

The original 12 steps that were started way back when in the 1930s 1935, is that the steps can be magical. They're very mysterious. There's something that's completely unexplained can happen when you actually work the steps. Not assuming what's going to happen when you write down certain steps. Not assuming what's going to happen when you write down certain things that may be in your inventory or certain people that you may finally make an amends to. But there is so much more just to the original 12 steps. Yet so many people refuse to actually work the 12 steps Now, I keep always saying, is the number one reason why people refuse to work the 12 steps is because there's no one pushing them.

Speaker 1: 3:45

They will tell you what's going on in their life and I'm assuming there's a lot going on in their life, especially if they're having some type of relationship spousal, boyfriendfriend issues but there's also a lot of things maybe going on with their kids, with their job, and those are very real Love, money, sex, and then, if you throw in just your own concept of God, but you can be working on your concept of God within the steps, you usually hold people back and that's why you need someone that's constantly pushing you to do homework. So I tell people that's why the Recovery Freedom Circle works, why people have such a clear understanding of recovery after 18 weeks, when you are working with me, because I'm constantly giving you homework, I'm constantly checking in, I'm constantly finding out what is going on. A lot of these people still want to tell me that they are self-motivated. Yet another year goes by, another year goes by and they're still messing around with step one, step two, trying to tell me their own concept of a higher power, trying to tell me that they're in the middle of actually putting down certain things on an inventory. I don't know why people still want to think that they are saving money. If you are wasting months and years, you're not saving time. You're not saving money and obviously you're not saving time either. And the whole reason is to get you to start thinking about what you want in life, because we really have to tap in and really to get into life.

Speaker 1: 5:37

Is this true intimacy? Now, a lot of times people would talk about intimacy with other people, but do you truly have an intimate relationship with yourself? I'm talking about the social or hobby, recreational intimacy that you're doing, what you want to do, like for me, working out, reading foodie type stuff. Also, do you have that spiritual intimacy? And we always talk about spiritual. We don't talk enough about spiritual intimacy with another human being. It's always usually around a sexual intimacy with another human being, but both are so vital. If you have a spiritual intimacy with another person, you guys have certain beliefs around God. You have a certain amount of sexual intimacy. You will have a much stronger relationship.

Speaker 1: 6:25

But it first begins with your own idea of your own spiritual intimacy with your own self, your own sexual intimacy or ideas of what you like. Then, of course, you have to have that mental and emotional intimacy with yourself. That is how you begin. So, and really all this intimacy starts with your own thoughts. Go back to the quote by Lao Tzu where he talks about your thoughts become your words, and that's why I always talk about, in step one, how your subconscious becomes so vital. All the thoughts that you have I deserve recovery, I deserve love those become your thoughts, those become your words, which in essence becomes your actions, and your actions really then dictate not only your day-to-day actions, but also your emotional intelligence. What are you feeling? That will also dictate your actions, which in turn comes back down to character, which is then obviously your destiny, and we talk about that. The way to truly stop addiction and to move forward is to change your character. Change your character, whether we're talking about gambling, we're talking about alcohol, we're talking about drugs. Read any of that 12-step literature. It's all there. So I encourage you.

Speaker 1: 7:47

The whole story of recovery starts and will end with your thoughts, your words, your actions, your emotional intelligence. That is almost like the beginning part, and that is how you begin. You don't start worrying about oh, I'm not going to drink today, I'm not going to gamble today, I'm not going to drug today. It is so important to start getting your mind fixated and focused on something else. Just start getting your mind fixated and focused on something else, because when you constantly talk about not wanting to do a certain addiction or behavior, you're going to eventually do it. And you're going to eventually more than likely do it even when you're doing what I prescribe in the Recovery Freedom Circle.

Speaker 1: 8:38

You've got to get off this whole relapse model. Relapse is almost a guarantee. It's a 90% almost guarantee that someone's going to relapse, but in essence is where are they going? So I want to encourage people here the story of recovery is a beautiful story, but it all starts with the mind, starts with the emotions, starts with God, starts with a lot of things and to move forward, because I want the story of recovery to mean I am stopped, I've stayed stopped and now I'm beginning to live my best life. With that we're going to end this episode of the 1% in Recovery podcast.