The Essence of Recovery Step Eleven - Silence

Quiet isn’t empty space; it’s the room where your next right move becomes clear. We dig into Step 11 with a practical lens—how prayer and meditation actually work when you strip away the noise, schedule real silence, and let your nervous system settle. Along the way we share simple rituals that compound: a weekly retreat hour in a chapel or park, a slow walk under trees, exercise or movement, and even the everyday magic of walking your dog for a hit of oxytocin and a reset of focus.

You will hear why church services can inspire but rarely deliver deep quiet, and how pairing Step 10’s scheduling with Step 11’s stillness turns intentions into routines that stick. We talk neuroplasticity in plain terms—natural dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin and endorphins stabilize when you unplug—and why silence sharpens discernment around work, relationships, and recovery choices. Nature plays a starring role: lakes, tall trees, and open sky reduce mental clutter and restore attention. Comfortable quiet with people you trust also matters; sometimes the strongest bond is sharing a meal without needing to fill the air.

If you’re starting recovery on your own or looking to strengthen it, this conversation gives you a simple framework: pray to frame the question, meditate to clear the channel, then sit in silence long enough to hear guidance. Track small wins with the Free Recovery Growth Scorecard, breathe on purpose to lower anxiety, and let daily walks become your moving meditation. When you’re ready to decide—keep going or pivot—you’ll have the calm and clarity to choose well.

If this resonates, subscribe, share it with someone who needs a quiet nudge, and leave a review to help others find the show. Then take ten minutes today: breathe, sit, and listen. Your next step is waiting in the silence.

Chapters

• 0:00 Laugh, Work, Love: Opening Message
• 0:30 Free Recovery Growth Scorecard
• 1:43 Step 11 And The Power Of Silence
• 3:05 Retreats, Nature, And Unplugging
• 4:16 Scheduling Silence Beyond Church
• 5:00 Breath, Calm, And Quiet Togetherness
• 6:05 Walks, Dogs, And Natural Oxytocin
• 8:08 Listening For Next Moves And Closing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:01

Silence is golden. 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 your relationships, work hard in your business for your jobs in school. Just work. And to love unconditionally, just put much more love out there and watch much more love return. Now, we are encouraging people to download the Recovery Growth Scorecard on the website www.lifeiswonderful. That is free. It's a free scorecard. It's a spreadsheet where you can start your recovery because everybody wants to start recovery, wants to stop an addiction on their own. Before they want to deal with anybody, whether you're dealing with 12-step rooms, you're dealing with a treatment center, whether you're dealing with a psychologist, whether you're dealing with a recovery coach. Want to start on your own. Get the natural dopamine, natural serotonin, natural endorphins, natural oxytocin. There's a list of items there to do. And you keep track and you have to start healing your brain. You have to start changing the neuroplasticity in your brain. So download the free scorecard from life iswonderful. Now, let's jump into this week's episode. A lot of times people will read step 11. It talks about prayer, it talks about meditation, it talks about getting closer to your higher power, God as you understand Him. But in reality, this step is crucial for movement, especially if you want to move on to step 12, which is the essence of that is Ubuntu, humanity. And you have to be in silence. When I say silence is golden, silence allows us, number one, to pray. Silence also allows us to meditate. Silence allows us to listen and hear what could be God's higher power, great mystery, uh role for us. You know, what is his intention? We can be thinking about that. But I also believe so wholeheartedly it is so good to just go on retreats. A retreat once a year is that spiritual revitalization of your spirit, of your soul. So you get much more in tune with you. As usually on a retreat, you don't have any TVs, you don't have radio, you're not distracted that way. You do have your phone, and you are urged to limit your use of any phones or texting. But the key is you try to unplug, not be on your computer, not do any of that. So you can start to just almost just be looking around. And usually the best thing about retreats, they're usually in nature. There's a lot of tall trees. There's usually either lakes or fountains. So there's some type of water source. And there's always flowers, there's always some type of church, chapel, somewhere where you can really go to be quiet. You can kind of disengage. And that is so key. Because the more that we we uh actually write in silence into our schedule, because remember, the essence of step 10 is scheduling, because that is what you're gonna do each and every day, each and every week. You need to have some silence time each week. Sometimes people will say, Well, I go to church for one hour uh a week. That is good, but usually church has a lot of activity. First of all, the service, the mass, whatever your religion is, there is some type of spiritual leader leading it. There's usually music, there's usually a lot of people also talking uh before service. And so it's not conducive for silence to just really almost to get into your own prayer. Because we talk about, we want to listen to what God, our great mystery higher power, is saying, we need silence. We can't, if you're like me, you're gonna get distracted and you're gonna want to sing, you're gonna want to listen to the readings, you want to do something. I always felt like some of the best moments in my life was when I would be backpacking with my brother uh through like the Grand T card, the most beautiful place. Now I haven't been to Montana yet, so I I have to say I have to go to Montana, but the Tetons to me are just incredibly gorgeous. And to be able to be backpacking and just in the middle and back there in the middle of nowhere, you can really kind of get in tune with nature. And you really kind of get in tune with yourself. So I encourage people to find some place. Go to your church when there's no service going on. They're usually open, especially during the day. Or there's usually, I mean, I mean, my parents have been in hospitals these past uh 10 years, and every hospital has a chapel. Most universities have some type of uh rooms, quiet rooms. So there is a lot of opportunity, or there's just a lot of great parks. You can go to any park in any major city, or if you're out in your rural, you can just be out in the country, and you can just be under an oak tree and connect. But silence really allows us to hear, and what do we want? Because we can almost hear our own breath. And that's the the essence of meditation when you can be in tune with your breathing. And breathing is so vital to good recovery. Learn to breathe. Learn to take those deep breaths so then you lower your anxiety. Learn to breathe so you're almost like more in touch with everything around, especially if you're with someone that you love. Whether it's your partner, whether it's your lover, whether it's your child, whether it's your parents. Sometimes silence just with someone that you know that you're safe with, that is a gift. Same reason why people have, you know, whether they're sponsors, whether they're best friends, whether there's some type of closeness that you can just be. You don't always have to be talking. Uh this past week, we know Rob Reiner got murdered by his own son. But one of his movies was Harry Met Sally. And there's a scene in the movie when Harry is talking to Sally, that is, Billy Crystal's talking to Meg Ryan, and they're eating salad, and he goes, God, it's so wonderful just to be able to eat my salad and not have to talk. Because they've been friends for a long, long time. And there is truth to that. Sometimes it's nice to share a meal where you don't have to talk, where you can just enjoy the food, enjoy the taste of everything. And so I really wanted people to just kind of get in and what is the essence? And so, step 11, and I want more people to really tap into this, learn to get to some type of quiet places, learn to be quiet. Sometimes people, and that's why sometimes people just love going on long walks with their dog. And they can get out of their house, their apartment, and they can just walk, whether it's a park, whether it's around the neighborhood, whether it's some type of pasture, that is also an excellent way. Because one, since you're walking your dog, that is a way to get that natural oxytocin. You're bonding with this loving creature, and dogs connect with humans in such valuable ways. And in and in turn, you're also getting into silent mode. So there is plenty of studies that say having a dog and where you walk a dog each day will extend your life for a variety of reasons. So I just want to keep encouraging people, pray, meditate, listen to whoever your higher power, God great mystery is. Allow yourself to hear good stuff, stuff that might be challenging, like we have to maybe rethink a relationship, rethink either working at a place or a business that we have, and really tap in to what is your next move. Do you keep going? Do you pivot? But the key thing is that you just enjoy life. When I always say life is wonderful, get silent, enjoy life. With that, we are gonna end this episode of the 1% in recovery podcast.