In today's episode, I talk about why being present is CRITICAL to becoming clean. Also, yeah, I'm BACK baby.
In today's episode, I talk about why being present is CRITICAL to becoming clean. Also, yeah, I'm BACK baby.
Good afternoon or morning or whatever. This is M. That's right. We're back. Ben in a bit of a hiatus here, it's been a couple of months and frankly it's almost feels bizarre to be talking to this microphone right now. Definitely the longest that I've gone without recording a pod. Since I started this thing. Maybe you're wondering where the hell is. I'm been, if you're one of my three listeners and I guess I'll tell ya. I've been on a bit of a world tour for the last two months. Went to a, quite a few different countries. I was in Africa, Chile, Costa Rica. And. Yeah, just reflecting on. All the things that can happen. When you're clean. Shit. I'm remembering six years ago before I was clean, I was in bathrooms doing drugs off of toilet seats. And. Now I'm flying across the world to go. Experience. Everything that life has to offer. And if you're an addict listening right now, I don't know what your version of. Heaven is or serenity, but for me, it's travel and. I'm able to do things like that now because I am clean because I was able to regain control of my life. And. This isn't a humble brag or anything, but. Just here today to let you know that. There are so many, so many gifts in life. And you're never going to be able to experience even. Even an iota of any of them. While you're in active addiction. The only way that I ever experienced any kind of joy. Or any kind of fulfillment. Is when I was getting fucked up. It's when I was taking those pills, it was when I was getting high, but. Now I've created a life for myself where. I don't need those things. I can. Create those experiences, those real experiences. Not those fake experiences where you just have dopamine shooting out of both ends of your head out of your ears, out of your nose. No. So just telling the addict out there who still suffering that. Get clean, get clean, man. Get clean woman, get clean, whoever. Because there are a lot of gifts out there.
Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-2:Anyways. Let's let's dive into a little bit of a little bit of addict talk. So where we last left off was on. I think it was step four, talking about all the shitty things that you've done in your life. And. Today, let's take a bit of a pause. Let's not go too much into the step work any day. Need to get my wheels back on here. So I just wanted to talk about something. That I think is super important. Not only for me, but for addicts everywhere. And I actually opened this up today with our daily mantra. As addicts have a daily mantra. And today it's living in the moment. We regretted the past. Dreaded the future. And we weren't too thrilled about the present. And God damn, God damn. Was that true? All of those years in active addiction.
Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-3:It was completely impossible for me to live presently. In any way. I was either spending my time doing one of two things. I was either regretting every single shitty mistake. That I had made. Because I was told as a kid. Oh, you did good in your math class. You did good in your classes. You were valedictorian of sixth grade. Woo. You. You have so much potential. And I never was able to live up to any of it because I was so deep in my active addiction. And so I spent most of my time just ruminating and ruminating and thinking. Wow. What a fuck up. I am. I haven't done a single thing right. With my life. And of course, what does this do? It makes it, so I can't do anything in the present. If I'm constantly berating myself and beating myself up. For all the things that I've done. Well, that's going to create a vicious cycle. I'm just going to keep doing shitty things. Because that's how our minds work. If you just tell yourself you're a piece of shit all the time, well, guess what, you're going to act like a piece of shit. And that's what I did. that's what I did. during all those years in active addiction.
Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-4:But I wouldn't do that all the time. I would also be worried about the future nonstop. Just oh, no. And what's going to happen when I graduate. Oh no. What happens? If I overdose in three days and oh no. What happens in yada yada, yada, blah, blah, blah. All the fucking time. And of course, when I'm thinking about the future. None of it's positive. It's all bleak. Because I'm using my past. As an engine. As a basis, point to think about all the things that are going to happen in the future. Oh, well, my life has sucked up to this point. So. In the future, everything is going to be the same. Of course I wasn't using positive psychology, trying to actualize a positive kind of future for myself. I was stuck in a vicious cycle of. Faking of every shitty thing that I had done in my wife. And then thinking about my future. Applying it there too. And guess what. That's called self actualization. That's called a self fulfilling prophecy. And inevitably. Bad things did happen. Because I was unable to ever stop. Just stop the mind. Live presently, look around, look up at the sun, look up at the stars. Realized that I had everything that I needed. I had the bare necessities, those simple bare necessities of life.
Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-5:And as I reflect on it, Maybe it was a coping mechanism of sorts, an excuse for me to never actually put in the work and the effort to actually get clean. Because if I'm constantly worrying about the past and worrying about the future. I've never focused on what's right in front of me. I'm not realizing. Right now. All of the damage that I'm doing. To myself, to my soul, to other people, to society. It's only through being present. That we can really get a grip on reality, right? And I mean that quite sincerely reality. Because the past doesn't exist. The future doesn't exist. They're just ideas. Just thoughts that are spinning around in our head. All that we have at any fucking given moment. Think about that. As you're listening to this. You were here. Right now. And you're always going to be here right now. That's all we got.
Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-6:And we can't make any changes to the past. We also can't make any changes to the future though. A lot of people think they can, all we can do. It's focused on what's happening right now. And until you recognize that as an addict. That you can only affect what's happening in this moment. Then you're never going to get clean. You're never going to get clean and it took me so, so long to recognize this. I would always kick the can down the line. A few years into addiction, it'd be like, eh, well, in five years, obviously I'm going to be over this whole addiction thing. I don't need to do anything right now. This has got to end someday. Guess why secret it? Doesn't fucking end. It doesn't end until you do something about it and you can only do something about it in the present.
Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-7:And I'll tell ya. It is real, real hard to live presently. When you're in active addiction. First of all your brain's not working, right. You're constantly coming down from a drug. So you don't have the necessary conditions required to live. Presently, you gotta be kind of healthy. Your brain's gotta be right. Your soul's gotta be right in order to appreciate and love. And just acknowledge that what is happening in front of you is real when your brain's all messed up. You're just like a monkey playing symbols in your brain all the time. You just have thoughts running on and on and on and on and on. And it makes it damn near impossible. When you have this movie playing in your head nonstop to be able to live presently. As a quick side note. I think all addicts are addicted. There's addiction to so many different things, but I think there's one common theme among addicts. And I think addicts. Are addicted to thoughts.
Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-8:And when you're just yammering on and on and on and on about everything, that's gone wrong. Everything that could go wrong. You're never actually making any positive changes. In your life. So that's my message. For today. Is. We need to find a way to live presently. And I think this actually extends beyond addicts as well. I've been clean for. Uh, five and a half years now. And I still catch myself doing this a lot. And for all of my quote, unquote, normies out there who are listening. I'm sure that you might be guilty of this as well. Thinking about things that have gone wrong. Thinking about things that could go wrong. Worrying about outcomes that you have no control over. What's the point. What's the point.
Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-9:I think you'll find. Once you start living presently and there's a spectrum to this. You don't live presently all the time. But once you start making an active effort to just. Look around. See how fucking cool things are. Oh my God. Just this experience of being alive. It's a pretty, it's a pretty crazy thing. And let's not get too, too meta here, but. It's only through living presently that we see that we have. We have what we need. And it's not that much.
Microphone (Yeti Stereo Microphone)-10:And then once we recognize in the present. That we're taking care of the universe has taken care of us. God, whoever. Then we can actually slow down and then we can actually start implementing real changes into our lives. Like getting clean, like finding love, like loving ourselves. But all of these things are only going to happen in the present. So that is my message to you. My fellow addicts. Is. Past doesn't exist, future. It's not here right now. We need to learn how to focus on the present. And then we are going to find. Gifts. And if you're wondering, okay, great. Um, that was, that was really nice. How the hell do I actually do that? How do I actually live presently? Well, I will do an entire, another pod. Where I'm talking about different methods and different ways to become present, because learning how to live presently has been by far. The most critical piece in me becoming clean and becoming a functioning human being again. So that's all I had today. I know this one's kind of short. You might hear. I might hear a little shakiness in my voice. It is. It is crazy. That I haven't done this in so long, but I am just so fucking happy to be doing this again. I feel like I've been gotten away from my purpose a little bit in life. And helping the addict who still suffers. Hey, tying it back into the theme today. I was wondering, oh no. What if. What if I sound weird? What if people aren't going to like my show, yada yada, no. Just turn the fucking record button on, get something going, who knows. Maybe I help someone. That's all I want. Thank you. So, so, so fricking much for listening today. If I still have any listeners out there. I would definitely start to get back into a more common cadence of getting these pods out. It just means a lot to me being able to do this. And it means a lot to me. If anybody out there is listening. So. Thank you So. much. Have a beautiful, beautiful rest of your day. And this is M signing off and we'll be getting back to you again soon.