Breakfast of Choices
Everyone has stories of transformation. And some of them include moments, or years of intense adversity, a time when it felt like there was no hope. This podcast, "Breakfast of Choices," holds space for people to share their true, raw and unedited stories of overcoming extreme struggles, like addiction, mental illness, incarceration, domestic violence, suicide, emotional and physical abuse, toxic family structures, relationships, and more. Trauma comes in so many forms.
Every week, as a certified Peer Recovery Support Specialist, Recovery Coach, Life Transformation coach and your host, I will jump right into the lives of people who have faced these types of adversity and CHOSE to make choices to better themselves. We'll talk about everything they went through on their journey from Rock Bottom to Rock Solid.
Through hearing each guest's story of resilience, my hope is that we'll all be inspired to wake up every single day and make our own "Breakfast of Choices". More importantly, that we'll understand we have the POWER to do it.
When someone shares their story, it can be unbelievably healing. And it can be just what someone else needs to hear at that exact moment to simply keep moving forward. So I hope you can find "that one little thing that sticks," along with hope and encouragement to just keep taking it one day at a time.
And now let me be the first to welcome you to the "Breakfast of Choices" community, a non-judgemental zone where we learn from, lean on and celebrate one another. Because the opposite of addiction is "connection", and we are all in this together.
If you would like to tell your story, I sure would love to listen. Please email me at Breakfastofchoices@gmail.com.
Respects,
Jo Summers.
Breakfast of Choices
Overcoming Generational Curses: The Journey from Childhood Trauma to Sobriety with Ben Martin
Welcome to Breakfast of Choices, where we share real-life stories of transformation from rock bottom to rock solid. I'm your host, Jo Summers, and today I'm honored to be joined by my friend Ben Martin, a local community business owner and the founder of R&B Trees. Ben has an incredible story to share about his journey from the depths of addiction and trauma to finding purpose, sobriety, and remarkable success. Growing up in a physically and emotionally abusive household, Ben turned to drugs and alcohol as a means of escape. His struggles led him down a dark path, including dropping out of high school, joining the military, and battling a debilitating addiction.
In this episode, Ben openly shares the intimate details of his story - the trauma, the addiction, the rock bottoms, and the transformative moments that led him to where he is today. His honesty and vulnerability are truly inspiring, and his journey serves as a testament to the transformative power of choice, accountability, and giving back. After hitting rock bottom, Ben made the courageous choice to get sober and rebuild his life. Through sheer determination and a commitment to personal growth, Ben has not only overcome his past but has gone on to achieve remarkable success as a business owner and community leader.
Whether you're struggling with your own challenges or simply seeking an uplifting story of overcoming addiction, this episode will leave you motivated and encouraged. Join us as we dive into Ben's story and explore the lessons he's learned along the way.
From Rock Bottom to Rock Solid.
We all have them...every single day, we wake up, we have the chance to make new choices.
We have the power to make our own daily, "Breakfast of Choices"
Resources and ways to connect:
Facebook: Jo Summers
Instagram: @Summersjol
Facebook Support: Chance For Change Women’s circle
Website: Breakfastofchoices.com
Urbanedencmty.com (Oklahoma Addiction and Recovery Resources) Treatment, Sober Living, Meetings. Shout out to the founder, of this phenomenal website... Kristy Da Rosa!
National suicide prevention and crisis, hotline number 988
National domestic violence hotline:
800–799–7233
National hotline for substance abuse, and addiction:
844–289–0879
National mental health hotline:
866–903–3787
National child health and child abuse hotline:
800–422-4453 (1.800.4.A.CHILD)
CoDa.org
12. Step recovery program for codependency.
National Gambling Hotline 800-522-4700
Welcome to Breakfast of Choices, the weekly podcast that shares life stories of transformation. Each episode holds space for people to tell their true, raw and unedited story of overcoming intense adversity from addiction and incarceration, mental illness, physical and emotional abuse, domestic violence, toxic families, codependency and more. Trauma comes in so many forms. I'm your host, jo Summers, and also someone who hit my lowest point before realizing that I could wake up every day and make a better choice, even if it was a small one. So let's dive into this week's story together to learn from and find hope through someone's journey from rock bottom to rock solid, because I really do believe you have a new chance every day to wake up and make a change, to create your own. Breakfast of Choices. Good morning and welcome to Breakfast of Choices life stories of transformation from rock bottom to rock solid.
Speaker 2:My guest today is Ben Martin. Ben Martin is a friend of mine. We've known each other just for a little while now. I first really kind of heard Ben's story. He was on the news I think he was on the Channel 9 News and I reached out to him and said dude, I heard your story. You're amazing, I'm proud of you. And that was probably I don't know a year and a half, two years ago, something like that. And I asked Ben to come on my podcast and he gladly said absolutely.
Speaker 2:And we're going to talk a lot about childhood trauma, generational curses and how they can shape a person's life and lead to addiction. And he's going to talk about how quitting alcohol and drugs it's not a magic solution. It takes time and it takes effort to overcome the underlying issues, but support from loved ones, helping others, can be instrumental in the recovery process and just making the choice to change and being ready to face the consequences is crucial for transformation. He talks a lot about, you know, accountability and learning how to be honest, and he's really going to share his story of transformation from rock bottom to rock solid. And you know Ben was in some pretty rough places and he is doing amazing now he has a tree company called R&B Trees. They do you know over a million dollars in business a year now. They do you know over a million dollars in business a year. Now he has a non-profit called share and care relief. He works with you know, he's in sobriety, he's been eight years sober and he works with other people in employment. He employs people that you know he's given a hand up and he's just overall, an all-around great guy really trying to give back and put out positive energy into the world.
Speaker 2:So I am super excited to have been here today and if there's anybody out there that is struggling, I hope you hear something today. I hope you hear that one little thing that sticks and you find those choices, those new choices that you can make, because really it is about just making the change and being ready, just being ready and being accountable for your own actions. So thank you so much for listening, sharing and please hit download. Thank you so much. I'm your host, jo Summers. Good morning, welcome to Breakfast of Choices. Real-life stories of transformation from rock bottom to rock solid. I'm your host, jo Summers, and I am here today with my friend, ben Martin. Ben is a local community business owner in Bee Trees, and I'm going to let Ben go ahead and tell his story today of how he was rock bottom and became rock solid and he's doing crazy, amazing things out there. Hey, ben, how are you? Hey, what's going on?
Speaker 3:Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for agreeing to do this tonight. I know you're a super busy guy and thanks for making time. It's important to share our stories. Super healing and super encouraging for others to hear you know how you work.
Speaker 3:I'm grateful for the opportunity and definitely part of my recovery has been helping others and not being selfish with the lessons I've learned.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. That's what it's all about Giving a hand up, not a handout. I'm going to let you just go ahead and kind of start where you want to start. I know childhood is probably, as we know, the lessons that we learn. The trauma we experience is pretty much what shapes us right into addiction usually. So I want you to go ahead and get started with that.
Speaker 3:Well, definitely, like you know, looking back, I've been sober coming up on eight years now. You know, I thought just when I quit drinking and doing drugs that that was the magic button and everything's going to be perfect. And it couldn't be further than the fucking truth. You know the years and years of sobriety I've had. Now really have let me, you know, get rid of that veil, that fog, and see. You know how crazy I am and really understand that it all does relate to childhood and past experience and generational curses that Carter never recovered from and just passed down to me and my brother, my father never recovered from and just passed down to me and my brother.
Speaker 3:So I grew up in Mustang, oklahoma, and just, you know, in mid to poor family. My dad did work the first part of my life and my mom always worked hard to try and take care of us. But my father was physically abusive. He hit me, my brother and my mother pretty negatively, you know, on a consistent basis and thankfully nothing sexual. I'm grateful for that.
Speaker 3:I've got several friends that have told me some pretty horrific stories, but just the physical abuse, definitely the mental abuse. At the time I didn't realize how long lasting that was. It was actually, I think, more damaging overall than the bumps and bruises, broken bones. But he was just an angry guy. He had a lot of issues himself.
Speaker 3:But growing up, you know, he had my grandpa was in the navy, was gone a long time and my grandma, you know, sweet old lady now supposedly the stories were, she was pretty mean and then at a late point there was some, you know, jealousy and some issues there with how he was being raised and neglected and a lot of that. I think there's a lot of trauma. You know he never spoke of it again, just heard stories through the family. But you know he said abuse of childhood so he passed that on to us. He never resolved his issue, never fixed anything. He created this, you know, a little world. Everything was shiny and perfect. On the outside he had this amazing act and that's where I got a lot of my salesmanship and charisma was from him. He can make a friend of anybody and fool anybody, but back home it was just hell yeah we had to live with it.
Speaker 3:You know I thought it was normal. You know I'd grown up like I didn't realize until like seventh or eighth grade that you didn't get beat but to shit or break in a glass of milk or whatever. And so as I got, you know, older, as soon as I could, you know, I started smoking pot. I started drinking when I was like 12, 13. And you know my parents drank a little. My mom was a closet alcohol. I didn't realize it at the time. They pretty much openly smoked pot and you know, at a younger age they did everything. They were pretty crazy.
Speaker 3:I was like my dad, you know, in the beginning had a job, a pretty good job, southwest Airlines and then he ended up I'm a forested at work. He was stealing a bunch of shit and at this time, you know, I would already moved out. But so just growing up it was, you know again, just a vicious cycle of the abuse and normalizing it and definitely setting in some, you know, deep-seated issues that I won't face the rest of my life. So I've got anger issues, I've got self-esteem issues, I've got issues with sex women and I've got issues of just overall, you know, being comfortable around around people. I'm in stressful situations. We really kicked off. I started running away. Oh, probably 13, 14, and it would be after we get hit or be. You know, I would disappear for a few days and then either eventually come back or my dad would call the police and they would find me and they would hopefully bring me back like I would beg. I'd tell them hey, as soon as you drop me off, I'll get my ass kicked. They'd still just drop us off Back in the day. My mom couldn't get herself. Nobody believed us. I didn't deal, even if they did.
Speaker 3:One time my dad kicked my brother in the ass so hard I split his ass cheek, didn't take him to the doctor or anything. Should have had stitches, but he couldn't sit down. I went to school a couple of days later, couldn't sit down. Counsel was like, hey, what's wrong? You know whatever. And I thought he was being disobedient. Finally got us in the principal's office and then he told all my dad, which of course we never did. We were so scared and then they brought me in the office. I was like I don't know what you're talking about and eventually I told the truth. And so then the cops come and you know, big old thing Never got arrested, never got in trouble.
Speaker 3:He got told that he needs to go to counseling. We went to counseling like a handful of times. They just all got washed under the table and you know it was just kind of to beat your kids. But as I got older I just got in more trouble and I was pretty smart about it. You know my brother. He shied away from drugs and alcohol. You know he had some violence issues in his life but he kind of turned more of a weird direction internally in how he acted. But I was more of a trouble maker. He was smart and sneaky, isn't that?
Speaker 2:funny though it's funny. There's two of you. You both went through the same thing, but you take it differently. You know what I mean. He, in turn, you went outward with it. It's just an interesting way that people absorb trauma right.
Speaker 3:Same household, same parents, same everything. We're two completely different people and unfortunately he I don't think he's really done a whole lot of work again. He hasn't ever went out the deep end as far as drugs and alcohol, but he definitely still has some issues with himself. But not to judge For sure. I love my brother and I talk to him as much as I can. He lives in Kansas. We've got a pretty good relationship. I wish it was better, but it is what it is.
Speaker 3:Coming out of high school I fought all the time Again High school. I fought all the time Again just sleeping around doing drugs, needing to get a hold of stealing, joined a gang and you know, school was get or miss. My biggest issue was just attendance. Anytime I actually tried, I had no problem passing the test. Turns out I'm actually pretty intelligent Again. Just a lot of the ADHD bullshit, bullshit, whatever. I couldn't sit still.
Speaker 3:So I got around sophomore year and I got to where I turned. I think I was 16 and I had 17. I had a emancipation decoration proclamation some shit word. I didn't have to live at home and I could. I was considered an adult, so I was staying with different friends sleeping on couches and I could check myself out of school, so not a good recipe. And then I was 46 years and quickly, about halfway through my sophomore year, I had, like you know, 45 absences or something, but one of the days of the month that I showed up to school, they brought me in they're like, look, you could go to summer school for the next six months and you wouldn't.
Speaker 3:You know whatever. You know, here's the options and whatever, and I just fucking quit, I'm dropped out. And that's when I really started banging drugs. I was shooting up, you know, both meth and coke. At the time I was hooked up with a coke dealer, so it was pretty available. You know, all I was doing was selling, so I could do it. I never made money and I was always constantly trying to sell the next rock just so I could pay back and get another none. And I got to a point where my mom found me and she got a letter, you know. So this is what should have been my senior year, you know. So I was pretty much just bouncing around on the streets living with people for a couple years and then my mom finally got a hold of me. She's like look, you could go back to.
Speaker 3:I called project connect and it was in radio low tech and you can get your degree, and she's like I'd really want you to do that and I was trying to figure out a way to get out of this. I was already well depressed and definitely knew that this is what I wanted to be. I did not do anything, I was in debt and so I thought if I could join the military, I could get away from this. So in order to join the military, you either had to have a GED or a high school diploma. So this all happened at the same time. My mom reached out, so I moved back in, which was crazy, and then I started going on Project Connect. So in like six months, really putting the nose to the grindstone, where I got two and a half years of high school accomplished yeah, crazy. Yeah, I walked a year late, but I graduated and then took off to the Navy.
Speaker 3:So the first year in the Navy, you know, I was still violent. I always had violent issues. I, just as soon as anybody would say anything, I'd fly off and hit them. It was just always in my head. You know, I always knew he'd be harder than my dad, so I wasn't scared of anything. I'd run just right into a fight, no problem.
Speaker 3:But after about a year in the Navy I ended up finding the wrong crowd again. All the way in California I hooked up with this chick and she was selling ecstasy and kind of got away with a lot while I was in the service. And then I got deployed right in time. I was in the middle of the with this guy's wife. He was in my shop and he was out on cruise and I was banging his wife and then he came back and it almost, almost all blew up and then I got sent out. So again, there's so many. So much of my story. I think I'm protected. Definitely God, you know, looking out for me. A lot of this is. This seems coincidental at the time when it's happening, but for sure, everything aligned and there's a purpose, though.
Speaker 3:I joined our when we went on. It was a Westpac on USS Carl Vincent and for the first time in my life, since I was 14, I was able to stay sober, and I was cause I was forced. You know, there was no alcohol, no weed, no pills, yeah, no women. I mean it was just you're on a you 12 hours on, 12 hours off, seven days a week. You know, we were at sea for about a month and a half. That's about, yeah, about a month and a half.
Speaker 3:And then we pulled into our first port, thailand, which was crazy and that's why I went back. I think you watched one of my trips on Facebook, but so as soon as I could obviously you know smug and say goodnight, I found weed. I was in a bar drinking and screwing whores, just went ape crazy. For we were there for a week. I almost died of alcohol poisoning twice it was. I mean I was comatose by the time we got out of there and I mean all that right there should be saying you know you got a problem, but yeah, it was all good to go Getting it into a week.
Speaker 2:You were just getting it all done very well.
Speaker 3:Oh man, it was nuts, and now we got them. So you just recover, drink, recover. And so we pulled out in September. So this is 2001. And we're doing drills to relieve the Enterprise and the Gulf. Ever since Desert Storm we've had a carrier over there.
Speaker 1:So Ever since.
Speaker 3:Desert Storm. We've had a carrier over there, so that's what a Westpac is and so we were over there. We're doing drills. And then September 11th happened and I was literally watching, you know, from the channel line. We had satellite TV, we were 13-hour time difference and I watched the second plane. Get the fuck. I think it was some kind of Die Hard movie or some shit.
Speaker 2:I don't know, it was so crazy.
Speaker 3:They called over the one MC all hands battle stations and had to muster and everybody's running around the ship. We get there and captain comes over and he's talking to everybody and he's like, you know, we don't know what's going on. It's not good. We're shutting off all communication, we're steaming out. Yeah, and guys you know don't expect to see land for a while. And and guys you know don't expect to see land for a while. And we didn't.
Speaker 3:We were at sea for 112 days straight in support of Operation Daring Freedom, one of the, you know, proudest moments of my life as far as I got to serve my country at war. We dropped 2.2 million pounds of ordnance on Afghanistan in response to 9-11. You, whether that's right, whether it's wrong, I don't know. At the time, you know, as a kid I was just proud to be there sharing my art, but again, longest I had ever been sober, so working out, I had hooked up with this guy. He's the clay for atlanta in college football. We go, guy, super strong genius. He kind of started mentoring me. I helped me mentally, you know, figure out a lot of things and I just didn't realize it at the time. If I had stayed on that course, I don't know where I'd be now, but I still had a lot of lessons to come, obviously. So that, for you know, almost three months sober, I was in best shape of my life. I was running three miles a day, I was benching a couple hundred pounds in multiple usage. I felt amazing.
Speaker 3:And then, as soon as we pulled back into port, the very first fucking thing yeah, I just knew I was back to drinking, back to smoking, back to fighting or whatever it could. So when I got down with Westpac, I came back and I just went batshit crazy Again, just fighting, fucking drugs. And this is all while I'm enlisted and you're not supposed to do that Kind of yeah. Yeah, I got caught up with the wrong people. They got caught selling I think they were selling tags, I can't remember, and my name got clipped in the hat. And so they did random. Where they say it was random, you're a good ass. Well, half of the company got called in. Everybody was getting fucked up.
Speaker 3:So I knew I was going to piss hot. So what I did is my dad worked for Southwest Airlines. I called him and just told him the truth and I said if you go, if you're absent for 28 days, you're not going to go AWOL. I can't remember what it's called. There's a certain time limit where you'll get in trouble but you won't get kicked out. Oh, okay, yeah, a certain time limit where you'll get in trouble but you won't get kicked out. You can go, yeah. So I was like, okay, I'm gonna come home for 28 days. Oh wow, guess it's where I get with the piss queen, and then I'll come back and lay on the mercy of the court and ask for forgiveness and I'll be okay. You see, if you piss hot, you automatically kicked out. Doesn't matter, right? So that was my game plan, came back, pushed it all the way to the limit, as, as soon as I came back, I partied for like a week with my friend.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was like that's a receipt. Going home is a risk to myself.
Speaker 3:Yeah, taking these plans of a 22-year-old. So came back, like I said, just right at the limit, got clean, flew all the way back to California, reported back with one day to spare and they went in front of the captain. This is like the fourth time I've seen her. She hated guys and this is, you know, excuses of a bit addict, but you know at the time as though she hates guys and whatever, but I hadn't fucked up. Multiple tournaments, yeah, and just like you, go for it, you know eventually they're gonna make hey, you're not getting them. So they wanted to kick me out with a dishonorable. I fought it through a chief's board. I had a jag warrior he's out of didn't really, you know, he didn't really. It was a kind of a paid now free attorney, I'd let the vendor he's back right.
Speaker 3:You know, just doing the bare minimum, I came out with all my arguments and all my speeches and tried to play it off again, never being honest, never saying I needed help, but just all these other excuses and everybody else's fault, and it didn't work. You know, I was wanting to try and stay in. I had like four months left on my enlistment. They ended up kicking me out but I got a general with honorable conditions which later on helped. At the time I didn't realize, I was still pretty upset, but I lost my navy college fund, which was like twenty two thousand dollars. I lost my gi bill, which is like fifteen thousand dollars, and it was my point. But the whole fucking reason I went to the navy was so I could get this money and go to college or get out of the navy. And I I do just absolutely go crazy.
Speaker 3:I kind of roamed around america, lived with a couple of shipmates, lived in new york for a while, lived in texas, went back to California, oregon and then Florida and then back to Texas and then basically after about eight, 10 years of roaming the earth, I came back to Oklahoma and after a few years and again, this entire time I'm drinking, I'm shooting knobs, I'm fucking doing anything I can to, you know, self-medmedicate. And then I met my wife. Well, she's my ex-wife now and this lady absolutely saved my life. When I met her I was selling weed. I had two pounds. Really I had stopped shooting up so much because, you know, I've been robbed a couple times and the guy that uh was my main hookup guy and he od'd, jose od'd. I don't know what happened, but you know I think he got murdered. But anyway, he got to a point where I understood, you know, okay, I'll just drink and do weed, and I would still do, you know, anything you put in front of me. But I stopped having just a huge access there. I never had any money. I was always just kind of just like, say, couch to couch and doing whatever I sold. So then I met my ex-wife, had a poker party and we hit it off. So within like a week of meeting her I moved in and then literally like I hid the weed in like the laundry room. Like a day later she's like it smells like weed. I'll just show her. I was like, okay, well, after you sell that, you know, please don't sell anymore. And so she really got me off the hard drugs. I would smoke weed not sell it and I was allowed to drink and. But I couldn't do this and couldn't do that. So then I started. I got a job. You know, one thing I always did was wait tables and bartend. Since I was a kid, being when I was in the navy, you know I always had that again, kind of charismamanship. I could talk to people, I could talk them into whatever you know I wanted. So I used that to my advantage.
Speaker 3:I was through a lot of my life in good ways, bad ways. I started working or being with her. I slowly but surely started getting a little bit better my life, not in any way quickly. I was still drinking and the drinking just got worse and worse. But I was a functioning alcoholic. I didn't beat her, you know. I wasn't out stealing, had a place to live, had a job, always had insurance, you know. But I slowly just died dead, hissed off anger, angst. You know I was cheating on her. I cheated on her multiple times and I don't know why or how she stayed with me. It turns out years later we're talking about it. You don't know how many times I cheat on you. She sat there and told me every single girl, their name, their father was like holy shit, you know. So I wasn't trying to hide it, it was just such a one-acted you know, care for myself. Yeah, you were respecting yourself.
Speaker 2:You didn't have. Yeah, it didn't have anything to do with her. It really had nothing to do with her. It was you.
Speaker 3:But I was, I think I was. Yeah, I was bartending a joint making good money. It was an iron, you know wine service, lobster or whatever that's making you know eight under a thousand bucks a week, which at the time for me was great money and we've. It was probably nine years ago, 10 years ago maybe, you know. Here in Oklahoma we get those goddamn ice storms. It had littered my neighborhood. I had a small truck at the time and I took my father-in-law's pool on chainsaw and I made like four grand, you know wheat. I was like oh shit, at the end of that week I had pneumonia. I don't know if I broke a finger. I went to her. I was like I love it, this is what I want to do. You broke a finger.
Speaker 2:It's all the things I love it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, this is it. And she said if I could get sober for a year I could start my company. And even with that, you know, I still for years and years I struggled with alcohol and weed and I again continued to get a better job, continued to rise up. I got Winster Oilfield, got my CDL, you know, and my cycle was I would get to a job and I'd stay sober for most of the day and I'd be a you know, super good sales or super good installer or super good whatever. I'd learn all the systems, I'd be one of the best employees, show up on time, freshly cut, clean, and then the conference would come and eventually I'd start.
Speaker 3:All my habits would start slipping in a little while. I started drinking work, I started doing all this shit and catch up. You know they'd smell my breath and my performance would drop off and I'd get fired. But I would immediately go out and get another job again. My wife was definitely an enabler. I think if she would have I don't know, honestly, I'm up on the fence with it If she would have gave up on me at the beginning, I think I'd be dead. Yeah, there's a couple times, not suicidal, but definitely on the brink I'm like fuck this. You know, I just yeah, the actions I did were crazy driving and fighting, and I still did a lot of very self-destructive behaviors. I even, and towards the end, when I was, like I said, making, had, you know, a job making 40, 50 000 dollars a year. But so I found tree work. She, you know, give me a year.
Speaker 3:So right in eight, nine years go by, I hit my rock bottom. I was working for ADT. I had multiple rock bottoms. This was just the one. I fucking bounced up and woke up. So I was driving an ADT truck, I was making $24 an hour. I had a little cell phone, a little laptop, my own car. It was a pretty cool job. We were left alone. We had two or three, you know jobs to be that date and again, very beginning the first year, dar, you know, always on time best sales rep. And then that, slowly but surely, I ended up working there like three years. It all started sinking in and I got pretty good at it. So still, really, by this time, I was an expert at hiding everything was an expert at hiding everything.
Speaker 2:You were off on your own right. You were in your own truck, off on your own, by yourself, so you could.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I did mortgage a store. I mean, there was multiple times about halfway through my shift. I was too drunk, you know. So I'd call them like, yeah, my son's sick or I gotta go, or whatever. I'd make some excuse and I couldn't finish the shift. A lot of times I'd be drunk as shit and I'd be training the customer on their homeless harm system. I probably would. You know one of the things I definitely still guilty about, the worst, and I can't believe I never got caught.
Speaker 3:So I would be in their home and they'd be off in the living room watching, you know, after a while and again, I'm a smooth salesman, white, you know, good, clean looking guy, you can trust me, I work for ADT I'd rifle through their medicine cabinet and I'd find their pills Scores, especially old ladies. They never took them and there'd be 50 fucking sick cars, yeah. So I'd take 5, 6, 10. I mean some of them. I'm like, holy shit, I can't believe. You know, I'm going to get it by the end of it. Shit, that'd be all up. And you know, never stole money, never stole a jewelry, you know. But a couple times I'd get liquor bottle or definitely a pill bottle and the legalist flock to that matter. It was just crazy.
Speaker 3:So that was a really where I was like holy shit, what am I doing every day? And then one day I was driving home from lawton and got pulled over. So I'll never get pulled over again, clean looking, driving an adt van. I always pay attention to the speed limit. And I had a cruel, horrible day. Shitty customer which again she probably wasn't shitty, it was me I was like you know what? Fuck it. I'm taking the rest of the day. I call my boss. Hey, I'm this dad, I can't do the next two jobs. He's like okay, whatever. And so I stopped and get my normal bottle of vodka monster drink. I'm drinking that. It's about half drink. I'm on the Indian termite below the joint, all in a company van and I get pulled over. So it turns out I was going to turn into a construction zone and I didn't see the construction signs and they slowed down. So I was going 75, which was the speed limit. I turned into a 55, and so I got pulled over and said shit you know, so I'm immediately.
Speaker 3:I got beer cans everywhere empty in your work. Yeah, windows down lighting a cigarette, you know the whole time. Pulled over on the side of the highway and I'm looking in my side view where I think he's gonna walk up on the passenger. I'm going down trying to hide your shit, looking for him. I'm looking on my driver's side thinking he's gonna walk up on the passenger. I'm trying to hide this shit, looking for him. I'm looking on my driver's side thinking he's going to walk up on my driver's side, and I just keep looking and I'm moving over to him and then you knock on the passenger's side oh well, that's good. Well, nice to meet you for a minute. So I like a great coupon commercial. He's like you know why I pulled you. Is that a beer can? I was like yeah, you know. And he's like well, you're going like 20 over and that's an open container. He's like you've been drinking? No, of course not. You know like that's from last night. He's like all right, you know, come on back here with me. And I knew what he was doing. You know, been in this situation multiple times, just not in my company view. Goes back, we go sit back in the cop car. He rolls the windows out and starts talking to me. So I do our slots Right. Again, it's a half-bottle lock on me.
Speaker 3:I was drinking for the last 10 years of my life. So I just straight up was like you know what? Fuck it, I'm a drunk. I can't figure this out. I'm going to lose my job. I'm going to get a DUI. I was like I've got a CDL. I was like I'm not even drunk. I was like, but I'll blow over a .02. I'm sure that I'll get fired. My wife's going to divorce me. Take my kids, plot it, do it, take me to jail. I'm ready. I don't know what to do. I drive John for all the time. I want to quit, but I can't. We talked for a little while. Basically he had mentioned a few things about his past and whatever. He let me go. He wrote me a ticket for open containers and he wrote me a ticket for 20 over. So it was like $980 in tickets, which at the time was huge. Health yeah, and basically I knew I was going to get fired anyway because eventually the tickets would roll onto my driving record and whatever.
Speaker 3:Before we left he goes up and he's like you know, is there any other stuff in the car? I was like, yeah, I was like, come on, so we go up there and we proceed to clean out the car. By the time we were done three, four, seven, eleven bags full of empties, empty vodka, empty like probably 12-pack of beer, full you know, two or three half-full vodkas, probably three or four joints. And he's like, holy shit, you weren't kidding, he's like man, maybe I changed my mind.
Speaker 2:I was like no, not very much.
Speaker 3:And I swore up downtown this is it. Thank you so much. You've changed my life and I'm shaking, I'm laughing, I'm crying, I'm just like, wow, my god, I can't believe it. First thing I do get in the car, he lets me go, get back on the turnpike and start hauling ass. First thing I do, I get off the turnpike and I go to a liquor store and I buy another bottle of vodka and that was my last drink. I called my wife, I said you know, I just got done buying a bottle of vodka and I told her the whole story and she's like, yeah, whatever you know she's heard me done.
Speaker 3:But you know, of course, alcohol, you gotta just have that one last drink I've been. You know this is it. I will never do it, but that was it. That was my last train. I did just a cold turkey. You know, I had you know on that aa and church and fellowship, and I knew how to do it. I knew the systems and the programs but the reality was just I wasn't ready. Yeah, so, to finally get that. I knew I was going to go to chile. I know it's lose everything that was enough for me to realize. You know, I wanted different, wanted something different.
Speaker 2:You knew, you knew all along that could happen, right, that's obviously we all know that right, that could happen at any moment, any time, and it's never enough to make a stop right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was looking for it. Yeah, I didn't care.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so. So what do you think I get that you didn't go to jail that night. That wasn't enough to scare you, though, so any insight, like since it's been so long now of why you think that did it for you well, that was the moment.
Speaker 3:The reality is I had just been getting away with it for so long. This is maybe the third or fourth time I had been pulled over and talked my way out of it To not have a DUI wreck and kill somebody To not gone.
Speaker 3:You know, I had one DUI. That was like when I was 23. And of course I would even near ready to quit then. So you know, here I am. I've been sober eight years, I'm almost eight years, you're eight years, so I'm 45.
Speaker 3:You know, it leads to a point where they say you know sick and tired of being sick and tired, and I'm not saying in any way, aa is just an obsolete answer. You know, you go in there and you're surrounded by a bunch of old people smoking cigarettes and drinking caffeine and they're just bitching about their fucking lives. Know, I don't even go to aa anymore. I think that it's definitely a tool. You know, I think there is help there, a rehab. You know, again, it's just the parameters and the steps. So this is what you need to do. But ultimately you just got to be fucking ready. You got to understand that this is it. I'm not gonna you. I cannot continue to function like this. It is my choice and you know you got to give it away. You got to understand, you know that it's your choice.
Speaker 3:And it's hard, it seems impossible, definitely the fucking hardest thing I've ever done in life. But it gets easier after a couple months, you know. So the first couple of days was the shakes and just sitting at home, fucking busy wall. I gave all my money to my wife. I took, she took all my car, exactly, called into work. I, you know, I just went through everything I had to go through, slowly but surely, over a couple weeks, kind of started planning out and not being absolutely insane. And then, you know, like two months, three months went by and when I hit three months I was like this is wow, it's the longest I've ever been sober, you know, minus my time on that ship.
Speaker 3:And now I look back and it's just I can't even imagine how it functioned. You know, I was very highly functioning. I'm being sober now, you know, being successful and going the places I'm going. I can see where. You know I was almost normal, I was functioning well enough. People didn't. You know it did not. So you know, just no magic spot, no magic blues.
Speaker 3:I think it was just a cumulative 15, 20 years in the last five of it being just absolutely miserable, on the brink of death. I stopped, I just stopped caring. I didn't care what people fucking thought, I didn't care if I get caught, I didn't care if I got the ring, you know. And I got to a point where you know, for whatever reason that getting pulled over this has been, what's it going to take? You know, what is it going to be? You mean, you mean, you mean, you mean, is it going to be, you know, dying to get sober? What the fuck is it going to take? Yeah, understanding that, you know, I've got to make a choice yeah, it's what it's about choices, right.
Speaker 2:That's why the podcast is breakfast of choices. That is truly the bottom line of what it is about. It is your choice. You're not. Nobody else is going to make you do it. It has to be your choice. You've got to get to that spot where you just go like you said. I am sick and tired of being sick and tired yeah took prison. It was hard-headed, a little more hard-headed, I think it took that yeah this is where you're going.
Speaker 2:This is where you're sitting. Stay here. You're gonna need about three and a half years to chill.
Speaker 3:Maybe you've been I got so lucky. I mean, there's so much shit I did criminally wise as a kid. How many people I wronged and walked over and stole from I never you know. So it's a big part of the reason I do so much charity now.
Speaker 2:You're giving back.
Speaker 3:Replace some of that karma and that energy. There's people I can't ever ask for forgiveness. You know they're gone. Yeah, what's people I can't ever?
Speaker 1:ask for forgiveness.
Speaker 3:You know they're gone, yeah.
Speaker 2:I was the same. It's all about that, right. It's just about the energy you're putting out there now compared to what you were putting out there then.
Speaker 3:Oh, a thousand percent. So after that day, on the way home, that was the next day, I called in sick and then I called my boss and I said hey, boss, you know, here's the deal. I'm sorry, I got something I need to tell you. I was like, but you can't say it. I said, you know, you're like, what the fuck are you talking about? But what.
Speaker 3:You know I can't do that. Me and him were pretty cool and he couldn't stand me and he's like, yeah, he's like you know, they're gonna once a year they pull your driving record. As soon as that pulls up, you're gonna get fired, you know. I was like, well, what do I do when he's like man? He's like I don't know, he's like you know, he's like I'll go get another job. I said okay, so I actually applied at Guardian. It's a, it's like a more of a mom and pop shop and they call it Alert 360. Now this, before all this shit hit my driving record and I lied on my applications and I told my work to ADT, which is, like you know, the premier. I was there, trained for three, four years now. So they hired me. They gave me a $2 raise. I worked on systems that were easier and, yeah, I, they hired me. They gave me a two dollar raise. I worked on systems that were easier and, yeah, I stayed sober.
Speaker 3:All this I need to change out, I think new environment out the idea of maybe this is it, you know the hope. I'm not sure, but you know, there I still suffered miserably that first year daytime, you know, and still there was a lot of close calls and but I would just go home and not, you know, do whatever I could to not fucking drink. Yeah, I was just milk and weed, and so, you know, a lot of times I talk about my sobriety and I've used weed on and off this entire time until about four months ago, you know. So I think we I don't know, you know it's hard to say the reality is, you know, any mind altering substance you know is a state. You know you're trying to not really face reality.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:But I didn't fucking, you know, get in wrecks. I didn't fight, you know, I got hungry and I went to sleep. So, you know, weed for me at the time was kind of a medication. So, you know, weed for me at the time was kind of a medication. And with, again, my success and the amount of shit I got going on my mental capacity, I realized, you know, I'm ready for the next step. So I've been working just as hard to quit weed as it is. I've been smoking since I was a fucking kid. So all programs and systems I have in place, you know, were walled around weed. So it's been difficult.
Speaker 3:I'm annoyed to Thailand. I actually, the whole time I was there I didn't smoke weed, which is fucking hilarious because it is everywhere. So I got a bit of quick weed when I got there I'm like, oh shit, where's my little homeowner? It is literally everywhere. What I was able to do. And then I came back and kind of fell back into it. I was cognitive for my girlfriend, you know and then quit for another month and I got back on it, whatever. So I've been about three months now. I love it, you know, I don't miss it. I decided to get into just that programming, that system of frustration? Oh, you don't. So my sobriety is for me. You know, my big shit back in the day was the hard stuff Got off that and then my crutch, you know, was alcohol. What was really keeping me back. So my true sobriety date, if you want, was three months ago, but I still drink caffeine.
Speaker 3:You know what the fuck. You know drugs.
Speaker 2:Right, caffeine is I mean. Come on now, there's got to be something right.
Speaker 3:Aspirin's a drug. Food is a drug, you know, really you can take anything and run with it to and out of the big way Enough of anything, except I mean so.
Speaker 2:But recovery is different for everybody. Recovery is it can mean a lot of things for people. You can be like you said when you first quit drinking. You might be sober, but your brain is not. You know what I mean. You still got to do the work. You still got to work on yourself. You still got to work through all of the things that got you there. Yeah, that's truly the hard part. That's the hardest part. It's not stopping this, the substances, is hard, but working out all of that trauma and all those things that got you there.
Speaker 3:That and that's the biggest thing that's been to me in the last three or four years is the way it's actually looking at myself and trying to fix all of the past and realize that you know these are deep-seated issues. You know why I can't forgive myself, why I can't love myself. You know why it's hard for me to communicate my feelings with people. You know express my truth, not look to please people or have everybody accept me and become a wonderful person.
Speaker 2:You spent a childhood, if I can imagine, walking on eggshells and trying to please people, please the situation at the moment. While you're walking on eggshells to not get your ass beat right, what's the next thing going to happen? So you walk around tiptoe tiptoe trying to be quiet and people please the shit out of everything, just to get through and just to get by. So you got a pretty good case of codependency. I don't know if you know much about that or study much about that, actually run a women's circle on that, so I have a whole course, but it's a real thing or behavior from childhood for most people.
Speaker 3:oh yeah, and that program yes, built in and how? You react and it works to what you think, what you think works. And then, yeah, as an adult, you just continue. And a lot of it also was just a lack of love, you know, lack of being cuddled, being used to be cared for again, very abusive relationship. You know, I wanted her the best she could, but she was forced. Let my dad do what he did or he'd beat her and it was almost a self-preservation type deal.
Speaker 3:So when I got to a point when I came out of the Navy and I had just the slightest bit of self-confidence, I was in shape and when they started paying attention to me I was a whore, you know, I was sleeping with anybody that would throw attention at me. And then, like I said, I would mold myself, become whatever party or group I would do, and because I wanted everybody to be my friend, you know, because I didn't have friends when I was a kid because I wouldn't talk to anybody. So, yeah, all of that All right. So that just led to a lot of what the drinking and drugs truly was, and that was just a self-medication to escape all these problems, make myself feel better or go numb. In the end it was just to go for me, normal and your normal day was nothing, being family, was not having all that, all this thoughts and the craziness in my head. And so now it's still dealing with it and finding other ways.
Speaker 3:In the beginning, when I quit drinking, I started doing tree work and it's crazy. I climb a hundred-foot tree, swing out thousands of pounds and I've almost died multiple times and there's an addiction level to that. It's dopamine rush that you just cannot fucking imagine as you're jumping out of airplanes or at war fighting bullets with a bite. It's similar to that. You know, it's really crazy what we do. The amount of work I did when I first came out of the bat, it led to me part of me being successful. I replaced all those bad addictions with somewhat good addictions. Now, you know, I'm learning a work-life balance and hump Ordinarily I can't work myself into to the dirt so I'm having to repair. Now all of these other you know, go green and work hard addictions and so it's never, never stops. That's the most important, it never doesn't matter.
Speaker 3:No, even so, it doesn't matter what you're getting off or what. It's never going to stop, you know you gotta keep, you don't know.
Speaker 2:You got to keep working on your phone.
Speaker 3:If you're not improving every day, you're not going, you're staying stagnant, you're going, you're not going, nowhere, absolutely. So I continue to help others. We have multiple of my employees are from sober living homes. I mean a couple of them straight from jail. We have, you know, group counseling. We do and it helps several guys, you know, get back on their feet and that's part of my sobriety program.
Speaker 3:It's part of 12-step work. Whatever, it's again a big part of why we do a lot of charity. I think it's to just you know I'm starting to feel good and help others and it helps.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Giving back is that is part of the road to recovery.
Speaker 3:That is the step. The last step is to be able to give back and to give the people behind you the hand up. Everything I do, who I've been screwing, where I made my money, where I was last night. He can ask me any question, anything, and I can tell you the truth. It is so powerful.
Speaker 2:Huge, it's huge.
Speaker 3:It's hard, you know you take it easy, but it's hard because it means you know I've got to act with integrity, you know.
Speaker 2:I've got to act integrity and be accountable. You have to be accountable when you do that Right and be accountable. You have to be accountable when you do that right.
Speaker 3:It's all about accountability and you're being accountable for your actions, and that's the thing you can't. You got to stop blaming others, from pointing the finger in. You know it's this person's fault, and well, my dad did this, well, the government did this, and that None of that fucking helps. None of that works. We all have problems. We're all fucking crazy. We're all human Right.
Speaker 3:You know, the reality is again if you don't make that choice, if you don't, you know, be honest and accountable about what your problem is, they'll never grow up, they'll never get past it 100% agree.
Speaker 2:Let me ask you your parents mom still alive.
Speaker 3:Like I said, my dad never worked through the issues as a kid. Oh no, my dad never worked through the issues as a kid. Almost Grew up when he got out as a teenager Not a decent job and kind of flew straight and he was always a hippie, kind of druggie and then, I said, created this world that we live in, where it was all through eyes On the outside it was shiny, so he always fought depression. He threatened suicide several times. He was working at Southwest Airlines cargo and the story goes that you know. So that taught him how to steal and you can go into the cargo and take a few things and change the barcode or whatever. Anyway, did this for years. Eventually then started noticing this big sting operation and supposedly the guy that taught him everything turned him in. They set up cameras and busted him. And this is when I was in the Navy you know 25 years ago.
Speaker 3:And so he got arrested at work and never been in trouble, never had any criminal record or whatever, and he'd smoke and pot closet drinking.
Speaker 3:I didn't know at the time but, you know really on my ass about my good and so of course he's not going to tell me about his. So after that he never recovered, man. He never got a job. Mom supported him. He lives off the retirement. You know their growing age Started burning through that. He was still on and off abusive. He loved him and just took it. He lives in this horrible existence. He was a hoarder. He just sat around. He got into like 350 pounds. He'd come out and try and it just. I really tried to. You know I forgave him. I started getting successful. I tried to get him out on the drop side and crying, standing up, doing anything, coming up, being paint fence, whatever.
Speaker 3:My mom was over watching my kids At this time I'd have three boys and she was a pretty solid babysitter for us and with like 6 o'clock at night, 7 o'clock at night, we were doing something. We got back and she was leaving the house and she was looking down at her phone and she'd gone 5 miles an hour, 10 miles an hour and she fucking shit. A cop car in my neighborhood, fuck, fuck. I got decent money and she calls freaks out. I'm like, don't worry. I went and knocked on the car, I did some damage and he's cool, I'm like I'm not gonna put this on insurance, I'll just pay a car. And he's like I don't even worry about it, whatever. And then so I call my dad. I'm like, hey, mom got in a wreck, it's all good, it's five am. She's like fucking, I'm going to kill that bitch and fucking run.
Speaker 3:I was like mom, y'all go home. She's like I got to go home, I got to go home. So she goes, I'm calling her, I'm calling her running out. He had taken out one of the spark plugs. She couldn't take the car. So she runs down the street and he just goes back there. And I get a hold of her, I go pick her up at the gas station and she never physically hit her, but obviously pretty traumatizing. And this has happened multiple times, more times than she can count, and she always went back every single time and it would never last more than 24 hours. So again, for the first time ever I had been doing I think we had the nonprofit by then so I had done.
Speaker 3:We did have the nonprofit. We did a huge charity job for Turning Point Ministries and they deal with this type of situation battered spouses so I called the guy. Hey, scott, you know, here's the deal. This is my family, my, my time. And he's like, yeah, well, we're out. So I put her in a hotel that night and then the next day, first day in the booker, is she guys go to talk to a group of battered women well get in front of a counselor and really see the difference about golder, and financially you don't have to worry about anything.
Speaker 3:That was one of the big things my dad always said, you know. So what are you going to do? You know you'll never that either, right, and just that kind of mind control shit. Well, I told her that you don't have to worry about that. You know you come live with us, we'll fucking get you, whatever does it there. So she, for the first time ever, basically didn't go back home within 24 hours and then after two or three days she realized that she didn't have to live like this. You know she got out of that mind control, crazy crap, the energy. And you know he flipped out and called and would you fucking tell your mom and bring her back? And only dad, you know, threatened the only person that still loves you, the only person that still loves you, the only person that still wants to be with you. You know you're fucking pregnant killer. Then we pulled down everybody. It's not our fault, you know, it's your fault anyway.
Speaker 3:So a couple weeks go by, me and him, he told me to fuck off and I blocked his number and then my ex-wife was communicating with her. She's been a really good you know. You know he really respected her and liked her for helping him. They had a great relationship. So he talked to her, you know, for the next week and a half and it seemed like he was getting better. You know, there was some good, positive talks, but I never called him, never spoke to him on the phone, but wrote him a couple of letters.
Speaker 3:But one day he just he called Robin and he says, you know, hey, this is in the safe and the keys under the mat. You know, tell her I love her and goodbye. Hung up the phone and she's like what the fuck? So she called me. I'm coming back from Texas. I'm pulling a piece of equipment we just bought. And she's like, hey, get out of here and fucking kill yourself. I'm like, well, I was like, you know, don't go over there. I was like cause I said, just call the cops. She's like okay. So she called the cops and she's like fuck it, I don't wanna go over the side of the house, wrapped a towel around his head and blew his fucking head off. That was a year ago now, more than a half a year ago, yeah, so he just you know he had a long road in front of him and my mom gave him a bunch of stipulations of you got to do this and this, and he just didn't want to do the work. And I get it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, I really don't understand. I've lost so many friends to suicide Me too and a lot of times I'm like, oh my God, what the fuck you know? But this I wasn't understanding. It was so miserable, it was so angry, it was so full of negative.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Never experienced anything.
Speaker 2:Sorry, that happened.
Speaker 3:Difficult. Sorry that happened. You know, the crazy thing is I was always worried about, like, when I got thing, something crazy like in the arena or something or whatever. It was like nine hours, 10 hours after I found out, Again, I was coming back from Texas. I still had like a two-hour drive and then I drive immediately to the scene and I wanted to see the body. I thought it would happen if they like tried to charge three of these detectives. They wouldn't let me. They're like look, you don't, this is not what he wants. You know. Now, I was so grateful he didn't. You know, yeah, yeah. So you know, four or five, I went home and fucking messing that and I didn't cry, if you know. Later that night I was like man, it was the first time I even thought about drinking. You know, what do you think about drinking in the sense of I'm gonna get drunk, fuck all this. It was just wow, I didn't need a drink.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you got to, that's really big yeah and that's amazing, I gotta say in all honesty. You know, the thought of drinking makes me sick. I can be around it, I can have it, and my girlfriend has. You know, freak, I go to my ex-wife's house and it's cool lying in beer. I can be at parties, I can go play poker and it does not bother me, it's good. Still, the lumbia we, you know, because that cigarettes on our weed, you know, because I have cigarettes.
Speaker 3:I quit smoking now. The other ones I still try and avoid. But you know, alcohol. I just knew I had to get ready.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I just can't do it. It's not something you can do, it's just not.
Speaker 3:It's not something you can do yeah, I can't do a glass of red wine with the state yeah, okay, no, it's okay, your life now in comparison to what your life what is?
Speaker 2:you don't need a glass of wine. You know it's not worth it not worth it.
Speaker 3:how do you know when it took me me so long to quit? I was so scared. I was scared of the idea of going to the movies sober or not being drunk.
Speaker 3:Going to white water not being drunk I'm not going to be funny, I'm not going to be able to talk to people, I'm not going to have a good time when I go play. None of that is true. My life is so much better. I'm so much better of a person, so much better of a father, even though you know the thing with the ex-wife I had been unfaithful for most of our marriage and it just we couldn't repair it. We tried, yeah, after I got sober, I still had those tendencies. So we just got to a point where we decided you know, split ways, but we're still love each other. We still have an amazing relationship, open relationship. I can go pick up my kids whenever I want. You know, she's again just amazing person. That's really, yeah, basically saved my life.
Speaker 2:As far as and you all work together now, right yeah, she always had to.
Speaker 3:then it's great. I started a crane company. She's a board member on the nonprofit and we work heavily involved with each other. It's almost like we're married, but minus living together and sex. Right, yeah, but she's for me. We curl together. Yeah, I go to her with my problems. She comes to me with her rod and we'd clog, you know, and we'd copy each other, we're better friends, you're better friends? Yeah, 100%. I mean, it's been almost like what we should have been from the beginning.
Speaker 2:And that's okay.
Speaker 3:We helped each other. You know we needed it then and we still help each other now. I'm grateful for that relationship. Yeah, for sure. You know I'm grateful we have what we have together. It's been a rest, you know, hopefully the rest of our lives with our kids and the business and passing down like a seat it's wonderful.
Speaker 3:So you started out your business pretty small and you've grown pretty big yeah, first year we did a little over 100 grand in trees, which I thought, wow, you know, only, yeah, I paid myself like fourteen thousand dollars and I'm talking 100 hours of work. We like I said nearly dying, you know, but we, just we turned everything back into the business. This year, this will be our coming out. This will be the finish of our seventh year. We're going to break a million again.
Speaker 2:That sounds good.
Speaker 3:We're starting a crane company where we have probably over $500,000 in equity with equipment. We've got nine, ten employees. We do work from $25,000 to $30,000 in trees a week. It's not all trail and truck and trailer Great, and I watched everything on YouTube. I learned I never worked for another tree company. I never worked for a landscape company.
Speaker 2:That's amazing. So it turns out, you are pretty damn smart, huh.
Speaker 3:Yeah Again. You know how I got away with. What I did for so long is yeah, is I was underneath all the craziness, I would bring stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Super happy for you and you have the nonprofit Share and Care Relief.
Speaker 3:Yep, yeah, we do charity through tree. So basically, again, in the beginning, when I first started doing you know climbing which there's not a whole lot of people that can do you know climbing Tree I would help out my grandpa and then I'd help my neighbor, and then I'd help you know the single mom, and then a disabled vet, and then as the company grew, the expenses grew, the size of my charity jobs grew and I'll probably make sense. So now it's its own individual thing. I'm able to hire other companies. We did a huge Cottonwood yesterday with like three different companies come out and help, Landed a little call Just this veteran, disabled veteran. Next month it ought to be like $15,000 for free work. Yeah, We'll do all that for free. We've helped out numerous nonprofits, hundreds of thousands of dollars in free work for free. It's amazing. It's awesome. It's such an amazing feeling to be able to help others. It's almost like a drug.
Speaker 2:I was going to say it's an addiction in itself. I agree.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it is. It's such a clean energy, the whole you know god thing. Give back 10 times all that. It's true. I mean anytime I feel bad, anytime we're slow in business, anytime something, you know, whatever goes wrong, I just go out and I do it. When I help somebody I don't, you know, a lot of times I'll put you know the bigger stuff on facebook I'm trying to gain traction with my non-profit. Sure, I get more successful, but in the beginning, you know, I wouldn't say anything to anybody. I wasn't looking for the hat on the back, I wasn't putting it on Facebook giving Obama a dollar or any of that shit. Just go out and do it and the results, man, they just they were amazing. It really is for for me to think where I was 16, 17 years ago.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:But kneeling in my room, I was homeless. There was some crazy stuff to now, like I said, being able to go and help others change lives for the better.
Speaker 2:I really hope for you at this time in your life that you are super fucking proud of yourself. Thank you that's what I hope. You go to bed at night going.
Speaker 3:Damn, I did some shit today and I am proud of myself it's all kind of surreal, you know, like sometimes I look and like I know more people know me now sober, so it's almost like I'm just telling somebody else's story. Sometimes I occasionally I'll write into some old friends, yeah, and then they're watching me on Facebook or they're, you know, and they're like, oh my God, I can't believe it. You know, I'm just like damn, I remember that now. Or you know flashbacks of how it used to be. Yeah, it can happen. You know, again, like you said, breakfast of choices. I mean, it's not easy, it's not just all of a sudden you flip the light switch and everything starts fucking working.
Speaker 3:It's like when shit's rolling downhill and you get the fucking DUI and you lose your driver's license and your girlfriend breaks up with you because you don't have a car now, and then you don't have a job in your apartment and then you're fucking homeless, and then all that shit just rolling downhill. Same thing when you start to win, when you get those little tiny successes and then all of a sudden people trust you, all of a sudden you know you're looked at for a leader and then you get financially free and I mean it's just snowballs and it yeah the momentum now that I've been like that, you know I have.
Speaker 3:It's like. I feel like I have to try and fuck it up and so, even when everything's going horribly wrong, this doesn't go right, this customer is a bitch, and this breaks down and it rains. I'm so grateful, I'm so happy for all my problems. They're first world.
Speaker 2:World problems right, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:I've got big boy problems now that aren't you know where. Am I going to get my next fix Absolutely, or I don't want to get out of all my breath. You know the shit that again, there's choices. So picking your battles and understanding it's your fault.
Speaker 2:It is yeah, and learning to be. You know, negative attracts negative, positive attracts positive right. So just as it rolled downhill, you can also make it roll uphill right. And so it is mindset, it is growth, it is positivity, it is changing those choices. It's those little steps you know what I mean. One step at a time. One step at a time, and pretty soon you got a staircase. You know what I mean. And it just keeps going. And it keeps. Building Doesn't happen overnight, it just doesn't.
Speaker 3:But you didn't see where you were overnight either. Right, exactly. You know I'm a big bull and one day it takes you out of the crawl, out of it. Absolutely. All those cliches saying they're real. True, it is absolutely true, and in the beginning it's one minute at a time.
Speaker 2:Yeah right, Absolutely.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you're right, it does get easier, absolutely. You're looking at it. Yeah, you're right, it does get easier and it's hard to. I wish I could matrix transplant. You know how I feel now, how I felt then and like I'm seeing. You know, I've had people die right in front of me and friends, and it's just man. You know, it's like I know what to do, I know how to fix this. You, you know. But ultimately, if they're not ready, yes, it doesn't matter, you can talk, you can give somebody the fucking blueprint to success, but if they don't put in the work, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 2:Yeah then it is about putting in the work. It's not just about stopping the drugs and stopping the drinking. It is about putting in the work. And yeah, it's hard, it sucks because you got to know yourself and sometimes we suck right. It's like, damn, am I really that? But you know that can change, right. You make a different choice and it changes things. So that's just where you become who you're supposed to be. Turning your pain into purpose is what it's all about.
Speaker 3:So I'm grateful, you know, grateful for my life. I'm grateful for my life, I'm grateful for my past.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:I wasn't Maybe where I'm at wouldn't understand what I understand. Now. You know it's definitely about being grateful. Yeah, Understanding that. Yeah that it's chance that I'm alive. I've got all my fingers, all my toes. I can see, I can walk, I can smell. I'm in fucking America. I can walk, I can smell. I'm in fucking America. It's amazing the opportunities that have been set before me.
Speaker 2:So it's mine to pick them up and run with. I love you sharing with me today. I always call you Ben Martin. I don't know why it was in my phone Ben Martin and I've called you that forever and Ben Martin. So I appreciate you sharing with me today.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you know, just sharing your truth, your honesty and being who you are, I appreciate the shit out of that. Yeah, well, again, that's what you know, true? You know, the true change that's happened for me is it's been the honesty and being willing to admit my faults.
Speaker 3:Yeah no one can do that. It really gives you a power that no one can take from you. No one can change. Know your truth, forgive yourself. I understand we all make mistakes, but don't make excuses, don't blame others. Face up to what you've done, walk through it, you know, and just don't give up. Keep moving forward and that's it. And you know we're going to get a little bit of time on this fucking rock Right? It seems like a long time, but it isn't.
Speaker 2:It's not, it's not. It's a point of an hour. You got to keep it. That's the biggest thing. You got to keep hopeful and keep going every day.
Speaker 3:Yes, ma'am. Well, again, I appreciate the opportunity and, as always, you're amazing.
Speaker 1:I am so grateful that you joined me for this week's episode of Breakfast of Choices. If you're enjoying this podcast, please subscribe, give it five stars and share it to help others find hope and encouragement. The opposite of addiction is connection, and we are all in this together. Telling your transformational story can also be an incredible form of healing, so if you would like to share it, I would love to hear it. You can also follow me on social media. I'm your host, Jo Summers, and I can't wait to bring you another story next week. Stay with me for more Transformational Thursdays.
