When your next decision could be your last

Life is a series of choices, decisions, consequences and rewards. Each day we are faced with life threatening decisions. Each decision has the ability to lengthen or shorten our existence. Some decisions , handled incorrectly could in fact be the last decision we ever make. Recovery is a decision to do better, to live and not die. Recovery remains a decision to live life joyous and free. Free from the pain offered by active addiction. The decision to recover invokes a new birth, a new chance to just do better. Make better decisions, get better outcomes, more rewards and less consequences. Its been said recovery is the greatest show on earth. Listen as Trent explains why his decision to recover places him firmly on solid footing to just do better.

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Welcome to the Recovery is a Process of Decisions podcast. This is Trent Thomas, your recovery peer support specialist. This week's episode is entitled When Your Next Decision Could Be Your Last. The road to recovery requires making the next right decision. This is a mandate every day and every minute of every day. We are always one bad decision away from making a fatal last decision. We live with the consequential prospect of our next decision being our last conscious decision. In the rooms of recovery, we hear many stories of what to and what not to do. In the rooms of recovery, you will find individuals sharing their most embarrassing moments of their lives just to tell us what to and what not to do. Not too long ago, someone shared that a friend of theirs who had some years of sobriety suddenly came into a lump sum of money and made the decision to do what he used to do. So he stopped some drugs and ordered up a woman. It was at a hotel room where a young lady found this individual dead, laying across the bed, a victim of sudden fentanyl poisoning, typically called a OD or overdose. This individual made a bad decision. In fact, this bad decision was the last decision he ever made. The drug fentanyl has shortened the time to recover and certainly made the consequences of returning to use much more deadlier. In real time, a decision to return to use, a trip down old memory lane, could very well be the very last decision one ever makes. Life is choices, decisions, consequences, and rewards. The reward for making good decisions is that you get to make more decisions. The consequences for making bad or wrong decisions is that decision could very well be your last. You cannot keep making the same bad decision over and over. Each time we make a wrong or bad decision, the consequences get more and more severe. The ultimate consequence for making bad decisions is when you can no longer make any decisions at all. This is called death. The state where decision making stops. Death is the end of life, the state of no will, no further movements, a stop in willful decisions, the ending to life's panorama of choices, decisions, consequences and rewards. Birth is the beginning, death is the ending, and life is what happens in between the two. The will to live is a God given state of perpetual motion. Our will, coupled with our desires, manifests itself in the parade of happiness, love, fun, adventure, joy, married with heartache, pain, doubt, fear, anguish, shortcomings as well as windfalls, mountain highs and valley lows. It is the full range of life that creates memories that last a lifetime. Life can be joyous and free for those that choose to steer away from the gravity-pulling effects of addiction and choose to do better and recover. Recovery is a conscious decision to do better, make better decisions and get better results, more rewards and less consequences. For me, I live in recovery. Every wakey moment is a decision to just do better, live better, be better, help someone other than myself, and choose to be the very best version of myself. I am recovery, and recovery is me. It is in my striving that I find the greatest joy. The struggles bring me closer to the God of my understanding. It is in the struggle that I find God. Faith is truly in the waiting, not knowing the answer. Unsure of the outcome produces faith, faith in God, for God knows what we know not. As I depend on Him, I find confidence and joy. I do not have all the answers. Most often I just play my part and let God do what God does. His will, his way, his plan. He is the director, the script writer, the motion maker, the movement inducer. He pumps my heart, blinks my eye, energizes myself, expands my lungs. God is my life giver, my life sustainer. I depend on God for everything. Without him, I am nothing. I would cease to exist without the God of my understanding. My gratitude for God, the giver of life, keeps me sober. It is my deep appreciation for him giving me another chance at life that keeps me moving in the right direction. It is my sincere gratitude for being born again that keeps me moving in a positive incline. My love for this new life keeps me steady in recovery. I love recovery. It is the greatest show on earth, and I am so joyous to be living a recovered life. This is Trent Thomas, and I would like to thank you for listening to another episode of Recovery is a process of decisions podcast. You can now subscribe to this podcast and receive special Reach Deep episodes for subscribers only, as well as a private personal email account to communicate directly with me for comments and show suggestions. I also would like to invite everyone to check out my new ebook entitled Recovery, The Seven Steps to Sustain Recovery, available at Amazon.com, written for those in recovery seeking a formula to sustain recovery. As always, your inspiring comments can be left at transnetrecover.com forward slash podcasts. Please feel free to follow me on Facebook and Instagram, hashtag transnetrecover. Thank you and have a blessed day.