Resilience Is A Daily Practice with Dave Loiterstein

Dave Loiterstein's recovery story starts earlier than most, with a quiet belief he carried as a kid: if his own mother didn’t want him, nobody ever would. Alcohol and drugs showed up fast, and the “off switch” never really existed. Together we talk honestly about what craving feels like, why some brains chase blackout instead of “just one,” and the disease model of addiction.

Then we get into the part most people avoid saying out loud: relapse. Dave doesn’t glamorize it or call it inevitable, but he also refuses to let shame be a life sentence. He shares what it meant to have 21 years of continuous sobriety followed by relapse. We dig into the pressure of the sobriety number and the daily reprieve that keeps recovery alive.

Dave’s journey stretches far beyond survival: a music-driven life, a career as a Hollywood makeup artist, and a pivot into substance abuse counseling and rehab admissions, taking crisis calls from families who need help immediately. Structure, routine, creativity, and parenting with boundaries are part of this discussion, because stability can feel unfamiliar after years of chaos.

Transcript

Welcome And The Resilience Theme

SPEAKER_01 0:22

Welcome back to Out of the Blue, the podcast, where we explore the moments that come out of nowhere, the moments that crack us open, and if we're willing, give us a chance to begin again. I'm Vernon West, here is my co-host, my son Vernon West III, the creative force behind our logo and our theme music. Today's guest brings us a story not defined by what nearly destroyed him, but by what could not break him. Dave Lloydstein's life has been shaped by deep wounds, fierce battles with addiction and moments when survival itself was uncertain. He searched for belonging, found chaos instead, and lived through relapses, loss, and brushes with death that most people don't survive. But Dave came back again and again. His story is one of surrender and resilience, of standing back up with honesty, humility, and a willingness to ask for help. He survived heart failure, a heart transplant, and even setbacks in recovery, and each time chose life. Today, Dave lives in a deep, meaningful sobriety. He serves others in recovery, lives with gratitude for his family and his second heart, and has learned something we once believed was impossible: how to love and accept himself. This is a story about resilience, about community, about choosing life again. So take a breath, lean in and join us.

Relapse Shame And Daily Reprieve

SPEAKER_01 1:55

Dave Loyderstein, welcome to Out of the Blue, the Podcast.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

Thank you so much. It's really an honor to be here, guys.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

It's an honor to have you honor to have you, Dave. An honor. You know, just talking about something about um how uh the the the the girl, the actress, came out and talking about her relapse. Um the girl who played in uh what do you know her name? Sierra Leone, I guess. But she's come out publicly about relapsing, and everyone and everyone thinks about it as being so courageous because you know the the worst thing about addiction is the fact that relapse is inevitable and very hard to avoid. And when you can overcome that and then come back stronger, I think that is that is what it's about. You know, I know I take my pride is contingent on a daily reprieve. Yeah, daily blessing from these from using this the tools. And um, you are I I'm amazed when I know when I found out you were substance abuse and giving your service to people, helping people. That was a that's a hard job, man. I I I kudos to you for doing that because you must encounter some real trying cases, but um, but it's beautiful though. So those Dave, now I said a lot about your life, but I think I want to hear it from you. Tell us your story, you know, I'll shut up now.

Adoption And Early Alcohol Use

SPEAKER_00 3:18

Oh no, I mean you yeah, you nailed all the the key elements of my life. You know, I I definitely started extremely young. You know, I was uh actually leading a group therapy session today, and we were talking about, you know, the the disease concept, and I shared with the group that I personally believe that I was born with this, you know, because I was adopted into a very loving family. Uh they were not drug addicts or alcoholics, they did have a liquor cabinet, and I was around six or seven years old, you know, but I had this empty hole in my soul as uh, you know, you mentioned I was, and I mentioned, you know, that I was adopted, but I had this feeling as a very uh young child that, well, if my own mother didn't love me, nobody in this world is ever going to love me, you know. So I I just felt empty. And even though I had the love of this, you know, very caring, supportive family, you know, I quickly turned to drugs and alcohol. First it was alcohol, you know. So uh initially it was my babysitters that were able to open the cabinet and give me alcohol, and then they had marijuana. But pretty quickly I knew how to break into that thing. And then in third grade, a friend of mine, well, he moved to uh St. to Missouri, the United States from Canada. And we met in third grade in school, and his parents had a liquor cabinet. So we together, as you know, uh two criminals, if you will, uh were breaking into our parents' liquor cabinets drinking together. And then friends, older kids in the neighborhood had marijuana, and and we started experimenting, and then came mushrooms, et cetera, et cetera. But, you know, we were just off and running at a very early age. So circling back, I believe that I was genetically predisposed, you know, to having a problem because I reacted and my body reacted and my brain reacted very differently, you know, right away to drugs and alcohol than other people do.

SPEAKER_01 5:34

I definitely resonate with that, Dave. I know that feeling. I definitely feel like I look at my own family tree, and my father was a definite alcoholic. I believe his father was, and even my grandfather on my Italian side. No one ever talks about my grandfather on my Italian side as being an alcoholic. But let me tell you, he made wine and he died of of uh alcoholism, of cirrhosis of the liver. I think he was. Just a guess. But I think it was, you know, something that ran in my family too. And it's it's a it's a gene, you know, and if you escape it, I think you're really you're blessed. But I mean, I I don't think my son, for example, he he didn't, I don't think he got the bite. Like the phenomenon of craving, I think, is what what it makes me think of.

SPEAKER_02 6:16

Like, whenever I I wouldn't say that, but um, I do want to ask you, Dave, when you say you were you it reacted to it differently, does that mean you kind of instead of getting like I don't know how far we end to monetize this on YouTube, but but instead of getting fucked up, you got like stable or like you you like made you feel normal. Yeah, what did that what does that mean to you?

The Craving That Never Stops

SPEAKER_02 6:44

Like you you sensed it was different.

SPEAKER_00 6:46

Yeah, so for example, some people may drink until they feel the point of, oh, I'm feeling funny. I better stop. To me, that triggers, oh boy, I need way more of this. Keep going, keep going until the point where I black out. I see. Like that's the goal to get obliterated.

SPEAKER_02 7:07

To completely escape, to completely forget your current circumstances.

SPEAKER_00 7:12

Yes, it's an obsession of the mind and an allergy of the body, as described in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous. You know, but we're talking about brain chemistry. You know, my my brain is wired differently. You know, um, I can't just have a half a drink and leave it at the table and walk away. That's alcohol abuse to me.

SPEAKER_01 7:33

Oh boy.

SPEAKER_00 7:34

You know that that drives me crazy when I see people do that.

SPEAKER_01 7:38

Yeah, right. I remember the first time I went drinking with my friends, and I was must have been 16 or something, and we had a couple of beers, each of us was drinking a beer, and my friend took a ship, and then he threw the can into the rocks of the beach, and I said, Was there was there beer in that? He said, Yeah. I said, Yeah, you crazy. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 7:56

But no, I mean, so early on, I I would when we'd break into my liquor uh parents' liquor cabinet, I would take in it multiple bottles and I'd fill up a glass this big and I'd drink two of those, you know, to where I would lay on the couch try and pass out, and I'd start throwing up and choking on it, and my friend would have to save me. And we're talking single-digit age, you know, that's probably not very normal, I would imagine. So I was drinking as an alcoholic at a very early age. Wow. So that examples such as that lead me to believe that I was probably different than my fellows. I was probably drinking alcoholically because I was predisposed. Just my opinion.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

Yeah, I think I mean the the medical community doesn't really have a cure for alcoholism, but it just does seem that we do find a cure or at least a way to arrest it with uh using the program.

SPEAKER_00 8:57

Well, it's it says that it's treatable. Treatable. They call it a progressive chronic fatal disease. However, it is treatable.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

That's a key word there, treatable. And it gives you when you're going through that world, I know for me, uh the word treatable was like a like a little dot of light in the black hole. That you mean there's a help out there for this? Because I just personally I hit my own bottom and I had uh I lost hope. You know, I thought there was no way. I mean, I didn't want to stop, I had no desire to stop. And um, but yet I didn't want to do it. It's like the worst dichotomy I can imagine. It's really like hell pulls you both ways. You want to stop because you know it sucks for you, but you can't stop because you can't imagine not, you know. So how did you finally do it though? What what was your big

Why Relapse Can Turn Fatal

SPEAKER_01 9:55

moment? Uh was there a big moment that you've you had several, I think, times when it you stopped.

SPEAKER_00 9:59

And yes, so my personal story is full of relapse, and I do not subscribe to relapse is part of recovery. I think relapse is part of relapse, you know, and it's not necessary. You know, I know plenty of friends that you know got sober and stayed sober and never relapsed. Obviously, that's the safer approach because plenty of people get sober, relapse, and die or go to prison. You know, consequences can be fatal. You know, fortunately, that wasn't my story. You know, I have many relapses, and I'd like to pause and say that I do enjoy telling my story because one of the key messages that I think it it says is never give up. You know, keep going. You know, always get back up. You know, it's not how many times you fall, but it's how many times you get back up. However, again, there's no guarantee that you will get back up, you know. So you're not always given a second chance. So it's it's not safe to relapse if you don't have to, you know.

SPEAKER_01 11:12

I was just gonna say that just figured who that actress was. And Natasha Leone. Oh, she's the one that went public about her relapse. And she wasn't saying that relapse is a part of recovery, she really wasn't. I think she was she was saying was pretty honorable. She was saying that it's a fact of life that happens, and if it does, you're not don't give up, come back. Yeah, you know. I think I it was pretty courageous of her to come public with it, I thought.

SPEAKER_00 11:38

Oh, definitely. I mean, because there's a lot of shame, you know, that that's involved in that, and part of that's good, you know, initially, as long as you don't stay in shame and keep keep yourself down, because shame is just gonna lead you to another drink or another drug, you know. But if you can stay humble and then launch yourself into doing the next right thing, one foot in front of the other, into sobriety, into recovery, then you can, you know, move forward and help lots of people with your story, you know. But if you use it to stay in a self-pity cycle, then you're just gonna remain drunk and and high.

SPEAKER_02 12:19

Yeah, I had a uh I I don't know if how much I can divulge for their anonymity, but I had I knew someone, I lived with someone as a roommate. Um they had they had a lot of pride in like having the coins, but I experienced like a lot of like strange emotional sort of manipulation from this person, and then discovered like cans and things, and noticed like it seemed like there was a disconnect between being proud of this the long stint of sobriety and the actual behavior. So I wonder if there's like a straight there, there's like an unintentional pressure that people put on themselves to maintain a sobriety and then losing the sobriety. I know I've heard it's like it's one day at a time or something along those lines. I don't know the language, but it's like every day is the first day. So maybe maybe there's like a pressure, and that results in a shame, even though the community doesn't seem like it would ever fault you for relapsing.

SPEAKER_00 13:29

I can speak to that. You know, a saying that we have is we don't shoot our wounded, you know. So someone relapses, you know, the the goal is to not kick them when they're down, but rather help them to get back into sobriety.

Returning After 21 Years Sober

SPEAKER_00 13:46

You know, I had 21 years of continuous sobriety. And then the doctors had me on pain medications that ultimately led to a relapse. And yes, I I was very shameful, you know, I felt a lot of shame. And I could have said to myself, wow, I which I did, you know, wow, I blew 21 years of sobriety. You know, I was leading meetings, I sponsored a lot of men, you know, et cetera, et cetera. And I could have stayed in that pity cycle, you know, and never gotten sober. You know, so it did take, you know, with humility, it took a level of courage to come back in and stand up in front of all those people and say, I'm back as a newcomer, you know. But there's some people that would say, uh, which I did tell myself, it's just it's I didn't lose that time at all. I still had that 21 years of experience, you know, so the number really doesn't matter. You know, I just have to pick a new date of sobriety. But I didn't lose any of that. Like today, I'm I'm coming up on three years in just a few months from now, you know, but it's the best sobriety I've ever had. And if you look at the big picture, you know, if you add up all the time I've been sober, it's I've been sober longer than I was using, you know. So at the end of the day, what really matters? You know, but I if I choose to, I could stay stuck in that pattern of, oh my gosh, I only have three years, you know, but you have to scratch the word only from the equation, you know, that's just ego. That's it, and ego will get you drunk.

SPEAKER_01 15:29

I I think the beautiful thing you said earlier is that you one day will the most when one day you that's the most that's the world record, really. And when you talk about years of sobriety, I I can relate to your story so much, David, because I had twice 21 something years too. And then um, after having uh a bout of uh cancer with um prostate cancer and going through that, for some reason it just made me decide I want to start try the new weed because I didn't I stopped smoking, I stopped everything before the the stuff became legal. And for some reason I thought this won't damage my sobriety, it won't be won't be booze, but it why it did, it did in fact, and I and I don't care about coming forward and saying my sobriety date ended when I stopped doing that too, because it's because you know, who cares? The quality of sobriety is what matters. Why did I go out? I think it's because the quality of sobriety was slipping. I was um, well, first of all, when you get scared by cancer, you know, I could use that as an excuse, but I but I didn't die from it and I survived it. And I think it made me think, I don't know, life is short, and I I felt like I was missing out. I can't think like that because there's plenty of new alcohol drinks I haven't had either. I'm not gonna go back out just to try them, you know. So um that's kind of the mentality I had. That's my I tell you, that's the disease, you know. It's subtle, you know, it'll talk to you like, Oh, yeah, you can do that. Oh, don't worry about that. Yeah, yeah. You know, it's like that little devil on your shoulder. But and I was saying to someone earlier that that little devil reminds me of Popeye. If you give him one little bit of spinach, all of a sudden his muffles, muscles go, and then his voice gets louder, and you don't hear the guy, the one on the other side who's saying, Oh, don't do that. You know you're not supposed to do that. Oh, what am I gonna do? It seems that the good guy is still soft spoken. The other guy has a big loud mouth, and he was a bully.

SPEAKER_02 17:32

Yeah, he's a bully, and um, so you know sound like an ego-fueled inner conversation.

SPEAKER_01 17:39

Out of doubt, it's the ego. You you said it too just now, Dave. It's the ego that did it, and that's what we do with. I think the steps, the 12 steps, it's about becoming right size, becoming humble, and that's why we do them. You know, we stay powerless, we stay reminding ourselves. The first step I always always maintain is the most important step. Because if you don't do that step completely, every single day, I don't care if you did all 12. It's like a it'll all come tumbling down in a second.

SPEAKER_00 18:12

It's the only one you have to do, 100%.

SPEAKER_01 18:14

It is truly that. So tell us more, Dave. I think you can speak to a lot of this stuff with your experiences, that's gonna really be a powerful message for our for out of the blue.

SPEAKER_00 18:25

Yeah, thank you. Well, I did have a comment Vernon the third mentioned, and I wanted to to comment on that. You were talking about uh quantity over quality. You know, there are people that have 30, 35, 40 years, but honestly, I don't want what they have. They've just been dry that amount of time, but they're not really working a program, you know. So someone that has a year or two years, they may be on fire in this program, you know, going to meetings, got a sponsor talking to, sponsoring other guys, working the steps, doing all this stuff. Meanwhile, there's a guy with 35 years who's miserable. You know, he's he's not sponsoring guys, he's not working a program, he just goes to a couple meetings a week, you know. So I think time doesn't necessarily measure up to quality. You know what I'm saying? I think you mentioned that a little bit ago.

SPEAKER_01 19:27

Yeah, I hear that loud and clear.

SPEAKER_00 19:29

So it really is truly one day at a time. And what are you doing in this 24-hour period?

SPEAKER_02 19:36

You know, how much of that time are you spent living as in like living in inverse to the addiction? You know, like defining yourself by, oh, I'm not doing this thing, and sort of staying in this like stasis as opposed to being active in the community and like embracing your newfound sobriety. Does that make sense at all?

SPEAKER_00 19:59

Oh my god, are you living in the solution or are you living in the problem? Yeah, right, right, yeah. And one of the seems like that would be damaging.

SPEAKER_01 20:07

And would you say, Dave, I think you're a perfect example that being of service is part of that, if not all of that.

SPEAKER_00 20:16

Well, thank you.

Career Shift Into Recovery Service

SPEAKER_00 20:17

Yeah, so I flash forward a little bit and I can I can jump around timelines, but so I I was a you know, pretty successful makeup artist, you know. That was my dream. So I'll just backtrack even more. I'm a musician, and my dream had always been since a child, you know, I used to practice, you know, being interviewed, because that's what I was, you know, I was gonna be a rock star, so I was practicing being interviewed, you know. What's your favorite, you know, album?

SPEAKER_01 20:48

You're doing great, Dave. This is perfect.

SPEAKER_00 20:51

Thank you. And so uh when I had my major heart attack, uh, the first one at 27, and got sober, I realized, okay, maybe it's time to start thinking about a real job. Because I'd never had a real job. You know, it'd always just been musician too loaded, getting kicked out of bands, and so on and so on. So I went to this vocational rehabilitation and they did all these tests. And again, not to brag, but they said, well, you'd be great at anything you did, which, you know, great news, but it didn't narrow anything down for me.

SPEAKER_01 21:32

That's that's I agree with that. I just talking to you, I feel the same way. You have you have an aptitude that I think is pretty cool.

SPEAKER_00 21:39

Well, thank you. Well, I do have a huge passion for horror films. Weird, but that's my thing.

SPEAKER_01 21:47

That's okay. So my son might agree with you. He likes some too, you know.

SPEAKER_02 21:52

Oh, that's really good. Yeah, maybe you know, it's it's like a a fun thrill ride, especially when they're good, too. It's tough to find a one. It's tough to find one with like really good writing. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_00 22:05

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 22:06

I would love to pick your brain about that. Yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

I I challenge a movie to try and actually scare me. It's really, really hard to do. But it's it's the thrill. I love it. So I found I I looked up my favorite uh makeup artist, Tom Savini. He did uh like George Romero zombie movies. He did the makeup for all those. And I started to write him an email, but I kept reading his his uh website, and later down the page he wrote, and here's a makeup school that I recommend. And there really wasn't many back then. I think his uh school that he recommended was one of the only ones, and it was called Joe Blasco, and it was in Florida. So I wound up going to that makeup school, and they taught special effects, but they made you learn beauty makeup too. So I wound up actually getting a job in makeup, in beauty makeup and special effects, and I found I made more money in the beauty and that I was good at it. So I worked in Florida doing both, and I got a job at this place called Sephora, which was brand new.

SPEAKER_01 23:16

Sure, middle Sephora, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:18

Yeah. And then they opened one in Vegas, so I moved to Vegas and worked for Sephora and did some side jobs. Then 9-11 happened, and I'm like, oh boy, do I go back to St. Louis with my tail between my legs, or do I make the courageous leap and try Hollywood, California? So I wound up taking my chances, you know, do the do the scary thing, do it scared. And I went out to Hollywood, do it scared. And I I got a job at Hollywood and Highland Sephora. I started doing horror movies on the side and doing these great makeup jobs on the side for beauty. And I went up doing this lady's makeup in the store, and turns out she was the head of the home video department for Universal Studios. Next thing you know, I'm assigned, I'm their makeup artist. So I'm doing all the celebrities on the planet just about. And then I start teaching at all the big makeup schools in town, and I've got this wonderful career. I'm written up in a magazine, I've got, I've got everything that I want. You know, I've built myself a life, you know, and sobriety. Everything's going fantastic. I got a girl, I got everything. Then this voice is telling me, you need to give back. You're just taking. What are you gonna do to give back? So I found a school at UCLA, they had a program, it was a substance abuse counseling program. They had it, you could you could do it in one year if you were, you know, really ambitious. Otherwise, it was a two-year program. I took that program, I did it in one year. A classmate saw that I stuck stuck out, and she got me a job at this place called Passages in Malibu. And quickly the owner said, Wow, we're answering the phones, the two of us. We think you would be great on the phones. They trained me and I became I created the position. I became the director of admissions. And then next thing you know, other Malibu rehabs were like, We want you to be our director of admissions. And that's how I started my career doing admissions, and I've been doing it for 22 years now.

SPEAKER_01 25:39

Wow, that's beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 25:40

Whoa, yeah, what a timeline.

SPEAKER_01 25:44

A timeline of this, too.

SPEAKER_02 25:46

Yeah, and sort of like allowing yourself to pinball around kind of being led these different places, but all all the while having inspiration behind them all. That is inspiring to me. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 26:02

And it is, it's a very, you know, I it's my niche. It's a very tricky job. I don't think, you know, I don't mean to sound like I'm bragging. It's, you know, just like any career, you gotta, you gotta like be the right person for that job. You know, I don't think just anyone can, it's not just, oh, you answer the phone and that's it. You know, you gotta wear a lot of different hats, you know. Um and I just happen to be the right fit for that job, you know, and I haven't burnt out after 22 years, you know, but it's very intense job.

SPEAKER_01 26:38

It's amazing. Because just for a second, for our audience to understand what I'm thinking, is that the people that must call you are from they're across the board, you know, they're frantic, they're hysterical, they're calm, uh, you know, all kinds of things. And then they and if you if you don't say exactly what they want to hear, they're gonna freak out on you. So how you gotta have all the you're gonna have the stamina and the the self-uh awareness to stay cool and give only measured and thoughtful responses. That David is definitely a calling, someone that can do that, and you found a way to do that. God bless you.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Everybody's in crisis when they call in.

SPEAKER_01 27:24

Absolutely, they would have to be, right?

SPEAKER_00 27:26

I mean, either them or a loved one that's calling, but they're in crisis, they're usually crying, you know, and I work 16-hour shifts in a row.

SPEAKER_01 27:36

Whoa.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

So whoa, my goal is to eventually retire and go into private practice as a therapist. So I'm going back to school at my age, and I started a part-time job. A friend of mine uh owns an outpatient program doing like CTOP, DUI, you know, type situation. And so I I run group.

SPEAKER_01 28:03

What's that? CATAP? What's that again?

SPEAKER_00 28:04

CATOP. It's uh if you get a DUI, you have to take uh group therapy and individual therapy for like seven weeks. You know, it's different depending on your assessment. So I'm helping him out and he's helping me out by giving me the job, but I run group therapy and and do individual therapy sessions, so that's helping me to get my hours, you know. So I in the school to get my degree, et cetera.

SPEAKER_01 28:30

Exactly. You need those hours, right? To get the the degree or become a registered therapist of some kind.

SPEAKER_00 28:36

Exactly. Yeah, I want to get my master's in, you know, social work and then get my LCSW eventually, and and then when I retire, I'm gonna do full-time private practice. That's wonderful. But yeah, what's what's so crazy to me is that you know, a former long-haired, tattooed, junky, crack smoking, drug addict, alcoholic, homeless, is now living this life.

SPEAKER_01 29:04

Oh my god. You know, God, who do you remind me of, Dave Vernon? Who does she remind you of? Nicole, Dr. Nicole Labor, who wrote the book The Addictional The Addictaholic. And she's all tatted up. But while she was going to medical school, she was a heroin addict. And um Wow. Wow, what an amazing person.

SPEAKER_02 29:23

Yeah, talk about high functioning very, very seriously.

SPEAKER_01 29:28

So um, go ahead, give me some more of this great Lloyd Stein wisdom.

SPEAKER_00 29:32

Yeah,

Creativity Structure And Stable Living

SPEAKER_00 29:33

I'm living my best life. I've got an 11-year-old son that I've been raising on my own since he was born. Wow. You know, I mean, I I'm still a musician, I'm in a band, you know. What do you play? I I play drums and I sing at the same time, too.

SPEAKER_01 29:51

Vernon, what do you do, Vernon?

SPEAKER_02 29:53

Come on, now I got a stick right here. What are we doing? Oh, yeah. I mean like four bands as a drummer, but cool.

SPEAKER_00 30:00

Oh my god, that's awesome.

SPEAKER_02 30:02

It's the best. Very cathartic, which I'm sure you you appreciate. It's athletic, you see, you get a sweat out, you you your mind, you can't think about other things. It's like every limb is going. You're a you're like a well-oiled machine. It is very therapeutic. I'm sure you feel that way.

SPEAKER_00 30:21

Oh, yeah. Yeah. When I talk to my you know, group and we talk about filling in the empty hole in the soul or meditation, you know, I bring up drumming, you know, and adding the singing component, the vocals on top of that. I'm splitting my brain to, you know, two hands, two feet doing different things. Then I gotta sing in addition to that, you know, which is different. So it's it's yeah, you can't think of anything else. Unbelievable.

SPEAKER_01 30:51

I can say this as a bass player, it was tough enough for me to learn how to put my body on sort of autopilot so it could play a bass line that's totally against the melody I'm singing. You know what I mean? You have to that's similar, but you're doing it with your I only have two hands. You have to use your hands and your feet, and at the same time be molding a vocal. I mean, that is seriously some serious multitasking.

SPEAKER_00 31:17

I don't know how I do it really. It is a mental flow state, yeah. Yeah, you get into this, you know, like mindful or almost mindless, probably, but sure I'm in a rhythm, I'm in a groove.

SPEAKER_02 31:29

Well, it's like you usually we usually have an undercurrent of like thoughts that we don't even realize are happening, even as we're just like walking around in life. But when you're doing that, your undercurrent needs to be the drumming, or or like one of the two needs to be the sort of like you're doing it like mindlessly, so then you have another thing on top of it, you are fully loaded with positive like charge. It is yeah, it is like good on you, man. That is that is a that's amazing, that is a wholesome practice.

SPEAKER_00 32:08

I love it, I do love it.

SPEAKER_01 32:10

It's what saved my life, really, because when I got sober, it was like 35 years ago, I was constantly playing music, and that kept my you know, the the ego, the monkey mind, the the the little spirit of myself trying to talk to me. Like you said, it I didn't have time for it because I had to get it, it had to I had to employ it to do what I had to do, and it what I did with my music was so uplifting to my soul, um that I could not imagine doing anything else. And I remember the one thing and I would say, David, because you don't look your age at all, and I don't I'm I'm probably the same because I don't look my age either, but um I'm giving myself a compliment. I'm giving myself a compliment. But but I'm telling you, I remember playing nightclubs, and a guy would come up to me, and an old guy came up and go, Hey, I remember you. We we we graduated together, and I go, What?

unknown 33:04

Holy shit!

SPEAKER_01 33:06

Yeah, no way, really. Then it was it was amazing because it did it does keep you young. That stuff keeps you young. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 33:15

Well, I think the secret to sobriety too is you know, well, let me back up and say when I first got sober, my life drinking and using was full of chaos, and I became addicted to the chaos.

SPEAKER_01 33:30

Oh yeah, oh yeah, crazy shit.

SPEAKER_00 33:33

So when I got sober, it was like boring, and I felt this big empty space that had to be filled, you know. So I fill it with I'm an artist as well. I like to paint and sculpt and you know, really anything creative. I'm I'm like uh, you know, you fit right in our family, I'll tell you that much.

SPEAKER_01 33:54

Oh, cool. Yeah, arts and crafts, anything like that.

SPEAKER_02 33:57

I will say there there's as someone who's not been like I haven't experienced the most chaos in terms of like even music, addiction, these things, but it's still hard to find like a it's hard to embrace stability just in general. How do you how do you like go about that doing that? Is it uh is it always looking and being open to a new path of of like a career and inspiration?

SPEAKER_00 34:30

Well, willingness is definitely the key, you know. If you keep an open mind and say willingness, you know, because my life was had no format, you know, it was just off the cuff, everything was off the cuff, you know, and now I have to have uh uh what's the word I'm looking for? Routine structure. Structure, thank you. You know, I go to my set meetings, you know, for Monday, for Tuesday, for Wednesday, you know, I've got a format, you know, uh a design for living. You know, I know what I'm doing each day of the week, you know, I know everything's laid out, and now I find great comfort in knowing that. And there's still time that's like free time, you know, where I get to do what I want, you know, but now I find, like I said, great comfort in the structure. Where before everything like was willy-nilly and it drove my brain crazy, but I didn't know any better, you know, until I got sober and found that the structure was the best thing for me. You know, it's just like when you raise a child, you know, they actually thrive when you give them boundaries and consequences and structure. You know, they don't like it at first, but that's what helps strengthen them. You know, they need that.

SPEAKER_01 35:55

You must be you must be a good dad, Dave.

SPEAKER_00 35:57

Oh, I don't know. I try my best. I do know that.

SPEAKER_02 36:01

You know, we were just talking, it's so funny. We were talking to someone else about how having a kid not in your 20s, but sort of later in life, feels like wise, and or or at least you're able to have a different type of wisdom and maturity in order to really be open to how a child needs to be raised. It is something that, as like a 33-year-old, it's there's a pressure already that I'm late. But then I hear about these inspiring folks like yourself that have embraced you know parenthood at a time when it made sense as opposed to a time where they felt like it was necessary. I think that that is also pretty noble, and um, yeah, and I I agree with my dad, who is also a great dad. I'm sure you're a great dad. Just that fact alone, giving a kid some routine and structure and boundaries and consequences is you know, it's part of the I think. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 37:02

No, I think you're right. Your dad is a great dad. Oh I had a I had a daughter when I was 19.

SPEAKER_01 37:10

That's so that's young.

SPEAKER_00 37:11

You know, I felt like I wanted to do things very differently than I did when I was 19. And there is there was sober and not sober, too. So huge difference. Sure.

Recovery Lessons For A Wider World

SPEAKER_01 37:24

Yeah. But um, wow, I'm telling you, David, this has been a great podcast. I mean, what first of all, one of the things we're going to be doing a lot this season in Out of the Blue is delving into recovery because it's a huge component of uh what out of the blue is about. I mean, actually, out of the blue is almost a program for uh recovery for normies, you know, people that don't think they have an addiction or don't even have to have an addiction, but they have something that happened to them that changed them, that that altered them, something that came out of the blue. And we find that I've been finding more and more that the what I've learned from the 12 steps and what I've learned from all that is uh is important to thriving for everybody, not just people that have had addiction problems or alcohol problems. So, I mean, there's so much um work to do, really, for all of us to get this this stuff out there. Because you know, the world's not doing that great right now. Um, we want to get too political about it, but um we know that there needs to be a lot of work done because there's certainly a lot of people living dry drunks out there. That's what it seems like to me. If I don't drink.

SPEAKER_02 38:34

I don't think it's very pol I don't think it's a very polarizing political stance to say that we don't want our country to be under siege and be unsafe. I think that that's perfectly okay to admit to our audience that we are not okay with wrongful militarization of our country. I just want to I'm gonna be the first out of the bluer to put that out there.

SPEAKER_01 39:01

Yeah, you are. And I think ice and that will not that will not be cut. Ship the fuck ice. We're gonna have to cut that, but the rest of it's pretty. No, no, we don't mean we will not.

SPEAKER_02 39:11

I just want, but I just want to say that because we talk about not getting political. And Dave, you know, I've you know, I of course I want you to feel comfortable to speak freely, but that is just that that is where we are. We are we we are pro-humanity, we are pro-um non-violence until nonviolence becomes a privilege, essentially. So I just want to say that.

SPEAKER_01 39:37

Right on, right on, Vern.

Final Thanks And Ways To Connect

SPEAKER_01 39:40

Heavy note to every note to end on, but yeah, we're getting near we're at the ending point of our hour talking, and um, and what a what a um example, a power of example you are for everyone out there. So, you guys tuning into this auto blue episode, you've still I know you've enjoyed it. And come back again because we're gonna have we're gonna have Dave back for sure.

SPEAKER_00 40:01

Thank you guys so much.

SPEAKER_01 40:02

Thank you so much, David, for sharing your wisdom of a life of a serenity, of a sobriety so well earned. I want to thank you, Dave, for being here with us because it was wonderful, really was even more wonderful than I had. I thought it was gonna be wonderful, I have to admit, but it was even more wonderful than I expected. And yes, you are now officially part of the out of the blue family. So see you later. And thanks for joining us, everybody. And don't forget to hit that like and that smash that subscribe button, and all you gotta do, spread the word. We're trying to save the world one podcast at a time. Thanks a lot, everybody, for joining us. Thank you, Vernon, my co-host, and thank you again, Dave Leuderstein from Out of the Blue. This is Vernon West. Thanks for joining us. Out of the Blue, the podcast, hosted by me, Vernon West. Co-hosted by Vernon West III, edited by Joe Gallow. Music and logo by Vernon West III. Have an out of the blue story of your own you'd like to share? Reach us at info at out of the bluepodcast.org. Subscribe to Out of the Blue on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. And on our website, out of the blue hyphen the podcast.org.