What is your Mental like?

Hey,

So we've talked about a couple different points when it comes to recovery. I let you know that you need to be empowered. You do this by following through on the decisions that you make with actions that support those decisions. When you don't, you start to lose trust in yourself, losing trust in yourself, causes you not to make the decisions. Then you don't take the actions, get stuck in a “rut”. You're gonna need to start taking those actions, making decisions, what are these areas in your own life. What areas are you gonna want to get the most support? I got a tip for you that I believe is crucial, and I want you to have it.

I spent more than 10 years trying to figure out how to get clean without going to rehab, without going to jail without doing all the traditional things. AA, religious groups, treatment centers. They, didn't work for me. So I felt like I was out there by myself, trying to sort out this mess that I had created. It's not any one else's job to figure it out. I'm the one that chose to do drugs and drink, I'm the one that needs to figure out a solution. Again, what I've told you guys is that the drugs may be new. Fentanyl may be new meth may be new. So what, and when I say new, less than a hundred years old, less than 50 years old, let's go with that. Addiction itself, isn't new people have been addicted since the human brain has been working. We get addicted to pleasures. We get addicted to comfort. We get addicted to people. We get addicted to substances, not just drugs and alcohol. I'm also talking food or some fucking PSOs out there that they want to tell me that I got the problem because I would smoke heroin. But all them four big Macs sitting in their car, with their belly, pushing the steering wheel. That wasn't a problem to society? I noticed these things when I was using. I started figuring out that it's not so much, the Drugs not so much the alcohol. It's not so much the vice itself, but it's the mental state that we have ourselves in. And so that's what I'm big on. How do we make decisions mentally and then follow through on them physically so that we can change the world that we live in?

I'm not talking, go save the world. I'm asking you to change the world that you live in. That's it make it somewhere that you want to be by getting to your definition of sober. Have you done that yet? Have you figured out what your definition of sober is?

Yeah. I'm asking you these questions because I had to figure these things out. These were pivotal moments. When I could define what sober was for me, then I could work towards that. When I understood that the decisions in my head need to be followed through with actions out here in my hands, in this world, with what I was actually doing, things started to change. I began to trust myself again, the stages that we go through are very common, but they're not the same.

So what I want to talk to you about today is your three needs as a human. That's your mental, your physical and your spiritual needs. You need to acknowledge that you have all three parts.

Again, I'm not here to preach. That's not my job. I need to teach skills so that you can make the decisions first, before I preach, what I know is true, you need to start trusting yourself before you'll trust anybody else. So the three parts that you need to know that you need to work on is your mental, your physical and your spiritual.

We'll start with the mental. This is logical thinking. This is step one before step two, step two before step three. And then assessing if there's any steps between one and two, assessing if there's any steps between two and three and making sure you do all of 'em, your mental state is how you are thinking logically your awareness to what's going on around you your cognitive skills, Also includes your self talk. What you're saying to yourself is super important. Most people don't even acknowledge that. They say some very foul things to themselves, but your self talk, that little voice that pops up that you think you don't have any control over. That's your self talk. That little voice though is part of the spiritual portion. The world calls it your conscience. So that's what I'm gonna title it. It's your conscience. My personal belief is that, that's God, that's the creator talking to you. You can choose to listen, or you can choose not to society calls it, conscience living. For instance, my little voice has been telling me recently, stop smoking. That's what my conscience has been telling me. That's what God has been directing me to do. I tell Him “I've been smoking since I was 14 years old. What do you mean I gotta stop now? Just stop smoking?” So that's what I'm working on right now is removing smoking from my life. How do I do that? I think logically, is smoking good for me. At this stage in my life? No, it damages my health. It doesn't increase my longevity of life. It gives me a small sensation before immediate regret. That's my mental.

When I smoke the spiritual side of it I Must address is Every time that I smoke, every time that I buy a pack of smokes, I feel guilt. I feel like a heaviness in my chest. That's where it hits me right in the center. “Ah, you shouldn't have done that, bro.” is what my self talk sounds like. I used to get that same thing when I was quitting heroin. When I stopped drinking and I still go by the sack and I still go by the bottle. “Ah, you shouldn't have done that.” So I know it's part of my transitional phase is this guilt feeling that I have inside. I appreciate it because it means that God's still talking to me.//// II use God for all those who don't believe in a God the high power communication is the spiritual aspect you must learn to acknowledge. So mentally I assess whether what I'm doing is logically making sense. Pro tip, don't lie to yourself. We can justify using don't get me wrong. I can come up with an excuse and I could probably validate why I use, but we can't do that. The reality is smoking. Isn't the worst thing. If you look at my history and you find out that I'm just smoking, ah, people, people don't bother me about it, but in my heart, in my soul, my spirit in my mind, it's not right. And I can't be doing it.

The physical portion of it, well I have a beard and it keeps the scents of what I have been around, my clothes smell. I don't smoke in my truck or house because I cant really stand the smell. So physically it is unattractive physically, It doesn't help me physically. It is detracting. It it's a liability for me. It's not helping me anymore.

Don't get me wrong. There was a point where smoking helped me because it was the only time I can get to stop and think. And that's what I know, I like about it its a comfort zone. The most I receive from it is the comfort that I have from a feeling I have known since I was a young man. I don't even like the smoke no more, but that comfort that I get, that's what I've been chasing. That's what I've been chasing my whole life, regardless of the substance. It's always been a comfort seeker. What I found out over the past three years is that when I live in comfort, things get worse. When I stay in a uncomfortable state, meaning personally develop me, myself, meaning working on something that I know I need to change. Things get better. So in your recovery, one of the next pillars I need you to know is that you have to address your physical, your mental and your spiritual needs. You have all three, how you choose to address 'em is up to you, but you have all three and you need to acknowledge them. Here's the other portion of this, where it gets really sticky for me.

You must include your community. Yeah. The ones who already know that you're using the ones who already know that you're over drinking, the ones who are most immediately impacted by it. You need to include them. I was, I guess, lucky in the fact that my immediate family told me I had to leave. My mom kicked me out of the house. My father kicked me outta the house of his house. They, they both kicked me out. I didn't have a community. I had myself, I had the floor and I had the bottom. When I started to get better When I started to actually show results. That's when my community started to come back around. I wanna be honest, I resented them for it. I still have some resentment towards them for it, because the reality is you left me in my worst state, told me to figure it out by myself and I did. Now you want to come say, “Hey, good job!!” then pat me on the back because I figured it out? I struggle with that still. I do. But what I'm gonna tell you is that if you have people around you still, who haven't given up on you, Who haven't told you to go figure it out on your own, leverage that love to lift you up, leverage that because there are some individuals out there and you see 'em, you can see it in their eyes that they've, just lost Hope. You smile at 'em There's no response. I relate to those people because I know what it's like to feel empty inside because you don't have a community. The people at my job, well, they just put up with me. As long as I did half-assed work. They didn't really care. Your job don't care about you. They just want their work done. Quite honestly, friends. If you have some good friends, while those are gonna be the ones that tell you, “Hey, go get your stuff, right? Here's some help. Here's some solutions. Here's some resources. “ then a good friend says “But until you start addressing this stuff, we're not talking about anything else.” That's a good friend. Most of the people that I used to run with aren't around. Your family, your community, your tribe, the people who still want to see you do well. They need to be involved.

How they're involved is up to you. When my family started to want to be participating in my life again, I had to set boundaries because, there's emotions that I have towards them about that. That aren't good, but they're not bad either. They made the decision that was best for them. And I can't knock 'em for that. I'm making the best decisions for me now. And I get to set the boundaries.

You set the boundaries on how much help you're gonna get from each one of them. But I'm telling you leverage one thing from each of them. If you have one that's just good at listening and tell 'em, “Hey, I'm gonna be going down this journey. I just need your ear so I can vent.”. If there's one who knows how to problem solve really well, and you could run your ideas through them, just for feedback, tell them, “Hey, you know what? I love the way that you create solutions, I'm gonna be, if it's okay with you, I'm gonna bring you some of my solutions. Can you poke holes in them for me, please?” This types of help, having someone to listen, having someone to poke holes in the solution that you're coming up with will save you Time, effort and energy! The reality is you're not the first motherfucker to have to do this shit. Are you gonna be one that survives? Are you gonna join the minority of us?

Are you're gonna be like the rest of them ending up in an institution or the grave. I'm passionate about getting people to their definition of sober. So if you would like help there's resources at nohalonm.com. I have a self-help guide that can help you set up a smart goal. I have a book. If you're just thinking about wondering what sobriety's like and how to start it, I have some free stuff up there as well, because you deserve to live the best version of your life. There's no reason to be tissue paper angel soft around here, man. No one's asking you to be an angel, but you are required to do better each and every day!