Jolene Park is a functional nutritionist specializing in Gray Area Drinking.

Almost 5 years alcohol-free, Jolene has studied the functional impact of food, emotions, environments, and movement in relationship to our physical bodies coining the term Gray Area Drinking in her TEDx Talk that you can watch here.

She founded Healthy Discoveries®  in 2001 and created Craving Brain coaching for individuals, the Nourish Online Membership Community for Former Gray Area Drinkers and a training program for coaches and healthcare practitioners who would like to specialize in their Recovery Coaching.

Sober Choice Program https://healthydiscoveries.mykajabi.com/Stop-drinking

Gray Area Drinkers https://grayareadrinkers.com/

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/healthy_discoveries/

HOME Podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-62-the-craving-brain/id1021126077?i=1000376879147

Check out this episode!

With me today is Jolene Park. You can find her on YouTube and view her TEDx talk about the gray area drinkers. Jolene, how are you? I’m great. I’m great. I’m honored to be here with you. Thanks for asking me on. Yeah, definitely. And I believe I checked yesterday, you’re up to 107,000 views on that Ted Talk. It’s crazy. It’s crazy, but it’s exciting.
I think some people could probably guess what a gray area drinker is, but why don’t you give us sort of a background of what a gray area drinker is and how it applied to your life? Yeah, you know, I mean, I certainly fell into this I never would have imagined 10-20 years ago that here I would be
doing this work and talking about this. , I was not a drinker early on in my life, ironically. And now. This has been
Become my work and you know, drinking came into my life in my late 20s. So, I had a little bit of a different story than some but I certainly heard the story of with many as well, but in growing up in high school and college, I just wasn’t a tip. You know, typically a lot of a lot of us have kind of that party background college and that kind of thing. And I didn’t I you know, alcohol, it just kind of wasn’t a thing for me one way or the other.
And you still went through the early part of my life, not drinking, but then in my late 20s, I went through a breakup, which I was just devastated about, and, and remember very clearly, you know, sitting down I’d had wine at home like I’d gotten it at a work conference one time and I was just kind of using it as a decorative thing, you know, on my calendar in my kitchen for months. And I just, I was like, screw it. I’m just going to sit down and open the follow. I was really calm.
Like, I’m in pain, I’m in grief, I’m going to open the bottle of wine. And I did. And there was something very different kind of in that moment like it, you know, I had a glass and I was like, Ooh, this just kind of, like stopped that ruminating mind, you know that the pain that has been in my mind and it just calmed it down. Like why have I not done this before? I had certainly drank before over the years, but it just didn’t kind of click one way or the other, I could take it or leave it. But in that moment, when I was in that heightened kind of grief and pain, something different clicked for me, and, and that’s where it began. And my late 20s I actually started then my own entrepreneurial business, my consulting company, when I was 31. And so it all correlated really, really quickly. And I just, you know, and I drank through my 30s and I was in the the entrepreneurial world I was in the business world. My friend group you know, it was that the kind of the single
Goal 30s we had disposable income we were out frequently like let’s try this new restaurant kind of the foodie scene, which was always very much mixed with alcohol.
And that was how I started drinking. And but it was very connected from the very beginning of I just want to shut my mind off with whatever it was with a relationship I was stressed about with running my business that I was stressed about worried about money. And it was like, I’m you know, I got this sophisticated bottle of wine it going to have a glass, I’m just going to have a glass and as soon as I would have that first glass and be like, oh, screw it, whether I poured it or I ordered it, I’ll have another and I’ll have another and how then easy it was to just finish that bottle. And as the years went on on a more you know, it first was just kind of the weekend like, okay, it’s the weekend I’m going to drink a bottle of wine. And then you know, as it went on, it was very easy most days to be doing that.
And so you know what it was, for me kind of back to this whole gray area. When I stopped drinking, I didn’t go to treatment, I was able to, I had the capacity and ability to say, I’m not going to drink and I didn’t drink and I stopped. But I also wasn’t, you know, having a glass of champagne on New Year’s Eve, and then not thinking about it or not drinking again for weeks or months. So there’s kind of those two extremes of,
you know, not really drinking, it’s just not kind of a thing in your life like it was for me in the early years. It truly wasn’t. And then more of that other extreme where we stereotypically kind of put it like Well, I’m not that bad in that bar moves all the time, no pun intended, of what that is, and I wasn’t kind of an either one of those categories. But what I was was in the middle of those categories, which then I started talking about is it’s the gray area. And it was also you know, so many women around me it was when I was going to book clubs, the girls night out that kind of the
suburbia neighborhood, let the mommy juice culture of let’s have some wine.
We’re not, you know, where people are like, well, you’re not an alcoholic. This is how everybody drinks. But the way we were drinking was very, very problematic. The way I was drinking was very problematic and that’s the gray area.
in your life, no one was really like hounding you, Jolene, you need to cut back Jolene, every time you drink. Everything gets ruined, everybody’s life is worse because of your drinking. You were just kind of in this area where, you know, inside at least what you’re doing is not the way that it’s supposed to be but you weren’t necessarily getting the outside.
I guess consequences and the outside reinforcement like for me, my parents, they would say hey, we know you’ve been drinking which didn’t even make sense because I wasn’t drinking in front of them.
But they would say, you know, maybe you should maybe you should lay off at a bit and my friends and my roommates is okay, Andrew, you’re gonna be drinking tonight, but why don’t you just cut yourself off at like nine. And that never, it never panned out, but I was hearing from other people, you need to tone it down, you need to tone it down. But that wasn’t your experience, your experience was keep doing what you’re doing. Exactly, exactly. Yeah. And I was never kind of known as like the party girl who, you know, the group that I hung out with, I actually, you know, people drank much bigger amounts, then than I did. So I fit in very well. You know, I didn’t stand out as like, oh, Jillian, you know, she gets a little out of control. You know, it wasn’t like my behavior change. I wasn’t an angry drunk or, or that kind of thing. You know, the one kind of, kind of external thing that I
I knew deep in my gut that I was on borrowed time, is I would drive a lot. So I, you know, I live in Denver, Colorado, and it was pre Uber, because I’m coming up on five years of not drinking. So Uber and Lyft kind of got their popularity around the time when I stopped drinking. Yes. And you know, and it wasn’t like I was blackout driving, you know, it was that thing of everyone. Everybody know, yes, this, like, I’m okay. But if I ever got stopped, or if something ever happened, how my life would have just completely shifted in the snap of the fingers. And that that worried me and I always knew in the back of my mind, you know how I was. So that was kind of the negative thing that didn’t happen, but there was no reason it couldn’t have happened. But no, you know, beyond that, there was nothing that kind of stood out but the way I was drinking was problematic, you know, finishing a bottle of wine
very frequently, very easily.
At the end pretty much most nights, there’s nothing about that’s normal. There’s something about that’s healthy or within range of, you know, good although there’s many people who are like, well that’s not a problem like I’m just getting started with a bottle. I just I just like to have a bottle of wine with dinner you know, for the for the antioxidant sir, right? My excuse I was working my way up the Corollas ladder. And I was in charge of training the new employees on the wines that we had. So when I would go to the liquor store and drink wine, I would buy the wines that Corollas had, and I would just be taking it to the face, drinking it in the name of research and being good at my job. That was my excuse was, well this is for work. That’s why I need to drink this bottle. I get it and I’m, you know, I’m a functional nutritionist. I certified in nutrition in 1999. And you know, a lot of my ongoing training, you know,
Lot of continuing education training these weekend conferences these functional medicine conferences and early on you know it’s just like 2002 2004 there was a lot of talk you know we’re going through all the time up fish oil and omega three fats and you know improving your gut health and that kind of thing and we’ve talked about like you said reserve a tall and the antioxidant effects and certainly you know, red wine it would come up of you know, a glass of red wine can have those nutritional the reserve call but you know, as can grapes, white grape, grape juice and all that, but and then we go out and have these kind of decadent dinners of like, okay, we just talked about all the benefits of amino acids and let’s have a good steak and some vegetables and a glass of red wine. So it was even, you know, in that industry held up and revered, but you know, a glass However, at that dinner table, we’re also ordering bottles and bottles and bottles of red wine which from
Me also kind of made it acceptable.
That’s, you know, part of my training. But there’s that slippery line then of you know, a glass to a bottle or more. Mm hmm. So when you get sober at the end of 2014 was there any sort of moment where it was like this is the end? Or were you just kind of
time to get sober I suppose What’s going on? early December 2014. , I was I was sick and tired of living the same Groundhog Day over and over and over. So for years, you know, really kind of through my, that decade of drinking, you know, I was through my 30s
I stopped a lot, you know, I would get in these cycles where I would drink and it would kind of it would escalate, the more I drank, the more it escalated, and then I kind of hit this period of like, all right, this is I just gotta like, stop and kind of clean this up.
And I go back to the, you know, the nutrition side, which I could hide behind a little bit like, I’m going to do a paleo challenge, which meant I’m not drinking for 30 days
what was really happening, but and so I would do that many times I did a yoga training and and I didn’t drink for 18 months, and it was a yoga practice that, you know, they were pretty vocal about bringing the alcohol brings down your vibration and part of you know, doing this yoga just with your alcohol is really not part of it and I was like, okay, you know, again, I had that capacity to stop. But then I would be like, what am I doing? Like, I can be a social drinker, like it’s not I want to be able to have a glass of wine. And so I would go back and I did that many many times over the years back and forth and back and forth. And it’s exhausting and the misery of going back into you know, having this period of not drinking and it’s things are just better across the board and then I would start drinking and kind of fall back in that pit again.
Everything was starts with you know, just
How I felt physically and emotionally I just was not kind of that effective person that I wanted to be I function I, you know, again, it was it was all everything was going okay. But yet internally it was much more sub optimal and so I just got so sick of that back and forth and there was this period in December 2014 another relationship because it’s very tied for me with relationships that that initial pain in my late 20s
and I would actually find I would drink more when I get into relationships almost as kind of like, I was buffering my like, when’s the shoe gonna drop and kind of that numbing protection? I would, and I would date guys who were big drinkers also and, and so I didn’t stand out as being a big drinker. So and 2014 I had just gotten out of another relationship that we were both drinking heavily. And there was it was just like, I what I want and I and I would hang out girlfriends like there’s just no one
Men like, you know, I want this relationship. And you know this, they’re drinking and then it was like, I, I’m pointing one finger out, there’s three fingers pointing back at me. And if I if this is what I really wanted, and it’s like, here’s this pattern that has been running for so many years, I just can’t keep doing this with relationships with the way I was drinking and, and I didn’t plan to quit. It wasn’t like this is going to be my last, you know, drinking day. But it was after kind of a week of just drinking every day, got to that Sunday after drinking on Saturday and was just just felt so sick. And I was just like, I’m just done and there was just something like deep in my bones that just knew and I went through scenarios. I remember very clearly I opened my TEDx talk talking about this, that I was driving down the highway, hung over this time, not drunk, but it was you know, Monday, Tuesday after that.
Saturday, my last drinking drinking day and I was just mentally going through these scenarios of like, is this really is like I was kind of in this competition back and forth and I was like but what if in the future I mean you know this this guy wasn’t dating anybody but some guy in the future and we go to Italy on this romantic call it Am I really not going to drink and I was asking myself this question I was like, No, no this you’re done done this I’m done. And then it was like What if something really awful happens like you know the the phone call comes at two in the morning? It’s just devastating. And and the whatever that is like, you know, a death of somebody really close to me Am I really then going to go through those days like it’s going to be so hard and painful and not just kind of numb no alcohol? And I’m like, No, I’m and so I had because I’d stopped and started so many times. I knew you know, I’ve been through hard things. I’ve been through holidays. I’ve been through it and I really just had to come to Jesus, you know, talk with myself this is this really at and I was like this is really it and I was very resonated.
I didn’t know what would happen in the future good or bad. But I knew that alcohol was not going to be an option. And this December will be my five year anniversary. I have not had a drink since that day. That’s incredible. And I know for myself, my wife and I, I’d say I have a couple of, of the
some of the top times that someone should drink that I didn’t and just for people that are kind of like on the fence like Kanye, Kanye. We got engaged on St. Patrick’s Day in Dublin. Wow, didn’t drink. We went on our honeymoon in Italy. Two weeks didn’t drink. I was at the table with a seven figure negotiation. Everybody else was drinking. I didn’t drink. So there’s that you can come up with any excuse, but I can tell you in all of those situations. It wasn’t something
And I mean, I had been sober several years at the time when these events happen. So it’s not like, well, I got sober March 23. And then I was faced with all these temptations on the 27th. But these things, you know, you start to build up that foundation and you start to take it in internally, that I am a sober person and a sober person does not drink on these occasions. And I mean for you now, I’m sure you probably embody it more than ever with your TED talk and with the programs that you’re putting out where that is your identity. It’s not just I’m trying this 30 day paleo. It is I’m Jolene park a person that doesn’t drink period. Here Here are the things that solidify that in my subconscious which probably makes it easier for you to stop because it is part of who you are. And for myself all
With you know, this podcast, it makes it a lot more difficult for me to go out and drink when it’s like, aren’t you the guy that has the podcast about sobriety, and I know some of the other big podcasts and I’ve had guests on the show. I know Shane Ramer, that sober guy that was part of his motivation, I believe Paul Churchill, with recovery elevator, I think that was his motivation as well. They were early in sobriety and like, Hey, here’s an extra layer of accountability. So moving forward them, how did you get into the speaking scene? And how did the TED Talk kind of unveil what were the steps that you took to make that happen?
What so my background is in public speaking, I was working in have been working in corporate wellness since 2004. And actually, my degree from college is speech communication. So emphasizing public speaking, corporate training, group facilitation. It’s always been my love and it’s always been the work of
You know, that I’ve done I never would have imagined that I would do a TED talk on alcohol and drinking, particularly my drinking story. And, you know, I’ve always known about TED Talks. But so that’s kind of that thing of, you know, life takes you in strange directions. But, but I do feel like the, you know, the 15 minutes on that Ted stage was kind of the all the work that I’ve been doing. led me led me to that with my with my public speaking. So, so how it, you know, came about was I didn’t start talking about not drinking until about a year, year and a half into not drinking, of course, personally, you know, friends and family knew because they just I was the red wine drinker. And now all of a sudden, like, we’re out to dinner and they’re like, chilling, why are you not having a glass of red wine so they obviously knew immediately, but professionally, I just kept doing what I was doing. I was I was doing health coaching and teaching ironically well, wellness classes, but I also wasn’t
was at that time teaching about brain chemistry, talking a lot about sugar and the different neurotransmitters Gabba serotonin, dopamine, I learned all about that in my functional nutrition training in 2000 2006 was when it was when I did that training. And so I incorporated that with my work. But it wasn’t until I quit drinking kind of a year, you know, a year and a half into being alcohol free. That then I started being kind of public about, Okay, look, this is my story.
And I quit drinking and I was listening to the motivation to start talking was I was listening to podcast, some alcohol free podcasts where people are talking about it. And I was listening. I’m like, I just feel like something’s being missed here. And what’s being missed is the physiology. And, you know, it’s still, like people like Holly Whitaker and Laura McCowan, they were doing great things and really kind of blowing the doors off the stigma of you know, not drinking and not
Like Holly doesn’t go to aa. And so there was like this whole kind of fall, who was resonating with that. But I was like, there’s this piece of neurotransmitters and blood sugar. And what I had always known and studied, and which really, you know, helped me and what I stuck to early on in not drinking was going back to the physiology for myself. And I just like, I just feel like people need to know that. So I wrote to Holly and Laura who do the home podcasts, and I said, look, I think there’s something, you know, missing piece, and I just thought that email would, you know, get lost in a sea of other emails? And they replied, and they said, Come on our show, we’d love to have you talk about this. And so that’s then what opened up, you know, I told my story and connected it with a lot of the nutrition, the physiology, the nervous system regulation. And, you know, then I start started to kind of get known for that. And then a year later, I applied to do the TED talk on neuro transmitters and physiology. So it was a bit of kind of a, you know, there was there was some steps in there, but the more
I start talking about I realized how much people were like this is, you know, really fascinating and this is me and I want to hear more about this this brain chemistry piece.
And you talked a bit about it on the TED talk but do you want to kind of go over the Gabba and Sarah tone and how that all plays into while you’re drinking? Yeah, so you know I I’m a big I sit very much in the physiology camp so as a nutritionist, my training my background, what’s so interesting to me and when where I’m when I, you know, look at the neuroscience of it is, is we talked about it starts with the body, and then it’s the brain is the second and traditionally, you know, we try to like cognitively and my clients will tell me this, they’re like, I know this stuff. I listened to it. I read it like I know it. Why do I keep drinking and the data is there is that we have to body first brain second.
So when the body feels calm when the body’s resource when the body is in homeostasis, then it gets the message to the brain okay? We don’t need to fight we don’t need to flee, we don’t need to go into freeze mode and the brain can calm down. So working with the body and some of those just foundational pieces is working with the neural chemicals in the body, not the cognitive piece, because we’re working with an animal brain and so when animals are, you know, freaked out or scared, like if there’s a dog that’s lost its owner, it’s running across, you know, traffic, that dog doesn’t understand language, but what under its body understands sensation and and calming that dog’s body and we’re the same way we have this animal body. And when we are stressed in this like triggered, activated fight , freeze state, which is usually you know, when we want to drink we want to like, try to regulate that for me to say, well just calm down and don’t drink that
doesn’t register. But what registers is doing something to regulate the body and momentarily a drink, you know, glass of alcohol feels like we’re regulating the body. It’s a physical thing, the liquid of alcohol going into our physical body, we get that regulation. And so we need to then start there with how can we regulate the body physically because we’re doing it with alcohol. How can we do it physically, but with something besides alcohol, and so I’m particularly looking at nutrients and foods and movements and lifestyle practices to go right into the root very quickly. And that route being our Gabba neurotransmitter which is responsible for anxiety, if it’s too low, we feel more anxious A lot of people say they drink because they feel anxious. The serotonin neurotransmitter is can be connected with depression. And then dopamine is connected with connection we want to connect with others. So you know, people will say I drink because I want to really
lacks or I want to connect. And so it’s often those neurotransmitters are literally low, we can test them and they’re low and we’re trying to regulate we’re trying to medicate and boost them up with alcohol. So now when we understand the physiology of what else can regulate and boost our internal pharmacy, have that anti anxiety kind of anti depressant, that connection hormone that dopamine is also about our motivation and our drive. When we learn how to regulate that it’s, first of all, it’s fun to know about it can be inspiring, it’s a different shift. It’s a different refrain from something’s wrong with me and I you know, just personality wise have a moral defect. Because our physiology regulates our psychology. It’s like when we have the flu and we don’t feel well physically we don’t feel well, emotionally or mentally. So going in and working with the physiology is where I start and
It’s what has really helped me and what has helped my clients.
What would be kind of the ideal diet for somebody, I’m sure a lot of it plays into the diet that you have. So if you take in a ton of sugar, I’m assuming that that’s not good for you. What would if someone were to stick to a regiment have a perfect intake in their body? What would that look like supplements diet, I know it’ll fluctuate person to person, but in a ballpark. If you could kind of give someone the shortcut of if you do this, you’ll be okay. Well, taking alcohol is the first step.
And I knew that you know, this was another part of that 2014 kind of moment of knowing is I knew this this physiology work and it was kind of like I can’t keep not knowing what I know and ignoring this like it was too misaligned. I knew about the physiology. I knew what
havoc alcohol played on hormones on brain chemicals. So alcohol is just the dirty drug. I mean, it just it just sweeps Gabba, dopamine, serotonin, acetylcholine, your oxytocin, your cortisol, it just does a sweep on all of them and lowers everything and just regulates everything. So taking alcohol out biochemically physiology wise is is the best thing you can do.
And so, you know, whatever the whatever the struggle is, whether it’s sleep or your mood or your weight, or you know, anything, alcohol disrupts all of that. So, so taking that out of the picture is is huge. And then, and then going back to just kind of you know, diet and nutrition, our body needs protein, carbohydrates and fat. And we want the secret sauce like we want to be like what’s, what’s the rock, we haven’t turned over? It, it’s going back to the basics. That makes the biggest difference. So eating protein and the reason why people
Protein is so important is because any protein that you eat, whether it’s animal based or vegetable based will break down into amino acids. And amino acids are the raw materials that make Gabba dopamine and serotonin. So eating protein every time you eat, it’s not just like oh, I say it and it’s a healthy thing to say. And it really like that’s what’s fascinating about physiology like how it starts to connect and when the rubber really meets the road. So protein is key. You know, if you’re just stopping drinking, if you’re have stopped, but you’re just like, my mood, my sleep, go back to protein every time you eat and eat three times a day, like it’s simple, but a lot of people just don’t do it. But it makes a really, really big difference and not just like, subjectively, like I’m just talking about this. You can see it on blood labs. So when you eat three times a day and eat some protein in those three meals, blood lab starts to shift like blood glucose starts to regulate triglycerides Can you know regulate
A little bit more the cortisol, the DHG, a stress hormone. So if we can measure it and it’s simple, eat regularly eat some protein. And then the next nutrition thing is the good healthy fats, particularly omega three fats because those omega three fats also feed your brain. The GABA, the serotonin, the dopamine so omega three fats are fish oil, flax seeds, chia seeds, but also the other good fats, coconut oil, real butter, olive oil, avocado, that kind of thing. And then that we need carbohydrates for energy for again for our brain, to be able to process information to not you know, low blood sugar, high blood sugar, we want to keep the brain blood sugar level, and vegetables are the ideal carbohydrates and then fruit.
Depending on you know, the person’s goal, what their symptoms are, what they’re trying to achieve. Some people can tolerate more starchy, grainy, flowery carbohydrates, but you know, the real whole grains are key ma brown rice
steel cut oats, amaranth, whole grains are always just whole wheat, whole wheat is a whole grain but getting the other whole grains in. And then the third category of carbohydrates is alcohol and soda and brownies and candy bars and cookies and so when people say to me, you know I’m not eating carbs, does that mean you’re not eating cookies or you’re not eating broccoli? So ideally, it’s just going back to the basics getting in good protein, whatever protein you like getting in good healthy fats and adding in fruits and vegetables. So for me, it’s about adding in instead of taking away because normally when we talk nutrition people like Oh, geez, you know what I have to not eat take away, deprive myself up and it’s actually just, we need to focus I think more on adding in the actual food because that’s what we’re missing.
And do you think there’s any good strategies for going about that like for myself, I know if I pre planned my mail
And meal prep, then it’s a lot more difficult for me to stray when I guess it’s that animal brain that you’re talking about, where I just walked downstairs and there’s the trigger of I am hungry at this moment, open the refrigerator. What is inside of the refrigerator? Here? Is food. Be a good or bad I am looking for food. I haven’t made a conscious decision. My animal brain. I know in the moment, I shouldn’t choose a brownie. But at the same time, it’s like well, I don’t face an immediate consequence with it. So just one won’t hurt. And I think we can kind of tie that into the alcoholic brain as well. You know, like you said, you didn’t get a DUI you didn’t injure somebody as a result of drinking and driving. And that was my experience as well. Well actually, I take that back I I hit some cars and got a DUI so not the same but 99% of the
Time it worked out. It worked out fine. And there wasn’t anything negative that happened as a direct result. But are there any strategies for not? Or strategies for stopping yourself or keeping on track? Yeah, I mean, you know, this could be a three hour workshop, because so you know what I just talked about protein, carbohydrates, fat. And if it were as simple as that the conversation will be over. But it’s not that simple. And there’s a lot of layers to this, and there’s a long conversation and to what you’re bringing up. So sugar and alcohol run the same pathway in the brain. They’re very similar. We switch so often, and this was me, I was, you know, my issue early on. I wasn’t a drinker. But sugar was an issue for me in my teens and my 20s. And then I discovered alcohol. I’m like, What am I doing? Like, I’ll call it just just a quick route. its immediate, like, why am I wasting time eating sugar, but then often, people will quit alcohol, go back to sugar. And you said, You know, I know it.
Need a brownie? This is like when people said they’re like, I know this stuff. I know this about alcohol, but why can I stop? So again, it’s not about intellectually knowing things. It’s about working with our physiology. So quick and simple. I mean, like you said, I think there is something if you just don’t have it in your environment. That’s that could be one just quick kind of kind of hack to not have things in your cupboards and that kind of thing, but it’s also not about deprivation. So it’s not also that you know, this thing of like you all this stuff you can’t have. So then it’s, it’s going to, you know, looking at kind of the deeper layers and you know, you know, one brownie here and there is going to kill you. No, absolutely not. So, what’s the goal like, like, what is it that you’re trying to go after and food can get really tangled with this kind of? This is bad food. We have so much so much. I mean, if we have the judgment on alcohol, that alcohol is bad, the way we have the judgment on a brownie is bad. I mean, people do
There’s just a thing of like these bad foods. And then there’s this equals, if we put that bad food and however we define about food in our body, now we’re bad. And that’s where it gets tangled and really messy. And it’s just, it’s just not true. I mean, you know, one Brown is going to knock you off your diet. Not No, not at all. But going back to first of all, what’s your WHY? And then and then, you know, there’s just a lot of, of layers under this like, what are we really hungry for what’s the void that we’re really trying to fill?
And and it could it be that we’re just, you know, lack of connection, or we’re needing more space and solitude, more creativity, and that’s what a lot of what I work with, with clients, getting to kind of that core void or core need, because we could drink all the alcohol and world or eat all the brownies in the world. And if that’s not what’s going to fill that void, but we need to get to, you know, uncover what are we really trying to feed
Here.
So understanding the root, it helps you to understand what the symptoms are. And there’s usually something deeper is kind of what we’re trying to medicate with all those, you know, the things that we’re putting in our body or the decisions that we’re making a lot of it, I believe it’s a Tony Robbins, it’s, we know what to do, we don’t do what we know. And that’s where someone like yourself as a coach, helps put people give them the accountability and the guidance, but it’s not always just the intellectual A lot of it. There’s the fear base also and entrepreneurs, people trying to start their own business. And I know that I need to do this, this, this and this, it’s like, okay, just go do that. It’s like, well, what if I fail, you already know what to do, just go do it and my company, we’re going through some gigantic acquisition and this and that and you know, we’re talking about big scary numbers.
On a, just on an animal level, my reaction, they say a number and I say, Oh, that’s, that’s way too much. And then you break it down. It’s like, well, that’s like, three days of sales like is that is that really so much? Or is it just your instinct and if you can get through on the cognitive level of, if I can tell myself that this isn’t scary because of these facts, it can kind of help how you feel with any sort of situation that you’re trying to overcome. But we had talked briefly before the show, do you want to talk about sober choice and at the time of this release, it’ll be pretty brand new, but would you like to give give people a couple details on what it is and what you’re looking to accomplish with it and how they can get involved? Absolutely. I just released a new online program called the sober choice and it takes people
Through the first 30 days, so you have me digitally. And you know, and I’ve recorded videos to really address kind of, you know, the concerns of I just stopped drinking but now I’m really craving sugar or carbohydrates and in an eight to 19 minute video, they’re really quick here’s that you know, go through look at this look at this, here’s a resource here’s an action step here’s your follow through and I just all the things of like, you know, I just don’t know how this whole forever question got a whole day on that sober sucks and hanging out with you know, my friends still drink but I’ve quit and you know, just kind of staying on track and all these things that come up and and delivering it which actually might the resources and the action steps are tie in with entrepreneurship, because, you know, keeping your blood sugar stable, working with building your resilience, that that ability to tolerate the discomfort you know,
That’s what’s in, in this program which you can apply. You know, when I say on day 30 of this program, all of this is, it’s not like you just did it on day 16 and then never look at it again. These are life techniques to help you maintain and sustain your sober choice. And so it’s just really I’m a real practical person, like, you know, when I’m in a class or not the teacher I’m like, just give me the house and tell me why it works. And so that’s how I’ve set this up. That’s and that’s how I teach it and it again, it correlates and you transfer it with kind of any life anxiety that might be going on. Whether it’s business or relationships when people talk about you know, I, this is my trigger to drink. This course is all of kind of the resources to get through those triggers.
That’s incredible. Well, Jolene, thank you so much for being on self made and sober podcast. And where can people find you to learn more about you? What are your social media
And we’ll have links in the show notes for all of these. So gray area drinkers calm is where all the coaching and programs I also train other coaches and healthcare practitioners how to work with gray area drinkers. So that’s all on that website. My Instagram is where I am mostly on social and it’s healthy, it’s healthy underscore Discovery’s because that’s the name of my original corporate wellness training company.
All right, perfect. We’ll have links for all that. And guys, if you enjoyed the show, comment on the Facebook page, review it on iTunes. let your friends know about everything that you’re going through. message me personally. messaged Jolene, get in touch with her. She’s a great resource. Be sure to check out her TED Talk, check out her programs and again, thank you so much for being on self made and sober. Thank you for having me.

Jake White started a business in college by hosting massive house parties… but without any drugs or alcohol. Soon he was gathering hundreds of students to his signature “sober parties” and getting nationally known sponsors like Red Bull and Pizza Hut. Now he travels the country as a vaping, drug and alcohol speaker – leaving students a platform to host sober parties for their community.

http://www.party0.org/
https://www.vive18.com/

Https://instagram.com/vive18_
https://instagram.com/party.0
Sobriety Date: May 1, 2012

Check out this episode!

Welcome to Self Made & Sober podcast. I’m your host, Andrew Lassise. And with me today is Jake white. From Party.0, and Vive18. Jake, how are you?

I’m wonderful, Andrew, thanks for inviting me as of the podcast

100%. Man. So why don’t you give us a little background on what Party.0, and by the team, what you’re doing with that. And then we’ll get into, you know, sort of your background. But once you give us sort of a breakdown on what your what your what your businesses are.

Basically, they do the same thing there for different audiences. So what we do is we help young people make good decisions around vaping drugs and drinking. And then we actually help them throw these massive parties without any drugs or alcohol. So it’s educational, but then we have an action item at the end for them to get involved in and kind of start a positive movement at their school.

Awesome. So I know when I was in college, it was all about drinking and partying. And I’m willing to bet that your experience was not the same. Or was it? And that’s what caused it to happen. What’s your background in, in the party scene?

Right? No, I mean, you pegged it, I was, I actually tell people like I was one of those nerdy kids, I did not want anything to do with using anything that changed my body or my mind. I had actually watched my uncle go in and out of the hospital, in and out of jail, and eventually have his life taken from, you know, dealing with addiction. And so I knew that’s the direction that I wanted to stay clear of. And it was funny, because in college, it was like your key to socializing was it was drinking it was smoking weed. You know, it was anything but just being you at a party.

I never thought about that. But you’re absolutely right. The only way to have fun is to not be yourself. Right? Yeah, exactly like observation.

And it was weird, because, you know, in high school, I had Goofy, weird nerdy friends, too. So we never held ourselves to any sort of standard like that. So I was going to these parties, considering like, all right, I need to go to hang out with people and to meet people and get the college experience. But the more I was there, the more destruction I saw, and thought, all right, I don’t want to be a part of this. I don’t know what else to do. But I don’t want to be a part of this. So I became silent about being sober. Because in college, what that means is, well, if you’re sober, you’re probably arrogant. thinking you’re better than you know, our decision to drink in us. Or you’re over religious, or they would think oh, I mean, and you’re in recovery, too. So they could think those three things about me. But what it boiled down to was, I wasn’t going to get invited to things. And I was going to isolate myself if I told you people that I was sober. That was my mindset for a couple years. And eventually, I actually read the statistic that nearly 30% of college students were just like me, they didn’t use any drugs they didn’t drink. But for two years, I hadn’t met anybody like that. So I kind of questioned the statistic. I’m like, well, is this actually true? And as I was considering that I realized, well as outgoing as I am. If I’m here hiding my own decision to be sober, why would anybody else jump out of the bushes and be like, Hey, I’m sober, want to be friends? Like that would never happen. So what’s probably happening is this 30% is hidden somewhere, you know, like, they’re not sharing who they are. We’re not meeting at parties and events, because you wouldn’t meet them there. So if I want this social environment to change it, I want to create a place where I can have fun and make friends without the pressure to use anything like that. I’m gonna have to create it or I can’t really expect it to happen. So that was kind of my mindset going into it. And I can kind of tell you how it blossomed from there if you want.

Yeah, definitely.

Okay, so at first, right, I knew I wanted to change something. I knew in order to change it, I was going to have to take action. And so this idea kind of struck me like, the house party is super fun. You know, it’s kind of dirty, it’s cheap. It feels like adventure, you walk to a Random House. I just didn’t like that one element of it. And so I thought, all right, well, what if I threw a house party without any? No keg, no drinks, and just had an excuse to get together. And I, I went to my buddy, Steve, and I asked him if he would be on board to helping me with this. And I actually didn’t expect Steve to say yes, because he’s a good old Wisconsin Boy, you know, loves his cheese, his Packers, and he loves beer, like he is Wisconsin through and through. But he actually told me, Jake, I would love to do that with you. Because I drove home an hour and a half every single weekend my freshman year, because I didn’t want to drink. I thought it would jeopardize, you know, my academics. And I could see this being really useful. Let’s throw these house parties without any alcohol drugs. Let’s do it. I’ll help you with it. Even though Steve wasn’t really sober. So we partnered up and, and we decided to do this thing. first week of school came, we got a notebook and a pen. And we met as many students as we could. And we were just talking to them for about 25 seconds enough to get their name, to tell them our name, and then invite them to a sober party. And as you can imagine, we were kind of scared like we didn’t really think people were going to respond well to it. But at the end of the day, we had met 100 29 people. And out of 129 people inviting them to a sober house party in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. 120 of them said yes, and gave us their phone numbers.

And these were 120 just random people not even knowing that. Were they sober people, or was this just a random selection?

This? This was a random selection. Like we didn’t know anything about these people. We just met them literally walked up to them, for the first time met them, and then invited them to a house party without alcohol. And I see your face man.

I was, you know, my brain was going ahead in this story. And I’m like, and let me guess this is where zero people showed up. And you had Wow, hundred 20 people, I have 129. That’s a pretty good percentage.

Oh, my God, we were blown away. And we were in disbelief. We’re thinking these they all lied to us. Like, these are fake phone numbers. Because the math doesn’t add up. If 30%. You know, out of 129 maybe it should be 4042 people that should be saying yes to this. But over 90% are saying that’s like That’s weird. So we decided like, Okay, we’ve got this list that people have said, Yes. Our next logical step is now we actually have to throw the party and see what happens. And here’s what I was thinking to, you know, we invited people to something to their face, they would feel rude. If they said no, maybe that was that was it? So this is the real test. Let’s throw the party and see if people come. We basically we get in Steve’s apartment, we get our friend Brian to DJ. We buy we go to Walmart and get those like five gallon jugs. You see it soccer practice. And we fill it one with grape Kool Aid one with cherry Kool Aid. Just

the things you pour on the coach after the big game.

Absolutely, exactly. So this is our party, we got a DJ, we’ve got two five gallon jug jugs of Kool Aid. We have a foosball table, we’re going to play beer pong with water. And that’s pretty much it. We have some like outdoor games, because it’s still good weather in Wisconsin in the fall. And we basically text our list 120 people saying, hey, party tonight, it’s beach house, here’s the address, you know, bring your friends, not your booze, we’re party and sober. And wait. The night goes on. And we start noticing people are coming in groups. So a few groups come in. And it’s been about 15 minutes. We’re directing people into the house. And Steve and I kind of like all right, well, let’s go in and check on our party. See, everything’s going I’ll never forget this. Stephen, I opened the door to his apartment. And the place is packed. from wall to wall. We counted there was 85 students packed in this one bedroom apartment. And it is the most awkward thing you’ve ever seen in your life. Like the DJ is going, he’s having an awesome time to live this life. Everyone else is so packed together, they can’t even dance, they can’t move. They’ve been drinking Kool Aid. So it’s not like they can pretend they’re having a good time. Like they’re in the right state of mind. They know this is the worst party they’ve ever been to. And one dude just yells at us from like the middle of the dance, or he recognizes us from outside. He’s like, Hey, is your party. And we’re like, Yeah, what’s going on? He’s like, the kool aid is gone, this party sucks. And he just dorms out. And that, dude, within another 15 minutes, everybody had left the party. It was a total disaster. And I basically looked at each other and said, Dude, we totally failed. This was the worst thing people have probably experienced at college so far. We either have to get good at this right now. Or we need to quit and stop telling people we’re going to do this sober party thing.

So you but you experienced failure right off the bat. And you decided you’re going to keep pushing through with it. So yeah, cuz i think i think the the approach on it is really great, because a lot of people know they’ll be starting like a side hustle or something, trying to trying to quit their nine to five and build up their toes in the water on something new and something scary. And you have the market telling you. Yes, we want this even though despite you probably have that negative self talk like, yes, I’m putting myself in your shoes and probably thinking that exact thing. Like everything you’re saying in the story. It’s like, yeah, they probably said that because it’s to your face. Like, let’s see if they actually show up. Right. And so I mean, the biggest gripe at this point is you didn’t get enough Kool Aid, I guess. I’m guessing that was a good learning experience for the future then, huh?

Right. So no, absolutely what you’re saying is true. And I think what I had to realize and looking back on it now I can say this, but I didn’t know it in the moment was everything that was out of my control went well, you know, there was a demand in the market people like to we’re offering they gave us their phone numbers. I couldn’t really mess that up. I guess I could, the way we invited people was was great. And then the party, everything that was in my control, which is what you do at the party, what’s your venue? Like? What do people actually have to do? How are you going to create connections? All this stuff I hadn’t learned, it made sense that I failed, because it was my first time trying something. So I think it was helpful that Steve and I did this together. So we didn’t get totally crushed by that failure. But, you know, starting with that success of getting 120 numbers, we’re feeling like on the clouds. And then we immediately get humbled because our party sucks, and we suck, you know, like, we just had to realize it. And all right, it makes sense. The first time doing it. Let’s try it again. And let’s make this thing work. So that’s kind of where the next step went, is we contacted a fraternity and said, Hey, you guys have the best house. You know, you’ve got tons of space, you’ve got a basement. You got different rooms. Here’s what we’re doing. I don’t know if you’d be into it. But we want to throw a sober house party at your your house. And day, actually, to my surprise, again, we’re on board. Let’s do it. People think we’re only about drinking, but we can party sober to like, let’s do this. We invited the same people back, you know, we’re like, hey, the first party was terrible. This time we got more room, more games, more KoolAid. In fact, we will went to Red Bull, we told them about our experience, we went to Pizza Hut, told them about our experience, and they are going to sponsor our party. So not only do we have music, DJ games, we got sponsors now too. So next party went up to from 80 people to 120 people. They had a great time, we started learning what makes a good party, you know, how do we create connections for people in a mindset, like they’re still in their mind? You know, they’re nervous when they walk in. But how do we design those nerves and get them to connect some with someone right away. So they’re making friends and they’re not in their head so much. We learned how to do that. We learned how to keep people there longer. Because as soon as you start making friends, and you get involved in a game or competition, you forget everything else, and you’re just engrossed in the experience. So we learned how to create these, these moments for people were they’re making friends, they’re having fun, and they’re finding community in a way that’s different than what they’re used to. So our tenants from their rows 250 202 50. And this is where the kind of entrepreneurship story begins, is I always blogging about this in my public relations class, and posting pictures online stories. And people from around the country started messaging me saying, This is the coolest thing ever. Like I’m you, I’m that one sober kid on my campus. I can’t find anybody like me, I don’t want to go to these other parties. They’re just not my scene, how do I do what you do. And so my thought was, wow, if I could actually teach people how to do this for a living, that would be the coolest job ever. And that’s kind of where that story began, and how we validated the idea of sober house parties, and why it’s a thing today.

So you’re starting in this was really just scratching your own itch. And then the market is saying, this is something that, you know, you can actually sink your teeth into this. And it’s, it’s really cool hearing about this, just, you know, I mean, I look at my college experience 10 years ago, and it was like, I’m trying to imagine college without drinking. Right? You know, and your experiences, you can have fun in college without drinking. And to me, I knew a couple people who didn’t drink. And when they told me, they would have fun, I just be like, can’t have fun if you’re so especially not in college, like outside of college, it’s like, okay, party’s over, like time to get a real job time to grow up. But like, right, in college, you don’t even have the social stigma to not be like destroying your life.

Right? Exactly. And it’s so funny, because like you said it your environment, like reinforce this idea, like, Oh, yeah, this is what we do to have fun, we go out, we get wasted together, you know, and you bond over that you bond over that shared experience. And until somebody invites you to something different, I think you you don’t realize it’s possible. Like even when I talk to professionals in the higher ed industry, and I’m telling them about my program, they’re in disbelief, saying it can’t happen. And we’ve worked with schools like Indiana University, Mississippi State like D one schools with insane party cultures. And we get the same result, every time, around nine out of 10 people are opting in to get invited to these parties. because number one, they want to be included, and they feel valued by someone walking up to them and inviting them to something, they feel accepted. And then when they go to the party, they have a good time. Because basically, you take the best things about drinking and using, it has, it has very little to do with what it actually does for you. And it has most to do with the community, you’re building around those unhealthy things. So just switching it and the way we brand parties and attract people. And build hype is just kind of like the secret sauce, the system we’ve built, that’s able to kind of disrupt this expectation you have at the college experience. And then when we started getting the same feedback from high school students saying, dude, I mean, we’re using wax pens, we’re smoking weed, we’re drinking. And some of us aren’t into that, or we don’t want to get into that. But we feel like it’s our only social outlet. That’s when we moved into the high school and middle school market with vibe, a team to help those students too. But same model, same platform of starting with a speaking engagement to share the story, and then empowering them to use our model to throw sober events for their own campus.

So what does it look like? If somebody wants to be involved in either of those organizations? Do they pay like a franchise fee? Or how does? How does that structured on the business side of things?

So the reason cool thing about Yes, students who want to get involved in this is doesn’t cost them anything. Our model is that we know schools are hiring speakers every single year, they have a budget for that. So we don’t want to create a new product in a market that doesn’t exist. If somebody is interested, you know, they contact us, they can go to parties zero.org or Vive18 calm, and that they can send us a message. From that point, what we do is we contact their administrators at their, their campus, and we introduce ourselves to Hey, you got a student interested in starting a really positive movement at your school? Would you support them by bringing us in, so they pay for everything, then what we do is we actually give them our playbook for exactly how to throw these parties. Here’s how you develop a team to help you out here the roles that need to be taken care of, here’s how you get sponsors, here’s how you promote, here’s how you throw an awesome event that gets people having fun, get people loosened up, get them connecting with each other, even if you’re not serving alcohol. So it’s everything is laid out easy and simple for them, they just execute it. And then we’re there to support them. So basically, what we tell people on the speaker side when we’re talking to administrators, is we can tell them, Listen, most speakers can come and share a really inspiring story with your students, they might influence them for a day or a week, what we’re doing is Our Story can actually stay with your school. Because when we leave, we’re not only leaving your students with a platform to impact their campus for years to come, which is going to provide value. Pike way after we leave. But we’re going to stay on call for those students for an entire year. So if they’re going through this platform, and they have questions, or they want to run ideas by us or anything, like we are literally a phone call or a Skype call away, we want to support them and make sure that they’re successful, and then brag on them. Like, let’s let’s make sure that these students are getting press coverage. Because this is newsworthy, let’s make sure they’re getting awesome sponsors, because we don’t want you to pay for these things. So it’s all built in to this platform and the business model of using speaking so the students don’t pay for anything, and the attendees don’t pay for anything.

Really the idea? I mean, it’s just your your product is actually the speaking engagements in getting your foot in the door with their and the guests just like a lay down before. I mean, I can tell you, I’ve seen millions of speakers and keynotes. And you know, the impact, it’s exactly like you said, there’s, you know, extremely, there’s the I am extremely motivated immediately afterwards. And there will be that fizzle out where it’s like, Okay, back to the real world. Like I saw Tony Robbins a little over a year ago, give a keynote. And I was like dead tired. And I didn’t even like it was on my bucket list is CM. So I was like I had gotten to the event at I think I woke up at 4am. And this is like 4pm. And he’s the last speaker and like Gary Vee was just on earlier. And it was he was really cool. And it was like, I guess I’ll stick around just to see it. And then he comes out on stage. And he’s got like those sticks and smacking together, got a room of like 3000 people like in suits and ties like jumping. It was, it was an incredible experience. I remember I got home about midnight, he completely rejuvenated everything. And I get home. And I say to my wife, I’m like, my life is completely different. Like, I’m not the same person you thought you knew. Everything is changed. Tony has changed my life. And then I wake up the next day. And it’s like, back to the grind.

Dude, it’s so true. You like, yeah, you get fired up. And I think it’s literally when you think about taking in information, we’re only able to take in a certain amount. So you probably have this one thing you learned from Tony speech. And even from that entire day, there might be just, you know, one or two things you took away. And you implemented because our brains are capable of doing that. So too, yeah, exactly. To be able to offer something beyond the presentation. For the industry. It’s like, Oh, no, duh, why wouldn’t we want to bring these people in? They do all the same things that everybody else does. They’re good at it, but then they leave us with something sustainable, that’s going to impact our community.

Do you have like statistics of like drinking incidents like before and after your events to us as like, hey, when we come and speak at universities, like drinking related incidents goes down? Like do you have any sort of information?

Right now? I wish I wish that I did. And this is something that I learned pretty quickly is that the industry higher ed, in general, college and universities, they like that in formation. And it’s really expensive to get like, and people will use it. So I guess I could go to a school that didn’t have party point, oh, look at the statistics, and then look at it afterwards and claim that I was the one who did Pat, you know, even though there was so many things they’re doing,

but any test in a vacuum is going to have a million different factors. And whenever they have, like when they do case studies, they’ll they will find the case study that substantiates their claims, right. And then within something so I mean, right, in general, I guess you could just look at like the drinking related statistics before and after your event in whatever timeframe needs to make sense. Yeah, you could say, you know, maybe there’s a correlation. Maybe there isn’t. But we have statistics approved that. Before we went into the school, there were, I don’t know, like 20 related accidents each weekend. And then after we came in, there were 10 years. Yeah, whatever, whatever the numbers say. And I don’t know if that’s too high or too little or right. Yeah, something like that. Right. I think I know if someone were were pitching me on something like that would be like the icing on the cake. Yeah. If it doesn’t resonate with me where I know just myself 10 years ago, I’d be like, Oh, you’re coming to throw sober parties. I mean, if you’ve got the track record, though, you have the experience. So it doesn’t matter what I think on it. Like, I can’t tell you that you didn’t have all these successful parties beforehand.

Right, exactly. But you’re right, though, that, that people numbers help validate, and people like that. So in the meantime, I think that in the future, we will have more of those numbers. I wish I had them now. But what I tell people is there’s these basically top methods when you’re thinking about about preventing underage drinking, and helping students make smarter choices. And so the first one is positive social warming, which is saying, Hey, listen, not everybody is out making destructive decisions. There’s a lot of students who are not using drugs, they’re not drinking. So that’s a method that people use. So what I tell people is we take that’s one of the best methods. And we take it a step further. Because Sure, you might have a poster that says 30% of students don’t drink 60% of students drink responsibly. But if every weekend, all they see is people getting smashed, and throwing up and peeing on people’s lawns, and like doing things that significant signify, like, that’s a pretty crazy night, and they are obviously drinking excessively. And you’re not seeing those people drinking responsibly, or you’re not seeing the people who are doing something else. Where’s the proof of that poster you just put up? We give that poster life. And it’s an opportunity to actually get involved with it and enhance their social life. So if Yeah, your posters, right, but I still don’t have anything to do on Friday night, I’m going to go out drinking, you know, because that’s what there is to do. So we give them an opportunity to take action to be a part of something, get what they want short term, and reinforce those positive social norms by showing them in person like, yeah, here, here, dude, here’s 200 of the people that are on that poster. They right here at this party. Come on in. You know,

that’s so incredible. So what’s one of the craziest stories that you have from a party where people are being sober? I can tell I can I can think of a million where alcohol, drugs were involved of absolute insanity. But I’m assuming just the people getting together in general, what’s one of the crazier stories that you’ve experienced or heard through people that are running the parties? Dude, it’s

honestly it’s like, so I can’t tell you anything crazy. Like, you know, the disgusting stuff, like, you know, happens, right? Like people are throwing up or people fighting. Because that doesn’t happen. This is a good thing. But what Dude, what happens? Honestly, you go there, and you don’t realize that they’re not drinking, like people are yelling at each other. They’re talking trash. You know, we’re having tournaments, like we’re playing games, where even honestly, like, we play a lot of drinking games, because they’re super competitive, and you can team up. So people are just insane. They’re crazy at these parties, because they’re just having a good time. And we’ve, I mean, we’ve had plenty of parties that have been shut down by the police, because we get noise complaints by the police come by, and they don’t believe we’re not drinking. And we literally have to teach people like, okay, have the website up on your phone. Because when the cops come, this is what you need to show them you’re not drinking, invite them in, like, show them you have nothing to fear. Then sometimes, honestly, we call the police beforehand, we say listen, we’re throwing this massive party at this address. We don’t want to waste your time. Like, don’t stake us out. You don’t need to do that. Just come on in. Like, we’ll gladly have you in, play a game or grab some Red Bull if you need to stay awake. Some pizza. And honestly, the craziest things that happen are just people being themselves, you know, like just being while being goofy dancing together. The dance floor is always packed, people love it. And they’re, they’re just, dude, it’s just talking trash, making friends, having fun. Because it will also just like for these games that we have if we have like a flip Cup competition, instead of instead of downing a beer, like we’re sponsored by pizza, so like, just we’re going to flip your cup and you got to eat a slice of pizza. It’s like the most hilarious thing to watch. And then it goes down the line.

It’s so messy and fun do is

I’ve done I’ve done flip cup with with energy drinks before but I’d never thought about yet. You have to crush the pizza. And then you flip the cup.

Right? Yeah, exactly.

That’s incredible. Yeah, and you guys just threw this together. And it’s such a cool story of triumph, because it didn’t work out on your first one. And that’s what I love from your story is that you tried something nobody else had ever done before. Yeah, or at least not on a big scale where you can’t just point and say like, how did they do it? let’s dissect it. But you dove in. And on paper didn’t have that great of a success on the first one. But you guys pivoted and you took notes. And what did work? What didn’t work. And a lot of people were just wired to be like, man, I stepped outside of my comfort zone. And it didn’t work. The end. Yeah, I shouldn’t have even tried that. But you took it and made it work. And then you started growing it and scaling it and getting other people involved. Like, I know, for my company, I thought best case scenario will get about 200 customers and I could make this my full time gig. And we were at like 25,000. So

I had gotten way, way better. Right?

That’s awesome.

I went 100 X to what I thought was possible. So I’m curious, where did you see this going?

To be truly honest, when it started out, since we had success very quickly, like after the first party, this thing just blew up within a couple months. Like we have big name sponsors, we’re getting hundreds of students to our parties. I was getting these messages from schools. So I and I don’t know what it would call it. But in denial and bliss and ignorance, I was like, dude, I am going to be ready. I’m going to travel the world, I’m going to like impact people’s lives. It’s like just going to start flooding in. And what I didn’t realize is, you’re building a business. Yeah, it’s going to take time. So I had this huge dream right away, like we’re going to start this national platform is going to be in every state, every student, you know, who’s like me at the school, because they’re out there, they’re just going to find me and start throwing these parties. And what I realized is that, you know, like, no one knows about you. And I that’s what I realized, like, You’re obsessed with yourself, Jake. Like, you love this idea. It’s great. And you’ve impacted this small bubble. But it takes a lot of work to bring it to a new bubble. Because you have to answer all the questions, you have to answer the skeptics. You’ve got to figure out, yeah, how do you actually pay yourself on this model. So I’m, I’m six years into this idea. Just last year learning about this new model of using speaking, I had tried charging schools to come to just start a chapter and throw a party. And honestly, that created a lot of barriers. I tried the nonprofit model, which was successful, but it burnt me out, I did not like it, I hated my job. Even though the model was good. I didn’t like my daily job anymore. And it wasn’t having time to impact students. We went on this national tour where we basically traveled around the country in this trailer. Just validating the idea again, because I had kind of lost hope. And I had thought I need to quit this thing, because it’s not working the way I thought it would. And I just need to, I just need to do something to prove that it still works, or I need to get out. Because realizing that it’s not going to work. And every time I do that I go back to Alright, students are showing an interest in this The world needs. I just need to go through these hard things to make it happen. But then, you know, on that national Tueller realizing, even though these last methods didn’t work, maybe this next thing is the one that’s going to try that. And speaking is the model I found out

drinking and drugs. Was that part of your story? Or was it just you saw your uncle? And you’re just like, I don’t want to go down that road like your sobriety date of may 1 2012. was that? Was there a story behind that? Or was that just happened to be the last time that you drank and you just embrace this life?

Yeah, I think starting out watching my uncle, I was like, I’m going to be sober for life.

And seeing my parents, they gave up drinking,

when we were born, so watching how much fun they had was really impactful to say, all right, I don’t, I don’t need it. It’s all about my friends. It’s all about what I do. I can get creative to have fun. But then, I think there was a bit of insecurity in college, seeing everybody that I thought everybody was doing it. And then imagining myself because I wanted to make an impact this way, imagining myself, you know, speaking from a platform or influencing someone and saying, hey, you don’t need this and then saying, well, Jake, have you ever tried it? I think that was a little insecurity for me enough to say I should at least try it. And so honestly, I think I drink three times in my life. When I went to an internship, and North Carolina had moonshine to some reason.

There’s a starting point,

I know.

And it was like, I remember, when I was drinking, I was like, I like this buzz, this feels good. And then I think when I came home, second time, I think drink with some buddies, just to kind of try it again, like it been six months or something. And then on my 21st birthday, I drank. And I remember those other times, though, I was like, thinking, sure, I felt good. But it didn’t bring up the best in me, I was more outgoing. I was learning things about being social when I was sober. Whereas when I was drinking, and I was tipsy. It was it was easy for me to just sit on the couch, not meeting new people and not getting out of my comfort zone. And having fun doing that. And now it’s like, I should have more fun pursuing people showing them love and acceptance and starting games and being the life of the party. If I can do it, in my own mind, I should learn to do that, because I’m getting kind of good at it now. And I don’t want to give that up. So once I made that decision, so that’s kind of where the date came from. And 2012 was when that was the period of maybe six months that I just tried drinking and decided that it was still not worth it for me to continue doing based on what I want to do with my life. And now it’s just basically a principle of, hey, if young people can see somebody, have an example of somebody who went throughout their life without drinking and enjoying it, then I want to be that person. Like, that’s definitely worth it for me.

Awesome. So what’s one piece of advice you could give business owners that such by doing it will make everything else easier or unnecessary in their business?

Wow, it’s tall order. I’m

thinking that my instinct goes to

stand out. Don’t worry about fitting in. Like anything you can do to stand out with your business to disrupt things is going to be worth it. Just because you’re going to learn from it more than doing it any of the smaller things that maybe other people are doing. And you’re going to capture the attention of You’re right. You’re right market. That will that that generate with you.

That’s awesome. All right, Jake. And wrapping up, where can people find out more about you and your company’s?

You can go to parties zero.org or you can go to Vive18 calm, and that’s VIV one. eight.com. And then we’re on Instagram as well. So yeah, party dot zero on Instagram and 518 underscore on Instagram.

Awesome. All right, Jake. Well, we’ll have all those in the show notes. Thank you so much for being on self made and sober. I know I got a ton out of your story and your experience and it’s really great to see, you know, young people who are making a difference and disrupting the party scene of all places in sobriety. So it’s awesome what you’re doing. And until next time, thanks for being on the show, Jake.

Awesome. Thank you, Andrew

www.omarpinto.com
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I am a Life Transformation Coach, Addiction Recovery Specialist and Lifestyle Entrepreneur. I impact and transform people’s lives daily through my podcast, thriving Facebook communities and coaching platforms.

I am also a recovered alcoholic in long term sobriety, and as a recovering alcoholic, I understand the challenges associated with maintaining sobriety.

Since becoming sober 15 years ago, I have made it my mission to teach people how to break the chains of addiction and to live their best life possible. In my life, I have not only struggled with addiction, I have struggled with my career, marriage, family, relationships, and in business. Life continued to deliver lemons to my door, and I continued to make lemonade.

What that means for you is that as a Life Coach, I have 25 years of life experience to guide you with.

Check out this episode!

With me today is the life transformation coach Addiction Recovery specialist lifestyle entrepreneur, Omar Pinto. You can hear him on the recovery revolution podcast. It was the share and the acronym. Yeah to share a podcast is spelled sh er, and it stood for sharing helps addicts in recovery very niched. Right. And many cases it was some people, especially if they were in sobriety, took offense to the fact that I was sharing helps addicts in recovery, right. And so that’s part of one of the reasons why I changed it to the recovery revolution. Because even that dialogue, even that conversation, even that language, as far as the difference between sober and clean, drives me bananas. So I was like recovery revolution. And what’s your interpretation of sober versus clean?
There is no difference. It’s just about what your representation of it what it means to you. What does cleaning mean to you? What does sober mean to you, but to attach some sort of negative connotation to one or the other is counterintuitive.
It’s a really good insight. I know a lot of people will argue, well, you’re only sober if you fit in this box. But one of the things I’ve discovered a lot from the podcast and just interviewing a ton of different people that have a ton of different perspectives coming into it, I was very much 12 step, read the big book, follow this and the more and more I do this, and the more and more I talked to people, when I talk to them with an open mind and an open perspective, I mean, there’s a million different ways that you can get sober and there’s no such thing as just a it’s right or wrong because you can’t argue the guy who’s got 20 years and loves his life, but says 12 steps, don’t want
And he’s doing his own thing. Like, you can’t argue that and the argument is, well, you’re not happy. And he’s like, Yes, I am like, no, you’re not nice. Well, I mean, it’s very interesting that the conversation of sober versus in recovery and all these different perspectives, and ultimately, I mean, its language. All of it is language. Do you use drugs and alcohol? No. And then all of a sudden, I create language around all of it. Some of its empowering some of its disempowering. And so if I were to walk up to you and say, Well, that’s a nice set of tomatoes that you have there. And you’re like, No, dude, it’s tomatoes. No, their tomatoes. Right? And we get into an argument
about something that means nothing. It means absolutely nothing, right? If Have you had a drink in 10 years? No. Okay, so then you’re sober. No, I’m clean. Here’s the thing. I’m not going to get into that conversation.
anymore I’ve I have, as a matter of fact, when I celebrated 10 years clean and sober. This before the podcast was even conceived or thought of before the share podcast was even an idea. I just celebrated 10 years clean and sober. And I posted that on one of these Facebook groups before I had my facebook group.
And so, and I posted on there and I said, Guys, I’m so grateful. I just celebrated 10 years clean and sober. And somebody immediately writes in there No, we don’t use the word sober in here. And I was like, Well, you know, identify with both with both fellowships, right? Yeah, but we don’t say so. Brynn here, okay. We refer to it as clean. Right? And so, we got into this battle on a Facebook group on this post that went on and then and here’s the thing. If you post something positive in a group, it’ll get you know, maybe 10 likes
In two posts, right, you post something controversial.
And it’s going to get 200, likes, dislikes, shocks, whatever 60 posts, all going back and forth. People are looking for an excuse to fight man, people are looking for an excuse to argue to unload their anger, bitterness and resentment for so many things. And part of that has to do with the fact that when you are indoctrinated into dogma, or into a dogmatic sort of belief system, which is like religion, which is like politics, and now like 12 steps, this is the only way and you follow it by speaking only this language. And if you introduce any other language, it will not work.
And so I got into this heated battle with the guy, he ended up kicking me out of the group. And I told my wife about it, and she looks at me and goes, Wow, what an amazing way to celebrate your 10 years.
You know, acting like a six year old, you know, and it’s like, then but here’s that’s that’s the beauty of like what I do now, NLP which is neuro linguistic programming her language what she said to me broke through
I was caught up in my own story
of injustice of intolerance of wrongdoing
and all she said was wow what an amazing way to celebrate your 10 year anniversary acting like a six year old and immediately a broke that pattern broke me out of my state. And I went, oh my god.
Like all these years 10 years been clean and sober. However I want to describe that and I’m diverting back, I’m regressing back into old behavior, right just because of what someone else said to me. And that’s when really what
We’re talking about now that’s that’s where the recovery revolution started. Like that whole, the name the recovery revolution started from those moments that I faced in recovery. When you’re going through all this, and your wife says that to you what’s going on in your head? Are you kind of combative, or here’s the funny thing. Okay, thank God, I had 10 years. Okay? Because there’s the first voice that comes in.
That says, You have no idea what you’re talking about. That’s the first voice that comes in. Then there’s a second voice that’s been around now for 10 years. And says to she, so right here acting like an ass. Wow, dude, seriously? What are you doing? If there’s anything I learned from marriage, it’s that she’s always right. Right, right. What? It’s so it happens fast. It happens fast. The processing happens quickly depending on where you’re at in your own work.
covering your own evolution, you know, mentally, physically, spiritually kind of thing. Right. So I was like, you’re absolutely right. As a matter of fact, I went and PM the guy and made amends. You know, was it for him? Absolutely not.
Okay, it was for me, I needed to let that go. I was holding on to it. As soon as I made the amends, it was gone. Right. I made the amends, it was gone. And, but that’s when I decided that there’s got to be other people like me out there.
There’s got to be other people around me that are sick and tired of listening to the same old rhetoric and try to discuss anything different with someone who isn’t a big book Thumper or an NA Nazi. That’s like walking into a Catholic church with the Qur’an. You know, I mean, like, you’re just looking for a fight. And I was like, I don’t I don’t want to fight. But I’d like to open up a discussion about recovery that
involves any and all pathways of recovery and you know mindsets about recovery. Any, any and all success stories, you know, what have other people done to find sobriety? Was it through 12 steps? Was it through something else? And what are the feelings associated with that? Because in many cases, what’s holding you in place in any place, whether it’s 12 step fellowship, a marriage, friendship, you know, is guilt, fear and obligation? And that’s what’s holding me and if I ask somebody, why are you still here? Why are you in this marriage? You know, wow, you know, at the end of the day, many of the emotions that are going to surface are going to be guilt, fear, and obligation, guilt, I’m afraid I’m going to hurt their feelings. Fear, I have no idea what it’s going to be like, you know, outside of this marriage, what’s my life going to be like? Is it better to be with the devil? I know over the verses of the devil I don’t or obligation in the sense like, you know, we’ve got all this time invested and we’ve got these kids and you know,
No, it’s like, I feel like I should stay here. Right? None of that is this is my purpose. I’m super excited to be here. It’s the I’m so in love with this person. You know, I’ve I’ve I love my career more than I have when I first started those when those things don’t surface then you recognize that someone is as caught up in those negative emotions. And with recognizing that how did you get into coaching and helping other people identify patterns like that and help them break through
it because I was so angry. I mean, that was that was really a lot of a lot of what was driving me a lot of what was what I was soothing myself for. A lot of what my alcohol and drug abuse was, was soothing myself from anger, bitterness, resentment, rage. I was a kid that was picked on bullied made fun of so I was shy and introverted.
And kind of like, recluse, tried to go unnoticed. Because I was afraid I was afraid of confrontation, I was afraid of getting beat up happened a few times, and I was terrified of it right. So I hid and I tried to go and notice, but inside of me was a lot of anger because of it. You know, I hated going to school I hated the other kids. I hated myself. Why did it have to be this way? Why did I couldn’t meet. My mother was very religious mothers Jehovah’s Witness, so huge, dogmatic presence in my life when it comes to how I was raised, no Christmas, no birthdays, no holidays, no hanging out with friends that weren’t in the same religion or the same fellowship. So there was these constant rules that I had to abide by and I was just pissed off and angry. And every time I did something that I wasn’t supposed to do, and when we’re talking about supposed to do is based on what somebody else is belief system. So there’s
Somebody else’s belief system that has now infringed on my freedom. Okay, and now it’s telling me that know what you believe is wrong what I believe is right. And if you do what you want to do, you’re wrong and you’re going to be punished for it. That’s basically how my, how I grew up, right. So just angry, angry, angry. So it’s like, what’s the point? Seriously, what’s the point? soon as you start drinking as soon as I started drinking, I could care less. I could care less about the rules, right, wrong. And and what I what I recognize many years later, was that what I did not feel when I was drinking was guilt.
That was the thing. guilt, fear, shame, obligation. Soon as I drank, I could care less. I don’t care what my mother thinks. I don’t care what my father thinks. I don’t care what other people think. It’s not important to me. You know what’s important to me right now. Another beer. You know what’s important to me, that hot looking girl over there. You know what’s important to me. What I
Want.
And so there was that huge giant shift and emotional state just by introducing a substance. And so man, this is this is amazing. Now of course, I can explain this to you now because I’m a coach and because of the coaching that I received, and understanding how the mind programs itself
and so I just was on autopilot. Oh, drinking good. Not drinking bad. That was it. I mean very simple, right? Lots of like a simple. So 10 years later, like I said, in recovery, when I started to, you know, recognize it, you know what, there’s got to be something else because I’m over this 12 step stuff, right? I’m tired of this. There’s gotta be something more. And I started delving into personal development. The first step was to join a mastermind, so kind of like a business mastermind to figure out what I was going to do with my business. And then at some point, I went to an NFL
P workshop and LP stands for neuro linguistic programming.
And I went to an NLP workshop and I said this is the most amazing system I’ve ever seen in my life. It was the most incredible coaching platform I’ve ever seen. It was fast, effective, and went right into releasing negative emotions, right that was part of part of the workshop. neuro linguistic programming neuro means brain linguistic language programming is just the map of the world. How I am program currently to see the world. Once I started doing the work I recognize that went back in time and I was like, Oh my God, that’s why I drank. Oh, that’s why I got into the fight with the guy. 10 years clean and sober. Right? I felt attacked. And I was always an angry kid that didn’t like to be bullied. So anytime. I felt like I was being bullied there came a point where I could bully back
And so whenever I would feel that because all that is a trigger, you get triggered. That’s why people drink, right? They don’t even know you got five different senses. Okay, you can hear, you can taste you can touch you can feel, or you have all these things that happened to you at any given moment you walk into a strange situation a different restaurant, okay, I’ll Park. Okay, a social setting that you don’t know anything. And any one of your five senses can trigger an emotional event that happened to you 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 40 years ago, and you’re right back in there emotionally. And all of a sudden, you’re like, I have no idea why I feel so anxious and uncomfortable in here. Right? So you kind of walk around not, you know, like a loaded gun, and many in many situations, right. So that was the beauty of me learning coaching strategies, right? It’s because what it is, is that things have that and as
The simplest core somewhere between the ages of five and 20, something happened to you a traumatic event of some sort. And that traumatic event created an emotional state or various emotional states. And from there a story emerges.
From that story becomes a belief system. Alright if I choose or decide to believe it, okay? That’s when a limiting belief comes in a limiting belief comes from a limiting decision. Okay, so when I was a kid, I got picked on I got bullied and beat up. Right. So that was a traumatic event from that a traumatic event. The emotions were fear, I feel weak, scared and small. Right. The story is, you’re you’re a weakling, you’re a policy. You can’t defend yourself. You can’t stand up for yourself, okay, you better try you. You need to run away from all Ernie and all confrontations right. And so this
is basically, for some people for for all of us really, right? A root cause event that just plagues us for the rest of our lives. And for many of us, the only way to sue that is through alcohol and drugs. How do you change how you’re looking at the world, when you’ve had it ingrained in you for years and years and years of this is the map of the world. This is how I see things. And then I know people will use that confirmation bias, like we’ll see. And some of my companies with salesman, they’ll have a mentality of I’m unstoppable. I’m unstoppable. And they’ll be getting sales after sales after sales. And then the exact opposite will happen. They’ll, I’m in a funk, I’m in a funk, I’m in a funk and everything that substantiates that claim that customer didn’t purchase. Therefore, I’m in a slump they’ll look away from this customer did purchase you’re not in a slump. Well, that doesn’t fit
model. So this is the excuse for why that doesn’t fit my model. So how do you retrain your brain to see the world in a different light? That’s a great example. That’s a great example because it’s quick. Right? It goes, it can go from one day to the next. Sales is like a roller coaster.
Okay, and you’ve got guys that are rock star in and out, and they’re just crushing it. And then they go on a slump. Okay, and then it’s like, How long before they get back on track? So there’s your focus. There’s your language, there’s your physiology, and there’s your state.
So here’s what happens. guy makes a few sales, right, especially when they’re new. Right? If a guy comes in and he makes a few sales, what’s the story he tells himself? I’m great at sales.
Not only am I great in sales, I’m the greatest human being on the planet.
Literally happened yesterday with our new employees. She got her first sale. And then she got her second. So she’s she’s been with us for weeks. And then we’re going to manage your meeting, the training manager says, Look, just read the script verbatim while I’m gone. And then we come back and she has two sales. And it’s like that’s, you get the confidence from the one. And then your entire map changes. But how do you get the confidence from the one Do you have some experience and suggestions on how to get how to get your win? The thing is, success leaves clues. So I just have to retrace my steps. I got to go back to the moments where I’m successful. So there she is, right. I just made two sales. I’m the greatest salesman in the world. I’m unstoppable. I’m incredible, right? There’s a story because I made two sales. I’m the greatest salesperson in the world. Tomorrow, I come in, I get on the call. Same confidence, same pitch, same conviction, right. I’m ready.
What am I focusing on getting this sale? Okay, what’s my language? My language is clear, confident, concise. Okay, what’s my physiology? I’m up, right? I’m confident, crushing it. Right? What’s my state? Absolute utter focus and confidence. Right? So there it is. There’s your triangle for the unstoppable salesperson, right? And this is somebody who has no training experience or very, very not has training experience, but they’re brand new. So they’ve experienced what we call Beginner’s luck, right? Next day, she comes in all the same, all the elements are the same and get a no not interested.
Oh, okay. Huh,
huh? Okay. All right. Well, that’s cool. That’s cool. I’m just going to call another one. No, thank you. So now I get to nose in a row.
new story evolves.
Maybe I’m not the great
a salesman in the world.
Maybe that pitch, they told me to do it that way, but
maybe there’s something wrong with it. I knew that word right here. That that’s never going to work right now. I’m not going to change this now. Right. And so now I go from focusing on, I’m going to get this sale to
God, I hope they don’t get another. No, I really hope I get the sale right now.
I’m going to change this part of the script right here. I don’t know if I’m ready to make that call just yet. Right.
My focus has changed. My language has changed. My physiology is changed, my status changed. I went from unstoppable to questionable.
Okay, so now, if I can just, if I can just recognize, hey, there’s two possibilities here. All right. There’s two possibilities. However, you had success over here. You had failure over here.
What do we have to do? We have to remember that there was a process that works.
And that in most cases, salesmen are going to get nine nose. For one, yes.
So if you got two yeses yesterday, you got 18 knows ahead of you before you get to the next one. Yes.
So now if that’s my new focus,
my new focus becomes Oh, oh, wait a minute. That makes sense. Okay, so number three, no, all right. I’ve only got 15 more knows to go.
It’s communication. I have to sell myself first. Everything is about selling myself first. So if it makes sense, because the sales manager came in, and it made sense to you that it takes nine knows to get one. Yes. You’ve already gotten your
yeses, which means you’ve got 18 more nose to go. And if you get another yes in the middle, then you better do a celebration because that’s just almost unbelievably unheard of. Right? You’re in the best. That’s, you know, 20% success. You’re in the top, elite 10% of sales professionals in the world. All of a sudden, my focus changes from being a failure because I got to nose to I am 15 nose away from success. And so just that self talk alone plays a giant role in how people perceive the world is building in that buffer of understanding failure and having an explanation for it. Is it just most people, they experience failure and instead of having that built in to their map, they just, they just say, well, this maps broken and I just need a different map. That’s just how our brain Yes, yes, it’s the lack of resiliency. The lack of resilience
is not taught. resiliency is not taught, okay? failure is not acceptable. bad grades are not acceptable. Okay, striking out is not acceptable. Okay? failure is not embraced. Okay instead of this is this is how we teach you resilience this is this is how it goes my friend, this is how it works. Here the brain needs a reason to believe everything is about belief if you I’m sure you’ve heard this quote, whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.
And so everyone has that same opportunity. Oh, I just can’t seem to get sober No matter how much I try. I can’t get sober.
That’s just I’m just programming myself over and over again. I can’t get sober.
I can’t get sober. And inside the subconscious brain goes, man, this guy does not want to get sober. Okay, we’re not we can’t get sober. All I gotta do is change the language. Man. I am struggling a lot. I want to get sober. I mean I really do. I want to get sober really really bad. I want it. I want it. But man, it’s it’s been difficult. It’s hard. Right and and I’ve been struggling a lot.
There’s nothing in there. That is limiting me from trying something new because I want it.
Okay, I want to make this sale.
What do I gotta do? How do I gotta do it? read the script the way we told you to. You’re going off script. Okay, stand up, smile. You’re slumping over your desk. You’re acting afraid you’re focusing on what you don’t want.
Okay, couple of quick adjustments. It’s just it’s all language. It’s when someone’s giving you direction. It’s language. It’s
No different, I just have to give myself the proper commands.
Right to get into state. I am an incredible salesperson. I’m an incredible salesperson, and I know what it takes to make a sale. How do you handle something where so you’re presented this map of here is how you get sober, be at 12 steps, be it whatever method you’re attempting, and say the person tries it one time, and it doesn’t work out. How does the dialogue change? When that happens when there’s immediate failure when they try something? Well, the first thing I asked them to is, what reasons didn’t it work?
What were the reasons it didn’t work? What was it about it that you didn’t resonate with, that you didn’t connect with? Right? And so they give me all the reasons right. So now I have all that’s all language. You know, that whole God thing? It’s ridiculous. I mean, I’m an atheist, right? I mean, I
16 years clean and sober. And I have heard the god argument more times if I had $1 for every time I heard that argument, right? So there’s patterns, it’s a consistent pattern. If you pay attention to the patterns, you start to recognize how you can help people on a higher level. The resistance here is the God thing. Okay, change the word, take the word out, make it something different. Okay, don’t use it
all but if it’s not in there, but then it’s not going to work. That’s your belief system.
You know, I mean, if you if you believe it’s true, then it is.
Why, if I just changed the word, you know what I mean? Like, I mean, like, I don’t know, like, and then the whole doorknob thing that doesn’t make any sense to me. What does make sense to you?
You know, well, you know, my family does.
You know, like, I care about my family a lot.
That could be a higher purpose. See, once you start taking out
The intensity to and the rigidity of it and become flexible. So we like flexibility. The brain likes flexibility. We like flexibility. So it’s like, I don’t like something. Give me the full reasons why. Right? For what reason? Don’t you like the word God? Right? Oh, God, you know, I was raised in this as a Catholic, and I had to go to church every week at this time, and I had to wear this super uncomfortable suit, not choking as a kid and I hated going all the time. I’m like, okay, where does God fit in all this? Okay, so you went into this place, and it was stuffy and you were a funny outfit that your parents made you were and somebody was talking a language out of a book.
Where does the where does like the God come out of all this? Right and what does he have to do with all this? yc you have to blame and all this? No, well, it’s just this. It’s like okay, so maybe could could there be could
there be a difference between religion and God? Maybe? Could there be a difference between like Catholics and Jews? So all of a sudden, what you do is you take this very rigid
belief system
and you throw what ifs at it.
Okay, what it does is it kind of lightens things up, right? And then you start to question, what am I making such a big deal about?
Or am I just looking for something to make a big deal about, so I don’t have to take action.
See, so, all this is when you start throwing what ifs into the equation, and you start asking, you know, so really, let’s go a layer deeper on this for what reason? Are you disagreeing with this or this bothers you? Well, it’s because of this. Okay, so then really, you had a traumatic experience as a child where this event happened, and you create a story. And that story is God is bad
guys
punishes me.
Right? And so now anytime the word God comes up, you immediately direct, you reject the whole process. Meanwhile, there’s 12 steps. There’s 12 opportunities here for growth and change that helped millions of people. But I’m choosing to reject it because of one word.
Wow. Okay, so then what? That’s what I try to do I, we start to kind of just
soften things up, soften things up, allow some, some space and some energy to come in some what ifs. Okay, and so what if we just ignore this for right now?
Let’s focus on what it is that you really want. What is it that you want? Do you want to get sober?
Or do you want to find yet another excuse why you can’t.
So the
are very probing open ended questions that allow people to connect with their subconscious mind. And you just let them sit there.
You come up with the answer. And if it makes sense to you, it will make sense to me. But more importantly, we have to identify what’s holding you back.
And it can’t be the word God because it’s just a little tiny three letter word inside of this literature that’s designed to help you get clean and sober for free. My hesitation in in at first was the whole God thing. I mean, for me, it was, well, I’m smarter than religion. I love the I forget his name, Bill Maher. He did a movie religious where he just basically just dispels any reason to believe in any sort of God and I was just like, Well, I mean,
The whole God idea, it doesn’t really, it doesn’t really add up. And here’s a ton of facts backing up why this is crazy. So I’m on board with you, Omar, it doesn’t,
it doesn’t make any sense. So therefore 12 steps won’t work for me. But the little tweak that bill Wilson put in, in the foundation of all 12 steps is your higher power that you can call God, whatever you want it to be. So it can be karma. It can be the doorknob, it can be anything, so long as it is not you running the show. And with that tiny ounce of willingness, that it doesn’t have to be Jesus God, it doesn’t have to be any sort of belief system that even already exists, is just something that works for you and amorphous
Anything, and then you can go on your way. And I didn’t really believe in it. And my higher power has changed significantly over the past couple years from when I first went in, and I was told you need to pray. And I would lay in bed and say, This is me praying to what my routine looks like now it’s completely transformed. But if I was stuck in the, the label of you were raised Lutheran, these are the rules in order to participate. I would have just thrown the whole thing away because it I don’t want to be told what I believe I don’t want to be told this is how to do things. The whole reason I went to entrepreneurship, is because I don’t want to be told how I’m supposed to be running things. I get to call the shots on my own life and the map that I’ve laid out in the last couple years, it has been I can call the shots and people will
Follow, and it’s going to be mutually beneficial. So my employees who work for me based on the the foundation and systems that I put in place years ago, those people who show up, they’re going to be getting the results they want. They want stability, they want a paycheck, they want to help others. Those are the requirements for working for me and so they get what they want. What I want. I don’t thrive on stability. I love the chaos. I love inventing. I love building. So give me that freedom to choose whatever it is that I want it to be and we can get over that hurdle. That was the huge thing for me because we’re all raised with when you hear God, you think, Christian, you think nails on the cross you think Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and that’s not what any of its about. But people just like you said they’ve been programmed God means
Jesus God means I’m out because I don’t believe in that. But it’s completely different.
Listen, it what you just said there is is. So I mean, like everything I’d already laid out is exactly what I deal with all the time. Right. It’s the rigidity and inflexibility that, because we have to all recognize that the programming has already been laid in. For all of us, the programming is there, the word, the word, God comes up, I’m triggered, the word religion comes up, I’m triggered.
We know this. We have to recognize this and if we choose to ignore that, then we just continue to push people out the door. Well, you have to you have to have a higher power. We have to believe in God and actually in all in all in all fairness, when people come to me for coaching, the last thing we discuss is steps we do knows I don’t do any step work whatsoever. We
I don’t do any traditional sort of recovery pathway, I focus on emotional healing. Right? That’s what I do. I mean, once once the root cause issues are resolved, then all of a sudden, I don’t have a need to soothe anymore. Okay, so if my root cause issue is that I was picked on and bullied as a kid, right? And I feel intimidated, weak, small, right when I’m not drinking,
then me going into a 12 step fellowship to learn how not to drink is not going to prevent me from you know, still being afraid out in the world. Like there’s something still where it’s like, Okay, well, I was in Okay, great. So I feel good about not drinking and using and chances are if I’m in a fellowship, I’m now hanging out with people in recovery. So it’s it creates that safety net. Right? But God forbid I’m at a work event because this is where the relapse has happened. I was at a work event.
We were in Vegas, everybody was drinking. You know, there was some peer pressure. And next thing you know, I am drinking, but what’s really I’m triggered is my childhood about being uncomfortable around people that I don’t know. And there’s potential danger. That’s all I know. That’s what’s being triggered emotionally. Fear. I am afraid. What did I used to do before drink? liquid courage now everything’s fine.
Till you wake up the next day, you don’t remember what happened? You’re outside, you know, in the kiddie pool. You know what I mean? arrested, right? Like, there’s that. All the consequences aside, but the truth of the matter is, until I recognize that it’s like, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. Okay. So that’s what was going on. Alright. So now let’s look at that story. What is the story because of this little event that happened, right, because of this little event that happen
When I was eight years old, I was picked on. I was bullied. I was punched in the stomach. The kid one I lost. Okay. So 48 year old Omar. Right? Let’s say that. Let’s just go back in time. Let’s just float back in time to that event. Okay, so let’s get to that event right now you’re on the playground. And you’re looking down. Right? And you see these two kids on a playground fighting. You’re one of those kids. Right. And you see the situation happening. Right?
If you could be there right now, right?
What does what does eight year old Omar need? Right? Like what would you do differently? Now? If you were right there right now? What would you do differently?
Well, first of all, there’s no way I would have walked up to that kid, right? He’s bigger than me. All right. I’ve never I’ve never been enough.
Fight. I have no idea how to defend myself. Okay, so I probably want to get some, maybe take some boxing lessons, maybe get some self defense, maybe learn how to communicate better, maybe increase my communication skills maybe if I would have walked up to this kid and said, Hey Look man, my sister just came up to me says you’re picking on her. You know me like, what’s up what’s going on? Oh, well she you know Baba Ba ba ba ba all right well I have a talk with her All right, but hey, how about you know, we agree that you know, it’s you know, I’ll talk to my sister you maybe you can leave her alone, that kind of thing. Maybe Maybe I just need some communication skills. Maybe I need some self defense skills. You know, maybe I don’t need to go and defend my sister in that way. Maybe I could just go to the school maybe protecting and defending my sister just meant I should have gone to the principal and said hey, listen, principal. There’s this kid apparently my sister she said there’s some kid that’s picking on her
Anything we can do here? You know that kind of a thing, right? So all of a sudden, it’s like, wow, there’s these all, there’s all these things that I could have done. Right? And so What about now? What are the things you could do now to make yourself feel better about going out into the world? You know what, I could take a Muay Thai class. You know, I could get into the gym and workout more, right? I could get better at communicating with people, right? Maybe I could read a couple books on How to Win Friends and Influence People. Right? Maybe I could grow, become a little better version of myself so I could be prepared for any situation. Right? And so now all of a sudden, we start to immediately take out this whole I’m the victim, this kid picked on me and bullied. I’m weak, scared and small. into here’s what I would do differently. Here’s what I could have done differently. Here’s how I could have looked at it differently.
Maybe,
you know, I don’t know, the kid was having a bad day.
Maybe my sister, you know, took a sandwich and you know, stepped on it or something. I don’t know, I didn’t ask enough questions. So you see, once you start to interject the what if
and actually what you’re doing is you’re interjecting possible new stories.
As soon as you give a story
that makes enough sense.
It could take the place of the current story, man, you know what, dude, I, you know what I mean? Seriously, what was I thinking? I should have done this. I could have done that. And then what happens is I can do that now. And it immediately almost, you drop off the victim suit and you go into action. I am going to go take a class right now. Shoot, I am
Going to go, you know, start lifting weights, I am going to, you know, whatever.
And that’s really what we want to do. We want to create enough challenging opposing stories, and in many and as much as possible, positive, so positive in the future, right and about yourself, right? I could take a martial arts class, I could learn to communicate better. You know what, I will communicate better. I do communicate better. I will take
a self defense. I will join the gym. I’m going to join the gym right now. And boom, before you know it, the story’s changed.
So when people are changing the story, and they have that moment of clarity, I know for a lot of people when when I’m doing business coaching, will will do a lot of dissection on
We’re struggling in this area. Here’s how we can solve it put a strategy in place. And week one on fire. We have this To Do List knocked it out of the park. Andrew, I’m seeing the results. This is great week to put together this plan. This is great. I’m feeling the effects. I got everything done again. Week Three. Yeah, I did most of it. But I missed this one thing, but yeah, man, I’m on fire. And then, you know, we get to like month three. And we put together the plan for that week. And then they’re like, yeah, I didn’t get around to it. And well, yeah. So how do you keep that fire alive for the motivation to change?
For anything, it’s your why? why you’re doing anything. Okay. So the How is it relevant? And
there’s a there’s a gazillion ways of how you can do something about
How you can get to an objective, right? But why am I doing it? You know, why am I in this new career path? Why did I decide to become an entrepreneur? Why did I launch this business? You know, why did I marry this woman? Why did I decide to have children? You know, why am I in recovery? Why am I you know, what, what is my what is the driving force behind what I’m doing? Right? And so, we’re always going to lose momentum, like you say, you go week one, week two, week three, it’s new, it’s like a new relationship. Okay, I’ll get the results. I get this nice boost of, of dopamine and oxytocin. And you know, I’m working with Andrew for the first time and then oh, my God, it’s, you know, like the stuff that Andrews got going for me. It’s amazing. It’s working. Wow. It’s like, boom. So next week, I’m already it’s just like the sales. Right? My brain is already programmed to believe that Andrew system works. So the next week, it’s like, we’re going to do this. Perfect. Alright, great. Blah, blah, blah, blah. All right, I’m fire. All right, next week. I got all these things done, except for one.
story just changed.
As soon as that story changes, and there’s a negative element that it gets introduced, the momentum drops a few.
I felt that as you were telling the story.
Right, right is that person got to that first obstacle that first challenge the first failure? No, I did all that, you know, I got everything else done, but
I’m going to focus all my energy on this thing that I didn’t do or this thing I failed. It didn’t get done. Right. And then the next one, I didn’t do anything.
snooze story of all this like, man. Well, what if I fail again? Well, what if I fail all of it? Well, what if I just don’t do it? If I just don’t do it, I can’t fail anything.
I’ll just take the whole right. But trust me on this one, I tell you, none of this is conscious.
All of this is subconscious.
Cuz you asked him dude What happened? I don’t know.
Oh, you won’t believe the week I had a show busy. Oh dude like, week just filled up man. Wow. Wow I love the I’m so busy like I run for companies and have a newborn but like, yeah, I get it though you’re you’re busy, right well so what you do is the first thing you have to do Why are you doing this? Why are you doing this
man because you know what I, I want to launch this business because I’m tired of working nine to 999 to five, right 10 to seven, right or or 10 to eight. Okay I’m tired of the two hour commute.
I’m tired of working on weekends. I don’t have time for my family. I don’t have time for myself. I want freedom man like I want time freedom and freedom to spend quality time with my family. I will do
You’re losing your focus, if we’re clear about what you want. Okay, then are you getting closer to getting further away? No, I’m definitely not doing shit. I mean, I’m not I’m definitely not getting closer. Well, you just got to stay clear on what it is that you’re going after you’re going after time freedom. You’re going after quality time with your family. Like this exercise. Nobody likes doing it. Okay, nobody likes making courses. Nobody likes launching a new product. Nobody likes all the work that it takes, right? If it was easy, everyone would be doing it. Everyone would be an entrepreneur. Oh, look how easy this is.
There’s no such thing
as easy. There’s just consistency. It’s all it is one day after what is one action that I can take? And if I fail, what did I learn?
But we have to stay clear on why we’re doing this. So if this if this is the driving force, that we don’t want to lose sight of that. No, you’re right, man. You’re right. No, no, no, that’s what I want you right?
Right, you’re right. All right, let’s scale it back, man. Let’s scale it back. One thing, one thing you want to accomplish in the next week, and then we’ll we’ll we’ll touch base.
And so everything is about, I have to find a way to communicate with myself effectively. That’s all it is. All that what we describe their, how they got pumped up and how they fell off is all language. It’s all communication. I am a rock star. I did everything perfect. I failed. I’m a failure. It happens in an instant by one little event, that little event tail spin into I didn’t do anything. And now I’m like, worse off than before. And then it’s like Andrew shit doesn’t work. spent all this money and none of this works.
Everything’s a story all based on one tiny little event that pivots me in a direction because it created an emotional response.
When I got success, there were social responses, positive, exciting. Confidence. I have a failure, I lose hope. I lose confidence. I lose faith, I lose whatever.
And I get demotivated, I lose my excitement.
You know, I guess I’ll try something else. I think there’s also something to be said for when you have a story. And then other people will tell you that is the correct story. So, just for instance, in my own experience, the company I started it was in my living room. We didn’t do a whole lot for year one. We did 36,000 gross. year two, we did 1.75 million. So there was a giant jump from year one in my living room to year to having 30 employees. So the narrative in my head was, I’m this great entrepreneur. I’m this great business owner. And then I started getting
The affirmation from everybody else, Andrew, we knew you could do it. Andrew, you’re so smart. Andrew, you’re so successful. You’re the next insert famous person. We’re so proud of your end. And that’s,
but I fed into that. And I kept doing the same things that I was doing. And I was getting great results. And we were growing, growing, growing. And then we weren’t growing. And the narrative in my head was, well, what am I doing differently? Am I failing and I, I have the, I have the ability to take an outside perspective on my life and look at it in a very black and white almost robot like way. And I know that most people they hate doing that or just don’t have the capacity to see things and I mean, it’s literally impossible for us to be completely objective and viewing our situations. But I feel that I’m better at it than most
And so I then struggle with, I have recognized this is my truth based on this objective observation. And then I’m rivaled with the outside people that haven’t taken the objective look, and they’re still telling me my story of Andrew, you should go on vacation every other month, you earned it, you deserved it. You don’t have to worry about that company. It’s been turnkey for the last three years. And that was the truth. And that was my narrative. And then things weren’t going as great as they were. And so then I’m not only battling with the internal dialogue of I’m this successful entrepreneur, what’s happening but then I also get the outside from everybody else telling me, Andrew, you’re so smart, you’ll figure it out, which is like one of the things that I absolutely hate because I want to get advice. I want to get suggestions. I want to hear outside perspectives. And then when people give me
their advice, you’re smart, you’ll figure it out. It’s like, I don’t need that answer. I need some. Some other advice. I need someone who’s, that’s actually the best one.
The best advice, you’ll figure it out, you’re smart, you’ll figure it out.
kiddo, instead, I actually instead I see where you know what I’m gonna I’m gonna, yeah, I’m gonna elaborate on it, you know? But it’s like, you’re smart. You’ll figure it out. You were smart. And you figured it out right from the beginning. This is your business, your company. You started it. This is your you’re the brainchild. Okay. It’s when other people come in with you know what, I have got this great idea. And maybe you should do this, right? And now you know what? And then this other person comes in and says, No, no, no, no, no, no, I have this other idea. This is what we should do. This is the way we see that’s a whole different thing. Then you have it in you. The answers are inside Andrew.
Connect with the most authentic version of who you are. Because in there is the answers. They’ve always been there. There were the answers that created the business in the first place. Now, when I start drinking my own Kool Aid, that’s when the problem starts. Okay? I am and will always be a firm believer in the spiritual connection. I believe that everything that I’m doing right now is divinely inspired and guided. And whenever there is some sort of inconsistency or something that is wrong, if I were I don’t even know if I like to use that word, if if something has changed. If something’s different now, if I’m going along and everything’s great, but then all of a sudden, something is changing. What it does is it forces me to look at is this the same direction I should be going? Right? I’ve had great success for this long amount of time.
Could I be doing something different? And if I could be doing something different? What would that be? In other words, what conclusions Have you come up with? What decisions have you made differently? Since you were faced with these challenges, Andrew, in your business, that I mean, there’s been so many I mean, just the entire landscape of the remote IT world. It’s a completely different world than it was five years ago when I got in. It was the exact right moment and I had met the exact right people in had the exact perfect acquisitions. And all these opportunities, they lined up with happy customers and just, there were so many things that were going in our favor that were
A lot of right place right time, there were just there were opportunities that you couldn’t pin on anything other than just something higher than me working in my life. For instance, one of our largest campaigns, if not ever, but definitely at that time, I ran into some guy at Dunkin Donuts in December of the previous year. So this is happening June 2015. And December 2014, I bumped into this guy at dunkin donuts. I was there with a friend. He introduced me Hi, nice to meet you exchange numbers didn’t hear from him for six months. And then I just hit a hit a wall in the company. And I just turned it over. I said there’s got to be something else. That guy that I hadn’t spoke to in six months. gives me the opportunity and now
Looking back on it, it’s like, well, of course it was going to work out because all the pieces were in line and we were doing the right thing. But he says, We’re out of business, I can give you this gigantic opportunity of leads. And I was like, well, this is, this is great. And all, how much do you want for it? And this is where this is where I learned the trick of you ask people what they want, instead of offering them what you want to offer. Because I was going to offer him the total value in my brain was about $300,000 for the entire thing. When I done the math, and I said to myself, if he says any number less than 300,000 I’m in and he said 600 and I was like, Well,
okay, and he’s like, okay, yeah, just write me a check for $600 I was like, Oh 600 600 just
600 dot 00 The End. Okay, so then I was faced with this
is too good to be true. Now I talked myself out of it. And I was like, You know what? Worst case scenario, it doesn’t work out best case scenario completely transforms the business. And the ladders What happened? It paid for itself in like three hours and then was 100% profit on marketing for 678 months, zero dollars in marketing costs it was. But that was just a wonderful opportunity. Higher Power, right place, right time, right? People, everything lined up. And I was riding on that. And it happened like, not in that awesome capacity. But similar situations happened over and over over the next couple years. And yeah, I was writing it and the landscape of the industry changed and those companies no longer exists. So we don’t have the ability to get acquisitions. pennies on the dollar.
But, you know, we’ve identified it, and we’re making moves, doing different types of marketing. I know that those days of getting the best possible leads for a penny per name, and now it’s closer to like 50 to $100 per name. I know those days of the past are no longer here, but you know, put one foot in front of the other and as much as I hated that answer just you saying that you’re smart, you’ll figure it out. It it really changes how I look at the situation that’s so fascinating how just in this exchange, I mean, I’ve I’ve heard a ton about NLP and I’m definitely going to be looking deeper into it. And Omar, I want to be conscious of your time. I could go on literally for the rest of my life in this conversation has been so great, provide so much value, where can people
Find out more about you and find your podcast and your coaching.
Well, thank you, Andrew, I really appreciate the accolades. And the thing is that we all that’s the that’s the story that we all need to believe about ourselves. Listen, you are smart person. You can figure this out. That’s everything. That’s everything. The thing is when I don’t believe that I’m a smart person, that’s when I get triggered. When somebody says, You’re a smart person, person, you’ll figure it out. I’m not a smart person. Right? I was lucky. I don’t even know how this happened. I’m gonna lose everything tomorrow. Right? So there’s, I’m attaching another story to that story to that comment, right and all of a sudden, you just attached a different story to that comment, and now has an entirely different meaning and moving forward when you get stuck.
You’re gonna say to yourself, wait a minute, Andrew. Dude, you’re smart enough man. We can figure this out. We always have.
Boom, and you go right into it. And then then the my next step is connect with your higher power.
Right? Like, that’s all I’m going to say I’m a coach, but I’m always going to say that it’s when you work as hard as we do. I know how much work you’ve done, Andrew, and I know how much work I have done, okay, to get to where I am at today. So it’s not the work that we’re lacking in. Okay, so there’s people that are sitting on the couch going, nothing’s happening for me, nothing will. Okay. Faith without works is dead. But once you’re in the trenches, you’re doing the work. You’ve got the years and the experience, and you get caught.
wondering, oh my god, I don’t know what to do. I’m in trouble. Trust me when I tell you, that’s the time where your connection with your higher power is going to make all the difference. Okay, you sit in silence for seven days.
Every morning the answer will come.
Period. That’s all I’m going to say. The rest of it is You can reach me at www dot Omar pinto.com or you type in the just recovery revolution podcast at recovery revolution podcast calm right to listen to the podcast or go to iTunes stitcher Spotify. Good Lord you just go to Google type in the recovery revolution will come up but the easiest way to find me is go to Omar Pinto calm it’ll have where to contact me all my social media, my coaching everything. Awesome. Well Omar, this has been so incredible. I really appreciate everything that you’re doing. And have a great day. I really appreciate it, man. You too, Andrew. Thanks for having me on the show brot

www.TanyaSilva.com
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Sobriety Date: 2006 

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https://www.amazon.com/dp/0743289803/?ref=exp_loc_pl_rushtechsupport – The Hidden Messages in Water by Masaru Emoto

“If you have one option, you have no options”

Check out this episode!

You come from a space of addiction, you are a powerful mofo.



With me today is the diet junkE Tanya Silva, how are you?
I’m great. Thank you so much.
Yeah, I love the the title, you want to give a little background on that?
Yeah, sure. I’m actually in the midst of rebranding mental health through fitness. However, diet junkie was created, actually part of the whole recovery process. And if you notice junkie is spelled JUNKE. And there’s no I in it. So it’s taking the eye out of the ping pong, yo, yo, going back and forth. space of the diet, dieting and the weight cycling and stuff like that. So that’s how that name was created. And actually, how it really was created because I did want diet junkie with the AI in there. But the domain was $250,000. And I’m like, these people are crazy. I’m having dinner. $50,000. So then I was like, What if I take the eye out, because technically, that’s the whole point of it. So then I dip out and it was $9 and 97 cents. So there, he was created.
That’s funny, I had a similar situation with my first company rush tech support. When I was coming up with the name, I just listed out like 100 different names, and then went to GoDaddy, and checked all of them against it. Like I think initially, the name was going to be like, infinity tech support. And it was like $10,000, I was like, let’s try a different one. Now. It’s cool, though, how the universe kind of takes that though, and the symbolism and meaning behind it, where I think having it without the I actually, you know, with the background of it, where you’re taking the eye out of the situation. I think that’s a really cool story. And you can you can just play it off. Like That was my intention all along, not to say
I like to share also like the truth behind it, because like, it’s important that people don’t get so frustrated, especially those of us that are like perfectionist and we want things to be done. 100% is just just keep showing up and just to try a couple different things. And so, I think it’s also good to share, like the truth, bind it to some people like okay, I don’t feel so bad about myself, you know?
Yeah, and I don’t think I’ve ever shared this on the podcast, but the initial name of the show was actually entrepreneurs in recovery. And when I google the name, person who ended up being a guest and introduced me to a ton of people, Jesse Harless, he is a recovery coach, and he owns the domain entrepreneurs and recovery. And I emailed him, I was like, Hey, can I call my podcast entrepreneurs and recovery? He’s like, No. He’s like, well, I kind of have this whole thing started. So what am I going to do? And he’s like, I don’t know, like, figure it out. And I was like, Okay, fine. And I spent weeks trying to figure it out. So the first couple episodes, it was recorded as entrepreneurs in recovery. And then we had called it successful, sober people. And it was kind of a tongue twister. And after I spent all the this time and all this energy for weeks, trying to come up with the perfect name, day after day, just kind of banging my head against the wall. And it wasn’t even like rush tech support. Whereas like, I needed like a $10 domain. I just needed a name that wasn’t taken. And eventually I $10,000
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I wasn’t gonna go that far. We already had the the coaching domain, but yeah, just gave up and I went on Fiverr. And for seven bucks, some dude in India was like, self made and sober. I was like, run it. Let’s do that.
Awesome. Wow, I gotta get on there.
Yeah, so moral, the story, don’t try to be creative. Just spend $7 and some guy in India will take care of it for you. And I’ve gotten more compliments on this name than probably anything that I’ve put together.
You know, it all works out for the best and even for the rebranding of what I’m doing is mental health or fitness. I literally just one day drove to Miami with isn’t our way. And this guy’s like,
I just randomly met this person who’s a producer. And he does film and movie he goes, You are mental health or fitness. And at first I got really offended. I’m like, What are you trying to say? And then I was like, Wait a second, he has something here because I feel like I’ve outgrown diet junkie. And then it just the evolution of the mental health or fitness just came because somebody said something. And it was like, Okay, cool. So it does all work out for the better. It’s wonderful how there will just be opportunities in your life, that it just seems innocuous at the time where it’s just like, someone said this one thing, and then the snowball effect of it. I know for myself, one of the big turning points in my company. Early days, a friend called me I remember I saw the I saw the phone ringing and I was like, This guy always wants something. And I was considering screening it. But I wasn’t busy at the time I answered the phone. He’s like, Hey, I got a job hanging some pictures at this lady’s house. Can you give me a ride? I’ll give you 30 bucks. I was like, Okay, sure. And that woman like completely transformed my business and like, change it from a side hustle to like a real thing. And it’s, it’s wild how these little random occurrences can just have gigantic impacts on everything, the whole trajectory of our life. Like I look at that single moment, as the moment that changed it from just Andrew in his living room fixing computers to what eventually became a company with dozens of employees and 10s of thousands of customers. And just, it’s been a crazy journey.
That’s so cool.
So shifting gears, you got sober in 2006, what’s going on in your life a little before that to make you decide, this is something that I want to do? Or was life just perfect? And you were like, you know, maybe I’ll just try getting sober?
I think that’s a great question. I think what a lot of people don’t realize is addiction is just a heavy attachment to something to get us through an intense triggered emotion. And so whatever that substance of choice is, is really just whatever you find on a cellular level you attached to. And so a lot of those attachments stem from childhood, you know, a lot of the things when you’re a kid, you just don’t have access to alcohol or drugs or large amounts of going to the store and bingeing on food or whatever you’re doing. For me it and most people I think in a space of coming from a space of addiction or heavy attachment is this mental disorders stem from childhood, because we’re not taught how to handle our intense emotions. So when it really manifested into the physical was after I did my first bikini competition, and I had just used food and alcohol and a way to know myself because I had some really got into a space of depression. And so I was healthy. I had competed, I had really leaned out and then all of a sudden after the show, I’m like, Okay, now what, like shit, like, now what, what am I doing, and then it just this wave of depression and anxiety and these intense emotions just escalated. Most people have them but they’re not just face of like a complete, like bam, in your face impact like escalations unless a life event occurs. And so after my first bikini competition, it hit and it does hit for most people. And these are the side effects that people don’t tell you in the bodybuilding industry. And, and I think now it’s more so of an awareness. And so I just like use food and alcohol and numb to myself. And it just kind of escalated. But, you know, it was just because I was never really taught how to handle anger, defeat sadness, anxiety, depression in a healthy way. And so I turned to substance because they gave me that instant gratification, which, you know, to give everybody instant gratification in that time. And so it just got completely out of control for probably a good a good year.
And when you first started, were there any consequences early on? Or was it just sort of, Hey, I found something that seems to be working.
Yeah, so I mean, there’s a little bit more to that story, of course, could be so many different side roads. So um, during that time, also, I was in college, and I played ice hockey for nine years. So I was an athlete as well. But when I had transitioned from being this athlete, that was a part of my identity for so long, I had been had competing and training and then using, you know, the dieting stuff in the bikini industry as that substitution. And then I was like, oh, shoot, now I don’t have hockey, and now I don’t have this. So then, where do I go from there. But also, during that time, what I’m getting to is, I come from a space of family substance abusers. And during that time, my dad had had major back surgery with this back surgery he got, he got hooked on painkillers, oxy cotton, probably cocaine, I mean, I really don’t know, because I was away during that time. So we grew up from a family of wealth, and all of that wealth was then taken from us. So you know, competing, then that hitting then the family crumbling, all the money being gone, there was so many factors happening all at once that I couldn’t understand. And the whole reality was just like taken. So I didn’t really have anything. And the consequence was like, not for the physical space, I had gained, you know, 65 pounds, after people start binge eating what the side effect is, because you fill your body just with so much food that you you literally can’t take on anymore. I then started skin picking to get that form of like, instant relief that, you know, euphoria. And a lot of people that are binge eaters, and like compulsive binge eaters, they actually then have a lot of not acne, but skin picking. So it’s almost like whether it being cutting, which is another form of addiction cutting, or skin picking. It’s still a form of like cutting and self abuse. So a lot of myself was more from a space of that.
So when you’re going through all that in your life, what’s going on in your head? Are you just like, I know, for myself, I was just feeling completely defeated at the end of my addiction and alcoholism and just kind of a what’s the point? What’s going on in your head?
Yeah, so during that time, and like I said, I was probably 1718 years old whenever things really started manifesting into the physical, so still a baby, you know, and and I just, I didn’t know what was wrong with me. I was like, I don’t know what’s wrong, me. Something’s wrong with me. And I tried to tell my mom and she’s like, nobody talked about addiction, even though it was so heavily like my, my grandfather lost everything from addiction, they were super wealthy from alcohol. It was literally a family heritage, I had no idea about and I didn’t even know till probably like, I don’t know, 10 years after of, you know, my own addiction. And I like it was it’s embarrassing, it’s embarrassing. You don’t want to tell anybody, I mean, I’m gonna I’m in a sorority, I’m around other, like females, I’m around people like you don’t want to you don’t want to be seen. You don’t want to be heard. You just want to, like, get into the space of like a hermit and pretend like everything’s like, okay. But I was aware that there was something wrong. I didn’t know because I had never even heard of the word addiction before. And so I remember when I was I went back to school, and I was in school and I went to like a counselor, I was like, I think there’s something wrong with me. And I think the biggest thing is a lot of people go in and what you know, I try to coach people on is like, there’s nothing wrong with you, you don’t need to be fixed, you’re not broken, you just have a toolbox that isn’t in alignment to how, you know, you, you want to function operate and show up in life. And so if you substitute that toolbox with other things that serve you, you’ll be able to function and thrive in life and not be, you know, an addict. And so she gave me this book on mindfulness, and meditation, and that my you know, the way that I started to recover was very unconventional, like I didn’t, I didn’t go like that was the only place really I went to she just kind of and then I started getting into books, as you’re getting into yoga, I always was exercising, I always felt exercise was such a powerful tool, even though my relationship around food and alcohol was very unhealthy and very like abusive. Exercise was just always a tool to still give you that, you know, feel good feeling and reconnect with yourself. And that’s why the whole company model completely made sense when the guy said mental health, your fitness, and I’m like, amazing, you know, like, it really is very powerful.
So what are some of the books that you recommend to your clients? As far as getting the proper toolbox in place?
Well, that’s it’s hard to say it’s like, what’s the best ad exercise? You know? Like, it depends, like, do you have rotator cuff issues? Do you have like hip replacements, can you even get to the ground with your knees? I mean, there’s not, there’s not to say when one all be all because I feel like, especially with my journey, and just also being around other people is that it comes in layers, it doesn’t happen overnight. And it’s about dis attachment, that’s addiction is just about a heavy attachment to something. And if we can just realize that then and we have to in order to be successful with overcoming it, you have to replace it with something of equal or greater value, or else you’re always going to stay in this gray space your entire life. So you there have a red space and grace. See, it’s like a light system. So I say you have a red light, which is like our and addiction and it’s too late, you have a yellow space, which is how most people are operating and functioning these days, like people who don’t think they need help. And then you have a green space and people that are thriving, they’re doing well, they know they’re in control of their emotions, they know how to set set them, like not put themselves in spaces that like will trigger them or they know they’re just in control of their emotions, they’re in there mentally healthy, they’re physically healthy, and they’re emotionally stable. And so um, you know, it’s hard to answer that because I feel like people need different things during different times. But I will suggest that self care has to be a non negotiable. And what I mean by self care is I mean, you need to start exercising exercises main placement is to quiet the chaos of the mind, it’s not even about the body, it’s about taking care of your body so you can reclaim your emotional state. And just quiet that chaos of whatever triggered emotion it may be. Second, you got to clean up your eating. And, and what I mean by this is food can really create mental disturbances as well. And emotional instability, like depression, anxiety, create night terrors affect your sleep. We don’t think that we think about food as like just looking great. And having six pack abs like no man like this is about your mental health, your emotional stability. And it reverses so many mental you know, dis ease is like uneasiness. And then the third is really taking your sleep serious and making it a non negotiable because your sleep affects everything it affects if you have energy to do your workouts, and it affects your your hormones, and it affects your eating choices. So I mean, if you can really get those three things down as far as like self care, you can really get into a space where like, she could just not only function as quote unquote, normal because I know that’s one of the goals for most people coming out of recovery, or like coming out of a day and getting more into recovery. But I don’t even like using the word recovery. I’m like, I’m just freaking thriving in life. You know, I’m extraordinary. I’m because what you say is so, so powerful. So I guess you want to answer your question about a book. Eventually, within my coaching programs, I do always suggest one main book and it is the hidden messages in water. Don’t ask me to how to pronounce this guy’s name, because I do not want to butcher it. But the hidden messages as well in water really is able to take like that fluffy stuff of affirmations and really show how it affects us on a cellular level.
It was that I just pulled up on Google real quick. I think I have the right person Massaro moto.
Yeah, I didn’t say you did not pronounce correctly, that I don’t take credit for it.
I know for for myself. And I know for a lot of the listeners, we’re always looking for, like golden nugget. That’s silver bullet. And I think, in general in life, it’s a lot more about the process and continuing on a journey. More so than Well, I read this book. And now I’m a successful entrepreneur, like I don’t think there’s ever going to be a single book or a single resource, like you said, a single exercise. I think that’s a great analogy. Because I know a lot of times people think they’re just one course away. They’re one great idea away, they’re just one moment. And I mean, we were discussing earlier, there are just completely random events that shift our entire lives. But I’m trying to think in my life, if there was something where I was like, once I do this, then everything will be okay. I know I’ve had that negotiation in my head before. But I don’t know if there’s ever been a time where that is played out the way that I thought it would, I know when I was younger it was once I graduate college, then everything will be fine. And then it was once I get a job, everything will be fine. And then as once the recession’s over, then everything will be fine. Once it’s it was a constant, looking forward for the future. Because once the future comes, then everything will be okay. And in the meantime, I wasn’t putting forth any effort, any actions into changing my current situation, I was just being the victim. And I know that once I got into the self development space, and once I started making an effort on taking care of the things that I can control, and focusing on things like health, wellness, mindfulness, all these things that we’re talking about, once I started making incremental steps in that direction, I feel like it’s a once I’ve been doing this for a couple months, a couple years, I can see a huge difference between where I was when I started, and where I currently am at. But I don’t think that there’s just a I read this book. Now my life’s different. I think that it can be a catalyst. I think it can introduce you to some ideas. But I mean, I’ve read about 5 million books on like business million books on wealth generation, and I’ve learned a ton. But I can’t say that there was any one nugget of knowledge that I read in one sentence, that completely changed my life. So I like that you put disclaimer, on
Yeah, and I think what what you’re saying too, is like the greatest thing about like, when you’re always about when this happens, you’re in a space of futuristic thinking. And when you’re in a space of futuristic thinking, the emotion that’s primarily triggered is anxiety. So you’re constantly in a space of struggling with this battle, the anxiety, anxiety is a trigger emotion, which we want to numb or pacify. And that’s where we stay stuck in this cycle, because there’s got to be a behavior to self soothe the anxiety because people can’t be functioning like that. So they go to pills, or they go to alcohol, or they go to food, you know, food is food is the number one mostly abused substance and you need it to survive. So it’s not like you can just, you know, get off of it. And another thing is, when you get into the space of knowing like the right thing for you at the right time. It comes down to trusting yourself. But we have multiple layers and versions of ourselves. So how can we call we operate from that space of our best self. And that comes from learning how to take care of ourselves. So yeah, you know, but the hidden messages and water just brings insight on we are 70% water, and our words of if you are constantly repeating, I am a binge eater, I am an alcoholic, you’re never going to get out of that yellow space, you’re never going to be out of that vulnerable space, you’re never going to thrive out of your life because say, I am frickin like thriving I am or if you don’t believe that which there was a space where I didn’t believe that and I got angry about it. I’m in the process of I’m in the process of becoming healthy. I’m in the process of becoming building a, you know, seven, eight figure business I’m in the process of, you know, so at least that kind of like that’s another layer of things. But yeah, it’s a trusting yourself to know what you need at the right time. But if you don’t trust yourself, that’s where you hire out coaches that you trust to get you from where you are to where you want to be. And that’s where we come in.
So do you think the idea of affirmations instead of the kind of stop lying to yourself? I know there’s there’s different points of view. And I’m curious of your view on the affirmations. where it’s like, I am 100 billionaire. I am someone that has six pack abs even though they’re 500 pounds and can’t walk? What are your thoughts on the exaggeration, ridiculousness? Because and and I’ll be honest, I’m sure a lot of people know the story, Jim Carrey wrote himself a check in the future. And I think it was like for $10 million. And then on that date, or around that date, he got the role for Dumb and Dumber. And that check was able to get cached. Yeah. And I had done a much, much smaller amount, but a number that I never think thought I’d be able to hit and actually was able to achieve that. And then then the next one that I did, like one year later was 50 times that number, and that that didn’t even come close, and the date came and it’s just like, well, I guess these ridiculous things don’t work. So what’s your view on affirmations? And how do you set them? How do you get them in the right path.
So I think going back to that book will help give insight on like, what happens on a cellular level, most people go around all day really negative about themselves. And there’s my first the first thing that I teach when I work with somebody is it’s called creating your North Star creating your power words. And we narrow it down to five, five represents change. So like in numerology stuff, and there’s truth behind it, because you can’t be at two places at the same time, you have to choose one, most people are so focused on where they don’t want to be that they’re constantly recreating patterns and putting themselves in the same situation, because they’re taking all their passion, all their energy, all their commitment all their drive. And they’re just focusing on spaces of what they don’t want and where they don’t want to be. So the whole concept of affirmations and placing your energy on a space of where you want to go, whether you believe it or not, you’re at least shifting, looking to the left of all of this stuff of what you don’t want and where you’re at and how you hate life and how you’re depressed and this and that, like, Okay, we got it. Like that’s so much energy, passion drive commitment, that if we take that those same qualities that you have, because people have and they’re just focusing in a direction that’s out of alignment to where they want to be, and they place it over to the right, where, okay, let me take all that stuff, which, if you come from a space of addiction, you are a powerful mofo, because you have laser focus, you have this drive, you have this commitment, you just have all these qualities. So you can take all those attributes and generate it to a space, and just create laser focus on that space of whether building a business, or like getting yourself really healthy. And you just generate all that stuff into the other space, like then you can start moving. And that’s why those powerful things happen. But if you’re constantly repeating something, or you’re you’re identifying yourself as something you used to be, there’s no you know, if you think about the word emotion, and you, you separate it from E, and then the M, it’s E, motion, energy drives motion, and that’s how it really is. So whatever passion or whatever you have, you have to drive in a direction of ultimately where you want to go and start focusing in on that. And so that’s one of the first things I get clear on one night when I work with students is we really develop these more stars. And then we look up the words, what am I saying? Is this really where I want to go. And even if you don’t know, and you don’t have that certainty, because most people struggle with certainty and self trust, even if you don’t have that, that’s okay. Because at least if you just show up, regardless of your emotional state, you’re never going to truly know because knowledge comes from experience, the only way to truly know something is by doing it. So by the time you get to that space, then you can make the decision. You know what I thought this was gonna make me happy, but it actually didn’t. But you know what, at least I build up the confidence and self belief that I can actually achieve it. And then I can course correct,
I think it’s a great idea to that. You get the confidence from the experience of doing something. I think it’s like Gary Vee, he says something like, you’re not going to get ripped by reading about push ups, you have to be doing the exercise. It’s not about reading up on how to properly execute this thing. And to do a ton of research. It’s about getting in there making mistakes, in course, correcting exactly like you’re saying, if the person who’s showing you the way hasn’t been there themselves, it’s very difficult.
don’t hire them.
Do not hire people who have not overcome what you are trying to overcome.
And that’s like the basis of 12 step recovery is, Hey, I was an addict. And now I’m not an addict. Let me show you how I did this. And they make an analogy. It’s like you’re down in a hole. And all the doctors, your family friends there at the top telling you, you need to go this way, you need to do this, you need to do that. And another addict alcoholic is the only person who’s qualified to jump in and say, I’ve been in this hole before. Here’s how I got out. And the idea that we’re showing someone the way, when we’ve been in their same shoes, it gets a lot of confidence from that person. Because I’ve had before my wedding a couple years ago, I had spoken to a friend who I knew, and he was a personal trainer. And he was like, Yeah, come to the gym, I’ll get you squared away. And I was like, Okay, cool. And I show up and he’s like, Look, I’ll be honest with you, I’m booked completely, I’m not going to be able to do this, however, talk to this guy. And the guy. He knew his stuff, I’ll give him that, but he wasn’t in the best shape. And I’ll give credit where credit’s due the accountability and the motivation to show up. He did get me the results that I was looking for. But at the same time, it was like, Well, I mean, you, you have the knowledge, but you’re not applying it yourself. You don’t have the things that I want in yourself. And that’s why I think business coaching for myself when I’m working with entrepreneurs who are just starting out. And you know, they’re, they’re in the level of approaching six figures. And they’re in the spot of this is more money than I’ve ever made previously. But this is way beyond anything that I’ve ever accomplished before. I don’t know how to break through six figures, or even start thinking about seven, or even eight. And I’ve been in that exact spot. Yeah. So when I’m speaking to them, it’s not from a place of I read this in a book, go try it and tell me what happens. It’s when I was in your shoes, I was in this hole, here is how I got out. And it’s it’s almost easy to be coaching on things that you’ve accomplished yourself. Because it’s like, yeah, I’m, I’m just re watching the movie that I’ve already watched, I’m telling you what happens because this was my journey. And when the industries are similar, it’s not super, super difficult to recreate results when it’s based on a system. Because we may have different services. But there’s a lot of things that are parallels in a service industry that you can build, and you can scale. And once you get past that mindset of I don’t know how to do this, I can’t do this. But you hire a coach. And they say, I used to think the same way that you’re thinking, here’s what I did to get what I have.
Yeah, and here’s what I see that you’re not seeing. And the good thing too is like, you know, everybody has a road, but within each road, there are and I talked about this in my nutrient like roadmap course that there’s side roads, maybe there’s emotional hunger, maybe it’s a cultural background, spiritual belief system at the genetic, you gotta roll, but you gotta hold these crossroads. And as a coach, and being from that space, I can fast track somebody, you can fast track somebody and save them. If I spent probably $85,000, the last six years trial and error trying to build my business, and certifications, different degrees to enhance my practice and skill set as a coach. And then you get to space, you’re like shit I have to unlearn. I have to unlearn some stuff. But I learned my experience from there. And you can save people so much, you know, people think like, Oh, $2,000 is a lot like $85,000 $2,000 is not a lot. And it took me over six years. So if I can get it get you where you want to be in, let’s say like six to eight months, depending how much reframing we have to do and how much attachment you have, maybe to a year for it to be a lifestyle. And every year, you’re becoming better, and you have the tools. And it’s maybe like a couple thousand dollars, like, please don’t complain to me,
here’s another way to look at it, too. If you want to make a million dollars, I’ve got it, you get a job paying $25,000 a year, you don’t spend a single penny, and in 40 years, you will have made $1 million. There you go, you spent 40 years and you earn that 1 million. But what if I told you, if you spent $2,000, I’ll get you there in two years, would that $2,000 be worth 38 years of savings, to fast track that. And I think we also just as humans, we definitely discount the fact that time is something that is not something we can regenerate. It’s not something that we have an endless supply of. So money is something that is a renewable resource, and it can fluctuate. But time and I mean, if we’re not going to get into like the theory of relativity, and like traveling at the speed of light and all that stuff, but like time on Earth, that every person experiences, it has a start and an end, and there’s no pausing. So if you want to get the results that you want to achieve in as little time as possible, hiring a coach, it’s not only just an investment, but you’re saving yourself, agony, and all of the problems that come down the road and you give yourself opportunity. And it’s a lot of things. I hate diving down this hole, but it’s a lot of the school system, it teaches you go work for somebody else, get a job, get a degree, and then you get into the real world. And it’s like nothing You taught me actually applies to real life. And now I’ve got real life things like a mortgage and credit cards and taxes that everybody experiences. But no one’s been taught anything. It’s like, well, aren’t we going to talk about like dates of the Civil War? Like that’s, that’s what I was taught in school. And it’s like, nope, that doesn’t matter in real life. It’s like, but then why do we spend so much time on it, it’s like, because it’s the school system. But the idea though, that you can spend a little extra money and eliminate headache, eliminate hardship, fast track to where you want to be. And then from that level, you know, if you have a business that’s generating millions and millions of dollars, to get an extra $2,000, is really easy. But it’s difficult when you’re at the beginning stage, and you don’t have the end result, to be able to see down the road. This is what life can look like, this is what life will look like, yeah, invest in yourself.
It’s about the quality of life. And as scary as it is, the more you lean into your fear, the more you build self belief and self confidence. And that’s the main reason why most people don’t step into things. And they do develop heavier addictions and attachments is because of the disappointment not with other people, but with their self. And the more that you actually show up and like we revert, you know, reverting back to the beginning of the conversation is, regardless of your emotional state, you have to realize your emotions are not reliable. And regardless of your emotional state, you have to stay true to your highest self, your best self, that self that you love that you admire that you respect, because it’s in there. But if you show up for that, and you invest in yourself, and the biggest thing which I’ve seen, because I’ve worked with multi billionaires, CEOs, I’m working with professional athletes right now, some a few celebrities with can’t name drop any because I do promise confidentiality. But even these, like billionaires that look like they have it all together, there’s some of the most saddest people. And it’s because they built all this stuff. And they made all this money and, but they have and enjoyed the process and the quality of the life and they and they’ve worked so hard and getting back to the whole self care segment as, as you’re building your your business, you can’t lose yourself along the way. You have to your business is your business, literally, there is no business without you. So if you’re showing up at 60% 70% 80%, even 90%, you’re only doing yourself and other people a disservice. So by putting your oxygen mask on first and and carving out time, like you have to keep yourself as top priority. And what that means is take care of your body. When you take care of your body and take care of your mind and reclaim control over your emotional state. That’s simple foundation.
So what are some of the strategies that you implement for people that say, have terrible eating habits and are constantly stressed, I know now I’m now I’m going to be trying to get it as much as I can. For myself.
So the first thing that I always recommend to people is I have a 21 day habit reframing reset course. And it’s literally just getting on schedule, getting on a sleep schedule, getting on an exercise schedule, and getting on a food schedule. When you have this like platform, this blueprint, then you can plug in the What’s with the platform has to be set in stone, it has to be a non negotiable and you have to think of yourself care as like a slingshot, I’m in this group called 90 x which there’s a it’s it’s going to be huge in the next year, but 90 x planner, their planners, and I’m the self care coach on there. And if you think about it, you’re it’s a slingshot and you pull back in order to scale forward in every other segment of your life. And so it has to be a non negotiable. And I think the biggest thing is just getting in your mind, like I am top priority. And when I when I’m top priority, and I take care of myself, everything else benefits everything else, my my for you for your wife, your kids, your business, your company, every conversation because you’re not showing up tired or burnt out, because that’s actually a whole different subject we can go on, you’re showing up fully alive and and generating energy, there’s power behind your interactions, your workflow, your, whatever you’re doing, there’s energy, there’s a lightness, there’s momentum behind everything. And that comes from you recharging you, nobody else can do that for you. So the first thing is just getting on schedule and making it a non negotiable until you start to prove to yourself like we talked about earlier, just show up. And you’ll see you’ll see that this is truth that that when you show up for you, like you have more energy for like I don’t have energy, because you’re not moving. There’s no circulation, there’s no oxygen flow, your brain is like please give me oxygen, your joints hurt because there’s a lack of snowmobile fluids, like please give me movement because that’s where I’ll heal your body. So powerful, has to be a non negotiable.
So I’ve personally been on a pretty good regimen in the last couple months, my wife and I, we’ve been doing five K’s and other races and stuff getting getting back into shape, eating healthier and things like that. But today, for instance, I woke up, I got ready to run did my morning routine. And it was kind of drizzling. And I talked myself out of it. What do we do on days like that, where today I talked myself out of it. Like that’s the the truth behind it. I’ve got my workout clothes on. I was ready to go. And then it was a little wet outside. And it was like, Well, I guess I can’t take care of myself today because it’s raining. What What advice would you give to if if I were speaking to you this morning at 530,
I would say winning to get you on a program. So the biggest thing to you just like food is you if you only have one option, you have no option really. And you have to have like when I work with my students, we come up with at least four different things to cycle through strength training, I believe to be the foundation because you get to work on the little muscles, you get to work on the big muscles, you get to have mobility functionality, you know, like all that stuff, like I focus more on functional strength training you know clearly work with athletes and but I train people like athletes because the the overall point is for you know you to just thrive. So you have to have options of stuff a home workout, you know, home strength training workout, or if you have a gym membership, you go the gym, but you don’t have to go to the gym to do workouts. I have a whole YouTube channel, which I do 10 minute no time workouts for my, you know, CEOs that travel and they’re like home in the hotel room, I can’t do anything. I was like, Yes, you can. Here you go, here’s your video. You can do stuff. But the and of course, depending on your injuries, things to work around, but there’s so many things and getting back to that is where you say, Okay, okay, I can’t do this. But what can I do? And this is where you have to have that second part of the equation, okay, I can’t do this. But what can I do. And then you create a toolbox, we create, I say the word toolbox a lot, because you got you got to have more than one tool in your box for exercise for food, you know, modalities to help enhance quality sleep.
I think that is the golden nugget of golden nuggets. Like as you were saying that. It’s just running through my brain. And that’s just I think the selfishness of just like humans, for you say, Well, if you have one option, you have no options. And then I’m balancing that against every aspect of my life. And it’s like, oh, my God, that’s, that is so profound. I don’t think I I’ve probably heard it 700,000 times. But just maybe with it raining this morning. You’re absolutely right. There were a million options. My wife has a gym membership. We have a Bowflex in the garage, we’ve got YouTube on the TV for hit workouts and for your no time workouts, which I wasn’t aware of. And I’m going to be visiting immediately after this. Because now I’m pumped and motivated and and want to
I like 10 minutes, I can do 10 minutes.
And that doesn’t only just apply for these micro situations of Oh, I don’t feel like exercising today. But I think of if it goes into my business and marketing and when people say we don’t spend money on marketing, we have 100% referrals. That’s how our business goes. If you have one option, you have no options. If that dries up for an instant you’re done. And I’ve experienced that
Yeah, you got all your you got one side road but what if I there’s a detour and you got one road? You got no side roads? Like how are you going to get to where you want it to be? You got to have options and not just two options. You gotta have multiple options because for example with the one of the lines of the work that I do, holidays happen vacations happen, life crisis happens. How do I keep my people mentally, physically and emotionally and nutritionally healthy and thriving? We got it here. Oh, this is what’s going on. Bam, here you go solution. I got this bam, he goes. And then everything cycles, everything cycle. So
is the key putting systems in place before the stimulus comes. So for instance, if I had my workout Regiment, for I wake up in the morning, go outside and run, but if I had planned before, if it is raining, then I do this. Is that the strategy you have the plan beforehand? Or what does that look like?
Yeah, so getting back to the the 21 day habit reframing like reset kicks, start course wherever people want to use words, whatever word resonates with you. We when we work on the exercise segment, we start to identify the body’s movement patterns. So everybody has a neat movement patterns. And I go back to childhood like did you play any sports when you grew up? Did you? Have you done anything that you were actually really enjoy doing? Like a lot of people you said, I have the hit I have the Bowflex? I have the gym. Do you know how to use the machines in the gym? Do you enjoy using the machines that you know how to use in the gym? Does your body enjoy them? But the Bowflex? Do you know how to work it correctly without getting hurt, and then hit workouts g7 like doing hit workout, you will never catch me doing a hit workout. because number one, I’ve got so many things going on. The last thing I want to do is jumping in an impact. I played nine years of ice hockey, I like gliding and flowing things. I like keyboard work and dumbbells. Every movement coming back to mental health or fitness is connection to breath. When you’re completely connected to your breath, and you’re going through space of an anxiety attack, or you’re getting just base of power, depression and triggered things happen a phone call happens. You know, let me use the most extreme case scenario when a woman gives birth what but besides you know, the epidural stuff, what do you do to prep for it breath work. So breathing connection of breath when you’re doing exercises, and you’re like, I use my breath, like I connected to the whole point of access to connect to that breath. So when you get back to the point of and I’m talking about a lot right now, when you get the connection of breath is more to give you the peace of mind to bring you in the present moment. that’s a that’s a connection to the breath. And you’re like huffing and puffing and doing high intense exercises coming to the to the audience that we’re speaking to right now. It’s you usually you need to calm down. So how do I learn to be comfortable being uncomfortable, you need to slow your breath down. So by doing high intensity stuff, it’s going to increase your cortisol level maybe trigger more stuff. But you know, I could be wrong, each individual’s different. But coming back to the beginning of what’s right, what’s your ideal movement pattern, and then starting to create exercises and options around that, you know, a lot of the things that I do is I get to the core and then to the end, and then we work backwards. So that’s how the toolbox is created.
If you had to pick one or two key things that you have done, that have led to your success, what would you say those are?
I showed up regardless of how I felt,
period, everything that I’m doing, I’m so scared.
I’m so scared. But I know that I lean into it. And when I lean into it, I know I’m on the right track. And anything that I’m complacent with, I know I have to move because I’m lonely. It’s just going to hurt me. You know, I’m not living, I’m settling. And that’s when you really die. Truly like your soul dies. You’re not you’re alive, but you’re not living.
For someone that’s got 13 years sober. What would you say is one of the biggest things that has helped you stay sober all this time.
being of service to others, you have to be of service to others you have when you when stuff is so so intense, you have to number one, take care of yourself, always make that a non negotiable. Never, when you start taking care of yourself, you lose yourself. And that’s when you go down the rabbit hole. So no matter what, but also come to a space of service volunteer my career really, really helped my healing process. Because when I was in that space, I had to decide I’m like, Who am I I’m 65 pounds overweight, I’m struggling with with addiction. I have no control over food, who am I to become a personal trainer, because that’s where I started as doing just personal training, and then end up doing life coaching and made this hybrid of life coaching nutrition and training style and then build online courses and stuff like that. But being a service and coaching, I’m affirming things that I wholeheartedly know, but I have to just get caught up with that. And so put yourself in a space in an environment where it’s healthy for you in the long run. Regardless of asking yourself who am I to do this? It just it will just heals it reconnects you to who you already truly are. Wow.
And what piece of actionable advice would you have for listeners who are trying to improve their business or even their personal life?
One thing that I always say is one of my taglines is self care is the gateway to self mastery, and self mastery when you really master yourself that truly is success to everything in anything that you do in your life. So self care has to be a non negotiable.
Danny have there have been so many gold nuggets throughout this whole podcast? I’m so excited to get this out to the listeners. This has been such an incredible experience. I’m really, really grateful that Michael got us got us connected. And where can people find you online?
So I have a website but like I said, everything’s been rebranded It’s www.tanyasilva.com, social media at diet junkie YouTube, but I do send out free newsletters that are really really powerful every Monday at 8pm. So if you sign into the website, put your name and email, you’ll receive them and then other information they can get from there.
Guys, be sure to check out Tanya and everything that she’s putting out. And thank you so much for being on the self made and sober podcast. I really appreciate your time.
Thank you so much for having me.

Randy Anderson is a person living in long term recovery and what that means to him is, he hasn’t had to use drugs, alcohol or any mood-altering substance since January 10, 2005. Because of his recovery he is able to have healthy relationships, obtain 2 college degrees, own a home, vote and even pay taxes, all those things “normal people” do. Randy recently started his own business so he can help people struggling with substance use disorder in a more non-traditional way. Randy is a recognized recovery and criminal justice reform advocate who has work on legislative issues and assisted in the passing of multiple pieces of legislation.

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And with me today is Randy Anderson. Randy, oh my god, the laundry list of things that you have going on is it is quite impressive. And that’s coming from someone that’s got a laundry list of themselves. But been sober since January 10 2005. Randy, how you doing?

Good. I’m fabulous. I mean, thank you for having me on today. And yeah, I think you just said something like, so everyone I know that works in this space or, or is any way involved in the prevention treatment, recovery side of addiction or the field has a long laundry list. At least those are actually I think accomplishing things. We tend to over commit ourselves. But yeah,

yeah, I’ve I’ve had some people on here where it’s like, how do you want me to even introduce you like, there’s there been some people or it’s just like, all right, best selling author, or that you did 10 years on TV, or that you have an award winning podcast, or it’s like you’re, you’re doing too good, you’re crushing it too much. So let’s get into what was your background like what, what caused you to get into recovery, everything’s good. And you decided I should get sober to what’s happening in 2005?

So, so first like to start, I just start by saying My name is Randy Anderson, and I am a person living in long term recovery. And what that means to me is I haven’t had to use any drugs or alcohol or mind altering substances, mood altering substances since January 9 2005. And because of my recovery, I’m unable to do things that I never even thought were possible. But more importantly, I have health relationships. I vote I own a home, I pay taxes, I do all those things that really normal people do, which is something that I hadn’t done in my active addiction very much. So for me, that’s really the important stuff. But how it happened for me is I think my story isn’t different, that different from a lot of people. I mean, I remember getting drunk for the first time when I was like 14 years old. And I remember how that moment is pretty clear to me that it it helped Medicaid or take away the pain that I felt, I had a I grew up in a very abusive household. I love I love my father now, but unfortunately, he grew up in a farm and, and where children were treated differently, I guess I could say, I was abused physically, emotionally, mentally, just about other than sexually, thank God, I’d never had that occur. But every other way you can imagine I probably had some abuse from my father. And it really didn’t know it, you know, as an adolescent, the damage that causes then you find something like liquor or alcohol, and all of a sudden, you have a blackout incident and you realize that it took away some pain, right? And I think that was probably the triggering moment where like, you know, they say one in 10 people have this addiction thing in their brain. Well, I think that was for me the light switch. Like once that turned on it started that path. And of course, I progress there to marijuana. I my late teens, and then I met cocaine in my early 20s. And that was what really did it for me. Once I was introduced to that drug, there was no going back. No other drugs really mattered to me anymore, although I tried probably everyone under the sun. But the one that really did it was cocaine. And that progressed pretty quickly. To where near the end of my addiction career. I was I was using or I was spending about $1,000 a day on cocaine. I was using talent bad. Yeah, right. I mean, and I don’t care what you do for a living, best paying job in the world. You can’t afford $1,000 day cocaine habit. I wasn’t by rich by any means. But I had a very successful small construction company, I was doing a lot of a lot of great, you know, construction work and making good money. Eventually, that went away and stopped working and stopped, you know, maxing out credit cards and selling off equipment and whatever it took to get money, and eventually came to the point where I was no longer able to find my addiction. And so for me, there was a point where friend of mine gotten a lot of trouble with some really bad people. And I was able to bail him out. And though that turned me into a drug dealer. And really overnight in the last year or a year and a half of my addiction, I was selling drugs primarily as my as my income. And I was paying my bills with it. I was paying my mortgage with it, I was paying my loans off. Even paying taxes with drug money. Because Funny enough, the thing I was most scared about is I didn’t even like wasn’t even scared of selling drugs to getting in trouble. I was more scared of getting audited by the IRS.

That’s Capone.
That’s how they got him.

It’s funny, I’m a huge fan of the mob. Like I’ve like that’s one part of history I’ve always loved studying in the technique you get Capone on was tax evasion, right. And so I don’t know why. But that stuck in my head, stupid, stupid thing to think about. But it was my like my biggest worry. And so anyway, so eventually, you know, did that for a while. And one day, you know, I was buying drugs from a really bad group of people from Mexico. And they had said to me, where where we’re taking a break, we had been informed that we might be getting some heat. And so they laughed, and I was I panicked, like, and I didn’t care about the money. Like I didn’t really care about selling drugs to people like I could care less I needed my drugs, I was using 10 to 14 grams of cocaine a day at that point. And there’s no way I could go without a heavy supply of my drug. So I just started finding other people, I start making phone calls. And I found someone that a connection that a friend of a friend knew from guy from California, give me the amounts that I would need to survive. And that led me to within a few weeks being rated by a DA Task Force.

Isn’t it crazy? The amount of resourcefulness we magically have when backs against the wall. Like there’s so many entrepreneurs that are like, I can’t land my first client. I can’t figure this out. I don’t understand SEO. And it’s like, well, if you have $1,000 a day cocaine habit, and your source gets cut off. Look how resourceful you are. How long did it take you to to figure that out? 48 hours 48 hours back against the wall when you have to make it work. That’s what a lot of people need back against the wall. I’m not sure if you’re familiar with the book profit first. I’ve read but I’ve heard of  I think his name it’s a weird pronunciation like Mike mech mccalla with something along those lines. But basically, the idea of the book is you get your money from sales. And then twice a month, you put a you put a portion away into a profit first account and a tax account. And it’s money that you can’t touch it off on the side, but you have to make do with what’s left. So it forces you to be profitable. And it forces you to have your back against the wall. So this is essentially what you’re doing with your cocaine habit except for it’s a little different in here situation. I don’t know if if people would shine in as wonderful of a light but I like to look for silver lining and things I can see a $250,000 a year habit or I’m sorry, 365,000. I was thinking business days. But you did you did cocaine on nine business days as well. Right holidays too.

Yeah, no, it’s absolutely true. And you know, it’s funny, I was a I’m a very good I’m a very good salesman, like everywhere I’ve ever worked in sold stuff since I was 20 years old. I’m done extremely well, my first year out of prison. I made $106,000 in home, and I was working as a home improvement salesman. So you’re absolutely correct. Like I, as a counselor, I always tell clients, like if you can transfer those same skills into like, I always make a joke that I was in pharmaceutical sales for a while. But it’s the same thing. It’s like it’s absolutely so yeah, 100% those lot of those skills that we’ve used to do at the illegal activity are completely transferable into a legal business. That’s the best part.

Yeah, some of some of my best salesman of all time. I mean, you look at them, and it’s like, tattooed up and down in juvie tattoos on the face. And it’s like, over the phone. This guy is the smoothest talker in the world. And as long as we’re not doing zoom calls, video chat with the customers, it’s just like, oh, Stephen, such a nice guy. And it’s like, I mean, he is nice now that he’s sober. But I mean, it looks a little rough. But I mean, understanding that resourcefulness. And you’re exactly right. You can transfer that type of personality. It’s not just a one to one. It’s not just, I need drugs, I’m good at getting drugs. But if you set a goal, and you need to hit it, and you’re relentless about reaching it, that’s a very good strategy, not just in sales and sobriety, but just all around if you’re, if you’re shooting for something, that’s a really good strategy, do it like you’re going to die if you don’t
know 100%. I mean, it’s a Yeah, so then I got so anyways, I started selling and I got raided by a DA task force, which led me down a whole different road. I when I think about that particular day, very emotional. I remember that morning, I went out to buy my sister a new one more she had called and one more broken, I had a lot of cash. So I’m like, no problem. I’ll just go buy your new landmark go to Home Depot buy a lot more when assemble it came home. And as I pulled into my parking lot, I got surrounded by good 10 or 12 vehicles. And of course, they were DA all over their bulletproof vest and guns drawn and police dogs and all that stuff. And I went up to a brick, they called me up to my condominium where they were already done pretty much searching it and locate all the drugs. And you know, of course I smart enough at that time, probably where I just said, you know, they are threatening you, you’re going to get five years for this five years for this five minute laundry list right off the bat, you’re looking there, you know, my tender done, you’re looking at telling you like you’re going to serve 25 years in prison. And you’re not that first words out of my mouth. After all that was like, I would like to see a lawyer. And then and then that ends the questioning. However, though, so, you know, I always say, fast forward through a few things. They did allow me one thing I remembers, I got to go to treatment while I was in it. So I was on pretrial release. And my sister had said, Hey, you should go get a real 25, which is an assessment tool in Minnesota to get treatment. And so what is that, you know, so they came to the jail, they did an assessment, they referred me to a treatment program. They let me out of jail to go to treatment. I wasn’t a role model client, I relapsed on drugs, the treatment center at high and the treatment center, I got sent back to jail a couple times. I broke all the rules. Except for I didn’t mess with the female clients. That was one rule I just lying lower for whatever reason I knew I shouldn’t ism.

Isn’t that the whole point of rehab to bring drugs to people? I mean, that’s your that’s your target demographic, the people that want to get clean, but are still kind of on the fence. I mean, you’re basically shooting fish in a barrel at that point, but not hooking up with clients. You’re not taking. That’s what everybody does. I mean, my my story was different than that in treatment. But I mean, that was pretty much what everyone was doing. I digress. So you’re going through and you’re selling drugs,
I was drugs back to get high. I did take another client down with me. I had a roommate and purse. I told him I had these drugs and a lot of a lot of bad things led up to this, like I got a vehicle stolen, and I just decided I got the efforts. And like whatever, I’ll just get high. And so I one thing I didn’t do, I didn’t sell drugs, but I didn’t bring a significant amount of drugs, the treatment center. And of course we got I got caught my took my roommate down with me. We got i got i got i had to send it. Here’s the funny thing of that. So that was Sunday, Tuesday, I had sentencing for my for my federal case. And I go to the courtroom and the judge says, Hey, hello, Mr. Anderson. I heard you had a rough weekend. I’m like, Wow, he knows about this. I didn’t know they shared that information, of course. And so he said did you take a ua when you got here as did he goes, you know the results? I don’t. He says well, you tested positive for cocaine and because of that I’m not going to allow anyone under the influence of a substance to sign any plea agreement. Mr. Marshals, will you please take Mr. Anderson into custody? they arrested me right there in the courtroom. Wow. Like no way did I know that was going to happen? I was all prepared. And now that I work and treatment I know how that works. Like that happens. Like that’s what happens right? So anyways, uh, eventually though, I you know, I remember getting released and I got assigned to a new counselor. And I’ll never forget, this is probably the day that I decided to at least give recovery a shot or sobriety however you like to word it so I was in the UAE bathroom at the same treatment center. They let me come back to the residential program. And Senior counselor gentleman by the name Mark Lindgren, amazing man who’s been to prison and done like his story is like you think your stories significant and to hear someone else’s story you’re like, holy crap. So I know he’s He’s worthy you a bathroom, it just starts ripping into me like you’re the dumbest mother ever I’ve ever met. You, you what you have a federal case pending, you got a state charge. You’re bringing drugs to a treatment center. You’re taking clients down with you. And this goes, You know what, I don’t know why I’m wasting my breath. Because this recovery ship isn’t for you. And I thought that was the that was the line that changed it for me because so I’m very competitive. I grew up in I grew up in an athletic household where my dad would say things to me, there’s no such no one remembers who won second place and second places for losers and all that stuff. So that was kind of the Father switch, he clicked in my head, like, Don’t tell me what I can’t do. And so I decided, like, I’m just going to start listening. And next thing I know, I was like doing recovery. The unfortunate thing was, after all that, and I completed about 10 months, I will say it took me 10 months to complete a 60 day program. That’s what I supposed to go to treatment for Ms. 60 days, but overall, it took about 10 months, which is really when people need and I remember they’ll go into sentencing. And this is probably by far the worst day of my entire life is the judge says, you know, Mr. Anderson, I see they’ve completed treatment. And you know, I’ve got a lot of letters from community members, you’re you know, you’re volunteering here there go stuff for the all those good reasons, I’m going to give you a break. Today, I’m going to sentence you on the lowest level of your of your of your level, you know, lowest month on your level, and those of us involved with the criminal justice. And there’s a staircase that we all very intimately familiar with. And it’s the sentencing guidelines. And he says I’m going to send into the 87 months in prison. And I thought wow, so I’m I’m a first time nonviolent drug offender with no criminal history, and you’re gonna put me in prison for at seven months. I mean, those, like, I just couldn’t believe it. And that was probably Yeah, that worst day I call I remember leaving there and calling my counselor and saying I’m done when you’ll get high. And he convinced me to come to coffee with him. And I knew I shouldn’t have went because I knew he’s going to talk me out of it. And he did. But I stayed sober ever since I’m tick. Yeah, what right? I know, I just wanted to go like, honestly, I mean, I’m not I hit. I was like this could end my life. And I really wouldn’t get to that point. I mean, really, I’m not gonna go to prison for seven plus years. And like, What do I care? Like, what does it matter anymore? But he convinced me otherwise. And thank God he did. And I’ve been, you know, in recovery sense. And fortunately, I had to go to prison. And I always say, I was fortunate I only served just a little under 16 months. So just a little under five years. When I was think back, though, I mean, my maximum sentence for all the felonies for the three felonies was 156 months. So to serve just under 60. I probably say it’s a blessing. And if people are like, Are you kidding me? I’m like, I’m not like I’m lucky back then. Because it could have been way worse. And However, no now so I worked with criminal justice reform. I’m a board member for the Minnesota Second Chance coalition. And I didn’t realize the racial disparities that exist until you know, I saw it in prison but I wasn’t it didn’t make sense to me like why are people with the same exact or similar crimes as mine, however, they’re not white. Getting they got the hundred eight months, like I got the 87 months August, the same bracket, but they got the pitch just basically because they were black. So I was saying thank god, I’m wife. I mean, that’s probably the reason why I didn’t get even worse, because it could have been way worse for me. But yeah, so I didn’t prison. I got out and I started to get my life back. You know?

I just I don’t it’s funny when you’re in prison. There’s a lot of doom and gloom and they tell you just expect less. You have three felonies now you’re not things are going to be more difficult for you. You know, and I’m, like beat both crap. I don’t expect less like I shoot. Hi, I’m a classic overachiever. Right? And, and I I started I got six I was successful. I did that not a prison, I had to take a telemarketing job and more very humbling to make be in your 40s making 850 an hour sitting sitting at a phone for eight hours a day making appointments for sales guys, which that used to be me, like, so here I am. I did it as a requirement of my halfway house. And once I did finish that I got it back into sales and was successful. My I wasn’t wasn’t my wife wasn’t very fulfilling, but I was paying my bills and getting my life back. Then one day I just got, I was at a job and another I switched jobs a couple times I was doing well. But the owner and I got a little disagreement. He fired me. And that was a eye opener. I’d never been fired from a job in my life. And that’s something my lovely wife said maybe it’s time to change paths, like so that’s when I enrolled in college. I will say the second scariest day of my life, was driving a college. The first was driving a prison. I was 43 years old. I thought there’s no way I have a GED that I got was incarcerated. There’s no possible way I can go to college and be successful. Well, I you know, I’ll say God, and whatever your God is puts people in your life. Sometimes they have more faith in you than you have in yourself. I’m lucky I’ve had a lot of people in my life like that. And my wife is one of those and she knew it. She knew I could be successful. She pushed me she she I will say she coerced me or convinced me that it may be carbs Good idea. But I went and I completed five years and got two degrees and licensed com drug counselor and but going to college is probably the biggest thing that ever occurred to me, I opened my world up to things like criminal justice reform and the recovery community and just a whole host of things I don’t think I would have ever had access to had I not went to college. To be honest, I think that was a huge change for me. So I was a really quick overview of like a seven year span. But that’s kind of what what it was likes. And that’s and today I get to do really incredible things. I mean, I’ve led route March marches and rallies in front of the White House and in front of the Health and Human Services Building in washington dc in front of Purdue pharma headquarters in front of the Arthur Sackler museum and the Smithsonian if I mean, just like things like really, that’s my life, like I if I’m work with Senator Amy clover chars in her office, and she was the prosecuting attorney for my state case in 2004. And she and I used to hate that woman, her signature was all about seizure papers. And now I work closely with her to try to help pass new legislation, I detected an opioid epidemic and like, Wow, really, this is my life. I mean, I sit on credible, so on board for my local sheriff. So the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office, I’m a community advisory board member. And we are at our first meeting about six weeks ago. And we are taking photographs for our ID badge to get in and out of the building. And I shared with my board members that last time I was in this building, getting a photograph taken, I was being booked into custody. And now I’m taking taking a photograph to get in and out of the building. I mean, really these this is like, oftentimes, I think it’s just this is a really a dream. And I’m just like going to wake up and none of it will be true, honestly, feels like

I have I have a friend who he was he was I forget what the the position was. But he was basically at the ribbon cutting ceremony on a new prison. And that night, he was the first person incarcerated in that same prison.

Yeah, so fast forward a bit to where we’re at today. I’m curious, what does your morning ritual look like? Is there any sort of routine that happens?

Whether I like it or not, I’m usually up by about five or 530. That’s why I’m usually in bed fairly early. Because if I go to bed at two in the morning, or nine at night, I’m still waking up at five or 530. So to get my sleep, I try to be in bed well for 10 o’clock. Anyway. So I get up and I get my coffee. I actually and I jump right on in my laptop, almost the first thing I do every morning is I do run seven social media accounts. So I get on there and I check the alerts. I see what’s going on the news. They know of course, I get my Google alerts for my, the washington post stuff. And I have like setup for of course, I as many of my friends know, I’ve been adamant about organizations taking pharmaceutical money. So I have Google Alerts set up to alert me of anything new information that might be coming out. I kind of check those alerts a funny thing that one of my friends favorite rituals every morning as I go on my Facebook and I I wish everyone that’s birthday is that day a happy birthday. Like no matter what, with how well we know each other not, not, you know, you’re 4700 friends on Facebook, but it’s, you know, 10 to 15 people every day, that’s their birthday. And I just think it’s really cool to start the day with like to say, hey, happy birthday, and then I and then you know, feed, take my dog out quickly. And then I just get you know, I have like somebody else I’ll get paid for a lot of the stuff I do. Because right now a lot of it’s just voluntary, but I that’s how that’s how my day starts every day. It’s just really right here, right where I’m sitting right now for the first couple of hours returning emails, checking social media alerts, seeing what’s happening on in the world. And that’s how I spend the first couple hours almost every day.
So with all those things on your plate, do you have any sort of tools that you use for your productivity? Or is it all just up in your head?

Yeah, it’s mostly up here. My it’s funny people also really good friend of mine channel, Donal, who we were together for a couple years. He’s Ryan Hamptons, a partner. Sean is one of those really organized guys that has like those kinds of things you’re talking about. And he’s tried to get me into using that. And it’s just I don’t know, how, you know, like Hootsuite and things like that, like, all the time, like you should really I’m still haven’t done it. Like, I just still keep doing it just on the fly and out of my head.

Yeah, I have a just a reminder each Monday to fill up the buffer queue, but buffer Hootsuite, it’s all the same thing.
It is and I probably should learn because it’s probably going to probably make my life a lot easier. But well,
the the idea behind it is that you’re bashing all of the all of the work that you’re doing. It’s just bashed all at once. So you could sit down for an hour and set up all seven social media accounts for the next week or two weeks. And then all you’re doing is just responding to the responses from the people that see it. And as long as it’s not time sensitive. And I mean, it depends. I mean, if there’s breaking news, obviously, this strategy doesn’t work. But if there’s like a rhetorical question that that’s trying to get engagement and things like that, that’s that’s one of those things, but everybody’s got their own path. But I’ve I’ve been a fan of buffer for the last couple years. And someone someone else had told me they’re like, yeah, Facebook punishes it, and you need to be doing it manually. So neither here nor there. I mean, everyone’s got their This is the rules, or it’s not the rules or
the night. The nice thing is I mean, honestly, so when you follow folks like Ryan Hampton, on Facebook, or other people that are really socially engaged, they post great content, and you can just steal it all the time. I mean, honestly, and it’s not I mean, it really that’s what that’s an easy strategy, like, Are you certain pages that have the information I need for my pages? I just follow those pages. And they’re posting daily all the time. So like, Oh, great, I’ll just share that to my page. And I don’t know that that strategy has been working, I probably could find more efficient ways for sure.

Just like everything in life, but what are some of the routines that you have just in your day to day that kind of guides you through? Or is it all just like you are on top on fire? 24 seven.

So what I really like to do is every day, so I mean, I am, you know, a four or five times a week, I’m having some type of lunch or coffee with people in the recovery community, like just to stay engaged, can see how I can get them engaged. Because there’s, you know, I don’t know if I it’s like, people ask me all the time, I don’t have a set routine. It comes to me. I mean, it’s I’m scheduling like funny things when people try to schedule a coffee with me right now. And I’m scheduling three weeks out to have coffee with somebody because that’s how my crazy life is like, my Google calendar is just ridiculous. And I’m like sign the calendar doesn’t exist for me in my life. My wife and I made that agreement. So but it’s just really I’m like, I’m just always mean things that are important. So I know one of the things I just said part time gig I just started which I think is really cool. So I’m the peer recovery specialist for the Ramsey County treatment court, peer recovery specialist supervisor for the Ramsey County treatment court. So that’s a specialty courts, which drug drug courts, I don’t like calling them drug courts that I wish they were called recovery courts myself. But that’s really cool. I mean, in 2004, I was a participant in the Hennepin County drug court. And now I’m a supervisor. Hennepin County is our largest county, Ramsey County is our second largest county. Now I’m a supervisor in one of those same courts. It’s like really, is this another one of those full circle moments? like are you kidding me? I was one of the kids, the kids at baseball camp that like become the coach.
yeah, so uh, but so that keeps so I have that twice a week now. And I know my local our CEO, Minnesota recovery connection, who I love and I’ve been involved with since I went College in 2014. I do use they have a free space. So I do a lot of stuff on the other side of the river. I call them in Minneapolis there in St. Paul. But a lot of my stuff occurs in St. Paul. So I’ll just go over there and hang out for a couple hours and return emails and just kind of get the just the, for me being in that space when the and I know it’s all recovery orientated. And it just feels good and it feels at home. I don’t know if I have a specific routine. It’s kind of me, Mike, if I look at my calendar, now my dislike this week is other than today, I’m a dentist appointment, which I am scared to death away. But my week is already booked out like I have everything scheduled. And there’s not I don’t waver from that schedule. A lot of my something cancels or like that. So that’s kind of maybe that’s my routine. It just getting my week scheduled in advance.
Yeah, I was just gonna say I mean, if we dig a bit like your tool that you use is the calendar.
My wife and I, we have an agreement, like both of us, if it’s not on the calendar, it doesn’t exist. And so, uh, that’s I mean, we obviously share our calendars. But that’s super important for our lives. Like, if anything, even if it’s even if it’s going to dinner, we make sure it gets on the calendar. So it’s definitely blocked off. There’s no question, neither must schedule something over it, blah, blah, things like that. So yeah.
So do you have any books that you recommend to people for trying to either improve their lives or good resources for recovery?
So I mean, at first, it’s enough, I say, I have the attention span of a gnat. And I don’t like to read i a lot. So I shouldn’t that’s so bad way to phrase that I don’t like to read books. I read tons of articles every day. Like I bet if if I put together all the articles I read the day, they’re probably equal some type of book. I just can’t sit down and read like a book. I love audio books, like if it’s an audio Great, so they’re obviously so I think the one that I want that I’ve heard or listened to recently that I Ryan Hamptons, book American fix. Like if you haven’t read that. It’s not only talks about the opium epidemic that our country is facing, but it talks about the addiction crisis, because really, like, I know, we’re hyper focused on opioids right now. And I get that, you know, with 70,000 people dying every year, we should be hyper focused on opioids. But we really have an addiction crisis that we can’t once the once we solve the opiate epidemic, and we will, because we’re a smart country will figure it out where we at, there’s already a meth epidemic that no one’s talking about. We’ve had an alcohol epidemic for how long we have a pornographic epidemic upon epidemic repeat. You know, we have gambling problems. I mean, so we really, I think, as I we need to figure out the addiction thing better, like we don’t, and I’m, you know, I’m one of those I pushed back against the treatment system a lot. And even though it worked for me, what currently some of our systems, but I’m sick and tired of blaming the client or the patient for all of our misfortunes. Like they haven’t hit bottom yet. They they’re not ready like bull crap. Like we’re saying those things. We’re killing people, like what am I doing wrong as a as a coalition? And what is my What is my program during doing wrong as a programmer, we can’t get these people that help they the proper, the right help they need. So not not saying as a person you had don’t have some personal responsibility for that. But we as an industry also have a responsibility for that. So I think Ryan Hampton, his book, American fix talks a lot about that. And I think it’s a great read, if you haven’t used it, everyone should check it out.
And I’ll be sure to have the links on the show notes afterwards. For anybody that’s looking to check that book out. And I know I’ll be doing it myself. So I mean, we touched briefly on the system itself needs to be tailored better, but if somebody is in recovery, or new to recovery, what strategies would you recommend that they take in their own hands to get sober?
Yeah, so I mean, get connected, I think I mean, you know, I’m not a, I don’t like john Hardy’s title, the what we thought we knew about addiction, we’re all wrong. That title, it’s not true. We do not like about addiction, and it’s not all wrong. But what I do agree with him on is the opposite of addiction is connection. And you can’t, what happens in early recovery. So we come out of treatment, or whatever help we got, and we have this recovery bubble where all of a sudden, wow, everything looks, rainbows and butterflies and all this stuff. And then it dies off quickly, right? And our life starts to go back. And all of a sudden, we’re bored. And we don’t know what to do. So and the problem is because we’re not making new connections, like we’re not becoming connected to those recoveries resources, like there’s tons of in today’s world, there’s probably parts of the country where it’s not great. It’s like, I have a friend in Montana, who complains all the time. But here like in Minnesota, we have an amazing recovery community that is even get engaged to but it’s not going to come to you like right, you can’t just sit there and wait in your living room or your your at your desk and like, Okay, come come to me now. No, it doesn’t work that way. You have to go get it, like just like you did for your drugs, or alcohol or whatever it is, you went and sought it out. Yeah, do the same for recovery. Like, and it doesn’t take as much effort is getting high. Because let me I mean, until we all time getting high for me was a was like two full time jobs. I mean, you know, procuring drugs, getting the money for drugs, buying the drugs, you know, whatever, all that stuff, like, you put half of that energy that you use to to end your addiction into recovery. And it’s actually pretty easy. So I tell people just get connected, like, go like, go go to, you know, so me, I’m a little look, I like going to the capital, if I’m really bored. When that when it’s legislative time, I’ll go sit in the hearing, like I’ll look at the hearing loss for the day, Oh, this looks cool. I want to go learn more about this. It will send me here your own. But that’s I’m as an advocate, like, that’s, that’s my recovery is like I love advocacy. So I mean, I just it just whatever it is for you. But you got to find it, you got to find it early and quick. Like but get connected, there’s plenty of opportunity, at least like I said, in my area, there’s a lot but
you can’t just sit back and wait. Not to mention also like if someone’s interested in 12 step recovery, like the whole premise of all of it is making people feel welcome so that they can get connected in different groups have different philosophies and stuff. And some, some are more welcoming than others. And some but I mean, I’d say in general, you go to a 12 step meeting. And if you raise your hand and say, I’m an alcoholic, I have no friends, I need help. The response will be at least nine times out of 10 will be people coming up to you and offering help. Here’s my phone number. Do you want to get coffee? That’s great that you’re in recovery? Do you have a sponsor? Do you? Do you have a big book do you have whatever the case is. But that’s been my experience in 12 step recovery is people are very, very willing to help, especially the ones that have good recovery. So it also weeds out because the people that have kind of shoddy kind of just show up and do whatever recovery, they’re not the ones who are offering to help the people who are in need of help. So look, literally by surrendering, you win. And I think that’s that’s great, great advice. Get connected. That’s the way that you can grow your network. And, you know, being able to pick up the phone and call somebody who has the experience that you do, because I’m sure a lot of people who have been to prison, they’ll they’ll get out and be like, nobody understands my story. And then you’re like I do yours. Here was mine. And this is what I did to get out. Because we’re the only kind of people that somebody down in a hole. And they’re trying to get out all the doctors family, they’re all the top giving directions. But the addicts alcoholics were the ones that jump in and say I’ve been in this hole, here’s what I did to get out and taking people through. I think that’s, I mean, that’s the whole basis of all of it. And moving moving forward, though. What’s one thing that a business owner, entrepreneur, someone who’s working their way up the ladder? What’s one thing that they can do that by doing it will make everything else easier or unnecessary?
Ask for help. Ask for help. Serious even in my business like so I’m lucky I over the last five years or so I’ve been doing the work I currently am doing. I’ve I’ve amassed an amazing network not only locally, but nationally. And when I need something, someone in my network knows it like it’s just and I’m not afraid like honestly, if I am looking for something, I’ll just throw it on Facebook when they say hey, I need this. Who can I need a bookkeeper for whatever, it’s in 20? In second in seconds, you have 20 responses, like oh, yeah, here’s here’s a person or here’s the issue. Here’s a connection here. I mean, don’t but don’t be afraid. Like if you don’t know what it’s okay. Like, there’s people that do though that’s the best part is like asked for help no matter what it is. I don’t care. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Don’t let your ego getting away. Are people you know that? Well, this is a really dumb question. I’m not there’s no such thing as a dumb question. You just don’t you’re asking is you don’t know the answer, right? I mean,
it’s definitely a good shortcut, especially if you’ve got people in your network, who know the answer. I mean, there’s no, there’s no downside to at least hearing someone else’s experience with something. I mean, why? Why have to go through it yourself just to learn? Man, I really should have gotten a lawyer to do that contract. Now that I got screwed over in this deal. I mean, that was that was for me. I had a giant acquisition with a company and it was just Well, this guy seems like a good guy will have a handshake deal. We don’t have to get a lawyer involved. I mean, you know, it’s, yeah, it’s whatever. And then, you know, I look at the opportunity cost from not doing it and easily 10s, probably hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost revenue, because we didn’t have a signature on what our agreement was. So, you know, I would have preferred if someone said, Oh, you’re doing an acquisition, you should get a lawyer but me my ego and my experience, I had nine before that, where a handshake was fine. They wanted to get out and you know, handshake, here’s the deal. But this one in particular, I didn’t have a non compete, signed, I didn’t have a I didn’t have anything sign that said he wouldn’t just start back up. And, you know, it is what it is. I’ve learned from my mistake. But now when I hear people, I’m in the middle of a merger acquisition, I say, you should get a lawyer is it. It’s just this old lady. And she’s just trying to get I was like, I don’t care. I told myself that I’d have a lot more money now had I spent the money on the lawyer. But you know, and everybody was telling me, you should do it, you should do it. And I said, No, no, I’ve got experience where it didn’t work. So everyone’s experience is different. But for anyone that’s looking to grow their business through merger and acquisition, get a lawyer, that’s worth it.
Did when I started my business Six, five months ago, the first thing she says get an accountant like help, they’ll help you set up QuickBooks they’ll give you they’ll give you the and it’s whatever 20 I get a really low 20 bucks a month plan. But it’s great like anytime I have a question to I email her she emails right back here. And you know if she was in charge me it was just an email. If I had to meet face to face, there’s a little bit but it Thank God I like did that I don’t know how I would have manage finances without just simple things like QuickBooks. And I’m glad I had someone to help me set that up. Because I couldn’t. Yes,
ask for help. Find people that know what you do not know who have success doing it. And just copy paste success leaves clues. And it’s literally that easy.
But I love one thing just quick is that the it’s the recovery community. Like we’re in every we’re in every circle, like there are people and I love utilizing that. And they want to help like that. Because part of our I think the way we we only keep what we have by giving it away, right? And however that looks I can look like lot of different ways. So that’s the cool part is people in recovery are just they’re so willing, I think sometimes too willing, I find you know, because like we pay bills. So sometimes we let that willingness get away of us doing paying our bills, but I love that’s the service work sometimes just that advice is is so crucial.
That’s incredible. I couldn’t agree with you anymore. But Randy, in wrapping up, it’s been great episode, where can people find you online?
So I mean, I’m on Facebook is obviously an easy place to find me, Randy Anderson, you’ll usually see me in some provocative t shirt or hopefully a megaphone or something like that. So pretty easy to find me. I do have a business now called bold North recovery and consulting. So it’s www dot bold North recovery and consulting. com. I know it’s a long drawn name. I didn’t want to be pigeonholed to a treatment center. So that’s why I added the consulting part of the end. Yeah, I mean, that’s the easiest place to find me. There’s contact me on those on both, you know, Facebook Messenger, right? I use all forms of communication on Twitter, Instagram, not on I have a Snapchat account, which I don’t use, but But uh, but yeah, Facebook is probably the easiest way or through my website, bold North recovery and consulting. com.
Perfect. Well, Randy, it was great having you on the show for everybody listening. Be sure to check out Randy and all the things that he’s doing. Subscribe to the show. Give us some feedback, comment on whatever platform you’re listening to it on. And Randy, thanks for being on self made and sober.
Thank you so much. It was a pleasure to be here. And yeah, it was awesome. Thank you.

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