Robert is the Recovery Guy. Getting clean and sober on April 25, 1986 has given me the insight and practical skill set to not only stay sober, but to also re-invent myself to the person I always wanted to become. Showing others how to do this is my life goal.
Today’s podcast is from a speaking event on Saturday, August 15, 2020. I was the keynote speaker at the “Old Timers” meeting at the Salt Lake City, Utah Alano Club. I share my story of my personal recovery and my understanding of what the 12 steps of recovery has to offer those willing to work for it.
If you are a person of recovery believing is foundational to everything we have. As a person of deep faith, my belief is not at the core of who I am; it is the very core of me.
A necessary shift for everyone in recovery is to go from negative bondage to a positive affirmation. This transition takes a consistent concerted effort to achieve. Most people stop before they succeed. It will likely be the most rewarding challenge we ever embark on.
One of the most challenging things we ever do is look inside ourselves to uncover/unmask the truth. The more critical the need to look.
Without inspiration things become old and no longer refreshing. We become stale and stop finding it desirous to grow
It for this very reason I want to challenge you to elevate your thinking and let you know I have found a way to have the best of all worlds. I can stay in the now/day while at least having a major say if not outright controlling what yesterday and tomorrow look like.
As John Maxwell says “If there is Hope in the future there is power in the present.” We want to hope to help elevate us to greater things.
What goes on in the mind of a person who sees their life completely falling apart and knows that their addiction is primarily the reason for it.
One of the most exciting things I have ever read was on page 98 of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous. It reads “Burn it into the consciousness of every man that he can get well regardless of anyone. The only condition is that he trust in God and clean house.”
I look at the moment in time when “I said I can’t do this anymore.” I was literally “sick and tired of being sick and tired.” At that moment, I was reborn for the last time.
One of the most important things to remember is that living is not merely the absence of not dying. I guess in the literal sense it is, but that’s not what I am talking about. I am talking about learning to live in a way that causes you and me to celebrate. Life needs to be as joyous in our living as our despair was prior to recovery.
“…iron sharpens iron and so a man sharpens the countenance of his friend.