Victorious In Recovery

What is happily ever after? 

Now that I have help what do I do with it?

Definition of effort 1: conscious exertion of power  2: a serious attempt 3: something produced by exertion or trying 4: effective force as distinguished from the possible resistance called into action by such a force 5: the total work done to achieve a particular end

Sickness noun a particular disease or malady. the state or an instance of being sick; illness. nausea; queasiness.

think verb (used without object), thought, think·ing. to have a conscious mind, to some extent of reasoning, remembering experiences, making rational decisions, etc. to employ one's mind rationally and objectively in evaluating or dealing with a given situation.

The truth is not always easily accepted. Today I want to talk about how I accepted things that were hard to accept as truth. 

Worry is our biggest waste of time, even more so when it's about things that have nothing to do with us...

The beauty of it is.... Whatever I need from God, he is enough.

When I can be truly me is when I can fit myself to be of maximum service to others. Definition of align To be in or come into precise adjustment or correct relative position.

Thank you for your support! I'm going to be taking a break from the podcast for 4-8 weeks.

Sometimes it's so hard dealing with frustration, but there are things that help.

Sometimes its hard after we have been sober for a while and still don't know what our purpose really is. Do I need to know?

It's important to acknowledge what is and what was as those thoughts and feelings come up. It's amazing what ten minutes of uninterrupted and purposeful feelings and thoughts can do for years of regret and shame.

Sometimes the most caring thing someone can ask me is "Have you taken your meds today?"  

I don't this it's by chance the books hold so much wisdom, yet we forget what happened yesterday so easily. Taking notes or Journaling helps me not forget the lessons I learn today when I most need them in the tomorrow. 

Happy 4th of July. Some days in recovery are good and some bad, this is just simply my 1007th day. Having one day at a time thoughts in a world that asks about your future isn't always easy to juggle.

Step 3 is a choice to have faith in God no matter the extent of my understanding. Faith is not knowledge or understanding, faith is a choice. 

Make life easy on yourself, when the matter is fresh, speak up about your beliefs and boundaries and it will become super clear who needs to stay and who needs to go.

It's my 40th Birthday! it's crazy to think that in 40 years I haven't known comfort or satisfaction or peace like I did today...  It's all about perception.

What is a goal? /ɡōl/   noun   The object of a person's ambition or effort; an aim or desired result

Episode #100 Thank you everyone for your support on this journey of mine. I hope you enjoy this episode!

There's always so much focus on what I should be doing... But theres something to be said about knowing what not to do as well. 

details noun an individual or minute part; an item or particular. attention to or treatment of a subject in individual or minute parts.

Definition of solution an action or process of solving a problem an answer to a problem specifically : a set of values of the variables that satisfies an equation

Today's guest is Lauren Curtiss from Boston MA.

The dictionary defines reproach as “shame or disgrace or that which brings rebuke or censure upon a person. Transcript thank you for tuning in to victorious in recovery it's been a very busy week very stressful and yet at the same time very fulfilling had a pretty good weekend and was able to do some service work as well as just hang out with a bunch of other people in recovery overall it was just a really good memorial weekend you know anytime i find myself in a new stage of life with a new group of people or in a new place i'm tempted to act in ways that i wouldn't usually act i'm tempted to be somebody that i don't like to be or to pretend to be somebody that i'm not to pretend to be better or just different and this experience with my new job and the fact that i live here on site i've noticed myself falling into those things every once in a while and i've had to be very vigilant about who i portray myself to be and also to be who i want to be if that makes any sense yesterday evening i was talking to one of the people here and i made a joke and that joke led me down a road to where i said something that wasn't very nice about one of the other people here thankfully the person i was talking to called me out on it and i was able to realize what i had just done but afterwards i found myself with this immediate weight of guilt and shame which serves its purpose you know i i'm a firm believer that god has created those feelings for a purpose there's no no incorrect feelings out there there's no mistakes you know there's a lot of things that i've felt shame about in my life that i shouldn't have but in this particular case i believe that was the exact correct feeling that should go along with what i had done but you know any time that shame and regret comes along that becomes a very lonely miserable place to be so i did my little 10th step last night and prayed and vocalized what had happened to god meditated on what i should do today to rectify it and i have started that process i have told the person involved that we needed to talk today that i needed to apologize for something and so that's all set into motion now but it always amazes me how quickly how quickly a joke or a conversation can lead down that road and if i'm not careful about being purposeful about who i'm trying to be i can find myself way off the mark really quickly and i've had to battle a lot of that in these last couple of years and it's funny because as soon as i got done praying and and laid down in bed i pick up the book that i've been reading which is drop the rock and the first thing that i read is let's look at a few areas we may want to examine to clean up as we prepare to become entirely ready and that's entirely ready to have god remove our defects of character and it continues on from there it says how is our language used are we gaining maturity do we swear a lot do we make crude remarks about the opposite sex and use bias or prejudiced language do we gossip are we sarcastic do we tell dirty or risky jokes do we use violent language we take a look at our language and see how it fits in with the spiritual approach to living and to becoming entirely ready and none of those specifically encompasses what happened but just it's always nice though to pray and to sit down and to read something and just to know okay i'm not the only one that suffers from the wrong things coming out of his mouth then in the bible this morning i'm reading a psalm of david and it's psalm 69 starting in verse 12 it says those who sit in the gate speak against me and i am the song of the drunkards but as for me my prayer is to you o lord in the acceptable time o god in the multitude of your mercy hear me in the truth of your salvation deliver me out of the mire and let me not sink let me be delivered from those who hate me and out of the deep waters let not the flood water overflow me nor let the deep swallow me up and let not the pit shut its mouth on me and to me it sounds like he is he's worried he's worried about what people will say about him he's worried about what people's opinions are he's worried about something you know but it but it felt very familiar because those were the first things that went through my head i'm like crap i'm the one that's supposed to be above reproach here i'm the one that's that's supposed to be getting on to other people for doing what i just did and it was that moment where i'm like crap i want to be anywhere but here right now and like i was saying before it's just good to see that they write books about these moments david wrote psalms about moments where he felt this way and there's the proverbs for that just like there is for basically every other mistake anybody can make it says the one who has the knowledge uses his words with restraint and whoever has understanding is even tempered even fools are thought wise if they keep silent and discerning if they hold their tongues i couldn't tell you how many times i wish i had just shut up just just be quiet david there there's no fault in having a thought come by my head as long as it doesn't make it to my mouth and that's been just this huge weight on me that i let too many of my stray thoughts that come through make it out my mouth i just just want to refrain from speaking as much as i do unfortunately it happens more so when i'm happy i've almost pretty much mastered how to keep my mouth closed when i'm angry when i'm upset or frustrated but when i'm happy and joking and and just having a good time the things that come out of my mouth become dangerous a lot of the times that filter isn't nearly as good when i'm happy as it is when i'm upset there was a prayer in my devotional the other day and said jesus please teach me how to be kind and selfless help me to show how much i love you by loving others the way that you've asked me to remove bitterness pettiness selfishness from me root my life and your love so that only loving actions become the fruit of my life amen that's what it boils down to is my goal is to show people love and respect it's to treat people the way that god has treated me to live in that grace and and reflect that towards other people and so i have to really hold on to prayers like this because they remind me that i'm not good at doing these things i have put a lot of practice into it and so it becomes really disappointing when i fail like i did yesterday of course there is a solution and you know i'm taking action that's the solution called for a little meeting with this person let her know what happened and you know apologize and do the right thing um but the other side of that is prayer and meditation on my side to get with god and find a solution at the very least try my best to steer clear of those types of conversations with anybody if i can't seem to figure out how to keep my mouth shut or divert a stray thought then then the next best thing is i can just not have those conversations to begin with i just wanted to bring that up today because it's it's a real part of my life it's just another day in the life of a recovering addict another day in the life of somebody striving to live a better christian life it's an everyday struggle and i think it's always important to bring those to light because now having said it there's nowhere to hide there's not that guilt festering in the background there's not a sense of of being an imposter you know i'm not pretending that i'm perfect and that i don't make mistakes and by bringing these things up it it helps it helps me remember that i don't have to hide who i am that i don't have to hide that i am flawed there's a freedom that comes along with people knowing my failures that is it has been more valuable than any other thing in my life the ability to speak truth and not varnish over it has saved my life and it continues to save me emotionally and for the times when i get called out on stuff or when people come up from my past and they're like oh well did you know this and this and this about this guy and the people that are around me usually say um yeah we did know and so it completely diffuses anything that anybody could try to say about me because i've already brought it up myself if you haven't tried it i encourage you to try it anything you're worried about people finding out it's better if you just go ahead and talk about it every time i talk about something that i've previously worried about people finding out there's just a huge weight that gets lifted because then when anybody brings it up i can be like yeah and i already took care of that or yeah that's right you're correct what's your point it completely takes away any power anybody can have over you and there is strength and freedom there that i don't even have the words to express how much how much freedom there is in that you just you have to live it to know how freeing it really is so i will continue to tell on myself i will continue to bring up the deepest darkest most embarrassing things i can about myself in public because every time i can think of one and i can bring myself to do it my life gets that much easier going forward there's that much less worry about somebody bringing something up at the wrong time because there's no wrong times anymore if it's already out there so i guess what i'm trying to say is david rafner makes mistakes i am flawed but one mistake i won't make anymore is keeping secrets all the other mistakes i can i can overcome but lying and keeping secrets will kill me from the inside out that's one mistake i'm just not willing to make anymore and i encourage you to do the same anytime you have the opportunity to come out with something bring it out into the open do it it defuses anything that could come against you and you'll find yourself walking around truly 100 free and you can't really put a price tag on that and i think that's all i have for you guys today thank you for tuning in you all have a good one thanks for listening if you enjoyed this episode and would like to show your support for the podcast please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review to catch all the latest from me follow me on instagram or facebook at victorious in recovery thank you again i'll see you next time [Music]

Definition of chain of command : a series of executive positions in order of authority a military chain of command. Transcript [Music] thank you for tuning in to victorious and recovery it's been a really good week i've had the opportunity to work with several people that just recently got released from prison and it's been really rewarding to say the least it's memorial day weekend and i just wanted to say thank you to everybody that served in our military and has helped this country be what it is today i was in the army and um it was short-lived unfortunately my addiction and my mental health came into play uh fairly early when i went into the army and it just wasn't it wasn't a a good place for me so they offered me the opportunity to leave and uh i said okay and took my leave and just kind of never really looked back from that but while i was there i i can say i learned i learned quite a bit i um i learned some very valuable life lessons while i was there one of which was how to pay attention and do what i'm told uh and thankfully that those were some things that stuck i was fortunate enough to learn about the chain of command and how that works and why it exists and that was a very valuable lesson because knowing where i stand in the world knowing that there are powers above me is a very important lesson and it has been for me and for a long time i had forgotten that i got so self-involved in my addiction and just in life that i had forgotten that there is something bigger and that's been a big part of my recovery is just getting back to knowing my position in this world that uh that i have authorities and in powers greater than myself and i've actually been fortunate enough to learn to be grateful that i'm not the greater power i am not the end-all be-all and that is such a relief when i can remember that i'm not the one ultimately responsible for the well-being of everybody around me i'm like oh i can sit back and relax a little bit and that is that chain of command and that's kind of what i wanted to talk about is my relation with god with other higher powers for that matter but today i want to talk about recognizing god's will and god's power in comparison to my will and my power for the longest time i thought that i needed to be able to produce that i needed to somehow find the motivation and the resolve the stick-to-it-ness if you will just in general i thought that i was weak if i didn't have what it took just in general like if if i couldn't do something i felt like i wasn't good enough to do it and that went on for a long time and so that over time that really seriously limits what i'm willing to try to do because anything if i if i go on that on that equation on that practice then eventually i run out of things that i'm willing to try to do because anything it seems like that i try to do on my own [Music] tends to fail eventually so i found myself not wanting to do certain jobs i find myself not wanting to start new friendships not wanting to work on cars anymore not wanting to pray not wanting to do all these things because at one point or another i felt i had failed and because of my failure that either i'm not good enough or i'm just not capable and i just got tired of getting hurt and hurting myself i got tired of being disappointed in life so kind of back on track with recognizing that chain of command recognizing the fact that i'm not the one in any one thing is a relief because i know that anything i try to do of my own power of my own strength is basically gonna fail i've proven that over and over and over again so what's what's the solution what's the remedy and thankfully using prayer as a tool i get to i get to find a little bit of humility recognizing like my rock bottom as a starting point because with my rock bottom i realized that the power must not be mine because i am incapable i was at my rock bottom and i'm like if i want to go anywhere in life if i want to do anything in life i need something more than just me and so i had to i was forced to learn to be dependent on god because like i said i had learned that it's completely useless to try to do it on my own i am unreliable my effort and my ability to succeed is dependent on my mood and on my circumstances on my perception and as long as i am dependent on myself i'm going to be subject to those things as long as i'm depending on my own willpower and my own strength i'm gonna be at the mercy of whatever life throws at me that day so i just end up getting exhausted and giving up and i used to feel bad like why can't i just push through why can't i just keep trying and the truth is is because my efforts aren't enough on my own so it's exhausting it's not just me but the good news is that when i add my effort after praying and figuring out what god's will is and accepting his will and getting on the game plan with my higher power with that upper level of chain of command when i exert my will and when i exert my strength and my effort my little bit of patience that i have when i put all that into something that's greater than me greater than my plan other than my plan i find that my efforts aren't wasted anymore i'm no longer getting tired and burned out because god like any good leader doesn't put me in places where i'm alone and likely to fail he puts me in places where i have a team of people working towards a single goal sometimes i know who those people are sometimes i don't see it they're just other outside forces that god is organizing on my behalf or on behalf of another goal but anytime i i can stop and say god what is it that you want me to do and i put my efforts towards that i find that they're never wasted yesterday i had the opportunity to go and help my sponsor along with several other guys to do some work on a guy's house and when i got there i realized this is something i've never done before and i noticed myself starting to get like a little uncomfortable because i didn't know what to do or where to be or what the overall goal was and then i remembered i'm like i'm not in charge of this and so i went and i asked my sponsors like what what should i be doing right now he said uh if you'll just take down that thing and you'll take off that one over there and uh we'll go from there we'll take a break after that and we'll reconvene and set our next goal and it was that simple so instead of just picking something at random and and maybe or maybe not helping the situation i went i did what i was told i finished that up by the time i was done with that we took a little break everybody was like okay well this is what we think this is what we're gonna do and i had my next little goal so i went up there i started to do all the things that they told me to do and we did that over and over and over again until we got to a point where it was time for me to leave and not one of my efforts was wasted not because i knew how to do what we were doing i don't know how to do any roofing i don't know how to do any of that but i knew how to pick up trash and i know how to take a crowbar and pull off some tram and and i know how to use a hammer and rip up some nails and take shingles off that i can do the goal was still achieved that's the key there were a team of people at least one of them knew what was going on and because of that in his direction my efforts weren't wasted and i see this and in every successful thing i see i see this same pattern i see the work of the many coming together for a greater purpose for a greater larger goal and if i pay attention i can see that around me i can see that one rock doesn't make a whole street you know it's a whole bunch of rocks i can see that one festival doesn't just happen by one person showing up it happens by a team of people you know there's just so many examples of what i'm talking about but somehow if i'm not paying attention i'll find myself in a position where i think that i have to do the whole thing and anytime that i catch myself in that little mindset it's really easy to tell because i'll be frustrated i'll be stressed out i'll be running around like a chicken with my head cut off and at the end of the day i will be in shambles i'll just be a mess and i'll be tired and i'll be disappointed because nothing got done and anytime that i find myself getting towards the end of the day and i'm like oh my god and i'm frustrated and and i'm just like man i didn't get nothing done i didn't do anything i treated that person badly because i was stressed out and like i find that kind of drama in that day i know i know where to look i know what it is i know that it's because david thought he should do it all himself and any day that i wake up in the morning and i pray that god help me do his will to see the opportunities that he has for my life to participate in bringing glory to his name and doing his will and helping other people those days that i'm mindful about that being my purpose are the days where i find myself getting a ton of things done feeling refreshed and satisfied and accomplished at the end of the day ready to go to sleep and wake up and do it the next day the difference is amazing and it's not that i tried extra hard it's not that i worked and and expended all my energy you know it's not that i was superman that day it's just the fact that i was doing something as a part of something greater and recognizing that i'm not responsible for all the pieces of the puzzle i'm just one all i have to do is be my own little piece in the puzzle and let everybody else be their own little piece in the puzzle and everything's gonna work out so i'll leave you guys with this i wrote this little snippet last night right before i went to bed it says but if i seek god and i seek his will and i use his tools in his strength and in his blessing along with whatever i have i always succeed i always move forward i always have exactly the amount of strength impatience and kindness and all the other things i need for whatever that day brings and i truly 100 believe that i think that's all i have for you guys today thank you for tuning in y'all have a good one thanks for listening if you enjoyed this episode and would like to show your support for the podcast please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review to catch all the latest from me follow me on instagram or facebook at victorious in recovery thank you again i'll see you next time [Music]

My favorite definition of faith is:   -A firm belief in something for which there is no proof. Transcript [Music] thank you for tuning in to victorious in recovery today i had the opportunity to be a part of a state conference and it was a really nice experience i got to hang out with a lot of great people they called our ministry up onto the stage and it was a very moving thing um somebody shared their story that it graduated the program at the place i work and it was just it was overall a really good experience i got to see a lot of other ministries too that are going on out there helping people in all kinds of different ways and so it got me thinking about service and i don't really think of myself as doing a lot of service a lot of times but looking around and talking to people and answering their questions i realized that that i'm doing quite a bit of service and i didn't really see it that way um i don't really see it that way all the time because to me it just feels like i'm working on me and so i'm kind of just realizing that there's they're not mutually exclusive the work i do for my own recovery can also be considered service work and most of it actually is and i've been talking a little bit lately about uh the fact that i'm i'm still reading in second samuel and it's mostly the story about david and just all the different trials and all his mistakes and all his victories and just everything surrounding that is very eye-opening it's very eye-opening to the grand plan that god has in the world around us it's eye-opening on how much god is willing to do for a person that is actively seeking to be in relationship with him and not just that part of what made david so unique in the bible is that he lived to serve god you know he didn't fight goliath for the fame or for any kind of reward he fought strictly for the name of god for god's honor for the honor of the people of israel he was doing service work it wasn't for himself even when david took the throne as king he wasn't i mean he wasn't born into that he wasn't crowned king because of anything he did it was god appointing him as king that was his ministry and he got persecuted for it by the previous king for years and years and then after that tons of people tried to dethrone him it was just not a great position to have you know to be a king back then was more trouble than it was worth you know there's so many so many things like that now that it's like why why god do i really have to do this right now this is crazy why is this so difficult you know i find myself in service positions like that sometimes where i'm like god i wish i wouldn't have said yes to this but on on days like today that i get to see all this other work that other people are doing i kind of get to see in the looking glass from the other side and go oh okay i guess maybe that's what people are telling me because i see these these ministries and these people that are passionate about helping other people and i'm like wow i wish i could do something like that and then i remember wait you do and it just amazes me that it's so hard to see from my end what is really happening that the scope of what a simple little service position can do the effect that it has going outward is amazing but anytime i agree to do something there's fear involved especially for me am i qualified probably not am i capable most likely not no am i educated enough not usually do i have all the skills required to do it successfully probably not no and and so there's fear there's fear that goes into taking a service position there's fear that goes into continuing to show up to a service position so like i'm left how do you alleviate that what do you do at that point how do you move forward and sometimes i don't know the answer but i saw a prayer recently that they helped me because a big part of my fear in service or and doing much of anything really is that i'm not qualified that i'm not capable and that i can't ask god because because either i think i should be capable by myself or that i'm not worthy to be capable to make a difference in someone's life there's all these irrational fears because i've been the recipient of so much grace that these fears are now not reasonable to have and so i came across this prayer and i wanted to share it with you guys it says god please show me how to approach you with confidence i know that you care for me i know that you love me but sometimes i doubt my worthiness please replace any doubts i have with bold assurance that i belong to you and you long to hear from me here i am please help me in jesus name amen and that was so simple but it's it's just this nice reminder that god doesn't ask me to do anything that he hasn't already given me the tools to do and one of the best tools i have is prayer it serves so many purposes in my life mostly though it serves to remind me that i'm not in this alone then i'm not doing it for my own reasons and that there is help i don't have to be the most qualified i don't even have to be qualified i don't have to be enough i don't have to be a subject matter expert or the most personable person i don't have to know all the answers i simply have to know who i'm doing it for and if i'm doing it for god then i can go to god in prayer and ask for help to do it however he sees best and today was a really great reminder of that because i after our presentation and everything we had this little booth and everybody's got their little booth for their ministry and i'm standing there and and i look at my boss and like he's like uh do you feel okay doing this stuff i was like well yeah yeah until somebody wants to talk to me and what what i meant by that is like i don't know what to say like yeah i work here and i know what i do on a daily basis but i i just i lock up when people ask me and so like i almost forgot a couple of times when i was standing there that i had other people around me that know the answers and so i'm like um uh oh yeah i remember now hey come over here real quick this is so-and-so he has this question and boom like a miracle it got answered and now as a result i know the answer to that question too and it's just like this this whole super simple thing it's like yes of course you can ask for help but in the moments that we find ourselves in for some reason i i tend to forget that i'm here as as a secondary part to a greater entity you know i don't have to be everything i can just be the guy that knows how to point you to the right person you know if that's all i know that i'm still doing my my part and i just feel like you know in service it's it's really easy to forget that to think that everything has to be perfect or that i have to know all the answers or that i can help everybody when really just being present and and being a mediator between two different parties to make something happen whether or not i'm at the center of it or not is really the whole goal the goal is to be of service however you can and today i was able to do that and it was really nice and the other aspect to all of this is it's the measure of faith that it takes to say yes to an appointment to a service position to just to anything new in life there's so much failure that has happened in my life there are so many disappointing moments where i took on too much where i took on too little where i said yes and then i couldn't when i said no and i should have there's just so many bad decisions so many poor choices in my life that that whole hope and faith aspect has been beaten down time and time and time again so now anytime somebody asks me if i can do something my initial thought is no i cannot to the point to where i have kind of magically forgotten how to do things that i'm really good at doing or forgotten that altogether that i even ever knew how to do them and it's it's fear that has covered those up it's not that i have lost the ability to do these things it's not that i have somehow just lost that part of me it's fear that has covered it up and said nope it's just not safe david for you to do that it's not safe for you to fail in that aspect again it hurt too much last time or you disappointed too many people last time you just shouldn't try anymore and that's been a big thing it's been a big thing even recently for me it's been a really big thing that you know and it happens with even the small little things like something happened to my toilet and it was running water and i'm like man i'm gonna have to call somebody and then i remembered no i know how to do that stuff i can do it myself but there was this moment that it was like no no you better not and and there was no good reason for it i have the tools i have the time i have the part and the equipment to do it like i have everything i need and there was still fear telling me that i shouldn't do it and i had to just talk myself down from that from that moment because it was an unreasonable fear and it's not unreasonable for me to have that fear but the premise for it is unreasonable right i'm allowed to have fears and and to work through them but i'm like this is this is a ridiculous one for me and i i had to work myself through it and so there's this this faith and it's weird it's like this mundane little embarrassing things that i have to have faith for that seem to be the most difficult you know i had faith when i started this podcast when i started my youtube videos i had faith when i started my website and everything and you know that was like almost to the point of being entitled i had faith about that stuff so for me to to fail in faith and hope on these other things is just kind of ridiculous to me in my mind and so that just puts another fear in me it's hard to even talk about these things because i'm like bro you get it together you should be better at this by now and i have to remember that it's just not about that it's not about being better it's not about being capable it's not about any of that it's just about getting used to believing that god has a plan for my life and that he knows my situation and that it's not too big for him to handle and on the other end of that it's not too small for him to handle there's no petty requests for god so that's what i'm working on this week is giving up those little things to god having faith that the service that i'm trying to provide to people on a daily basis whatever it may be is something that i'm called to do is something that i am not necessarily capable of doing out of my own strength or my own knowledge or my own abilities but then i'm simply going to be capable of doing it because that's what i was called to do that day and so there's this faith that i need to have and that i strive to have that it's a it's a no matter what faith that even if i fail in my own eyes that i've still served my purpose i've still done my service for the day i've still accomplished what god set out for me to do that day and so i'll leave you guys with this the measure of success can't be what i perceive the outcome to be that day because a lot of times i will think that something went very badly or that it didn't turn out as well as i had hoped or that it wasn't understood the way it was supposed to be understood or whatever a million things that we overthink in life a lot of times it just doesn't look good but that doesn't mean that it wasn't used exactly the way it was supposed to be used in god's eyes because the outcome is 99 of the time something we are never going to see because the scope is just bigger for every little thing we do the scope is so large that we're just not going to see the outcome that god sees that god intended and that's okay i'm just gonna have faith that what i was called to do that day was done and i can go to sleep knowing that i've done the service that i was called to do so i think that's all i have for you guys today thank you for tuning in y'all have a good one thanks for listening if you enjoyed this episode and would like to show your support for the podcast please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review to catch all the latest from me follow me on instagram or facebook at victorious in recovery thank you again i'll see you next time [Music]

Kindness is one with love and service.   Transcript [Music] thank you guys for tuning in to victorious and recovery this week i got a little bit sick and just sitting around doing nothing has this effect of making me feel useless and then i get all up in my head about if people value me and what are they gonna think because i'm not doing everything i could be doing right now and and i i forget like we do that it's okay to not be perfect you know that it's it's just something that happens you know i'm gonna have commitments fall through i'm gonna have days that i'm just not doing well and lately i've been talking a lot about the learning side and recognizing those times where we don't feel like anything's going on but there really is and that ties in with this a lot because in the past i have looked at being sick or being absent even for any other reason as an automatic point deduction basically on my value towards you know whatever maybe a job or a group of people etc you know i forget i forget that my value is not based on how well i do i mean there are certain occasions where when you perform better your value is more but when it comes to relationships that's not necessarily true being vulnerable being accessible being truthful such as hey i don't feel good today i think i'm gonna have to pass it's one of those things that doesn't discount my value but it actually ups it and gives the other person an opportunity to move in and take over sometimes being absent or being unable to fulfill a role allows somebody else to step into that role temporarily and be a blessing there's really true value in that not to mention that my value as a whole is based on who god made in the beginning who god created me to be and how well i try to use that so sitting at home this week kind of feeling a little bit useless i noticed a few things one a lot of people reached out checked on me a couple people came by hung out with me for a little bit brought me food so instead of the normal thoughts that i would have i got some reassurance of that value that i have and it was nice and it served more of a purpose than that it allowed me to find a deficiency and that's an area where i've been lacking i've been lacking in the ability or the motivation to step in and help others and show that they have value in my life thankfully today i had two opportunities to do that and i took them and i feel better for it and it doesn't take much honestly the two opportunities that i had one of them was over a text message and it was just quick it was one little sentence and i know it had an impact because it was it was just simple it was from the heart and it was in a time where it was appropriate and i just sent it and i know that it helped i know that it expressed that they had value and the other one took me about an hour to go and see somebody and it has its value it has its value not just for that person but in the continuation of that cycle somebody took the time to visit me most likely because in the past somebody had taken the time to visit them so it's almost the pay it forward type of thing and it's not that any of us are doing it because we want that to happen i mean there is a genuine part where we just care for our friend and we want to go visit them but i'm just thinking further into it at the impact that my life has that your life has that everybody's life has the little decisions and the impact they carry with them is really amazing if we were able to dissect everything with the eyes of god and see how broad the impact is how immense how many little branches come off of that we would all be amazed and we would all do these things more often and it's only through meditation and prayer and constant seeking that i've been able to see just a little glimpse of that to understand the magnitude of that that no small thing goes unnoticed to the universe every little last thing if you need any proof start ignoring some of them that little speck on the counter just let it go don't clean it up the next day it's three little specks and the next day you have ants and cockroaches you know it's it's the little things that add up but the same is true the other way you can open the door for somebody and it could mean the world to them who knows what they're going through you could bring somebody food and it just it changes everything it did for me this week i went from wondering where i stood and how valued i was in this new society that i'm in to knowing at least a little bit that somebody thought of me that i mattered and i would have been fine you know i would have made it till today i wouldn't have done anything rash you know it would have just been whatever but because somebody took the time it changed it changed how this whole week started rolling it made me interact with the people around me differently and so it matters and i don't think that these things go unnoticed with god i've been reading in first samuel and ii samuel and there's a lot of stories you know and of course david made a lot of mistakes but there's there's a few key things that are really interesting one of which is that king david had like a deep respect very deep respect for anything he considered that god blessed anything that he considered that god had anointed in any way he had a very deep respect for that and that that laid an impression on me it didn't matter if king saul was persecuting him or if he was at war it didn't matter everything he did was for god he had a couple of slip-ups like all of us but he was very purposeful about what he did and didn't do for those that he considered to be anointed by god the only reason why i bring that up is because i realize now that i should treat everybody as if they were anointed by god and if i were to have that respect and love and conviction towards every person as an individual not just generalized but selective and purposeful and honed in on each person for who they are if i were to address people in that way everybody around me would feel loved everybody around me would feel valued it would be really hard to have a bad interaction with somebody they would have to just adamantly be trying to and i've had a couple of good examples of that type of attitude lately there's a couple of new people around me at work that treat everybody with that love and with that respect and with that purposeful mentality of making people feel valued and loved that i find myself responding and kind i find myself wanting to take that and turn it outwards towards other people i feel like there's a lesson there because a lot of effort goes into every day regardless of whether i'm making people feel good or not effort goes into living life so i guess what i'm trying to say is that if i'm gonna spend my time and my effort my energy my spiritual energy on anything today why not choose to spend it on making other people feel loved and welcome and wanted and valued why not make each interaction as good as i possibly can because at the end of the day that has a ripple effect going forward and maybe just maybe you'll make a difference in a lot of people's life by treating that one person right and i think that's all i have for you guys today thank you for tuning in you'll have a good one thanks for listening if you enjoyed this episode and would like to show your support for the podcast please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review to catch all the latest from me follow me on instagram or facebook at victorious in recovery thank you again and i'll see you next time [Music]

The little things Matters, issues, concerns, outcomes, etc., that are or seem to be of minor significance or  importance.   [Music] thank you for tuning in to victorious in recovery well it's been a pretty good week so far this week i've been reminded a lot of how important the small things really are because it's been one of those weeks that i'm i'm still kind of settling the schedule is kind of leveled out my expectations have become clear at work there hasn't been a lot of drama a lot of surprises it's just been a week and it's the first week like that that i've had in a long time i'm not one that's big for change so anytime i have things that are constantly changing that means i'm constantly in a state of anxiety so i tend to be tired and irritable distant so it becomes this constant battle against myself it becomes a constant battle against the people around me it becomes a constant battle in prayer because i feel like i have to ask for things i feel like i have to constantly be begging for help and so when i get a week that is just a week just a set of days doing the things that i'm supposed to do and having the interactions that i usually have and the things that i expect to happen that week actually happen it can seem a little boring on the surface after having struggled for so long to have a normal week so i land in that place where we're at where we're just constantly unhappy with our surroundings um if you're anything like me all i wanted was a normal week three weeks ago but this week now that i have a normal week and everything has just kind of lined up the way it was supposed to i'm like man what do i do now it's kind of boring you know and i'll catch myself watching a show going home i really don't want to pick another show but i don't really want to leave because i'm comfortable and maybe i'll just eat you know and so that's just kind of what's been happening this week last week i had talked a little bit about the time of waiting where you learn things and how valuable that time is and these few days have been like that you know i haven't had a lot of exciting things happen i haven't had a lot of interactions that were just stellar memorable but what i have had is time to get used to my surroundings time to to be at peace time to meditate time to just sit around and watch a show and enjoy the life that i have right now but it's times like these that i get to really see who i am and what is driving me because i'm not so busy that i'm constantly moving for a goal so i get to see the character defects in their fullness just in this kind of silent time that i have you know i get to see that my eating habits aren't what i would like them to be i get to see that i haven't been exercising as much as i should in the absence of the busyness of life i get to see that even when i have time i'm not reaching out to people as much as i should that i'm not allowing myself to feel the feelings that i should be taking this advantage of time to work through so i'm left with the choice i can either just kind of watch netflix all day and clock into work and do my job and clock out and do it all over again or i can take the time to spend a little bit of extra time doing the things that i need for my own personal care and i guess that's what i wanted to talk about today there's times where the best thing and the only thing that i can do is make it through the day and at the end of the day i'm just ready for it to be over but the days that i have the opportunity i need to remind myself that these are the times where i have that little bit of extra emotional stamina to take care of the really important things for example i had been putting off calling the va scheduling these medical appointments and stuff that i need to do and that was one of the little things on my list this week that i was able to tackle it's been on my list for two months now not because i never had a moment to call but because when i'm busy when i'm stressed the last thing i want to do is add another conversation to my list of to do's you know i'm tapped out emotionally i'm tapped out psychologically there's only so much and i know that limit now so when i get little times like this i'm like okay pull out that list and there is a list my okay call the va wash the car go get extra hangers that you've been needing for the closet you know those those little things they always get put to the back burner for a rainy day these slow weeks these slow days are that rainy day and learning that habit that skill to take advantage of those little days those little moments where i think i can handle talking to a government call center person and the annoyances that go on with that i think today's a good day for that you know knowing when those times are is a big part of what's allowed me to recover coming off of a shift where everything went badly where the whole day was filled with surprises is not the best time to add to your stress level it's not a healthy time to add to your stress level in my opinion but if i'm sitting at home and i find myself bored that's probably the perfect time to add a couple of little things off of my list that i've been ignoring and it's funny because having a successful day at work and and doing my work chore list of things to do is fulfilling yeah i get a little sense of accomplishment when i have a good day and stuff but it's nothing compared to taking care of the things that i've been putting off when i check one of those off my list i'm like wow i really accomplished something it's because it's a different type of reward it's not the things that i'm doing for my recovery it's not the things that i'm doing as a requirement for my job it's not like maintenance it's a personal achievement it's one of those things that i get to take off of my plate and just know that it's done it's not gonna reoccur tomorrow when i come back to work and i don't know why but there's just something special something magical about taking care of those little things so i guess if i'm trying to say something at all is first i make myself have that list and there's a there's a little bit of diligence it goes into having such a list because i have to have to know what has a a time limit on it and what doesn't so i put a few things on there sometimes they're just things that i want to do for myself like one of the things that's on my list is get a passport i imagine that's going to be pretty low on that list but it's on the list it's kind of like that save for later cart on amazon you know you you can have as much things on that list as you want and honestly you don't ever have to buy anything that's in that in that card it's just nice to know that it's one thing that you would like to do but it's not a necessity there's so many necessities that catch me up on a daily basis that i have to take care of that i have to do to survive that it's nice to to know that there's a list of things that i can choose to do and every once in a while i get to mark one of those off and it feels like i did something special for myself it's a kind of self-care that i haven't had the luxury of having in a long long time and i didn't realize how important it was and make no mistake about it it is super important there's something rewarding about just making the list even before i i take anything off of it even before i can have a concept of what it will take to achieve it there's something rewarding about just grabbing that notebook and saying hey this is one thing that i would like to do it becomes a reality it becomes a possibility the moment i put it on paper so i'll leave you guys with a goal next time you have a day that you find yourself just enjoying the day you have a little bit of extra oomph that you haven't used you can afford to sit down for a second make a little list small things preferably put a few things on the list maybe take the time to break those down into smaller things like i had mentioned in one of my other episodes that you know there's some things that require several steps break them down and then just set it aside knowing that you've started a little bit of personal care and if you pick up that list from time to time and and you you'll find you can take care of one or two of those things every once in a while it makes a big difference because it takes the mundane out of life because i might have to work every day of my life i might have to have the responsibilities of caring for another person for the rest of my life and and they're just things that did never go away they never really feel accomplished so to have something small that can be accomplished once and for all is really important for my mental health personally and i challenge you guys make it a habit of having a list like that that you can reward yourself by finishing a couple of things on every once in a while and i think that's all i got for you guys today thank you for tuning in y'all have a good one thanks for listening if you enjoyed this episode and would like to show your support for the podcast please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review to catch all the latest from me follow me on instagram or facebook at victorious in recovery thank you again i'll see you next time [Music]

Definition of prayer a devout petition to God or an object of worship. a spiritual communion with God or an object of worship, as in supplication, thanksgiving, adoration, or confession. the act or practice of praying to God or an object of worship. a formula or sequence of words used in or appointed for praying:the Lord's Prayer. prayers, a religious observance, either public or private, consisting wholly or mainly of prayer. that which is prayed for. [Music] thank you for tuning in to victoria's in recovery these last couple weeks i've been praying in different ways than i usually do and i wanted to do an episode just i don't know kind of to talk about prayers a little bit to talk about which ones have helped me and how the thing about prayer is that we have to go to god in prayer we have to go to our higher power and the thing about that is that there can be no manipulation there can be no pretending and i mean i guess you could try if you wanted to but the uh the whole premise of it is is vulnerability it's being wide open to an entity a creator that is non-corruptible you can't pretend when you're in prayer and so prayers become very personal they have to be to be successful they have to be very very personal they have to mean something to me or else i'm just talking you know i have to find that personal connection that personal definition maybe the little change in words to fit my situation take each prayer that i'm trying to do whether it be a 12-step prayer or just a personal prayer it needs to be something that means something to me i wanted to read something that kind of spurred this whole thing for me it's out of a book that i'm reading it says the good thing about prayer or the problem with prayer depending on perspective is that we have to go to god to do it this means we can't get away with anything it means any negative thoughts bad attitudes hardness of heart or selfish motives are going to be revealed by the lord fervent and honest prayer causes depths of our hearts to be exposed that can be uncomfortable even downright miserable and that's the simple truth of the matter you know i can go to god in a very shallow way but it's not really going to take me anywhere i wouldn't imagine it would be enjoyable for god it's definitely not going to be comfortable for me and it's going to do me no good not only is the prayer basically useless it's not going to change me it's not going to put me in a frame of mind that i need to be in for changes to be made in my life and you know prayer is meant to be us talking to god right or at least that's what they tell us but it's not a regular conversation with a regular human being it's not something that i can edit you know i i can edit this podcast i can edit the video you know i can edit what i say or don't say to other people i can manipulate a situation i can turn around a conversation to lead down the road that i want it to lead down but i cannot do that in prayer i must not do that in prayer so how do i rectify that personally lately i've been getting on my knees and that's not because i think god requires it it's not because i think it's necessary for my prayers to be answered it's not even comfortable for me to do it or easy sometimes but what it what it does is it gets me down to a level of humility that i need to be to open up about the things that matter it puts me in that frame of mind that helps alleviate all those problems of me trying to manipulate me trying to pretend all those things just kind of melt away when i put myself in a physical representation of submission and you know that might not be necessary for you it hasn't always been necessary for me but right now it is because the more things that come my way the more entitled i tend to get the more i slip into that little bit of thinking that maybe maybe i deserve all the blessings maybe i deserve all these good things maybe i should expect more good things because of just how great i've been doing and you know i don't need to look down on myself but i do need the humility to know that i am at the whim i am at the mercy of god i have nothing to offer god other than myself there's nothing that i can do that's going to be enough to earn his respect to earn his love to earn anything everything that i have from god is a gift it's out of his grace and his mercy so humility becomes a very big part of what i try to do in prayer here's another prayer that i read this week that i really like says god you know everything about me you know the areas of my life that have potential but are being held back by broken habits and belief systems please bring clarity and healing to my life by cutting away anything that is cluttering or destroying my heart and mind transform me so that way i continue to bear healthy fruit in jesus name that prayer to me is a lot like the third step prayer you know it's talking about things that could hold me back from being of service to god and for those of you that haven't read it the third step prayer for aaa is an adaptation of a another prayer but it says god i offer myself to thee to build with me and to do with me as thou will relieve me of the bondage of self then i may better do thy will take away my difficulties the victory over them may bear witness to those i would help of thy power thy love and thy way of life may i do thy will always amen and that's on page 63 of the big book that tackles a lot of things in that one little prayer the submission part at the beginning i offer myself to thee to do with me and to build with me as you will then it talks about the bondage of self and taking away my difficulties and i've been praying this prayer every morning for a long time now and the image that goes through my head when i pray this prayer changes routinely because at those points i'm not i don't just recite it you know i'm on my knees i'm in submission to god and so when i'm praying this prayer if i slow down a little bit i can see what i'm asking for i can see myself and what my patience level might be that day i can see the character defects that i've been having issues with i can see the situations that i usually take it upon myself to handle which i shouldn't be handling and at the end where it talks about that i can bear witness to those i would help of his power and his love and his way of life well i don't get his power and i don't express his power and love or give a good example of his way of life unless i let him take away those other difficulties that it talks about in the beginning of the prayer so at that point i usually add in the goals for the day i think about those in my mind as i'm praying that that part i think about the things i have planned for the day the people that i'm most likely going to encounter and how i might love them or show the power of god in the way that i interact with them and that's helped it's helped a lot and there's a simplified version of that that says god take my will my life guide me in my recovery and show me how to live it's so easy to forget that these prayers aren't about not doing drugs they're not about our struggle with drugs or alcohol or sex or whatever addictions we may have these prayers are about living life they're about a successful life and how to overcome who we are not how to overcome what the world is not to change the world but to change me prayer helps me get through the down times more than anything else and what i mean by the down times i'm not talking about depression i'm talking about stagnation i'm talking about the times when i might not be stuck but i'm not moving at the pace that i think i should be moving at i'm not seeing those blessings i'm not seeing the progress or the motion forward in my life those are the moments when it's it's really really easy for me to slip into something else slip into looking for comfort and joy and fulfillment and all the wrong things it's easy for me to stop going to meetings or stop going to church and stop reaching out to my friends and hanging out and all those things i have a early warning sign of when something's not right and it's it's just that feeling in the pit of my stomach that there's a problem and that little feeling if i continue on in my day and i don't stop and pray and give up whatever that feeling is but words to it then it builds into something bigger and most likely most of the times i'll have that little bit of discomfort and i'll be walking around doing whatever it is that i'm doing that day and i'll interact with the person and it won't go well i might have an argument or i might get frustrated about something they said [Music] they might ask me to do something completely simple and completely within the realm of things that i should probably be doing anyways and i'll get a resentment all because i didn't take care of it there in the beginning prayers are for me these days they're not as much the foxhole prayers or the just everyday get on your knees and do your thing and then go on with your day type of prayers they're they're real they mean something to me in the moment when i stop and pray during the day it's it's because i need it it's because the people i interact with need it's because i'm not going to be who i need to be unless i let go of whatever it is that i'm praying about so i was talking about this time of waiting you know and right now i'm in one of those times yeah i have a new position and i have a new place and all these little things but to me emotionally and spiritually it feels like i'm a little bit on autopilot there hasn't been a lot of change and those slow times are difficult for me they don't come naturally you know the living life without any excitement or any drama doesn't come naturally and there's something that has been really important for me to remember in times like this is that yes i i have i have lessons that i learn when i'm going through something really tough i have lessons that i learn when i have exciting things happen but in the slow times in the down times between life's problems and between life's successes is the time where i learn to live with what i have it's a time that i learn to appreciate what i have that's where i learn the dedication and perseverance that it takes to get up and do the same thing over and over again because it works that's where i get my practice and i need that practice now it's reading something about that last night actually and it says your time of waiting will turn into a testimony and all who witness your deliverance will come to fear and trust the lord when you wait patiently on the lord you will be blessed and your heart will be strengthened your patient waiting shows god that you trust him with your life and he rewards faith like that in big ways and it had a challenge at the end it says let me challenge you as you dive deeper into the blessings that come from waiting patiently on the lord i want you to prepare your heart to begin to wait knowing that god is going to take care of you get ready to understand what it really means to trust god with your win and i like that because it's not when w-i-n it's when like when something happens w-h-e-n and that's that's true because it's not going through the hard times it's not going through the easy times when i learn how to trust god when i'm going through those times those times where you just react to things and what comes from my reactions isn't what i learned in conflict it's what i practiced in the peace time that i had this is the time that i learned to trust god because i get to see and work around and be in communion with the things that god has given me i get used to them i practice using the new skills that god has for me and so when the next issue comes along when the next trial comes along i'm going to act on what i've learned and practiced in this time that's supposedly my down time it's really not a down time it's it's like spring training it's nice you know the the pressure isn't on you're just there to hone your skills you're just there to take what you know learn a couple of new things in an easy soft relaxed type of way but you know spring training might not have that that immediate stress of having to win a game but it's some of the hardest work that you can do because when i'm training when i'm learning to hone my skills my only opponent is myself the only thing i'm working against in these times like this is myself i'm not learning how to deal with a difficult situation i'm not learning how to overcome a difficult time i'm learning how to be good at being who i am sometimes i pray god why did you why did you make me this way you know and it's been a long time since i prayed that prayer but i remember praying that prayer in high school as a kid i remember praying that prayer many times when i just wasn't feeling like i was capable of dealing with life these days i'm more likely to pray something to the effect of god how is it that you love me this way how is it that you're okay with me being this way show me why you made me this way help me use what you've given me those those prayers are born of the same feeling but my goal is different i used to think that i wanted to know why everything why this why that what's the reasoning behind that and i can still kind of fall into that trap but i've i've taken that and i've used it in a different way it's all it amounts to god it doesn't matter to me why you chose to make me this way show me how to use it show me how to serve others with how you made me and it wasn't in a meeting that i learned that it wasn't in conversation with somebody it wasn't through a hard trial i learned that in prayer because for so long i just prayed god make me this god make me that god help me to get better at such and such or help me to be a better person help me to be somebody else and it was in prayer that one day i was like okay fine don't change me i don't care and just out of that frustration of of being real with god i was like fine you want me to be flawed fine at least help me use what i have and that would just set off a spark of change and change was while all i ever wanted i wanted to be different turns out i didn't need to be different but change still happened my character my core beliefs may not have changed but how i saw what i needed to do with what i have changed and once i started to use those things that god had already given me then i had the right things to pray for then things came up that i was like okay god i tried this with this set of skills that you've given me and it's not working can you show me how to do it better and those prayers pretty much always get answered because i'm not asking god to change what he made i'm not asking god to change his will i'm just asking to better fit into it i'm asking for help doing what he wants me to do with what he already gave me and the more prayers like that i pray the more i realize i don't need to change who i am i'm already what god made so i'll leave you guys with this and i know that i kind of walked myself in a circle on that one so at this point of the podcast usually one or two things happens either i talk and it all comes together somehow and i'm like wow god that was good where i stop myself and i'm i say god help me and this is one of those times i've gotten to the end of the podcast i've put out a lot of information and i don't know what to do and i wanted to record this one in here instead of cutting it out because this is exactly what i'm talking about god what do i do i've talked about prayer and this is my real prayer i had my notes i got distracted and now i don't know what i'm saying i don't know what the whole point of this is to begin with i need your help holy spirit speak help me wrap this up and it just so happens that on this particular episode i get to leave that in because it's what i'm talking about already god already gave me what's necessary for this for this day for this episode for for this life that i live within this little 24-hour section and if i'm not capable of doing with my best efforts whatever it is that i think god has for me today then i'm probably wrong i probably think god has given me something that he's not giving me i probably think that god is asking me to do something that he's not asking me to do because the truth the simple truth is that if i was supposed to do it today i have 100% all the tools that i need to do it so keeping that in mind i think that's all i have for you guys today thank you for tuning in today you all have a good one thanks for listening if you enjoyed this episode and would like to show your support for the podcast please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review to catch all the latest from me follow me on instagram or facebook at victorious in recovery thank you again and i'll see you next time [Music]

Believing in yourself is great, but are you ready for the task?    [Music] thank you for tuning in to victoria's in recovery it's been a pretty good week so far i got a lot of good response from my last podcast and i just wanted to say thank you to everybody that tuned in and listened i was talking to somebody the other day and it reminded me of so many circumstances that i've been in throughout this recovery of mine i remember when i was brand new and you get out of jail or you get out of treatment or whatever and everything's coming at you really quick and you get those first couple of encouraging moments and you're like i can take on the world everybody's saying you know believe in yourself you can do this you got this man you're doing so good and it gets your confidence up which is a good thing don't get me wrong it's a really good thing but what i want to talk about is the other side of that the part of that where i know what i'm supposed to be doing i'm supposed to be recovering i'm supposed to be working on me but i look out and i see my goals i want to be i want to have my children back with me i want to have the job and i want to have the car and i want to have a nice phone and i want to get all these things lined up and so as soon as i get a job i go out and i start buying things as soon as i can afford an apartment i get the apartment and or i move in wherever and i automatically want to start thinking about getting my kids back and getting all these things back and all those things are super good goals to have so it's really hard it's really hard because there's that side where everybody's saying you can do this believe in yourself you got this but there's a very real side that is very much in need of recovery and to be completely 100 honest i'm still there and there are a lot of things that would be really nice to have and to do goals to tackle amends to make etc then i have to tell myself no you're not ready no you don't got this i was told once that the right thing at the wrong time is still the wrong thing and that stuck with me i think at the time i was telling somebody about some girl i wanted to be with or something but the concept applies everywhere and what made this come into an idea that i wanted to talk about was i was reading in matthew 25 and there's something there called the parable of the talents and jesus is talking about a landowner a master that picked three of his servants and he gave one of them five measures of gold and he gave one of them two measures of gold and he gave the third one just one measure of gold to keep for him while he was gone and so it tells a little bit of a story the first guy went and invested the money in one way and doubled the money the second guy did the same thing he went out and invested the money he doubled his money and the third guy went out and he dug a hole and buried the money so some time goes on and the master of the house comes back and calls these three guys up and says you know where's my money what'd you do with that and the first guy's like hey i invested your money i doubled the money here you go and he says good job good and faithful servant gives him more same with the second guy but the third guy that just had the one he said well i know that how you are with money and everything so i was scared i just buried it and here it is and the guy says why didn't you do anything with it you could have at least put it in the bank and let it earn interest so he took away the one and gave it to the guy that had the most and that was always like a a strange concept to me you know i was like why and i never understood it years and years that i've read that story and i never really quite understood it until i started thinking about it in recovery terms in terms of getting my life back together and so when i look at it like that i see a whole nother picture because in the story it also talks about how each one of them was given the amount according to his ability that part i understand i understand that there are things that i'm not able to do there are things that i'm not ready to do there are responsibilities that are too big for me to handle in my current place in my current situation in my current state of mind i remember when i first got out of jail this last time i got a job at ihop because i figured okay i can do that and i was right i could and i did it well but that's all i could really do at the time at the time i was dealing with a lot of stuff and to think that i could have had a different type of job with more stress or with or even even a job that paid more would have been too much for me at that time i couldn't handle having money in my pocket at that time i couldn't handle doing anything other than working at a restaurant it wasn't too much longer after that that i was offered the opportunity to be a house manager at a sober living house and i thought i was ready for that and before the old house manager even left the house and i start my new position i had already gone off the deep end just stress wise and i couldn't handle it just a prime example of something that sounds really good on paper sounds really good as a concept but it's just not something that i'm capable of doing at the moment so my new understanding of this is it's a lot more involved because opportunities come along that i've tried to take that i wasn't ready for and it just set me back like the guy that only got the one deal of gold he wasn't even ready for that and i i understand that spot in life there's been plenty of times that god is just giving me this one little thing all i had to do was just one little thing and i couldn't do it and then i got upset and offended when he took that one little thing from me and gave it to somebody else but he did the right thing you know god knows what he's doing and he'll give me little things every once in a while and sometimes i'm just not ready to do it whether that be willingness or emotional mental stability financial stability sometimes i'm just not ready most of the times i'm not ready and it's taken me a long time to realize that yes i've got this yes believe in myself but i also have to know where my safe limit is because right now let's say hypothetically i get the opportunity to have my son full-time right now i think maybe maybe i could do it but six months ago or a year ago or two years ago absolutely not no way and it's not because i'm a bad dad and i find that that that's the the mentality that gets me in trouble because i think well i'm a great dad i love my son maybe i have enough money in the bank and a car and all these things and my first thought is yes i can handle this but it's way more involved than that you know i may see my life getting a little bit better but the proof is when when i try to deal with those things and i realize wait i'm getting way overwhelmed my job which i need is starting to suffer my relationships which i need are starting to suffer my time that i get to invest into recovering emotionally and physically and spiritually is starting to suffer if if those things are starting to happen there's a good chance that whatever i'm trying to take on is outside of my capabilities at the moment and that's the hardest thing the hardest thing to admit especially when it comes to children to admit that i'm not ready and like i said i might be now i don't know but there were plenty of times where i thought i was ready for something and i was like bring it on and i just wasn't and if i had just waited till i was i would have progressed a lot more than i have if i had given myself the time to learn and to heal to prepare financially so i guess what i'm trying to get out here is that there's a lesson in this story and it's not just to steward money it's not about investing it's not about god giving your blessings to other people it's about taking whatever small thing that i am capable of doing and getting good at it investing time investing effort into those little things that i'm capable of right now so that when i get the opportunity to have the next little thing i'm ready for it and eventually i have enough of those small little things in place then my life starts to look and feel a little more stable and when i have that stability then maybe i can take on one bigger thing invest my time invest my effort and do the same things but really in my opinion big things never really come it's always an accumulation of a bunch of small things like getting a car is not getting one paycheck and buying a car getting a car is paying off my fines saving to reinstate my license taking the test for the license getting the license then saving for the car while still taking care of my responsibilities then making sure that i can afford insurance then getting the car and saving money for possible things that might happen to it so instead of just thinking i'm getting a car that might be a big step but that's not my goal my goal is to take each piece individually on a pace that i can handle so that it's an easy transition into the logical so i'll leave you guys with this anytime i find myself trying to make a big decision i stop myself and i ask why am i having to make a big decision why am i having to take a huge step because it shouldn't be that way and usually the answer is that i'm getting ahead of myself that i'm trying to jump into something that i'm not ready for and what ends up happening if i decide to go ahead and try to do that is that not only will i not succeed but what i already have will suffer and that's what this parable is about so i'll say it like i said to my friend there are no big steps that are successful if i want to be successful i have to break it up into small steps and little bit by little bit by a little bit i'll get there and that's all i have for you guys today thank you for tuning in you all have a good one thanks for listening if you enjoyed this episode and would like to show your support for the podcast please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review to catch all the latest from me follow me on instagram or facebook at victorious in recovery thank you again i'll see you next time [Music]

The idea of being perfect is a trap! You'll never meet the people you need to be around by trying to be perfect so just be truly who you are. 

Just a little insider look at what is usually going through my head during the making of an episode and a quick Thank You! [Music] i just recorded an episode i don't really even know what i'm gonna call it yet but it's about being authentic and i just wanted to record something because usually i take a bunch of notes and i'm just sitting here i i had like this one little fleeting thought on my way to my mom's for for mother's day and i'm like you know i don't have to brag to get respect and and the reason why i was thinking about that is because it's something i heard at church and about you know just being who you are uh broken and all you know and so i just all this stuff started flashing up and but i didn't really have anything concrete to put in my notes and so i'm like god just please speak it's like lord just i don't know what i'm gonna say i don't know how it's gonna sound i just i just want to share it and and that that was my prayer i was like just to speak i just want to share what this concept this realization that i had or that i've been having and i hit record you know and by the end of it i think i haven't even edited it yet but i think it was what needed to happen you know i think it's where it needed to be and i got a little excited which you know excited for me is is kind of low-key i'm like you know i'm always really really even-toned and everything um so i'm praying i'm like god thank you because i think that was awesome and i hope i didn't take it over the top with my self-will and i don't know i wanted to record this little snippet because there's a lot of doubt that goes into doing this a lot a lot of doubt and i don't i don't even know how to describe it like i know that i'm doing something that needs to be done i know that that people have told me that i have things to say that are good sometimes and but at the end of the day i'm like gosh is this really does anybody really even want to hear this and and i know that's not true you know the numbers prove me wrong when that but still you know talk about authenticity when i don't even really know what i'm doing all i know is that sometimes i hit record and i say a few things and people say that they really enjoyed it and so i catch myself praying kind of the same prayers all the time god i don't know what i'm going to say but help me say something and then at the end i'm like woo that was good and then i'm then i have that immediate moment where i'm like oh now you're getting conceited you know you need to just tone it down probably gonna have to delete half of that because you got excited and whatnot and there's just there's so much there i don't even know what i'm trying to say but i'm really glad that i have the support that i have from you guys and and i just thank you thank you for everything for letting me be me and uh and continuing to come back and to keep listening if you haven't already find me on facebook it's victorious in recovery or on instagram on twitter it's victorious ir reach out you know send me a message if you have any ideas for an episode let me know i'll definitely look into it thank you again y'all have a good one [Music] 

Feed the right things to your inner voice and your view of the world will begin to look like the promises. [Music] thank you guys for tuning in to victorious in recovery so far this week it's been better than i expected to be honest i had kind of come into the week expecting to fail basically um you know there's uh some new people coming in that uh i needed to take care of some stuff with and and it's all new to me you know uh all of it and so my initial reaction to new things is usually what if i fail what if it doesn't work out and thankfully i was able to kind of catch myself there and not let myself go too far into that mindset because i can really get myself in trouble when i expect the worst you know i catch myself just automatically gearing up to what if i fail what if i'm not capable of doing this what if i look bad what if blah blah blah endless amount of what ifs when really if i make myself stop that line of thinking i can come to a place where it's not what ifs if i can really catch it early i can make sure that i'm in that frame of mind where okay i'll probably mess up on a couple of things i may not experience this the way that i think i'm going to or the way that i think i should but at the end of the day by stepping back from that i can i can get some peace knowing that worst case scenario yeah maybe i fail worst case scenario it doesn't quite go off the way i thought and the situation is probably going to be fixable there's nothing really that i can do that's going to be detrimental to anybody's future so i can sit back and relax a little bit and be like you know what it's okay i don't have to know everything right now matter of fact the day doesn't even have to go the way that i think it's gonna go it can just happen and i can take what i know and do the best i can with it and it's gonna be okay and that's how it turned out you know i took the information that i have the resources that i have and i did my best with them and it all worked out so far but my ability to distort reality with my perception or my expectations goes well beyond that unfortunately and i think that's the case with all of us really and so i have to be watchful and uh this week hasn't been a real bad week for that i've been able to stay in the right mindsets and everything but there's this this new church that i'm going to and it has all the right things it has community it has a group of people that are just absolutely dedicated to what they do and to helping people like us and so really in the grand scheme of things there's no reason why i should dread going there's no reason why i should not like it but i'm so pre-programmed to want to have that excitement of that that show that gets put on at church a lot of times you know with the lights and the music and just that that excitement in the air and that's just not the type of place that this is and so going into it the first week i was like oh okay this is different and then the second week i was like huh okay we're going again gotta do this and now we're going on the fourth time that i've been there and there was this moment where i caught myself and i'm like no let's step back just a little bit let me try to perceive this in a healthier way what's really going on here and i was able to do that for the first time and i really enjoyed the service i really enjoyed the time that i spent there the people that i interacted with i enjoyed all of it but what really changed the place didn't change the people that were there didn't change the music didn't change nothing the only thing that changed about that was how i decided to view the situation how i decided to perceive my environment and i know that i've talked about perception and all this stuff before but this is kind of a an important subject so important that my everyday life 100 depends on how i decide to perceive it there are so many things that can happen on any given day and the possibilities of me taking those things and converting them into a poor me situation versus a i get to learn something new situation are endless and what really brought all of this up to begin with was a story that thankfully i read before we went to church the other day it's in the step 6 section of drop the rock and it talks about a story the same story perceived by two different people and so i want to share that with you guys it's on page nine it says don d went into an aaa meeting one evening he frowned when a member mispronounced a few words while reading how it works he felt appalled when another member stood up and said he was an alcoholic and an addict another person talked too long as he slipped out the door immediately after the meeting don d muttered that was terrible i should have stayed home bob m went to a meeting one evening his head was bowed as he listened to the preamble and how it works his eyes moistened as he listened intently to the member tell his story he was grateful for being able to attend this meeting after clean up and a little socializing he paused as he locked up the meeting room door his thoughts were thank god for such a beautiful fellowship both aaa members were at the same meeting each found exactly what they were looking for and you know i would like to think that that is a fictional story but all my experiences says that most likely that is a hundred percent real because that's exactly my experience i've gone to meetings one month and i'm like man that sucks and then go back to next month and it's basically the same people the same old-timers telling the same stories the same people new guys that are having trouble reading the preamble and stuff like that and it's and i perceive it great it's a hundred percent the fact that one day i was in a bad mood and nothing was gonna make me happy and the next time i needed that meeting and i was ready to accept the information given out and i was ready to listen and i was ready to receive and so i did i can't tell you how many times that's happened and you know i i think there's a lot of things that go into it you know it could be just the amount of stress in my life that i haven't dealt with it could be one of those days it's just a really bad day but i've found a pattern you know and it's a pattern of selfish versus unselfish usually it's a matter of what i expect and what i think i deserve and what i think other people should do versus the days that i'm just ready to take the world as it comes and i was reading on a website and there's a quote from paul david tripp and it says no one is more influential in your life than you are because no one talks to you more than you do we never stop talking to ourselves the things you say about you about god and life are profoundly important because they form and shape the way you then respond to the things that god has put on your plate so at that point i become either my best friend or my worst enemy and an instigator of hate and dysfunction so much of how i perceive the world around me depends on what i'm willing to practice inside my mind you know and it's not something that you just get better at overnight it takes day after day after day constantly practicing saying the right things to myself and those right things don't just come from nowhere they don't just come to be i don't magically all of a sudden one day wake up and know how to talk right to myself because my my inner monologue it's based on this unconscious beliefs and bias that i've built up over my whole lifetime it's the basis of how my brain interprets and processes my daily life in second corinthians it talks a little bit about this and that's in chapter 10 verse 3-5 it says though we walk in the flesh we do not war according to the flesh for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses we are destroying speculations and every lofty thing rised up against the knowledge of god and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of christ you know and that's all good easily said but like usual how exactly do i make that happen and i think it it's it's what comes in goes out basically so i have to keep in mind that there's this war of what's going to fill me up is it going to be the tv radio things i'm reading daily discussions is it going to be just a montage of all the experiences that happen to me every day and i'm just gonna let that soak in and be what fills me up because if that's the case and i'm not gonna do very well if the only thing that i have going through my head is what i experience on a daily basis that's no good because most days have the potential to not be very good i have this stress at work i have stress at home i have stress about paying bills i encounter weird people on the street saying weird things to me so i have to battle that i have to input better things on purpose on a daily basis so that i have options my opinion about myself and about the world around me will have options so if i find myself not appreciating something i can look that up i can study about it i can find a reason to appreciate the things that are happening in my life and feed that to myself so that when those situations come up again i have the choice you know i may not always make the right choice but i can provide myself a choice i can say no i learned that thing that i was reading the other day no i prayed and god was telling me this no my counselor my mentor my sponsor has repeatedly told me this is a good thing i can choose to accept it now as a good thing because i've put that choice inside me so i'm allowing myself to see the world in a new way and after a while when things happen my first thought might come in and be junk but my mind will have enough good things in it that it'll say no that one's probably not right i have all these other options to go forward from this moment and that's not the best one so then i can go and be like okay yeah i think i like this version better and i can use that so it's a deliberate and conscious insertion of god's word and good teaching and wisdom that we encounter here and there the problem is is that we don't typically encounter it just casually it's something that we have to seek out something that we have to really look for but if we get enough of that in there we'll start to notice that there's some mental stability that happens because of it because i'm not just washed from side to side like in the ocean you know i'm not just pushed around against my will i've got a basis to stand on and yeah it takes a lot of trial and error to get there but it's something that that only happens on purpose if i just go about my day and let things affect me however they're gonna affect me i'm never gonna get there if i just go on what i see and what i feel at the moment i'm never going to be happy so when i get into that meeting that isn't always the best meeting or i go to this church that doesn't necessarily fulfill my expectations every time what's going to drive me it's that that old saying that they have an aaa take what you can leave the rest see the similarities not the differences that's what it's talking about it's talking about going in with the purpose of finding my spot of finding my purpose and being there because the truth is is that god puts me wherever i am for a reason so i can i can be disappointed i can have a resentment for being where i am or i can figure out what my purpose is for being there and fulfill it and spoiler alert my purpose is usually to serve other people my purpose is usually to serve my higher power my god and when i get into that frame of mind and i use all the tools that i've been gathering up all this information and all this word of god all those times in prayer that i'm on my knees all those times in meditation if i gather all of that together accumulating and organizing those options in my mind then when when i find myself somewhere that i'm not necessarily enjoying myself when i find myself somewhere that's difficult or in front of somebody that's difficult the abundance of what i have stored up for that moment will come out good or bad there's a scripture that i think kind of sums it all up and i'll leave you guys with this it's psalms chapter one verse two and three says his delight is in the lord's instruction and he meditates on it day and night he will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water which yields its fruit and season and its leaf does not wither and in whatever he does he prospers and i think that's all i got for you today thanks for tuning in you all have a good one thanks for listening if you enjoyed this episode and would like to show your support for the podcast please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review to catch all the latest from me follow me on instagram or facebook at victorious in recovery thank you again and i'll see you next time [Music] 

It's NOT about abstinence from drugs and alcohol, It's about a NEW LIFE. [Music] thank you guys for tuning in to victorious and recovery well it's been a hectic couple of days here at the new job i'm filling in for my counterpart here that's on vacation and um it's stressful it's always stressful taking over something that you know nothing about kind of being put in the fire is i mean it can be exciting it's it's different that's for sure some of you might have noticed that i changed my graphic for the podcast and there's some forethought to that and i wanted to address a little bit of that today so far up until now the podcast has been loosely about my beliefs and mostly about my journey and recovery but the longer i go the more i realize how closely tied they are so much so that i can't separate the two anymore because to talk about my success is to talk about my beliefs to talk about my victory in recovery is to talk about my god because without that none of this even matters to me a recovered life from drugs and alcohol means nothing to me without my purpose in christ without my journey towards a life in ministry i can just no longer separate the two and continue to move forward so i'm choosing a more direct approach to talking about my life in recovery i've mentioned it before but the whole reason why the name victorious came about was because some family of mine was telling me that in the bible when somebody's life took a turn and became something else usually god would give them a new name so for me that became victorious not just symbolically it just became who i am there was a moment where i was defeated and i had the choice to roll over and just die to give up or i could move forward in victory and in a new life a new creation so i'd like to be clear that i am a new creation in christ that's the whole that's the whole point of it yes there are many pathways to quitting drugs and alcohol but my path to this victory is through christ because i'm not just recovering from drugs and alcohol i'm recovering from the past i'm recovering from a life that i don't want to be in anymore i'm recovering from my experiences with the law i'm recovering from great personal loss i'm recovering from a mindset that wanted to kill me today i was watching a show and it's this australian show and there's this plot going on where these people are coming back to life and one of these girls that came back alive was going to confront her murderer because they when they came back they didn't have a memory all she knew was the evidence she was given by some police guy and it turns out that the guy she goes and confronts that has already served this long like 20-year sentence didn't actually do the crime he just gave up he was accused of it and nobody believed him and he said you know what fine i'll serve the sentence and there's this moment in there where he said nobody believed me your parents didn't believe me not even my parents believed me and after a few years i started to doubt myself i started to believe in myself and i knew exactly what he was talking about because there there's been accusations there's been plenty of accusations of things that i have done and i've been convicted of them and i've served my time but there has been other accusations of things that i didn't do and i know what it feels like to just say you know what fine fine it doesn't matter i'll serve the time because at some point you just just give in and that's that's so much bigger than what i've had to recover from drugs and alcohol i've had to recover from giving up i'm still recovering from laying down and not fighting the fight that's been a much bigger struggle than anything else serving a sentence for a crime i didn't do and i'm talking about a sentence inside not talking about the courts i'm talking about just accepting what other people wanted to say and just saying you know what i'm done with this fight i can't take it anymore i'm out just do whatever you want to do i don't care it's not worth it that's been the hardest part and to say that i could have gotten there with anything other than my higher power would be a disservice to what i'm trying to do here because i'm finally able to stand on my two feet and say you know what not guilty i'm not gonna fade away into the shadows i'm not going to pretend to not be a christian i'm not going to pretend that i think there's any other way that i could have recovered because i don't it's that simple every day i fight a little battle is it worth it that's the battle is there anything left worth fighting for can i be the man that i need to be will i ever be happy can i ever live another normal life will ever be better than i once was all these things are right up there on the same level if not higher than drugs and alcohol and all the other addictions you know with enough time and enough support i'm sure there was plenty of other routes i could have taken in recovery from drugs and alcohol but i needed the true hand of god to recover emotionally to be made whole again so i guess all of this is to say that i'm a christian because i think it's the only way that i can survive the only way that i have survived the only way that i've wanted to survive so that's why the new graphic because it's not about drugs it's not about alcohol it's not about recovering from things that are tangible it's a christ-centered recovery to a new life that's worth living that's worth fighting for and it's worth sharing with others so thank you for tuning in i appreciate all your support you guys have a good one [Music]

Transcript [Music] thank you for tuning in to victorious and recovery this week i've had a lot of experiences just new ones in my new job and with new people and it's been good anytime that i find myself having to adjust to a new circumstance a new type of life basically new rules and new people it propels me into a new stage of learning it presents new problems it presents new stresses and with those come new teaching new learning one thing that has been great about living on my own again is that there's not that impending feeling that somebody's gonna walk in so i found myself praying and seeking god deeper than before and i'm not sure why exactly that makes a difference but i've noticed that that's the case there's something really simple there's something freeing about knowing that when i'm talking to god when i'm studying when i'm praying when i'm meditating that i don't have to worry about oh is somebody trying to talk to me oh is this gonna get interrupted somehow so i've had i've had depth lately that i haven't had in a while and it's been nice in the last couple of episodes i've been talking about a few books that i'm reading mostly the drop the rock book but in reading that i see a lot of concepts that i know came from the bible so i started diving in a little bit to the biblical terms of that i wanted to share some of that with you guys because my my ultimate goal is to not just recover from drugs from alcohol from all the other addictions it's to find a way to live life that is fulfilling find a way to live life where i'm not constantly having to make amends not constantly fearing for the worst trying to put all these words and knowledge into practice thankfully i know now that putting these things into practice it's never going to get me too perfect but it just might get me to proficiency i might just be proficient maybe even good at doing the things that i've learned so it's progress and diligence rather than perfection and the scripture that describes where i want to be or what i'm talking about the best for me is in matthew 7. starting in verse 24 it says therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice it's like a wise man who built his house on the rock the rain came down the streams rose the winds blew and beat against the house yet it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock but everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on the sand the rain came down the streams rose and the winds blew and beat against that house and it fell with a great crash and i like that it talks about both sides of the story there it talks about what happens when we gather all this information all this knowledge and and wisdom that we've learned and we put it into practice as best as we can that is the foundation that's that solid rock foundation that allows us to withstand the hard times but there's that big cautionary note at the end what if i hear these words what if i take in this knowledge and choose not to use it that's a purposeful act of disobedience and that's way worse than being ignorant right you can be ignorant for a while and it's gonna be okay god's grace will most likely cover you because you just simply don't know any better and we've all been there too and in a way it's kind of nice being ignorant sometimes you're like oh well you know i just didn't know but now that we've put all this work into our step work and we're hanging out with the right people that are teaching us the right things and now we know better and i strongly believe that when we go back out into the world after being in these programs and we know better and that's why it gets way worse way quicker because we're no longer in ignorance now at that point i'm actively choosing to go against what i know is right and if i know without a doubt what god's will is for a situation i must do that i need to do that next right thing that i know that i'm supposed to be doing because making an amends to god isn't like making an amends to a person when i make an amends to a person or when i know i need to it's you know it's something that i can write on paper and get around to it whenever and just kind of lollygag around it's a much simpler thing you know i might even blame the other person and push it aside because i think they deserved it or whatnot but when i purposefully knowingly go against god's will there's a high probability of shame there there's a high probability that i'm going to be ashamed to be in contact with god i mean don't get me wrong i shouldn't be i should just know okay i made a mistake go to god admit my mistake you know the the usual men's process but what happens when i purposefully go against god's will is i tend to isolate i tend to not be in contact with my higher power and when i do that i cut myself off from that power that i desperately need to continue on in life and until i'm willing to completely fix that make that amends with god i separate myself from the sanity i separate myself from my progress in recovery and there's no more dangerous place for me to be than separated from my god so needless to say i try to not find myself in that situation these days so moving on a little bit from there remaining in god's will requires searching and seeking this constant looking for new answers new wisdom and remembering the wisdom that we've already come across and there's a few scriptures about that and remember this is talking about the sixth and seventh step still what's my part in giving over my character defects to god and letting him remove them from me there's a lot of practice of something that goes into that and most of that practice in my opinion is seeking god it's that conscious contact with my higher power taking his instruction on how to do things better in proverbs 8 17 it says i love those who love me and those who diligently seek me will find me in deuteronomy 4 29 it says but from there you will seek the lord your god and you will find him if you search for him with all your heart and with all your soul in luke 11 9-10 it says so i say to you ask and it will be given to you seek and you will find knock and it will be open to you and this is probably one of my favorites is in jeremiah 29 13 it says you will seek me and find me when you search for me with all of your heart i remember there were so many times that i searched for god i still do that i'll be like god i don't know what to do here and i meditate on it and i don't feel anything really like aha moments you know popping up or anything and i'm just kind of lost so i'll start reading and i'll start looking for the answers and all the places that i know to look and i'll find it but i didn't find it just saying a prayer on my knees that was the beginning what it makes really clear in those passages is that i have to continue to seek sometimes the answer isn't really anywhere sometimes there's not a book or a chapter in the bible that talks specifically on the situation that i'm in but somehow there's this spiritual principle of seeking and finding that always comes into play if i continue to look the answer will present itself and funny enough sometimes there is no answer but the seeking gets me into the right frame of mind that the problem that i thought i had is no longer a problem sometimes the seeking just is a means to get me outside of myself for long enough to realize that god's got my back and there was no solution needed and when i'm seeking god when i'm searching for answers when i'm doing all the things that i need to do i don't tend to find myself making mistakes that i need to make amends for i don't find myself treating people badly i don't find myself in my character defects and there's of course a proverbs chapter for that in proverbs 2 it says starting in verse 1 my son if you accept my words and store up my commands within you turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding indeed if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure then you will understand the fear of the lord and find the knowledge of god for the lord gives wisdom with his mouth come knowledge and understanding he holds success in store for the upright he is a shield for those whose walk is blameless for he guards the course of the just and protects the way of his faithful ones then you will understand what is right and just and fair every good path for wisdom will enter your heart and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul and that's that's a lot of promises and those promises have very few requirements the requirement is to seek god to seek his understanding to seek his wisdom and i like that last promise for wisdom will enter your heart and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul that's where the psychic change happens he promises that we'll go from where we are a lot of times where doing the right thing just doesn't feel right or doesn't feel good all the time it feels forced it feels fake to where it'll be pleasant to me it'll be an enjoyable experience of course then it goes on to say the opposite for the people that don't do that just like so many other things there is an equal and opposite reaction karma goes both ways if you do good things you try actively seek good things good things happen you become better but if i actively go against it all bets are off really it's really easy to think of all the beautiful things that come with seeking god and forget what comes when i actively go against him at one point i was having issues with that you know because nobody likes the fire and brimstone side nobody likes the side where what if you aren't a good person and i find myself a lot of times going oh well there's a lot of things i'm not a very good person in and i'm always reminded of grace i'm always reminded that my intentions matter but there was some study that went into that you know i had to i had to determine who my god is i had to accept the fact that there are two sides of everything yes my god gives me his grace he's given me this opportunity to be treated like family but on a very real level he is my lord he is above me the chain of command starts with his word so it's good to remember that it's eye-opening to look at what it means to be lord what it means to be the master of all things the creator of the universe it gives me an a nice healthy respect for doing the right thing it also helps me comprehend how how much i must be loved for him to not just wipe me off of the earth nobody likes to hear about doing the wrong thing and getting punished for it you know it's not a it's not a pretty version of a higher power so the moral to my story today is that the flip side is jails institutions and death we've all heard that but why is it that well because bad decisions lead to bad consequences and that's what helps me appreciate the life the blessing the mercy and grace the happiness and joy and all the other gifts that come along with attempting to make the right choices so what i'll leave you with today is that in preparation for working on my character defects a little bit more it helps me to appreciate that god really does want to help me but there are consequences for not wanting to get help and without recognizing those consequences it's hard to appreciate the benefits of putting in the work so today i'm committing to put in the work to continue to try to do the next right thing and that's all i have for you guys today thank you for tuning in you all have a good one [Music]

Whats the meaning for pause?   a temporary stop   Definition of pause (Entry 1 of 2) 1 : a temporary stop. 2a : a break in a verse. b : a brief suspension of the voice to indicate the limits and relations of sentences and their parts. 3 : temporary inaction especially as caused by uncertainty : hesitation.   [Music] thank you for tuning in to victorious and recovery well the week has been going better i finally got not just moved in but settled in emotionally to the new place and i think uh it had a lot to do with that um my last episode i was mentioning how hard of a time i was having and you know sometimes i i guess it just takes a minute to get used to places new places and new people and for me personally getting used to having to interact with a new set of people is is an adjustment so in preparation this week i've been reading a book to help me start working the sixth and seventh step once i finish with the fifth step with my sponsor and it's an a book called drop the rock it's got a lot of good stuff in it so far i think it's a it's a much needed thing because in the other books it doesn't doesn't give a lot of guidance for step six and seven at least not that i found very useful and this book breaks a few things down for me which i really like and i wanted to read a little bit from that book and give you my take on it on the third page the first paragraph says regardless of what little i know about being different i must first ask am i willing to believe that i can be made different it is important to remember that step 6 doesn't say became entirely ready to make myself different it says we're entirely ready to have god remove all these defects of character god not me makes me different by giving me what it takes to change it is my job to act and behave like the change has occurred in doing this the process of change happens and it frequently involves emotional pain the pain of living the way i have been becomes greater than the fear of change and there's there's a lot there but the part that i really like is where it says it is my job to act and behave like the change has occurred and that to me sounds a lot like the fake it till you make it slogan and that one always set weird with me because you know i don't want to be fake right i don't want to feel like an imposter i don't want to feel like i'm trying to be something that i'm not but at the same time if i'm being really honest i want to be something that i'm not and so i've always battled with that you know at what point is it me trying to do better and at what point is it me trying to appear to be better than i really am but there is one or a couple things that i've noticed in this battle for trying to get better is that at some point there was a realization i don't know if somebody said something or if i heard something but it came about nonetheless that just because my first thought isn't always right doesn't mean i have to act on it and i think that's what this is talking about here you know i might have an initial reaction to something to my surroundings or to something somebody said or to just an abrasive type of situation my reaction might be impatient or it might be cruel my reaction might just be you know me being rude to somebody whatever the thought or initial feeling is that happens inside me doesn't have to come out though and that's been like a best practice for me to take that little sliver of a moment between thought and action between feeling and action and recognize that the opportunity to pause and say wait what do i know i should be doing and you know because there's a lot of times where somebody is asking a lot of questions or somebody is approaching me at a moment that's just not a good time to approach me basically and at that point i have i have the options bunch of different options one of which is common for me to be impatient and rude and dismiss the person but i find that that sometimes i'm able to take that little pause take that moment and say they're not doing anything wrong they're just asking you a question and so i take that moment and i breathe and i do my best to put on my nice face and answer the question or pause the show i'm watching and respond appropriately to whatever's going on and each time i do that i get closer and closer to that being my initial reaction sometimes i'm sitting at home and my alarm goes off and says hey you need to do this and my initial thought is nope not today i'm i'm gonna have to reschedule that i'm gonna have to just crawl in a hole and not do whatever it is that i'm supposed to do that day and i find myself with another opportunity do i turn off the light crawl back in bed and say not today or do i begin the process of preparing for that and more times than not i'm able to get out of bed or turn off the tv and start getting dressed by the time i'm done with whatever my preparation might be change clothes or take a shower or make some food or whatever the closer i get to being done with that the better i'm feeling about actually going and doing the thing that i'm supposed to be doing of course there's there's still moments where i'm like no i just i can't do this i just can't not today but those those times are less and less often now and it's not that i am better it's not that my first reactions have just magically changed it's just out of sheer practice of trying to do the next right thing that i've gotten better and i really think that that's what this is talking about that's me being willing to let god change me to let god improve upon me the next line after that actually talks a little bit about that it says it also involves the pain of attracting seemingly obnoxious people these folks are mirrors of my defects i get to experience how it feels to have the shoe on the other foot and i don't know i don't know if it is that god is just purposely putting these people in my path because that happens a lot i'm like i know i need to work on my patients and then everybody's testing my patients that day or if it's just that i'm more aware of it then i'm giving myself opportunity to deal with it either way it's working i may not have become more patient but i have acted in a way that has allowed me to practice that patience and goes on from there and says this is a step of surrender and trust not of self-will or determination we surrender our ideas of which defects stand in the way of our usefulness to god ourselves and others that's that's what i like about this book is because it's talking about the real issues like yeah it's all really nice uh i'm entirely ready god for you to do your thing and whatever that means you know i can i can say that i'm entirely ready but until i understand what that involves it's really hard for me to move forward to being ready so this gives a good clear picture my my responsibility isn't to make the change my responsibility isn't to have the power the strength or the self-will the determination or the even the motivation to change my responsibility is simply to pause to take a moment to allow the knowledge of what the change should be to come into play that's my responsibility just that that one little split second of knit nope not gonna do that what should i be doing okay let's try to do it that little decision is my responsibility the acting as if and the cool part about that is that i may not have achieved a lot of change on some areas but the moments that i've tried have opened up possibilities to improve some of those little moments have allowed me to say things that were encouraging to people some of those little instances those little pauses have helped save me from creating more problems in my life and there's a lot of value in that a lot of value that i don't think enough people talk about because yes i need to eventually make all these amends and i need to talk about all the things in the past and and take care of my responsibilities and get a job and do all these things that we do you know and and a lot of talk goes into what i need to do but what i don't hear about a lot is the ability to not do things it's an art it's a well-honed skill how to not inflict more damage while i'm trying to fix things and i feel like that's exactly what this is talking about it's that whole if i can't say anything nice don't say anything at all that little thing like i may not be able to improve on this situation but i cannot make it worse that i can do i may not be able to change this person's mind but i can achieve not arguing with them may not be able to make this person stop asking me the same question over and over and over again but i can do my best to answer or at the very least i can excuse myself and leave i can minimize the damage if i'm practicing that and sometimes not doing damage is the best that i can do that day there's a lot of days a lot of moments a lot of situations that i wish that i could have a do-over because i'm like ah nothing bad would have come out of that nothing at all but i went and opened my mouth i could have just went home and finished out my day and tomorrow would have been a new day but now i got to go back and deal with all this crap because i chose to act on what i thought i chose to act on how i felt at the moment instead of just keeping my mouth shut instead of just taking the time to explain whatever it was or whatnot you know there's so much good that can come out of doing nothing that i can't discount the value of just being quiet sometimes so i think that what i'm trying to say is god hasn't only given me the right words to say or the right actions to take he also gives me the ability to sit still sometimes to just not do anything wrong sometimes the best action that i can take in a day is just to sit still and watch god do his thing and i think that's all i have for you guys today thank you for tuning in you all have a good one [Music]

Its ok to talk about not being ok no matter where you are at in life. [Music] thank you guys for tuning in to victorious and recovery so over the last few days i've gotten pretty much all the way moved into my new apartment and i've had some time to just kind of get acclimated a little bit you know and everything is going good so far really but somehow my stress level has gotten a little weird i'm not sure if it's the move or the expectation or just thinking about the future too much i'm i'm not sure what to make of how i've been feeling to be honest i feel peace about where i'm at about the decision to be here i love the people i love having my own space again so there's there's just been this thing and some of my friends have been like oh no that's just what's going on with everybody but i can't put a lot of stock into that you know um when when i feel something is off i i have to examine it internally i have to at least feel like i tried to narrow it down to something you know that in itself is stressful so let me tell you how it's felt i'm excited to be in a new place i have all the things i need i got to have my son this weekend and as far as i can tell he enjoyed his time here too i've been a little worried about my finances i've been a little distracted with that but other than that like on the surface everything is just looked really good really bright so to say that it's a little surprising a little frustrating to feel not at ease right now is an understatement and i i think that may be a big cause of of just why i'm frustrated because i don't get it and you think by now i would because this happens to me often so like am i really surprised no no i'm definitely not surprised what i am is having a harder time talking about it than i used to and and that's kind of what i wanted to talk about today because i know that days aren't always going to be easy i know that there's going to be days that i don't feel good and i'm just not going to know why it's just going to kind of come and go and things will get better or they'll just fade away whatever's gonna happen is gonna happen and i'm i'm gonna survive i'm gonna do just fine but talking about it while it's happening which i know helps me gets harder and harder and it's not that people discourage it it's not that i think i'm above it there's just this expectation that nobody else sets on me but me right at some point during this process of of recovery i reach these little milestones where for some reason my mind wants to tell me that i need to be better than i am at that moment so that that creates this blockage because any time that i set myself apart from the normal everyday joe i isolate any time i feel like i'm different special in some way because of the podcast or because of a new position at work or because i happen to be the guy that has the most time in a meeting anytime that thought comes to mind there's this automatic blockage that says i have to be better than i am and and i can know that that's not the case all day long and it it doesn't always help though i still have to make myself remember that there's never gonna be a day where where i don't that i don't have the responsibility to share there's never gonna be a day that i don't need to open up there's just not a time or a place where i can afford to set myself apart so much that i stop sharing that i stop being real and i i don't think that that's what's happening right now you know i don't think that that's what's causing my frustration right now but it is it is something i felt when i started thinking about doing the podcast i'm like what am i gonna share i've been so up in my head that i haven't taken any notes for the last few days i haven't really been able to soak anything in that i've studied it took everything i possibly had to make it through today without losing my patience without having some sort of outburst and i felt it lingering inside me all day there was something that just wanted to come out and i managed to make it through the day without exploding at something so when i sit back and i think what am i going to share today i'm not terribly encouraged i tend to feel like i don't have anything to share i tend to feel like i should be better at this that i should for some reason be exempt from days like today and i've come to realize that that that's not something that i can afford to let myself believe i'm often reminded of this i've read several versions of what i just said from other people's writings so i'm not i know i'm not alone in that but it feels terribly alone it seems like sometimes no matter how many times i read it i feel like i should be better i should have it all together that by now i should be expected to do better i guess so what am i trying to say really i'm trying to say that today was not easy and one of the hardest parts about a day that's not easy is being willing to be vulnerable enough to admit it to come out and say it to share it with somebody else this is the part that over time doesn't get any easier if anything i think it's gotten harder in the beginning i in my own mind i didn't have anything left to lose so it didn't matter what anybody thought it didn't matter if somebody looked at me weird or thought i was crazy or made fun of me and none of it mattered because what could you possibly do to me that i hadn't already done to myself what could you possibly take from me that i had i didn't have anything for you to take from me so sharing the truth was liberating it was easy it was comical i had nowhere to go but up so as time passes and i feel this sense of it's a misguided sense but still i feel this sense of having some sort of reputation to uphold or some sort of image or some notion some expectation of myself that is not reasonable as as time passes and that gets more and more out of hand the harder it gets so i mean that's where i'm at right now so i guess what i'm trying to say if i'm saying anything at all is it's just as important today for me to share my flaws and my difficulties to ask for help and to find some sliver of patience with myself than it was on day one because it doesn't matter how much i know or how many days i have under my belt it doesn't matter how many steps i've done it doesn't matter what job i have trying to uphold an unhealthy standard of myself can kill me and i'm not okay with that outcome in order for me to stay healthy i have to realize that there is nothing in this world that i need that should make me not want to tell my truth if i can't have something because i have a bad day if i can't have or be something because of something i share on here then i don't want it if i can't be flawed then it's not for me if i have to pretend to be something pretend to be better than i am pretend to have a better day than i've had to get something then that something isn't for me and that's been a hard lesson because i always want to put my best face on i always want to put my best foot forward and dance around the truth to mold this image of what i think people want to know and see and unfortunately that's just not the end result that i want because that's an impossible standard to live up to day after day after day and having impossible standards for myself is what got me into this mess to begin with so today i choose vulnerability i choose to expose my own failures my own character defects i choose to talk about the bad days as well as the good days and if i ever say anything on here that disqualifies me from something then it wasn't for me to begin with and that's that's my rule that's the rule that keeps me in check if i can't be honest about something then i'm not in the right place if what i'm trying to get makes me want to have to lie to get it it's not for me so if i was gonna suggest anything to anyone that's what i would suggest keep an eye out if you're ever trying to achieve a standard that you feel like you have to lie to achieve if you're ever talking to somebody and feel like you have to hide something about yourself in order to continue to talk to that somebody chances are you're not in the right spot and you're trying to get things that you don't need in your life those are the things i have to tell myself anytime that that i feel like i'm not living up to my own standards anytime my feelings are more intense than i would like to accept for myself my defense against that is to just share it as is and nine times out of ten it's not as big of a deal as i thought it was gonna be i hope that made sense to you guys um if not oh well i guess thank you for tuning in y'all have a good [Music]

There a place we often get stuck, its the place between where we were and where we want to be.

To step into God's will, we must let go of our own.

A new measure of success is required to survive the ups and downs of this world.

No one tool can tackle every job, Its important to have every tool we can find at the ready so we are not caught of guard.

The truth really will set you free, not just in your 5th step but in everyday life.

Today I had the privilege to share my story live for the fist time at "Breakfast Club" in Oklahoma City. Enjoy!

Sometimes secrets are deadly if we don't talk about them.

Special Guest - Emily OKC

Exodus 33:17 ESV And the Lord said to Moses, “This very thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name.”

Special Guest Heather C. from Oklahoma City.

I absolutely must be patient with myself as well as maintain a faith in my sponsor and in God and in the process of healing, Remembering that I am not here because I know how to do this, I'm not here because I can do this by myself. I'm here exactly because I cannot do this and because I do not know and that's the whole point of this whole thing. 

Every other thing we do in life is created from something that was already existing but the creativity of the mind is pure new power that didn't come from anywhere but us.