Latest / Breaking Down Addiction / #23 Aaron Hamm — Let Go of What You Think You Know: Surrender & a Life in Recovery

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#23 Aaron Hamm — Let Go of What You Think You Know: Surrender & a Life in Recovery · Breaking Down Addiction

0:00
SPEAKER_01: When I go headfirst trying to make my life better, it never works.
0:02
SPEAKER_01: When I go headfirst trying to make someone else's life better, it's like I blink and my life is like a dogwood in like spring.
0:08
SPEAKER_01: Like you open the curtains one day and there's flowers everywhere.
0:11
SPEAKER_03: It's like hello, and welcome to a new episode of Breaking Down Addiction.
0:22
SPEAKER_03: I am your host, Johnny Phillip.
0:24
SPEAKER_03: This podcast is brought to you by National Addiction Specialists.
0:28
SPEAKER_03: We bring individuals in recovery onto our podcast to learn their story of experience, strength, and hope.
0:34
SPEAKER_03: And today we have a very special guest, Mr.
0:37
SPEAKER_03: Aaron Ham.
0:38
SPEAKER_03: Thank you so much for joining us.
0:40
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
0:40
SPEAKER_03: Good to be here, man.
0:41
SPEAKER_03: I appreciate it.
0:42
SPEAKER_03: I'm excited about it.
0:43
SPEAKER_03: So I've known who you are for the better part of six or seven years, but we've never technically met before.
0:48
SPEAKER_03: So I'm super excited to get to know you more, and especially on camera, which is kind of cool.
0:53
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
0:54
SPEAKER_03: But I like to start all these out with the same question.
0:57
SPEAKER_03: And that is if you were sitting across from yourself in active addiction, let's say you're in your your deepest bottom and you can talk to that person, what would you say?
1:10
SPEAKER_01: Man, I'd probably say forget everything you think you know and just listen to what these people are trying to tell you.
1:18
SPEAKER_01: Um I think, you know, I I think one of my biggest problems is I wanted to be sober long before I actually got sober.
1:25
SPEAKER_01: Like I genuinely did.
1:26
SPEAKER_01: You know, like in my heart of hearts, I you know, I wish I could have gotten what people said.
1:30
SPEAKER_01: But it's um my mind, I I do this thing where it's like when somebody's talking to me or explaining something to me or giving me direction, I kind of uh formulate that into a bundle of what I think they're where I think they're trying to go with that, and then try to look for kind of a shortcut.
1:47
SPEAKER_01: And uh and in any way, like I understand what you're trying to say.
1:50
SPEAKER_01: I I can probably get there a little quicker.
1:52
SPEAKER_01: Um, so I'm gonna do this my way.
1:54
SPEAKER_01: And uh and I never stayed sober.
1:57
SPEAKER_01: So yeah, probably just quieting the inner voice of what I think I know and just listening to somebody else, um you know, among other things.
2:07
SPEAKER_03: I'm so glad you said that you would want to figure out a shortcut.
2:10
SPEAKER_03: The the first or the last time I went to treatment in Hazledon in Center City, Minnesota, I wasn't fully committed into like, I'm gonna stay sober for the rest of my life.
2:23
SPEAKER_03: I said I'm gonna do this thing and eventually maybe enjoy a glass of wine at dinner.
2:28
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
2:29
SPEAKER_03: You know, so I was already talking myself into other things, yeah, looking for a shortcut or a way out.
2:34
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
2:35
SPEAKER_01: Well, and it's true, you know, I was the same way.
2:38
SPEAKER_01: And it's funny, it's like if somebody, if I'm at somewhere and they say, Oh, the curfew's 10 p.m., I will think, okay, they don't want people out running the streets doing illicit things after hours.
2:48
SPEAKER_01: I get that.
2:49
SPEAKER_01: But if I'm out with friends, especially if they're sober and we're having dinner, like the yeah, I don't really need to come home at 10.
2:55
SPEAKER_01: I can come home whenever we get done because the kind of the principle of what you're saying, like the the safeguard, like I'm still abiding by that.
3:02
SPEAKER_01: I'm just I'm not gonna do I know that's an extremely corny example, but that carried over into everything.
3:08
SPEAKER_01: Any suggestion, any, any, any, just anything whatsoever.
3:11
SPEAKER_01: And um, and again, you know, like the the permanent sobriety forever, it just seemed a little uh kind of like an overreach almost.
3:18
SPEAKER_01: You know, I need to get my life under control.
3:19
SPEAKER_01: Then maybe smoke some butt, or maybe just drink on the wheat, drink Heineken, get a bottle opener, and just you know, no more natural eyes, just Heineken, like, you know, a civilized gentleman.
3:29
SPEAKER_01: And uh you know what I'm saying?
3:30
SPEAKER_03: So like zip Heineken all weekend, that's that's gonna be fine.
3:34
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
3:34
SPEAKER_01: The problem was the brand, not the 24-7 constant use and and not working, you know.
3:38
SPEAKER_01: It's it's it's but anyway, but yeah, very funny, man.
3:42
SPEAKER_03: We uh so we we were discussing beforehand you were a blackout drinker very early on in your life.
3:49
SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah.
3:50
SPEAKER_03: When did you realize that that wasn't normal drinking?
3:53
SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, it it's actually funny you say that because to your point, I didn't know that didn't happen to everybody.
4:01
SPEAKER_01: And you know, when I started drinking and and socializing, you know, whatever it is, 14, 15, 16, probably 15, 16, when you're really going out with your buddies drinking, I would always black out and I would do things that I don't remember.
4:12
SPEAKER_01: And the next day your friends are upset with you.
4:14
SPEAKER_01: They say, Man, do you remember what you you called me this or you did that?
4:17
SPEAKER_01: And and I'd be like, Oh, you know, I I don't even remember that.
4:21
SPEAKER_01: And no one would really respond to that.
4:23
SPEAKER_01: And then one day my buddy he said something I did wrong, and I said, Man, I'm sorry, I don't remember that.
4:28
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, Aaron, he goes, You don't have to say you don't remember it.
4:31
SPEAKER_01: You can just say, you know, you're sorry you did it, you're embarrassed or something.
4:35
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, no, no, no, like that that's also true, but I don't even remember that happening.
4:40
SPEAKER_01: And it clicked with me that he had never had a blackout.
4:43
SPEAKER_01: He thought this blackout thing was just me narcissistically like things up or not taking ownership.
4:49
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, like, oh, whoops, I don't remember that at all.
4:51
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, Well, of course you remember it.
4:53
SPEAKER_01: Like, quit saying you don't remember.
4:54
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, no, no, no, wait, well, you never like, you know, black out.
4:58
SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
4:59
SPEAKER_01: And it was like a revelation that not everyone goes through that.
5:02
SPEAKER_01: So I'd probably be somewhere 15 or 16.
5:05
SPEAKER_01: I probably learned that that not everybody, in fact, maybe you know, smaller percentage do than don't.
5:11
SPEAKER_01: So um, but yeah, it was pretty wild.
5:14
SPEAKER_03: That's when I started drinking and also started blacking out.
5:18
SPEAKER_03: I thought it was cool to black out.
5:20
SPEAKER_03: I was like, dude, I got so fucked up last night, I don't remember a single thing.
5:25
SPEAKER_03: That was awesome.
5:26
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
5:26
SPEAKER_01: Did good.
5:28
SPEAKER_01: I mean, this sounds like it's like did you wake up to bad stuff, or like were you a blackout?
5:32
SPEAKER_01: Were you just funny and goofy and friendly, or you know what I'm saying?
5:35
SPEAKER_03: Like it was it was a mixed bag, but mostly friendly.
5:39
SPEAKER_03: Uh-huh.
5:40
SPEAKER_03: And then I sometimes I'd pee myself.
5:42
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you know, and that's that's so that was embarrassing.
5:44
SPEAKER_00: Okay, yeah.
5:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
5:46
SPEAKER_00: Well, and I guess you, yeah, sometimes it was it was like, oh man, you did, you know, you said this to so and so it was funny, but but a lot of times, and I don't know what it is, you know.
5:54
SPEAKER_01: Some people, you'll notice this, they get drunk and they're just kind of they love everybody.
5:58
SPEAKER_01: They're happy, and I mean like really drunk, not like six or eight beers or something, you know, like super slash.
6:03
SPEAKER_01: And other people are just angry or confrontational.
6:06
SPEAKER_01: And I I, you know, I can only assume that's I don't know, something inside of you waiting there.
6:10
SPEAKER_01: I don't know what it was, but I wasn't like the most angry, violent, but like I wasn't giving anyone compliments either.
6:17
SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
6:17
SPEAKER_00: Like I'm not walking around like boy, this is you know, cool outfit.
6:20
SPEAKER_00: Like it was always I love you, bro.
6:23
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
6:24
SPEAKER_01: So uh yeah, blackouts, but it was the wildest thing, you know, because I I you know, anyway, most people, you know, probably listen to this have had them, but you're just enjoying yourself partying, then you just wake up wherever you wait the next day, and it's like, wait, how did I how did I get home?
6:38
SPEAKER_01: How did I get here?
6:39
SPEAKER_01: And it's just it uh there's an out there's a little panache to it, kind of like uh man, last night must have been wild, but um, but it you know, it would it definitely had its dark side.
6:49
SPEAKER_03: So you originally or you started going to treatment at an early age.
6:54
SPEAKER_03: 16.
6:55
SPEAKER_03: 16, and then you you went to Hazel in.
6:57
SPEAKER_03: Was it the adolescent program?
6:59
SPEAKER_01: It was adolescent, but it was it was 16 to 24.
7:01
SPEAKER_01: You would think when you think adolescent, you think 18 and under.
7:05
SPEAKER_01: I don't know the the the science behind it, I don't know why, but it was 16 to 24.
7:10
SPEAKER_01: Um, and yeah, I went there, it's I turned 17 in there, as a matter of fact.
7:14
SPEAKER_01: And it's it's um, yeah, it's funny.
7:17
SPEAKER_01: My brother had gone there before me, and he he was 18, so he just AMA'd.
7:22
SPEAKER_01: He signed himself out.
7:23
SPEAKER_01: And I remember I was there a few days and it was my birthday, and I'm all upset, you know, I don't want to go home and I'm throwing a fit, you know, I'm not doing, I'm not going to group.
7:30
SPEAKER_01: And this little uh sweet count, he must have been 75, you know what I'm saying?
7:34
SPEAKER_01: A little frail old man.
7:35
SPEAKER_01: He comes in my room and he's like, hey buddy, he's like, let's talk about it.
7:38
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, I don't want to talk to you, man.
7:40
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, Well, just come to group and share and see if you feel better.
7:44
SPEAKER_01: And and uh I'm like, look, I'm not going to group and I'm just being a jerk.
7:48
SPEAKER_01: And finally, this it's like somebody flipped a switch in this little old man.
7:51
SPEAKER_01: He was like, Listen, you little asshole.
7:53
SPEAKER_01: He's like, I know what you're trying to do.
7:54
SPEAKER_01: Your brother just left here.
7:56
SPEAKER_01: You think you're gonna do the same thing?
7:57
SPEAKER_01: He goes, but since you're a minor, if we have to boot you out of here, you're going to a locked facility, you know.
8:02
SPEAKER_01: And I remember it just he was like, So you want to come to group?
8:05
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, okay, I'll be there in a minute.
8:07
SPEAKER_01: You know, like, but I guess he'd already talked to my parents, you know, and gotten permission to do all that, like the you know, but anyway.
8:14
SPEAKER_00: Good on him.
8:15
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
8:15
SPEAKER_00: Oh, it was, it was.
8:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm glad.
8:17
SPEAKER_03: Was it your parents that had this suggestion for you to go to treatment at that age?
8:21
SPEAKER_03: Or what was it also you or were you kind of forced?
8:24
SPEAKER_01: No, 100% forced.
8:26
SPEAKER_01: You know, it's it's I I was, you know, pretty serious alcoholic from the jump.
8:31
SPEAKER_01: My brother had, and he he he was too.
8:33
SPEAKER_01: My brother just gotten in this car wreck, and from a car wreck, he was looking at 75 years.
8:39
SPEAKER_01: He had a couple assault twos, which I think were 10 to 20.
8:42
SPEAKER_01: And then he had six felonies, so four more felonies, whatever they were.
8:46
SPEAKER_01: I think one endangerment, which is funnily enough, it's only a Kentucky charge.
8:50
SPEAKER_01: It's like flagrant disregard for human life.
8:54
SPEAKER_01: And uh, and so he was going to treatment to try to make himself look good in court.
8:58
SPEAKER_01: So he went, he bounced, and my parents were like, well, let's tackle Aaron.
9:02
SPEAKER_01: So I got forced there.
9:03
SPEAKER_01: And it's funny, looking back, I didn't know what alcoholism was.
9:07
SPEAKER_01: I I looked at it as like being grounded away from home.
9:11
SPEAKER_01: Like, you know, instead of you know, you being grounded and then can't go out, we're just gonna send you away so we don't have to uh enforce all the grounding rules.
9:17
SPEAKER_01: Like, but you're grounded for a month.
9:19
SPEAKER_01: Come out and do whatever you want.
9:20
SPEAKER_03: And essentially, we don't have to deal with you.
9:22
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, right.
9:23
SPEAKER_03: Somebody else, this is somebody else's problem.
9:25
SPEAKER_01: Uh-huh.
9:25
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but no permanent sobriety, no change in your life, no space.
9:28
SPEAKER_01: It's just kind of you're going, you're you're you're gonna be punished for a month, and then when you get home, you know, I hope you've taken time to think about, you know, what you've done right.
9:37
SPEAKER_01: Like there was no long-term sobriety, like it wasn't even like not on the radar as an understatement.
9:44
SPEAKER_01: You know, I was just I was just doing my time and fully planned on getting screwed up the second I got home.
9:49
SPEAKER_01: So um and didn't know there was anything wrong with that kind of um yeah, yeah.
9:53
SPEAKER_03: You thought it was normal, maybe.
9:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
9:56
SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, I just I don't know, kind of like I got a little out of hand, you know, maybe, maybe change a few things, but definitely still get get fucked up, you know.
10:04
SPEAKER_03: So were you just drinking at this point when you left England?
10:10
SPEAKER_01: So the the I I was I always drank from the first drink to my sobriety day, drinking was always the the the number one.
10:18
SPEAKER_01: And there was almost always um weed, you know, I was almost always smoking weed.
10:23
SPEAKER_01: The only times I wasn't always is if I didn't have the money for it, it's more expensive than alcohol.
10:27
SPEAKER_01: And then what I also love probably third was Xanax, and then probably fourth was cocaine.
10:32
SPEAKER_01: So, but at that time I was drinking, smoking weed, and I think I had been well, actually I'd been introduced to all four of those because I remember on my drug screen, my admission drug screen, there was cocaine in it.
10:43
SPEAKER_01: And I had only done cocaine a handful of times.
10:45
SPEAKER_01: So, you know, it's it was I was like, are they gonna call my parents and tell them the drug screen?
10:49
SPEAKER_01: But yeah, so I was doing a little bit of everything by that point, so that that I ever really partook in.
10:55
SPEAKER_03: So you weren't really sold on sobriety for a while, it sounds like.
10:59
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and you went out and went to treatment 16 different times.
11:05
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
11:06
SPEAKER_03: Um before I get to the let's earmark the question of that final time, what was different?
11:12
SPEAKER_03: But what allowed you to keep going back out?
11:17
SPEAKER_01: You know, excuse me, there um I I I I don't know for for sure, um, but one inadvertently people around me kind of cushioning my fall.
11:33
SPEAKER_01: You know, like I always had a place to go.
11:35
SPEAKER_01: I always had uh, you know, somewhere to rest my head, you know.
11:39
SPEAKER_01: They were enabling you.
11:40
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
11:41
SPEAKER_01: And um and not knowing that, because you know, I I deal with that.
11:44
SPEAKER_01: I'll talk to I I I do not I don't work for an entity that does this, I don't do it for hire, I don't push my mission, but every once in a while somebody will reach out and they'll say, they'll know my story and they'll say, hey man, I'm really struggling with my brother or my wife or my husband or my, you know, can you talk to a family member?
12:03
SPEAKER_01: And this may not be true.
12:04
SPEAKER_01: This this number one is an opinion, and number two, I'll admit that I have no way of proving this either way.
12:10
SPEAKER_01: But one of the biggest factors when I see people either leave treatment or get drunk after treatment, very rarely do they bounce to go live behind a dumpster and get screwed up.
12:20
SPEAKER_01: They almost always have a girlfriend, a boyfriend, a mom, somebody that takes them back in.
12:26
SPEAKER_01: Very rarely, or they have, you know, some money to get a hotel.
12:29
SPEAKER_01: You know, very few people um, you know, go say, all right, I'm I'm walking down to the bridge to live out my days drunk.
12:35
SPEAKER_01: They generally have something in their life kind of cushioning that reality.
12:39
SPEAKER_01: And for me, um, I guess I don't know, thinking it couldn't work for me, having people that kind of were somewhat in my corner.
12:48
SPEAKER_01: And, you know, see, I was just, I was really a hard-headed guy.
12:51
SPEAKER_01: You know, I was really just kind of uh, you know, play now, pay later kind of guy, regardless.
12:58
SPEAKER_01: I was in, I was just telling the story earlier, but I was in a mental hospital one time and I wasn't going by the rules.
13:04
SPEAKER_01: And I remember they called my mom, they had me in the office, and they put my mom on speaker, and they didn't tell my mom I was in the room.
13:10
SPEAKER_01: They just said, Miss Ham, they go, you know, your son's a patient here, he's not going by any rules, he's not doing anything we say.
13:16
SPEAKER_01: And the doctor was on speakerphone looking me in the eye, talking to my mom, and she goes, you know, we can keep Aaron here indefinitely.
13:22
SPEAKER_01: They go, we don't need a court order, we don't need any kind of judgment.
13:25
SPEAKER_01: Well, he can he can stay here for the rest of his life if we determine so.
13:29
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, and they go, and we need somebody that he trusts that can explain that to him because he's clearly not understanding.
13:36
SPEAKER_01: And in the speaker, my mom just goes, Oh, you know, you hear the sigh.
13:40
SPEAKER_01: And she goes, Look, she goes, Aaron's had every kind of consequence you can imagine.
13:43
SPEAKER_01: He's been locked up, he's been in trouble, you know, no light, no friend, no, you know, just saying she goes, Aaron's not gonna do anything that Aaron doesn't want to do.
13:50
SPEAKER_01: She goes, I'm sorry, I can't tell him I love him.
13:52
SPEAKER_01: And she hung up the phone and she didn't know I was in the room, I wasn't supposed to hear that.
13:56
SPEAKER_01: And if I was younger, I would have thought that was about the coolest thing you could have said about me.
14:00
SPEAKER_01: But I remember I was 31, I'm homeless, I'm penniless, you know, I'm sitting in this metal institution for the fourth or fifth time, whatever in my life.
14:08
SPEAKER_01: And I just remember thinking, you know, anyway, it was very depressing.
14:11
SPEAKER_01: But the point is, um, I just I don't know what it is, I just don't do anything unless I don't know.
14:17
SPEAKER_01: Like I something in my heart shifts and and tells me to do it.
14:21
SPEAKER_03: So um I think that's a good statement.
14:24
SPEAKER_03: Something in your heart shifts.
14:26
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but yeah.
14:27
SPEAKER_03: And let's also earmark that because it probably comes into play later.
14:31
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
14:31
SPEAKER_03: Um so you're you've been arrested upwards of 30 plus times.
14:36
SPEAKER_03: Yes, yeah, 33.
14:38
SPEAKER_03: The the la 33 times.
14:40
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
14:40
SPEAKER_03: So that last time you were arrested, what was different and like what happened in that scenario?
14:47
SPEAKER_01: So the kind of shorter version is right before that I had 19 months sober.
14:52
SPEAKER_01: And I was actually, you know, I'd worked the steps, you know, I was sponsoring other guys, I was working in treatment all day.
14:57
SPEAKER_03: 19 months is a good time.
14:59
SPEAKER_01: It is good as the longest I ever had.
15:00
SPEAKER_01: And uh and I was I was I was out of the country on this uh um study abroad ordeal, away from the program, you know, long a lot of lot of things came into play, and I ended up taking some pills and I I got drunk immediately.
15:15
SPEAKER_01: And for eight months I was out running, and I just thought that was my one chance I blew it.
15:20
SPEAKER_01: You know, like my because I'd wanted to be sober for so long, and I finally had a year and a half, and I thought I blew that, I'll never get it back, and I wreck my car, I go to jail.
15:28
SPEAKER_01: And in jail, don't get me wrong, I wanted to be sober, but my life, the one thing I was positive about, I'm telling you, the number one thing I was positive about was that my life would never be good again.
15:37
SPEAKER_01: Not in a pessimistic type of way, not in a cynical, like in a very reality, you know, you know, perspective, my life could never be good.
15:47
SPEAKER_01: And I wanted to be sober, but I don't know.
15:50
SPEAKER_01: Anyway, after about a month in jail, they sent me to Buffalo Valley.
15:54
SPEAKER_01: And in there, I'm still wanting to be sober, but there came a point where I had some volume in my property that I got arrested with that followed me to jail, that followed me to Buffalo Valley.
16:04
SPEAKER_01: And I kind of had this plan, even though I didn't want to do it, it was kind of driving me that I could get out of here because now my time's up.
16:11
SPEAKER_01: I did a month in jail on Buffalo Valley, and I could have either stayed there and worked at Buffalo Valley, they call it a peer-to-peer for$80 a week and room and board and food, or bounce.
16:22
SPEAKER_01: And I called uh couldn't get an apartment.
16:25
SPEAKER_01: My buddy wouldn't let me crash on his couch, and finally I called my dad and I said, Hey dad, you know, if I'm gonna do this peer-to-peer thing, I was like, I need$500, you know, the pretty, you know, the the ego.
16:36
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, I said, I have no clothes, I have one pair of tennis shoes to give me blisters.
16:40
SPEAKER_01: He goes, No, I'm not sending you$500.
16:42
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, Okay, well, okay, a couple hundred, you know, a pair of sneakers, you know, some sweatpants.
16:46
SPEAKER_01: He goes, No, I'm not doing that either.
16:47
SPEAKER_01: I was like, Well, you know, can you pay if I can't live here right, you know, can I get in the halfway house?
16:52
SPEAKER_01: Will you pay for that?
16:53
SPEAKER_01: He goes, No, I'm not doing that.
16:54
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Will you please just send me cigarettes?
16:57
SPEAKER_01: He goes, No, he goes, and I'll never forget it.
16:59
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Aaron, he goes, I'm not mad at you.
17:01
SPEAKER_01: He goes, this is not a punishment.
17:02
SPEAKER_01: He goes, I love you.
17:03
SPEAKER_01: He goes, if you get sober, I'd love to, you know, you'd be in my life, come visit anytime.
17:07
SPEAKER_01: He goes, but but we're done here.
17:09
SPEAKER_01: He goes, I I'm not, I'm not doing anything for you.
17:11
SPEAKER_01: And and it just kind of hit me that if I were to screw this up, I was live, I was literally gonna be living under bridges.
17:19
SPEAKER_01: Because when I'm drinking, I have no earning capacity.
17:21
SPEAKER_01: I I'm around the clock drunk.
17:24
SPEAKER_01: And then the other thing that happened, I went back to the little day room where they're watching TV, and there were six or eight guys.
17:30
SPEAKER_01: One was saying, my girlfriend's sneaking in some, you know, some drugs, whatever it was this weekend.
17:36
SPEAKER_01: And another guy goes, Oh man, he goes, My grandma's on a fixed income, but the first of every month, when she gets her check, she sends me$30.
17:42
SPEAKER_01: Like, can you front me?
17:43
SPEAKER_01: So he's counting this grandma out of her retirement money.
17:46
SPEAKER_01: And all this stuff sitting around.
17:47
SPEAKER_01: And I remember, and I'm looking at this, and up until that point, I was always separate from that.
17:51
SPEAKER_01: Like these guys are low life.
17:53
SPEAKER_01: I just caught a DUI or I just caught an assault.
17:55
SPEAKER_01: Like that, I'm just stopping in here.
17:57
SPEAKER_01: I'm not as bad as that.
17:57
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
17:58
SPEAKER_01: Y'all are the people that belong be here.
18:00
SPEAKER_01: Your lives.
18:00
SPEAKER_01: And for a split second, well, actually a little longer, it hit me.
18:04
SPEAKER_01: I was like, I am these guys.
18:05
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, if I were to die, other than my family mourning me, no one's life on the planet would be negatively affected.
18:14
SPEAKER_01: Like I was not contributing anything to society in any way.
18:18
SPEAKER_01: And it just it hit me that, you know, my life was always gonna be like that unless I listened to everything they said and did everything, no more picking and choosing.
18:27
SPEAKER_01: And something snapped, you know, the lack of options and some sort of you know revelation kind of coupled together.
18:34
SPEAKER_01: And to the best of my ability, I've tried to adhere to these principles ever since.
18:38
SPEAKER_01: So but that is it's a wild story.
18:43
SPEAKER_03: Um, so Buffalo Valley, and then you did you end up doing the peer-to-peer?
18:48
SPEAKER_03: I did, I did, yeah, yeah.
18:50
SPEAKER_03: And then how long did you do that?
18:51
SPEAKER_03: And then what was the what was after that?
18:54
SPEAKER_03: So another funny story.
18:55
SPEAKER_01: So excuse me.
18:57
SPEAKER_01: So I told you when the peer to when it was peer-to-peer come back to Nashville, I did try to get an apartment.
19:02
SPEAKER_01: I kind of tried to jump ship.
19:03
SPEAKER_01: And I put in this, I filled out all this application as this nice apartment.
19:07
SPEAKER_01: And at the end it was like a$150 application fee.
19:10
SPEAKER_01: So I'm like, well, I'm flat broke.
19:11
SPEAKER_01: So I just exited out of the application.
19:13
SPEAKER_01: Didn't even submit it, I didn't think.
19:16
SPEAKER_01: And so I do peer-to-peer for three months, and when that's up, I'm trying to figure out what to do.
19:20
SPEAKER_01: And I get a money back and I get a phone call from this lady at the apartment complex.
19:24
SPEAKER_01: She goes, hey, I'm calling from the Lexington, uh, I'm following up on an application.
19:28
SPEAKER_01: And I said, that was three months ago.
19:30
SPEAKER_01: I was like, she goes, yeah, our census is low, we're pulling old apps.
19:33
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, I didn't even think I submitted that.
19:35
SPEAKER_01: And she's like, well, it's right here.
19:37
SPEAKER_01: And I go, um, I go, but I didn't pay the application fee.
19:40
SPEAKER_01: And she goes, yeah, yeah, that's fine.
19:42
SPEAKER_01: We waived it.
19:42
SPEAKER_01: It's all good.
19:42
SPEAKER_01: Don't worry about it.
19:43
SPEAKER_01: In my last apartment, before I got locked up, I got evicted from, I got the emergency 72-hour eviction.
19:51
SPEAKER_01: Somehow they found out about my rec DUI and they kicked me out while I was in jail.
19:54
SPEAKER_01: 72 hours.
19:56
SPEAKER_01: And I had to have like all types of cosigners and extra deposits for that one.
19:59
SPEAKER_01: So I was already on the, you know, the red, the do not fly list on the first one.
20:03
SPEAKER_01: Then I got a violent eviction from it or whatever you emergency eviction from it.
20:07
SPEAKER_01: And I go, okay, well, let's get down to brass tax.
20:10
SPEAKER_01: I was like, you know, what do I need to get in here?
20:12
SPEAKER_01: She goes, nothing.
20:12
SPEAKER_01: Just first month and a$500 security deposit.
20:15
SPEAKER_01: Like, like 24 hours before I was set to go.
20:18
SPEAKER_01: An application I didn't submit, I didn't pay the fee.
20:22
SPEAKER_01: And there was, I was on like the don't rent to list.
20:25
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you know what, if there is a, and they just let me write in right when I'm supposed to get out.
20:30
SPEAKER_01: So I moved back.
20:31
SPEAKER_01: I came back to the Lexington.
20:33
SPEAKER_01: Uh, Discovery Place gave me my job back, and and life just unfolded.
20:37
SPEAKER_01: You know, funny, this I'll make this as quick as I can, but I was working at DP before I relapsed.
20:44
SPEAKER_01: Discovery Place.
20:45
SPEAKER_01: I no called, no, got drunk and bounced.
20:48
SPEAKER_01: No, no, nothing.
20:49
SPEAKER_01: And so they give me my job back.
20:50
SPEAKER_01: And I'm working on main campus, this sweet little, you know, gig.
20:53
SPEAKER_01: They got a cafeteria, ice cream machine, soda fountain, private.
20:56
SPEAKER_03: I love DP, those chocolate chip cookies.
20:58
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
20:58
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, the undercooked, you know, melty.
21:01
SPEAKER_01: And they came to me and they go, Aaron, we really could use you at our extended campus a couple days a week.
21:06
SPEAKER_01: And it's like a house in a, you know, some no kitchen, no, you know, you know, no industrial kitchen, no ice cream machine, no offices.
21:13
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, I don't want to do it.
21:15
SPEAKER_01: But then I was like, you know, I left them high and dry.
21:17
SPEAKER_01: They gave me a job twice.
21:18
SPEAKER_01: Now I'm gonna do this for them.
21:19
SPEAKER_01: And then part of my responsibility for working in extended care was driving a van to a Wednesday noon meeting with all these old timers and, you know, meeting I'd never stepped foot into.
21:28
SPEAKER_01: That's where I met my wife.
21:29
SPEAKER_01: And now we're married.
21:30
SPEAKER_01: We have four sons, you know what I'm saying?
21:32
SPEAKER_01: Beautiful life together.
21:33
SPEAKER_01: By trying to go out of my way to do something I don't want to do, to make amends to DP.
21:38
SPEAKER_01: That set in motion the bet one of the best, you know, sobriety in my family are the two best things in my life today.
21:44
SPEAKER_01: I never bro.
21:45
SPEAKER_01: I had no other way to meet her.
21:47
SPEAKER_01: I mean, could we have bumped into each other, Kroger?
21:49
SPEAKER_01: Maybe, but probably not.
21:51
SPEAKER_01: You know, so it's just wild how things unfold.
21:53
SPEAKER_01: That is so beautiful, dude.
21:55
SPEAKER_00: Well, thanks, man.
21:56
SPEAKER_00: Yes, cool story.
21:57
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
21:58
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I had no idea how you guys met.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Well, that was it.
22:01
SPEAKER_01: And uh, and it's just weird, you know, most of the um, you know, most of the good things I have in my life today came from things that I either didn't want to do or I thought they were bad when it happened.
22:12
SPEAKER_01: Like, and not not to like be poetic.
22:13
SPEAKER_01: It's so funny.
22:14
SPEAKER_01: Like, if something good happens to me or I get a cool car, I'm like, oh man, this is awesome.
22:18
SPEAKER_01: And then it's just the payments and the high insurance, and people look at you differently.
22:21
SPEAKER_01: It's like, actually, this isn't that fun.
22:23
SPEAKER_03: And then uh that's that's a great outlook on that.
22:29
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thanks for sharing that.
22:30
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
22:31
SPEAKER_01: No, you what?
22:31
SPEAKER_01: There's this guy, Clark, and he says he was talking about the four step, you know, resentment, you know, the cause, you know, what part of self it affects and my part.
22:38
SPEAKER_01: He goes, I like to tinker with things, and he goes, uh, I inventoried my blessings one time and traced those back to the root cause.
22:45
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, almost invariably the root cause of all my blessings came from something that looked bad on the front end.
22:50
SPEAKER_01: And I I I look at that like after, you know, but anyway, anyway, it's it's that's pretty true for me too, you know.
22:57
SPEAKER_03: So um I can I can go on record and say the same thing, yeah, actually.
23:02
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
23:03
SPEAKER_03: Wow, that's super wild.
23:05
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, it is how it works.
23:07
SPEAKER_03: Dude, just congrats to you for everything that you went through.
23:11
SPEAKER_03: And then so you started working at DP again.
23:13
SPEAKER_03: And then what from DP, what happened next?
23:17
SPEAKER_01: So it uh I'm working there and I always wanted to do a sober living, and you know, but I had no money, no credit, you know, no, you know, I was having trouble staying sober.
23:26
SPEAKER_01: So I got a little sobriety time and I was I was pitching this idea to my dad.
23:31
SPEAKER_01: I said, you know, I'd really love to do a sober living.
23:34
SPEAKER_01: And my thing was anybody can kind of heckle from the cheap seats.
23:38
SPEAKER_01: You know, you yeah, I can walk into Kroger and be like, oh, they should, this layout should be different.
23:42
SPEAKER_01: You know, anyone's capable of that.
23:43
SPEAKER_01: But I kind of did that with halfway houses.
23:45
SPEAKER_01: They'd have bugs or, you know, they you know, they didn't have, you know, there was things I was like, this is kind of the, you know, they could probably do this.
23:51
SPEAKER_01: So I thought they could do it a little better and be more recovery focused.
23:54
SPEAKER_01: Like, because a lot of places, not all, if you're listening, not at all, a lot of places money's the number one thing.
24:01
SPEAKER_01: If your parents write a check for a month and you know, your meetings are short that week, who kids, you know, we got the check.
24:07
SPEAKER_02: We want that bed full.
24:09
SPEAKER_01: Right.
24:09
SPEAKER_01: And so I was like, let's do the opposite philosophy.
24:12
SPEAKER_01: If somebody is is paying but full of shit, they're gone.
24:16
SPEAKER_01: If somebody is really trying but short on money, let's keep them.
24:20
SPEAKER_01: Let's have pest control, let's put TVs in the bedrooms.
24:23
SPEAKER_01: Let's kind of kind of try to treat these people nice.
24:25
SPEAKER_01: Like they're humans.
24:26
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
24:27
SPEAKER_03: Also trying to make a difference in their life.
24:29
SPEAKER_01: 100%, 100%.
24:30
SPEAKER_01: And so my dad bought a house, and my pitch to him, I was like, you know, it's it's you buy it, you know, if I screw this up, you know, you can always sell.
24:36
SPEAKER_01: It's not like you're fronting me for advertising, you know, that you can't recoup.
24:40
SPEAKER_01: Right.
24:40
SPEAKER_01: I don't know why, but he did it.
24:42
SPEAKER_03: And this this is from a while earlier, he wouldn't give you 500 bucks, 200 bucks, or even a pack of smokes.
24:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
24:50
SPEAKER_03: Look at this.
24:51
SPEAKER_03: Uh yeah, yeah.
24:52
SPEAKER_03: Keep gone.
24:52
SPEAKER_01: And he owned the house.
24:53
SPEAKER_01: You know, it wasn't, excuse me, it wasn't a gift or anything like that.
24:57
SPEAKER_01: Um, but uh, I mean, but a blessing.
25:00
SPEAKER_01: I never, ever, ever um would have been able to do it without his help.
25:04
SPEAKER_01: So I did that, that filled up, it became, you know, big.
25:07
SPEAKER_01: Or no, I'm sorry, it it worked.
25:09
SPEAKER_01: You know, we stayed full, we were helping people.
25:12
SPEAKER_01: And tragically, my father, it's my brother was murdered in 2018.
25:17
SPEAKER_01: And it was a bad scenario where, you know, Kentucky has these stand your ground laws, and and the the guy who did it said he felt threatened.
25:24
SPEAKER_01: So he never even went to jail like that night.
25:26
SPEAKER_01: Whether that's right or wrong, I don't know.
25:28
unknown: I wasn't there.
25:29
SPEAKER_01: Um, but you know, it was a tragic thing.
25:30
SPEAKER_01: My brother's died, the the killer's, you know, free.
25:33
SPEAKER_01: And and uh so I'd go up to Louisville to visit my dad because um it uh I would go up there about once a week to visit with my dad.
25:41
SPEAKER_01: And one week is about two months after my brother died.
25:45
SPEAKER_01: And I'd made amends to my dad, but I I I offered him some financial amends early on, and he said no.
25:50
SPEAKER_01: And I probably couldn't have paid it.
25:52
SPEAKER_01: So, you know, be you know, I don't know how noble it, you know, you can't worry about it.
25:56
SPEAKER_01: Anyway, now I'm making a few bucks from the halfway house.
25:58
SPEAKER_01: I said, I'd love to pay you back.
25:59
SPEAKER_01: And I said, here's what I feel I owe you, here's the payment plan.
26:02
SPEAKER_01: And he didn't want it, didn't want it.
26:03
SPEAKER_01: And finally, I was thinking, I was like, Dad, I was like, I want to be square with the the universe.
26:06
SPEAKER_01: I was like, I I want to be square with everyone.
26:09
SPEAKER_01: And so will you please do this?
26:10
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, Okay, I will.
26:11
SPEAKER_01: And and we started talking, we had this long talk.
26:13
SPEAKER_01: And I remember I'm needing to get back to Nashville because with the time change, if you hit rush hour in Louisville, you hit it in Nashville too, because you go back an hour.
26:20
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, I gotta go, I gotta go.
26:21
SPEAKER_01: And he's super long trip then.
26:23
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
26:23
SPEAKER_01: And he keeps talking.
26:25
SPEAKER_01: And finally I figured, screw it.
26:26
SPEAKER_01: You know, my just lost my brother.
26:27
SPEAKER_01: You know, how often do I see my dad?
26:29
SPEAKER_01: You know, I'm gonna talk as long as he wants.
26:30
SPEAKER_01: And we had this beautiful talk.
26:31
SPEAKER_01: I made the second amends to him.
26:33
SPEAKER_01: We give each other this big hug before I leave.
26:34
SPEAKER_01: I love you.
26:35
SPEAKER_01: Looked him right in the eye, I love you.
26:36
SPEAKER_01: He goes, I love you too, Aaron.
26:38
SPEAKER_01: I leave.
26:39
SPEAKER_01: And eight days later, my dad died of a sudden heart attack.
26:43
SPEAKER_01: You know, he wasn't in poor health.
26:44
SPEAKER_01: There was no uh precursor, you know, that no one saw this coming.
26:48
SPEAKER_01: And it's a it's a funny thing that if I had known he was gonna die, and that was the last time I was gonna see him, our conversation would not have been one word different than the one I actually had with him.
26:59
SPEAKER_01: And I didn't know he was gonna die.
27:01
SPEAKER_01: We just organically had this conversation.
27:05
SPEAKER_01: And so after he passed, for about a year, I got a couple more houses and we take all the broke dudes, you know, all the people, the the everyone that, you know, when somebody calls the halfway house and this is not a knock, uh, it really isn't.
27:18
SPEAKER_01: But when somebody calls a halfway house and like, I desperate, I need help, blah, blah, blah, but I don't have any money, they give them Aaron's number.
27:23
SPEAKER_01: You know, right or wrong.
27:24
SPEAKER_01: I'm not saying that's good or bad, but I it's just I I would get, you know, I would get referral.
27:28
SPEAKER_01: You know, if you didn't have money, you were getting my number.
27:30
SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
27:31
SPEAKER_01: And so I'm bringing these people in, and we do make them get jobs, and we would kind of associate, you know, um, you know, form tabs, you know, like when you get paid, you're gonna have to pay back rent.
27:40
SPEAKER_01: And what would happen is even if you cut these people breaks, it takes them a week or two to get a job, two or a week or two or three to get paid.
27:47
SPEAKER_01: And then if they owe you six or eight hundred bucks and they get a$480 check, they bounce.
27:52
SPEAKER_01: They go get high, they leave.
27:54
SPEAKER_01: And so I was like, I have this amends to my dad.
27:56
SPEAKER_01: I have a number in mind.
27:57
SPEAKER_01: I I made it to my dad.
27:59
SPEAKER_01: I said, All these people are coming in broke.
28:00
SPEAKER_01: I said, I'm gonna buy a house and I'm gonna do a free 90-day program.
28:04
SPEAKER_01: And no strings attached, no grants, no subsidies, no truly free.
28:09
SPEAKER_01: Now that me paying the mortgage and the food and the electric is gonna be my amends to my dad.
28:14
SPEAKER_01: So I find this house, go under contract on it, and just lo and behold, the closing day out of my control was set on my dad's birthday.
28:20
SPEAKER_01: Like uh, they said August 3rd, you close.
28:22
SPEAKER_01: And I'm doing different deals at this point, so I'm not paying attention to closing days and inspection dates.
28:27
SPEAKER_01: I was like, August 3rd.
28:28
SPEAKER_01: I was like, I was driving down the road, I was like, that's uh and I was laying in bed that night and I couldn't sleep, and I was like, August 3rd, I was like, holy cow, I was like, that's my dad's birthday.
28:35
SPEAKER_01: And um, and I started doing that free house that you had to copy the big book to get in.
28:40
SPEAKER_01: You had to hand copy 164 pages to get into the program.
28:43
SPEAKER_01: Then you had 90 days free.
28:45
SPEAKER_01: And um, it's an amazing thing.
28:47
SPEAKER_01: I I don't want to like get too much into it, but some people would come and volunteer for that program, and I met people that I never would have met that were volunteering there.
28:58
SPEAKER_01: And me and their paths crossed, and we were able to work together to you know make something happen.
29:08
SPEAKER_01: And even though I'm I'm not affiliated with that organization at all, whatsoever.
29:12
SPEAKER_01: Don't make a dollar, not on the board, not on the pay.
29:15
SPEAKER_01: I'm not a fill, I have no ownership, just meeting them and some things able to happen, and that um that program has now gotten thousands of people into treatment.
29:23
SPEAKER_03: And I think another program.
29:24
SPEAKER_01: Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah.
29:25
SPEAKER_01: And it it's yeah, and it's all them.
29:27
SPEAKER_01: It's I have nothing to do, but it's just crazy how that my goal was to try to like help human and it's like God's like, you're not the right person, but these people are built for it.
29:36
SPEAKER_01: And it it I don't know, it's about another beautiful thing that just happened, you know.
29:40
SPEAKER_03: So um I it's unbelievable that because there's a lot of strange parallels and strange coincidences that are happening, like your dad's birthday for that one house.
29:50
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you're having this leap of faith to help this other agency that are helping thousands of people now, one of the fastest growing treatment centers in Tennessee.
29:59
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
30:00
SPEAKER_03: Um so was this sober living, were you calling it Recovery on Wildview back then, or was that something totally different?
30:08
SPEAKER_01: So, Recovery on Wildview, it's a funny story.
30:10
SPEAKER_01: There was a there was a guy I respect in Louisville that opened up something and he called it Recovery on Walnut.
30:16
SPEAKER_01: And I just thought that sounded cute.
30:17
SPEAKER_01: You know, it was on Walnut Street, you know.
30:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I just thought that was cute or clever.
30:22
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
30:23
SPEAKER_01: Like I like it.
30:24
SPEAKER_01: Miracle on 31st, 4th Street, you know, the movie, you know, we're recovering.
30:27
SPEAKER_01: I just it was it had a ring to it.
30:29
SPEAKER_01: So my first house was on Wildview, so that's why I named it Recovery on Wildview.
30:32
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know there was gonna be multiple locations, I didn't know it was gonna be, but anyway, the last time, pardon me.
30:40
SPEAKER_01: I know the last time I was in jail, you know, my sobriety date jail trip, there was this kid in there, God like truly bless his heart.
30:51
SPEAKER_01: No southern connotation, like just poor kid, had mental things and all this.
30:56
SPEAKER_01: And one day he was super sweet, and I was like, What are you even in here for, dog?
30:59
SPEAKER_01: Like, what are you fuck you doing?
31:01
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, Oh well, he goes, I I I broke into a uh Nissan dealership.
31:07
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, for what?
31:08
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, Why I said, What'd you steal?
31:10
SPEAKER_01: He goes, No, blah, blah, blah.
31:11
SPEAKER_01: Long story short, he had nowhere to go and no family.
31:14
SPEAKER_01: So he threw a brick through a car dealership and sat on the curb and waited for the cops to come just so he could go to jail.
31:20
SPEAKER_01: So he'd have somewhere to stay.
31:21
SPEAKER_01: And he would have to do that.
31:23
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
31:23
SPEAKER_01: And he did a uh he did a Bible study in the back of the jail and the back of the dorm.
31:29
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, Everyone needs, he was a little odd.
31:32
SPEAKER_01: Anyone come to Bible study?
31:33
SPEAKER_01: And I figure I want to support this guy, and I could use some Bible study.
31:36
SPEAKER_01: And I remember he read this thing, he said, Above all else, fervently love one another, for love covers a multitude of sins.
31:45
SPEAKER_01: I still get like teared up thinking about it.
31:48
SPEAKER_01: But uh I said, Where is that?
31:49
SPEAKER_01: And he said, it's it's 1 Peter 4.8, and I've never forgotten that.
31:54
SPEAKER_01: And so when my dad, uh when I did the house for my dad, I formed an LLC called the Ronald J.
32:00
SPEAKER_01: Ham 1 Peter 4 8 House, and that's what I named it.
32:04
SPEAKER_01: So that's how the name was.
32:05
SPEAKER_01: So I mean, oh well, thanks, man.
32:07
SPEAKER_01: I I appreciate, you know, it's it's there was a guy, I love this, and he was on a speaker tape, and he says, he says, if I said yes to every single thing the program or people or whatever people asked me to do, if I said yes to everyone for the rest of my life, he said it wouldn't even cover the interest on the debt I owe.
32:28
SPEAKER_01: And that I I'm I'm I that's how I look at it.
32:32
SPEAKER_01: You know, like I don't I mean, very rarely will you say me say no to anything.
32:36
SPEAKER_01: You know, if if my sponsor tells me not to take on more sponsees, I'll say no.
32:39
SPEAKER_01: Or if there's an organization that I really that I don't know, there's very few, but I try to say yes to everything and and chip away at the debt I know or I owe.
32:49
SPEAKER_01: And um, and that was kind of the you know the moral side of that, the you know, loving people and you know, you know, I really am trying to change type stuff.
32:58
SPEAKER_03: So but anyhow, dude, you're I think you're doing a beautiful job.
33:01
SPEAKER_03: Thank you, man.
33:02
SPEAKER_03: I I can't believe the things you've done.
33:04
SPEAKER_03: It's it's it's astounding and amazing.
33:07
SPEAKER_03: And some of the things you're doing quietly, which I really respect.
33:11
SPEAKER_01: Oh well, thank you, man.
33:12
SPEAKER_01: It's I I I always like to go on record, even if the subject is broached, you know.
33:17
SPEAKER_01: I I I know, and not not like false homage, like I would not be here if it wasn't for people that helped me.
33:23
SPEAKER_01: Sam, Sam G particular, I know I would, I know God would put him into my life.
33:28
SPEAKER_01: And uh, and you know, my father, um, you know, when he died, my brother had just been killed, so whatever he had came to me, and those resources, you know, allowed me to do things.
33:37
SPEAKER_01: Um but uh but it's just funny, you know, like the little, the little, you know, they there's this Bob Darrell has a story, you know, the old lamp lighters back when there was gaslit lamps in like England or wherever, everywhere probably.
33:50
SPEAKER_01: He goes, But if you're on a hilltop at dusk, you could look down, you know, a mile away and see the town.
33:55
SPEAKER_01: He goes, and you'd never be able to see the lamp lighter.
33:57
SPEAKER_01: It's dark, it's you know, there's people moving around.
33:59
SPEAKER_01: He goes, but you could look at the lamps that are lit and you could always see where he's been.
34:02
SPEAKER_01: And it's kind of like that with God in my life.
34:04
SPEAKER_01: I don't see him operating.
34:06
SPEAKER_01: But when I look back and I just think of where I was and you know, this into like the life I have now, like there's a path there.
34:12
SPEAKER_01: And I remember I was in a meeting one time, didn't have a sponsor desperately, wanted to get sober, and I sit next to this guy I've never seen before in my life, and they pass around a correction can.
34:22
SPEAKER_01: And they said, you know, this is not the collection plate for AA.
34:25
SPEAKER_01: You know, this is to buy books for people and institutions.
34:27
SPEAKER_01: And I'm an institutionalized guy.
34:28
SPEAKER_01: I was in institutions 92, 93, 94 months in just a 10-year period.
34:32
SPEAKER_01: And outside of that, I'd been in two.
34:34
SPEAKER_01: But I mean, I just my whole life was in.
34:36
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know if getting your tires rotated was a scam.
34:38
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know the difference between the debit card and a credit card.
34:41
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know if if taxes were optional.
34:43
SPEAKER_01: Like I didn't understand the 1099.
34:45
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know any of that.
34:46
SPEAKER_01: I really didn't in what a lease meant, and in how to get a cell phone.
34:51
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know any of that.
34:52
SPEAKER_01: I if you put a gun to my head, I wouldn't tell.
34:54
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know the answers to those things.
34:56
SPEAKER_01: And um, and anyway, anyway, so institution for near and dear, but I'm sitting there and they pass this can around, and this guy next to me made a fist and he put it in the can.
35:04
SPEAKER_01: We're right next to the chairperson.
35:05
SPEAKER_01: He was the first one to get the can.
35:06
SPEAKER_01: He fist and he passed to me, and I'm nosy.
35:08
SPEAKER_01: I looked in, there's a$20 bill in there.
35:10
SPEAKER_01: And this is 15 years ago.
35:12
SPEAKER_01: For one, I'm flat broke, and two, 15 years ago,$20 was more than it is now.
35:16
SPEAKER_01: Hell yeah.
35:17
SPEAKER_01: I remember I thought it was the coolest thing that this guy did that secretly and on the slide, like just for the good secretly.
35:23
SPEAKER_01: And afterwards, I went to Scott L.
35:25
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Hey, I know you know everyone in this meeting.
35:27
SPEAKER_01: I know you're too busy to screw with me, but I need a good sponsor.
35:30
SPEAKER_01: And out of the 150 people in that room, he went directly to the guy I was sitting next to and told him he was my sponsor, and that was Sam G.
35:37
SPEAKER_01: And it was just weird how how things, the dots, connect.
35:40
SPEAKER_03: Um, yeah, and even some more things that are strange coincidences.
35:45
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, but but I I think to the extent that I do things quietly, though the more I I'm blessed emotionally and spiritually with my family.
35:54
SPEAKER_01: Don't get me wrong, I'll brag time if I get a cool car like you, I'm gonna park up front.
35:59
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but I I do try to uh to to not make a big fuss about, I don't know.
36:04
SPEAKER_01: I'd rather have God's blessings than the worldly blessings.
36:07
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'd rather have God say, I'm gonna shine a little bit over here on him than somebody say, like, man, I I really think you're cool, you know, or whatever whatever.
36:15
SPEAKER_03: I'm not saying anyone's gonna be like, totally get it.
36:17
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
36:17
SPEAKER_03: So I I do want to rewind just a tiny bit before I forget this thought.
36:22
SPEAKER_03: But your brother being murdered, and then 70 something days later, your dad dying suddenly of a heart attack.
36:28
SPEAKER_03: You're sober at this point.
36:30
SPEAKER_03: What kept you sober and not drinking at that point?
36:34
SPEAKER_03: And you know, like what what kept you on the right path?
36:38
SPEAKER_01: So it was a it was a terrible knock, you know.
36:40
SPEAKER_01: And I I I don't like when people, well, I don't I don't want to say I don't like it.
36:45
SPEAKER_01: I always you you heard you ever hear somebody like talking about how tough they are, or how you know, or or I have all the, you know, you're in jail with somebody and they're like, I actually have a Lamborghini, and it's like, no, you don't, like it's I don't like so I'm not, but let's just say I used to live a lot differently than I live today.
37:00
SPEAKER_01: Like, I mean, there's a there's a big rap sheet full of it.
37:02
SPEAKER_01: Like I'm not making it, you know, I just I I handled problems more primitively than I ever would think of doing today.
37:10
SPEAKER_01: And so when that happened with my brother, I was just shy of two years sober.
37:14
SPEAKER_01: So there was a little bit of uh, you know, kind of that old attitude in me.
37:18
SPEAKER_01: And I'm thinking about if I'm gonna do anything or, you know, what would I do?
37:23
SPEAKER_01: And you know, so I'm dabbling with that.
37:25
SPEAKER_01: And I remember this um Sam, he told me, he goes, I want you to close your eyes and think of one or two of the worst things you've ever done.
37:35
SPEAKER_01: He goes, not the biggest crimes, but the most shameful.
37:39
SPEAKER_01: He goes, the the things that the last thing on earth you would want to advertise that you've ever done.
37:43
SPEAKER_01: He said, if you had a time machine and could go back and take back an event or two, what would you rush back in time to just not do that?
37:50
SPEAKER_01: That's a good question.
37:51
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
37:52
SPEAKER_01: I closed my eyes and I thought about it.
37:54
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, How would you like it if I knew about those things and I advertised into the world?
38:00
SPEAKER_01: I went Facebook Live, I called the news company.
38:02
SPEAKER_01: He goes, and then, like if you ever put me down for a reference for a job interview, you know, they said, Tell me about Aaron Hammond.
38:08
SPEAKER_01: And I go, here's all you need to know about Aaron Hammond, and told him those worst things.
38:11
SPEAKER_01: So you know, do what you want with that info.
38:13
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Would that be fair to you?
38:15
SPEAKER_01: I said, No, I don't think so.
38:16
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Your problem, Aaron, is you judge people based on the worst things they've ever done to you.
38:21
SPEAKER_01: Somebody's only as good to me as the worst thing they've ever done to me.
38:25
SPEAKER_01: He goes, unless you want to be judged that way, you can't judge other people that way.
38:29
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, you know, the the horrible things you did, do you want mercy or justice?
38:34
SPEAKER_01: For do you want to be forgiven or do you want the penalty that comes with it?
38:37
SPEAKER_01: I said, Well, I want mercy and forgiveness.
38:39
SPEAKER_01: And he says, It's mercy and forgiveness for everyone on earth, or justice and penalty for everyone on earth.
38:44
SPEAKER_01: He goes, and you're a part of everyone, and you get to pick.
38:47
SPEAKER_01: I want a mercy for me and justice for you.
38:49
SPEAKER_01: If you know, if you cut me off in traffic, it's what the fuck are you doing?
38:53
SPEAKER_01: But if I cut someone off in traffic, it's like I'm texting my wife, she's got a little kid, you know, just you know, it's not my fault.
38:58
SPEAKER_01: And anyway, he says, so you know, if you want, you know, mercy, you got to give it anyway.
39:03
SPEAKER_01: And the last thing, the the biggest thing to help with that, I'm not speaking for anyone else.
39:07
SPEAKER_01: This rivals any feathers, I don't mean it, okay?
39:10
SPEAKER_01: But if I think of the worst thing I can think of, maybe in humanity, you know, historically, the worst event or worst person, there's nothing.
39:21
SPEAKER_01: If I took that to the God I prayed to and said, God, listen to what this guy did.
39:25
SPEAKER_01: Listen to this.
39:27
SPEAKER_01: There's nothing where God says, ooh, whatever you do, hang on to that hatred.
39:32
SPEAKER_01: Like that, that's horrible.
39:34
SPEAKER_01: Listen, here, listen to me now.
39:35
SPEAKER_01: I never ever want you to let go of that hatred.
39:38
SPEAKER_01: Ball it up, fold it up, put it in a little gooey, tarry, black, just you know, icky mess.
39:44
SPEAKER_01: Stick it right behind your left ventricle.
39:46
SPEAKER_01: Just keep it there.
39:47
SPEAKER_01: Because a little hatred will make your life better.
39:50
SPEAKER_01: You'll sleep better.
39:51
SPEAKER_01: It won't skew your view of society, it won't leak into your emotional interactions with your children.
39:56
SPEAKER_01: No, no, no.
39:57
SPEAKER_01: Little hatred's good for the heart.
39:58
SPEAKER_01: Keep it there forever.
40:00
SPEAKER_01: That's never the answer I get, regardless of the circumstance.
40:06
SPEAKER_01: There are things where I need to call the police.
40:08
SPEAKER_01: There are things that I don't have to condone.
40:10
SPEAKER_01: There are things that, frankly, I can condemn, but I don't believe I'm ever supposed to uh hang on to anger.
40:20
SPEAKER_01: And so I want to be free.
40:22
SPEAKER_01: And you know, what that kid did to my brother, I could have done a million times.
40:26
SPEAKER_01: I got one, I talked about want endangerment.
40:28
SPEAKER_01: The only reason I know what it was, I've gotten that for fighting twice.
40:31
SPEAKER_01: And I don't pay attention to my charges when I go to jail because they give you everything, and then your lawyer pleads it down.
40:36
SPEAKER_01: So I I got to the point I didn't even care what my charges were.
40:39
SPEAKER_01: And the second time I got hit with want endangerment, I'm riding down in the cop car.
40:43
SPEAKER_01: And I said, What is want endangerment?
40:44
SPEAKER_01: He said, flagrant disregard for human life.
40:46
SPEAKER_01: He goes, What you were doing to him, he goes, what you did to him could have killed him.
40:50
SPEAKER_01: And I got charged with it.
40:52
SPEAKER_01: I could have done what this guy did.
40:54
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
40:54
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it that was me, just on a different night in a different circumstance.
40:58
SPEAKER_01: Don't get me wrong.
40:59
SPEAKER_01: I don't want this asshole to come over and have Thanksgiving dinner with me, but he's free.
41:04
SPEAKER_01: I I don't like him.
41:05
SPEAKER_01: I'd prefer not to see him.
41:07
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to hang out with him, but he's free.
41:09
SPEAKER_01: I I don't it's you know, he can take that up with whoever he needs to take that up with.
41:14
SPEAKER_01: Um, and I try to, you know, carry on my brother's legacy.
41:17
SPEAKER_01: Anyway, that's how I got through with that.
41:18
SPEAKER_03: And then the those are beautiful thoughts.
41:20
SPEAKER_03: It reminds me of there's that Tupac quote where he's talking about his enemies, and he said, My enemies aren't allowed to eat at my table, but I still want them to eat.
41:30
SPEAKER_01: Oh, I love that.
41:31
SPEAKER_01: I don't think I've had that time.
41:33
SPEAKER_03: It's so wonderful.
41:33
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I was just like, I don't want you near me, but like I want you to have a good life and be comfortable.
41:40
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
41:40
SPEAKER_01: I I I love that.
41:42
SPEAKER_01: I love that.
41:43
SPEAKER_01: It's um, yeah.
41:45
SPEAKER_01: I never heard that particular one before.
41:47
SPEAKER_03: I I so I I'm inspired listening to to what you're saying.
41:52
SPEAKER_03: And um, I watched this Netflix Netflix documentary the other day.
41:57
SPEAKER_03: Uh it's The Rise and Death of Mariah Wilson.
42:00
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
42:00
SPEAKER_03: Did you watch that?
42:01
SPEAKER_03: No, I haven't.
42:02
SPEAKER_03: And it's it's this bicyclist, this female who was going to be like the world's best gravel bicyclist, and she went to Austin to visit a friend and started loosely dating this one guy, this other bicyclist, and that guy was on and off with this relationship, this girl Caitlin.
42:23
SPEAKER_03: Caitlin ended up getting jealous and going over to Mariah's friend's house and shooting her.
42:28
SPEAKER_03: She was something like 23, 24 years old, and uh went to trial, and and uh Mariah's mom is in this documentary a lot.
42:38
SPEAKER_03: I mean, her daughter was killed for no reason, just jealousy.
42:42
SPEAKER_03: And uh the way that she handled it in court, she spoke to the killer in court, and it was just with such grace.
42:49
SPEAKER_03: And then at the end of the documentary, she just said, This dumb girl did a stupid thing.
42:54
SPEAKER_03: I wish it never happened.
42:56
SPEAKER_03: But she didn't wish her this terrible life, you know, or like anything bad happening to her.
43:02
SPEAKER_03: She got 90 years in prison, of course, but it's just to see how the family and the mom handled it.
43:07
SPEAKER_03: It was with such grace.
43:09
SPEAKER_03: It's beautiful.
43:10
SPEAKER_01: I do love that.
43:12
SPEAKER_01: I do love that.
43:13
SPEAKER_01: You know, there was a Chuck C said something like that.
43:16
SPEAKER_01: His daughter was murdered.
43:18
SPEAKER_01: And uh he said 25 years before that that he was in Washington, DC, and saw an interview where a young teenager was murdered, and they interviewed his mom that night, hours after he was killed, and they said, What do you have to say to the killer?
43:30
SPEAKER_01: And she goes, I've already forgiven him.
43:31
SPEAKER_01: And and he goes, he could tell in watching that she was serious, you know, it wasn't the posturing.
43:36
SPEAKER_01: And he says, You know, I I found you know, the the quicker you know, forgiveness takes place, the more effective it is, or the or you know, the more the more permanent hold um it has.
43:46
SPEAKER_01: And you know, it's just it it's I I don't have room in my life for that.
43:50
SPEAKER_01: I have too much and again, not to be pro I have too much love and too much joy to um to entertain that.
43:57
SPEAKER_01: When I'm when I'm stressed out, when I'm being short with my My kids, and when they're asking me something, it's just like, oh, what?
44:03
SPEAKER_01: You know, and you you hit them with that, then you immediately feel horrible.
44:07
SPEAKER_01: It's never something that's going on right there.
44:09
SPEAKER_01: It's somebody that owes me a little bit of money, you know, not consequential money.
44:14
SPEAKER_01: It's somebody that said something to me three weeks.
44:16
SPEAKER_01: It's stuff that doesn't matter at all.
44:18
SPEAKER_01: And it's really taken away from my real, true, real-time life.
44:23
SPEAKER_01: And it's just, I don't like that anymore.
44:26
SPEAKER_01: Um, but anyway, uh, and yeah, so, but you know, and the the thing with my father, like doing things in his honor and trying to honor um, you know, his presence, uh, or you know, everything he taught me, what he did for me, trying to trying to live the way he always wanted me to live.
44:44
SPEAKER_01: And you know, it's a it's a it's a funny thing.
44:46
SPEAKER_01: He had different um, he had things in different states and he collected cars.
44:51
SPEAKER_01: So I mean, they were, you know, there was there was a lot, there was a lot to pick apart in his estate.
44:56
SPEAKER_01: And I had to go to insurance companies, um, county clerks, uh, attorney's offices, all this.
45:02
SPEAKER_01: And everyone without fail, it wasn't formality, but they would stop and they'd be like, God, your dad loved you boys.
45:08
SPEAKER_01: They're like, that's all he would ever talk.
45:09
SPEAKER_01: Like, every, you know, and it's kind of like, oh, they're being nice, they know I just lost my dad.
45:13
SPEAKER_01: Then I'd go to the county clerk and they're like, You're Aaron, they're like, you're all he would talk about.
45:16
SPEAKER_01: Like every time he came in here, his boys, his kids.
45:19
SPEAKER_01: And my brother and I were nothing to be proud of.
45:21
SPEAKER_01: I I failed out of my third sophomore year to go to penitentiary.
45:24
SPEAKER_01: My brother, you know, got he was home, he got kicked out of so many schools, they had to homeschool him.
45:28
SPEAKER_01: I mean, we were nothing to be proud, but he just loved us so much and just wanted the best for us.
45:32
SPEAKER_01: So, you know, kind of trying to, yeah, really.
45:34
SPEAKER_01: It meant, I mean, I could tell, I I know formality, like, oh, your dad loved you.
45:39
SPEAKER_01: You know, I I can tell, but everyone's saying like the same words, like uncommon phrasing, you know, not just like, oh, you know, it's, you know, I don't know.
45:47
SPEAKER_01: It's just weird.
45:48
SPEAKER_01: But anyway, but making peace with that was um, you know, getting over the the anger and hatred and trying to, you know, live how they wanted me to live and trying to help other people.
45:57
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, it's just it's there was a guy, Scott L, and he would talk to me, he had cancer, and he said for a while it was touch and go, he didn't know if he was gonna make it.
46:08
SPEAKER_01: So he thought of the seven best days of his life that he ever lived because if he was gonna die, he was gonna try to reenact those or you know, do those things again, whatever they were.
46:16
SPEAKER_01: And I thought about that, and I thought of the the five or ten most happy I've ever felt.
46:22
SPEAKER_01: And every one of them came from doing something for someone else.
46:27
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't when I got the real new fancy car, it wasn't when my new house was built.
46:32
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't, don't get me wrong, that was cool.
46:34
SPEAKER_01: But there was a few things I'd see on Facebook, tragic stories like families' houses would burn down and like everyone died, except you know, and they needed a little or whatever it was.
46:42
SPEAKER_01: It's not all monetary, but you do that, and I felt like a million bucks.
46:46
SPEAKER_01: Like it it's I get my true joy from trying to make other people's lives better, whether it's my kids or whether it's people in the program.
46:52
SPEAKER_03: Um well, I think everything that you're doing right now and serving your brother and your dad, you know, you're serving out your debt, as you called it.
47:00
SPEAKER_03: You're also instilling all of this into your kids.
47:03
SPEAKER_03: And so the things that you've lost from your brother or gained from your brother and your dad in life, you're passing all of that down to them.
47:11
SPEAKER_03: And it's that's also a gift.
47:13
SPEAKER_01: I appreciate it.
47:13
SPEAKER_01: I hope it's amazing.
47:15
SPEAKER_01: I know they're seeing it.
47:16
SPEAKER_01: That's the uh you always wonder like how you're gonna raise your kids like is it like a can't do attitude or like sports, or like you gotta study how I want them to love other people, I want them not to judge and to love other people, like that's my hope for them.
47:29
SPEAKER_01: Same same for mine.
47:30
SPEAKER_01: Okay, yeah, yeah.
47:32
SPEAKER_03: I I do I do want to ask not to switch too hard.
47:36
SPEAKER_03: Um you you've said that God put it on your heart.
47:40
SPEAKER_03: What does that look like in real time for you?
47:42
SPEAKER_01: Um when God, and I I don't claim to have a direct line to God or or anything like that, but it's it's it's usually things that are good and that the universe doesn't argue with.
47:58
SPEAKER_01: If I called someone right now and said, I love these Ferraris, I wonder if I could swing it.
48:03
SPEAKER_01: You know, there's nice use when I could probably get paid.
48:05
SPEAKER_01: My wife would be like, Ferrari, like, you know, what are you gonna do about car seats?
48:09
SPEAKER_01: You know, it's oh she's you know, you know, uh, you know.
48:11
SPEAKER_03: Wife's always have a good mind for things with the kids.
48:14
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
48:15
SPEAKER_01: And then I call my sponsor and goes, oh, that's too flashy.
48:18
SPEAKER_01: You don't want that, you can't go volunteer at the when it when I'm facing resistance.
48:22
SPEAKER_01: That's that's my my litmus test of if it's God or Aaron.
48:26
SPEAKER_01: If I said, man, I want to feed the homeless once a month, I'm gonna go down to Samaritan, I'm gonna feed the homeless once a month, my wife would be like, that sounds like fun.
48:33
SPEAKER_01: I'll probably go with you sometime.
48:35
SPEAKER_01: And if I told my sponsor, like, hey, I don't know if this is right or wrong, I think about going feed the homeless once a month, I'd be like, by all means.
48:40
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
48:41
SPEAKER_01: I think that'd be good for.
48:43
SPEAKER_01: I asked this guy in Atlanta one time, I said, How do I know it's my will and God's will?
48:46
SPEAKER_01: Because even with the purest of intentions, I still don't know if I'm hearing me or God.
48:51
SPEAKER_01: And he says, if you have to manipulate anybody to see it your way, if you have to orchestrate a situation so it works out the way you want to, he goes, if you have to rearrange or, you know, you know, kind of try any kind of effort, he goes, it's usually your will.
49:06
SPEAKER_01: He goes, God's will is just right all the time.
49:08
SPEAKER_01: You don't meet a lot of resistance with God's will.
49:12
SPEAKER_01: So when something is put on my heart, that I usually run it through the litmus test and ask a person or two.
49:19
SPEAKER_01: And you know, I know instantly, instantly if it's it's coming from me or somewhere else by by whether or not I meet resistance.
49:28
SPEAKER_01: If I'm rationalizing, manipulating or not even with bad motives, just like here, the reason I can do this is because if I move this money here and you see how that could work.
49:37
SPEAKER_01: I don't that that doesn't need you know what I'm saying, that God's will doesn't need any of that.
49:42
SPEAKER_01: And I heard something great recently that said if something nice is put on your heart, do it immediately.
49:46
SPEAKER_01: Like if you think of someone three you haven't seen in three years, and you just man, I want to let them know I really appreciate their friendship, send a text right now.
49:53
SPEAKER_01: Because my mind was like, well, just cold reach out to them after three years, they're gonna think that's weird.
49:58
SPEAKER_01: I better not.
49:58
SPEAKER_01: No, no, no, no, no.
49:59
SPEAKER_01: Do it before that, just do it.
50:01
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and um, but anyway, how about you?
50:03
SPEAKER_01: I mean, do you have any insight?
50:04
SPEAKER_01: You know, like what do you?
50:06
SPEAKER_03: Um I mean, I've done a lot of bad things in my day, and I've been a very selfish person.
50:14
SPEAKER_03: And anytime that I do things from an unselfish perspective, that's when I know that I'm doing something actually good.
50:24
SPEAKER_03: And you know, I was I was a lot about growing, I was also immature, um, emotionally immature.
50:33
SPEAKER_03: And so when I would talk to somebody, I would love talking about myself.
50:38
SPEAKER_03: You know, and it's like now I want to talk to other people and I want to learn what has made them a better person.
50:47
SPEAKER_03: And I want to learn other practices, but I also don't want to learn that practice and not do it.
50:52
SPEAKER_03: I want to dabble in it.
50:53
SPEAKER_03: I want to I want to have fun with my life and try to do as much good as I possibly can.
51:00
SPEAKER_03: You know, my my life since getting sober, I uh I was a tutor musician for 16 years and you know, trying to entertain people where it was a lot about self too, you know, trying to get popular and make a living that way.
51:14
SPEAKER_03: But then I went to treatment and right that third day that I was sober when I understood what was happening and I knew I needed to do this thing, I basically waved the white flag.
51:25
SPEAKER_03: I was like, I want to help people.
51:28
SPEAKER_03: That's that's what I want to do now.
51:29
SPEAKER_03: And that's how I ended up meeting my wife and now having a daughter and having this beautiful life that I have always wanted.
51:37
SPEAKER_03: I didn't know how to attain it though.
51:39
SPEAKER_00: Oh wow, that's wow.
51:41
SPEAKER_03: Um, there's also a perspective that I try to keep most days.
51:45
SPEAKER_03: Um, there's that uh movie director, Kevin Smith.
51:48
SPEAKER_03: He did the movie Clerks, Smaller Hats.
51:51
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
51:52
SPEAKER_03: He uh he was a bit of a naysayer in his his earlier years of his life, and then he had a heart attack.
51:58
SPEAKER_03: Um, and he almost died.
52:00
SPEAKER_03: This is maybe seven, eight years ago.
52:02
SPEAKER_03: I can't remember the timeline.
52:04
SPEAKER_03: But uh now he I saw an interview with him, and somebody in the interview was was asking him a question on what he didn't like about some movie or or whatever, whatever in pop culture.
52:17
SPEAKER_03: And he said, you know what?
52:18
SPEAKER_03: I had a brush with death.
52:19
SPEAKER_03: I know that I'm very lucky to be alive, and I will no longer spend time telling you and and sharing my thoughts on things that I don't like.
52:30
SPEAKER_03: I'm gonna spend my whole rest of my life telling you about the things that I love.
52:34
SPEAKER_03: And so I really try to keep that perspective.
52:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I do love that.
52:39
SPEAKER_00: I do love that.
52:40
SPEAKER_00: That's really good.
52:41
SPEAKER_03: And and speaking of helping people, you still sponsor after all these years eight to ten men at a time.
52:48
SPEAKER_03: Like what, you know, how do you keep your cup full and then how do you keep from burning out on that?
52:54
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, one that's tough.
52:55
SPEAKER_01: I have a bad habit of um, I just say yes to everybody.
52:58
SPEAKER_01: You know, there's kind of one philosophy.
53:00
SPEAKER_01: If a million people ask you and it's overwhelming, say yes to all of them, God'll filter that out.
53:04
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you don't wish badly on any, but you know, people quit calling, or somebody moves, or you know, they don't like you, they get a new sponsor, kind of that's one philosophy.
53:12
SPEAKER_01: But there's another philosophy of just, you know, I couldn't sponsor a thousand guys effectively.
53:16
SPEAKER_01: I just couldn't, none of them would get any good help.
53:18
SPEAKER_01: So, in order for me to be effective, that does have to kind of be limited.
53:22
SPEAKER_01: Um, so I try to take I try to be in the book with somewhere around four guys at all times.
53:28
SPEAKER_01: Because, you know, when guys go through the book, I mean, you know, once or twice, I mean, they they call you a couple times a month if they're having a fight with their wife.
53:34
SPEAKER_01: You know, you it's not really that hands-on.
53:37
SPEAKER_01: So I try to keep some new guys.
53:39
SPEAKER_01: Fill in my cup is really based around family.
53:43
SPEAKER_01: You know what I'm saying?
53:43
SPEAKER_01: I mean, don't get me wrong, I go to my meeting, like tonight, for example, is my guys' night.
53:47
SPEAKER_01: It's my guy's AA night.
53:49
SPEAKER_01: And uh I go, I'm meeting guys at 5:30, I'm going through the book with them, meetings from 6.30 to 7:30, and then afterwards, we all go out for kind of a long dinner, an hour and a half, two-hour dinner.
53:59
SPEAKER_01: We all, you know, I eat a bunch of food and we bullshit and have fun.
54:02
SPEAKER_01: That fills my cup.
54:04
SPEAKER_01: And then honestly, around my kids, like I'm not saying this to like try to sound like a good father.
54:10
SPEAKER_01: There's almost nothing somebody could ask me to do where if I had the choice to stay at home around my family that night or go do that, where I would genuinely want to go do that instead.
54:23
SPEAKER_01: I love, you know, my kids love me.
54:25
SPEAKER_01: I'm like me and my wife, we're their favorite people.
54:28
SPEAKER_01: Like, and it's so, that's so kind of constant that it almost I can overlook it, but it's like, and it's not always gonna be like this.
54:35
SPEAKER_01: Like they let it when they see me, they love hanging out with me.
54:38
SPEAKER_01: And I remember how I felt about my parents, you know.
54:41
SPEAKER_01: So I want to be that for them.
54:43
SPEAKER_01: So I I get my my my solitude.
54:45
SPEAKER_01: I call my sponsor, I listen to speaker tapes, I hang out with my family.
54:50
SPEAKER_01: And, you know, luckily, I I this is kind of a, I don't want to say icky, but I don't like to talk about it too much.
54:56
SPEAKER_01: But my life is designed to where I don't have to do a single thing that I don't feel like doing.
55:03
SPEAKER_01: Like it's just a spade of spade.
55:05
SPEAKER_01: Like nobody, you know, I listen to God, I listen to my sponsor, I listen to my wife, but nobody can say, like, you know, you know, anyway, you're working till 10 p.m.
55:15
SPEAKER_01: tonight, or you know, or get over here and move this, or you know what, like I so so the as busy as my life is and as active, I I am able to, when I'm redlining, I can say, hey, I I'm not doing anything today.
55:28
SPEAKER_01: And there's there's not really a consequence to that.
55:30
SPEAKER_01: So when you know, people see they're like, oh, you're always ripping and running, you're doing this.
55:34
SPEAKER_01: It's like, but what they don't see is I have the ejection button that you know I have full autonomy over, you know, so I can take a day break.
55:42
SPEAKER_03: Which you you have to pull that button, you have to push that button, pull that chord.
55:46
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, sometimes.
55:47
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
55:48
SPEAKER_01: So some days, you know, if if I'm just not feeling, I take turn my phone off and I take a nap.
55:52
SPEAKER_01: You know, it's just I um so anyway, but yeah, the um, and we go to church too, you know.
55:58
SPEAKER_01: Extremely, you know, I'd say we go to church, you know, anyway, at least three or three times a month, you know, usually four.
56:05
SPEAKER_01: That's awesome.
56:05
SPEAKER_01: But um, yeah, I get some good word there too.
56:08
SPEAKER_03: These men that you're working with, uh, this is a deeper question.
56:11
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
56:12
SPEAKER_03: What's the hardest truth that you have to tell them when you're working with these fonts or these sponses?
56:17
SPEAKER_01: Um I believe, again, this is my opinion.
56:20
SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's literature to support it, but I do think like any affliction, there are different degrees of affliction.
56:28
SPEAKER_01: And just from my experience, this could be factually wrong.
56:32
SPEAKER_01: There could be a PhD or some, you know, somebody that says, Aaron, you're absolutely wrong.
56:36
SPEAKER_01: And I would accept that if they explain.
56:37
SPEAKER_01: So please don't.
56:38
SPEAKER_01: I'm not going on record stating this as fact.
56:41
SPEAKER_01: But one of the things is I believe that certain people with certain consequences or ultimatums or whatever, they can just kind of change their lives and not drink or use drugs anymore.
56:53
SPEAKER_01: I think others truly are powerless over whether or not they pick up.
56:58
SPEAKER_01: You know, we are without defense against the first drink.
57:00
SPEAKER_03: And they have no support system, no resources, nothing.
57:05
SPEAKER_03: It's like the system is designed for them to fail and keep failing.
57:08
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
57:10
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
57:10
SPEAKER_01: And getting through to them, you know, the the necessity for something outside themselves, um, for help.
57:16
SPEAKER_01: Um, and then the other is is probably the God piece in general.
57:22
SPEAKER_01: You know, I I w I I I won't give you the long version for real, but you know, I always believed in God, but I didn't believe, and I don't even I didn't even think this was like blasphemous or anything wrong.
57:32
SPEAKER_01: I didn't believe he was interactive in human lives.
57:34
SPEAKER_01: Like you, I if you're in traffic, I can't say, hey God, clear the interstate for me, and then the the the cars part.
57:40
SPEAKER_01: Like he just, or if I wished I had blonde hair, I can't pray and have blonde hair.
57:44
SPEAKER_01: Like he just, that was my proof.
57:46
SPEAKER_01: But this this guy, he goes, he goes, you know, you you look at God, he he gave me an example.
57:52
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Imagine if for the next week you were rude and obnoxious and selfish and mean to everyone.
57:59
SPEAKER_01: As much, you don't break any laws, you don't commit any crimes, you don't hit anybody.
58:03
SPEAKER_01: But you know, my mom texts me and says, How you doing?
58:05
SPEAKER_01: I say, me, stay out of my business.
58:06
SPEAKER_01: You're always bugging me.
58:07
SPEAKER_01: And then at Starbucks, they asked for a tip, and you know, I'm not tipping you, but you hurry up and get my fucking coffee.
58:12
SPEAKER_01: You know, and they asked me to clean up after the meeting.
58:14
SPEAKER_01: Now you want to help stack chairs?
58:15
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, no, I'm not a janitor.
58:17
SPEAKER_01: Why don't you hire somebody?
58:18
SPEAKER_01: Do I look like I work?
58:19
SPEAKER_01: No.
58:20
SPEAKER_01: And if I did that for just a week, my life is gonna seem lonely and exclusive and cold.
58:29
SPEAKER_01: No one's gonna be reaching out, no one's gonna want to hang out of hurt feelings.
58:32
SPEAKER_01: It's the world's gonna seem dark and cold.
58:35
SPEAKER_01: And on the other hand, if for a week I'm just as nice and pleasant, you know, I'll take here's a$10 tip.
58:39
SPEAKER_01: Or, you know, what baby, my wife, what can I do for you?
58:42
SPEAKER_01: You sit down.
58:42
SPEAKER_01: What do you need me to do?
58:44
SPEAKER_01: You know, I text my mom, just hey, I really love you.
58:46
SPEAKER_01: Without your support, there's no way I would be alive today.
58:48
SPEAKER_01: You know, all this night.
58:49
SPEAKER_01: If I do that for a week, I'm gonna go to meetings, people, hey buddy, happy to see you.
58:53
SPEAKER_01: My mom's thank you.
58:54
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna get invited.
58:55
SPEAKER_01: My world's gonna seem loving and kind.
58:58
SPEAKER_01: And that's only a week.
58:59
SPEAKER_01: Imagine if you stretch it out six months.
59:01
SPEAKER_01: One's gonna have a bunch of friends, one might be, you know, and the force that separates those two is not intelligence, it's not money, it's not education, it's nothing worldly.
59:13
SPEAKER_01: And I like to think, what is that force that separates those two lives?
59:16
SPEAKER_01: I don't know what it is.
59:17
SPEAKER_01: I think it's love and God.
59:18
SPEAKER_01: When I tap into that force, the world around me changes.
59:23
SPEAKER_01: And I try to I try to show that to people.
59:28
SPEAKER_01: But you know, everyone's been there.
59:29
SPEAKER_01: When you're two days sober and someone's two years sober, it's like, well, that's easy for you to say, Aaron, you have your own apartment and you have a driver's license.
59:36
SPEAKER_01: It's like, yeah, but I didn't.
59:38
SPEAKER_01: I in and this is the um when I go headfirst trying to make my life better, it never works.
59:43
SPEAKER_01: When I go headfirst trying to make someone else's life better, it's like I blink and my life is like a dog would in like spring.
59:49
SPEAKER_01: Like you open the curtains one day and there's flowers everywhere.
59:52
SPEAKER_01: It's like, damn, that just happened.
59:54
SPEAKER_01: Like, what?
59:54
SPEAKER_01: And that's what it's like.
59:56
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, bro, that is such a great statement.
59:58
SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah.
59:59
SPEAKER_01: It's it's I it's true.
1:00:01
SPEAKER_01: It's true.
1:00:02
SPEAKER_03: No, thank you for sharing.
1:00:03
SPEAKER_01: But trying to impart to them, you know, like, you know, you need some help.
1:00:07
SPEAKER_01: Maybe God or whatever, universe can make your life better and focus on that.
1:00:11
SPEAKER_01: You ever seen the karate kid?
1:00:13
SPEAKER_03: Oh, God.
1:00:13
SPEAKER_01: He's getting beat up and he's like, teach me karate.
1:00:15
SPEAKER_01: He's like, Yeah, wax this car, wax all my cars.
1:00:17
SPEAKER_01: He goes, like, I want to work for you.
1:00:18
SPEAKER_01: I need to learn karate.
1:00:19
SPEAKER_01: He goes, wax the cars.
1:00:20
SPEAKER_01: Comes back, he goes, teach me karate now.
1:00:22
SPEAKER_01: He goes, paint my fence.
1:00:23
SPEAKER_01: He goes, I'm not here to work for you.
1:00:25
SPEAKER_01: And and after a few days, he keeps getting beat up and he corners him.
1:00:28
SPEAKER_01: He's like, You can teach me karate or not?
1:00:29
SPEAKER_01: He goes, wax the cars.
1:00:31
SPEAKER_01: And Daniel made the motion, and Miyagi went to hit him and the motion blocked it.
1:00:34
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, paint the fence.
1:00:36
SPEAKER_01: He goes to kick him in a black.
1:00:37
SPEAKER_01: He was teaching him karate the whole time.
1:00:38
SPEAKER_01: It just looks like he was waxing.
1:00:40
SPEAKER_01: And that's the same thing with me.
1:00:41
SPEAKER_01: I come in, I'm like, I need help.
1:00:42
SPEAKER_01: I got court coming up.
1:00:43
SPEAKER_01: No one likes me.
1:00:44
SPEAKER_01: And they're like, get to the meeting early.
1:00:45
SPEAKER_01: Set up, be nice to people.
1:00:47
SPEAKER_01: Make coffee.
1:00:47
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, make you big.
1:00:49
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, no, no, no, you don't understand.
1:00:50
SPEAKER_01: I need an attorney and a driver's license.
1:00:52
SPEAKER_01: They're like, no, you don't understand.
1:00:54
SPEAKER_01: Do this shit, and that all will work out.
1:00:56
SPEAKER_01: And it seems so frothy, but it's true.
1:00:58
SPEAKER_03: No, dude, totally.
1:01:00
SPEAKER_03: I always say to someone that I'm helping in early stages of recovery, I'm like, always try to do the next right thing.
1:01:07
SPEAKER_03: Not the best thing, but do the next right.
1:01:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:01:13
SPEAKER_03: Um man, I I don't want this to come to an end.
1:01:17
SPEAKER_03: I I could talk to you for like nine hours straight because your energy is infectious, and I just love your verbiage around everything with life and recovery.
1:01:27
SPEAKER_03: Um but one last question.
1:01:30
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:01:31
SPEAKER_03: Um if there's somebody stuck in a pattern of addiction or mental health issues and they don't know what to do, what would you say to them?
1:01:46
SPEAKER_01: I would tell them, reach out for help.
1:01:49
SPEAKER_01: Obviously, there's resources, there's numbers you can call, there's you know, programs everywhere.
1:01:54
SPEAKER_01: But one of my biggest pet peeve, or one of my biggest hindrances, pet peeve, something I didn't understand, is every time I came in to get help, they would tell me I hadn't surrendered.
1:02:04
SPEAKER_01: They would say, you need to surrender.
1:02:05
SPEAKER_01: You know, and I thought surrender was physical.
1:02:08
SPEAKER_01: And I had had more consequences than I think anyone that's ever told me I hadn't surrendered.
1:02:14
SPEAKER_01: Like he hadn't had enough pain, he ain't learned, like it's like, you know, I've been arrested a whole bunch.
1:02:19
SPEAKER_01: Like I and arrest doesn't mean that's not what you get the point.
1:02:22
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:02:23
SPEAKER_01: It's like, what am I missing?
1:02:24
SPEAKER_01: Is it the 50th arrest?
1:02:26
SPEAKER_01: Is it the 18th?
1:02:27
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean not surrender?
1:02:28
SPEAKER_01: And I thought surrender was imposed physically or something.
1:02:33
SPEAKER_01: And I heard a guy, Bob D.
1:02:35
SPEAKER_01: on a speaker tape, he said, surrender is letting go of my attitudes, my opinions, and my judgments that I know what's best for me.
1:02:44
SPEAKER_01: I always wanted help, but I at a certain point I wanted to tell you how you needed to help me.
1:02:50
SPEAKER_01: And, you know, it's they gave me this paper in Buffalo Valley about the the Tebow wrote.
1:02:55
SPEAKER_01: He said, you know, the recuperative powers of the alcoholic ego would be comic if they weren't so tragic.
1:03:00
SPEAKER_01: And he he referenced the pink cloud.
1:03:02
SPEAKER_01: He goes, people say the pink cloud with the negative connotation.
1:03:05
SPEAKER_01: He goes, it's really positive.
1:03:07
SPEAKER_01: He goes, what it really is is albeit temporary, perfect suppression of the alcoholic ego.
1:03:11
SPEAKER_01: I'm grateful for my bed and my job at McDonald's and my little beater card.
1:03:15
SPEAKER_01: But then about four months goes by and it's like, I'm 31 working at McDonald's.
1:03:19
SPEAKER_01: You know, and this car is a piece of crap.
1:03:20
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:03:21
SPEAKER_01: And so I I say all that in a roundabout way to try to let go of what you think you know.
1:03:30
SPEAKER_01: And what you you you you just just my my my attitudes, my opinions, and my judgments need to go to one side.
1:03:36
SPEAKER_01: I never did anything in life unless I understood it, agreed with it, thought it was necessary or thought it would work.
1:03:44
SPEAKER_01: Ever.
1:03:44
SPEAKER_01: Whether homework as a kid or drills, never.
1:03:48
SPEAKER_01: I need to do things in recovery that I don't agree with, don't think are necessary, don't think will work, and don't understand.
1:03:54
SPEAKER_01: Um but anyway, just uh a blank cam.
1:03:57
SPEAKER_01: I I would call, reach out for help, and just as an experimental 30-day period, do absolutely anything and everything somebody suggests that I do.
1:04:05
SPEAKER_01: And I would say that would probably be a big step in the right direction.
1:04:10
SPEAKER_03: Dude, thank you so much for saying all of that.
1:04:14
SPEAKER_03: Beautifully, beautifully said.
1:04:16
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no problem, man.
1:04:18
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think that would help a lot of people if somebody were listening to this stuck in that pattern.
1:04:23
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, but I think there's a lot of lessons to learn in there.
1:04:25
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, thanks, man.
1:04:27
SPEAKER_01: And there there are many, I mean, there could be a million things better than that, but it it my my personal thing was my resistance.
1:04:34
SPEAKER_01: And I didn't even know it was that it was innocent, but it was just resistance.
1:04:38
SPEAKER_01: Um, yeah.
1:04:41
SPEAKER_01: This guy, Chuck P, he said his sponsor told him to write down everything that he didn't want to do, any spiritual suggestions he didn't want to do.
1:04:48
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Chuck, just keep a list of him.
1:04:49
SPEAKER_01: He goes, I'll never bother you again.
1:04:51
SPEAKER_01: If I say don't go to the strip club, you want to go to strip club, that's fine.
1:04:54
SPEAKER_01: Just put refused to not go to strip club.
1:04:56
SPEAKER_01: He goes, keep a list.
1:04:57
SPEAKER_01: And then and Chuck goes, Why do you want me to do that?
1:04:59
SPEAKER_01: He goes, So when you go out and get drunk, you won't have to call me and ask me how it happened or where you went wrong.
1:05:03
SPEAKER_01: You'll have a comprehensive list of exactly where you fucked up.
1:05:07
SPEAKER_01: And I like that.
1:05:08
SPEAKER_01: There was always things that I don't need that.
1:05:10
SPEAKER_01: Thanks for now.
1:05:11
SPEAKER_01: Anyway, wow man, but powerful.
1:05:14
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, it's true.
1:05:15
SPEAKER_01: I I was you know, um but anyway.
1:05:18
SPEAKER_03: So well, you saying that, um, it's thank you for all that.
1:05:23
SPEAKER_03: But also uh speaking of speaker tapes, did you ever listen to Bob O from Wisconsin, Bob Olson speaker tapes?
1:05:30
SPEAKER_01: No, I don't think so.
1:05:30
SPEAKER_01: Is he good?
1:05:31
SPEAKER_03: He's great.
1:05:32
SPEAKER_03: I don't think he's alive anymore.
1:05:33
SPEAKER_03: Okay, and some of them are you can I find them all on YouTube and whatnot.
1:05:37
SPEAKER_03: But yeah, uh God, uh every every one you can find on YouTube, I I would just go through and just repeatedly listen to them.
1:05:45
SPEAKER_03: Great sense of humor, you know, old school guy.
1:05:48
SPEAKER_01: I love learning about a new, I don't want to say heavy hitter, but like when somebody says what you just I'm gonna run out and check it out because I've got about eight or ten that I love, but um, but now I almost don't pick new ones like I'll I'll need a reference, you know.
1:06:02
SPEAKER_03: Cool, I'll I'll I'll text them to you.
1:06:04
SPEAKER_03: Please do, please do.
1:06:06
SPEAKER_03: And please let's get together in like the next nine months or year and do another one of these.
1:06:12
SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah, and do a recheck in because I'd love to ask you about 20 more questions.
1:06:16
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
1:06:16
SPEAKER_01: No, anytime I I know my answers are long-winded, so I it's uh I'll come back as many times as you need.
1:06:21
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
1:06:22
SPEAKER_01: Like, yeah, I really it's great, man.
1:06:24
SPEAKER_01: It's it's I think this is really cool what you're doing.
1:06:26
SPEAKER_01: Beautiful setup, excellent questions, and I've really enjoyed getting to talking to you.
1:06:30
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, same here, bro.
1:06:31
SPEAKER_03: Dude, thanks for joining us.
1:06:33
SPEAKER_03: I can't wait to see you come again.
1:06:34
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, uh please, everybody out in listener land, uh check out all of our podcast episodes, Breaking Down Addiction, like and subscribe.
1:06:44
SPEAKER_03: And uh, if you have any questions for Aaron Ham, I know that you can find yourself online.
1:06:49
SPEAKER_03: Um, hit him up if you have any questions about recovery or if you're recovery curious.
1:06:54
SPEAKER_03: I'm sure you have some really good pieces of information.
1:06:57
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, I'd be happy to help if I can.
1:06:58
SPEAKER_01: If I know it, I'll tell you.
1:07:00
SPEAKER_03: Thanks, brother.
1:07:01
SPEAKER_03: Well, thanks for having it.
1:07:02
SPEAKER_03: I just got to know you, but I I love you so much, bro.
1:07:05
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I love you too, man.
1:07:06
SPEAKER_01: I sincerely appreciate that.
1:07:08
SPEAKER_03: Thank you, brother.
1:07:09
SPEAKER_03: Thanks for joining us.
1:07:10
unknown: You got it, man.