Change Your Brain Every Day - What to Do When Your Self-Talk Works Against You, with Chris Browning

Episode Date: January 22, 2020

When actor Chris Browning became addicted to heroin, one of his biggest takeaways was that heroin addiction is the only disease that tells you that you don’t have it. His ego and distorted view of self constantly got in the way of his getting help and making a change. But, as he describes to Tana in the episode, it was the miracle that took place during a prison riot knife fight that finally convinced him to start looking for the other side.

We are going to start your new year, your new decade off with a bang. Tan and I are going to do a six-week live class. So starting January 21st, every Tuesday, we're going to be with you for an hour. And at the end, we're going to give away over $20,000 in prizes. We look forward to helping you kick off this new year by becoming brain health revolutionaries. Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. I'm Dr. Daniel Amen. And I'm Tana Amen. In our podcast, we provide you with the tools you need to become a warrior for the health of your brain and body. The Brain Warriors Way

podcast is brought to you by Amen Clinics, where we have been transforming lives for 30 years using tools like brain spec imaging to personalize treatment to your brain. For more information, visit amonclinics.com. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is also brought to you by BrainMD, where we produce the highest quality nutraceuticals to support the health of your brain and body. To learn more, go to brainmd.com. Welcome back. I'm still here with Chris Browning this week.

We are talking about not only addiction, but coming back from addiction. But in case you missed in the first episode, some of the things that you might've seen Chris on, Angel Has Fallen, your new movie, Outlaw Johnny Black. Right? So we're looking forward to seeing that. Green Light Healer, The Book of Eli.

Oh, The Unhealer. Unhealer. Book of Eli, that's coming out soon also, right? Book of Eli? No, The Unhealer. Yeah. Unhealer. Book of Eli. That's coming out soon also, right? Book of Eli? No. No. The Unhealer. The Unhealer should be out.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that was a thing with Natasha Henstridge and Adam Beach. Okay, fun. It's kind of a supernatural thing. I'm going to look for it. Yeah. Fun.

But I remember you from The 100 and Sons of Anarchy and Bosch. Those are three that I watch. So, yeah, so pay attention. Look for Chris. And you're just a great actor. Thank you. It was really fun seeing you on set. And we've been, I was just so.

Yeah, we did a thing. We just did a. Yeah. I was in the stage mom thing. So it was fun. So my daughter actually got to work with you. And that was really fun for me to see. In Escape from Area 51.

Yeah. You should see it. I can't me to see in escape from area 51 yeah you should see it i can't wait to see it yeah it's gonna be fun it's gonna be fun so we've been talking about you know as i was sitting on set with you and you were talking about i heard you say i did heroin once for six years and i ended up living under the 405 freeway and i'm like sitting here watching you and i'm you know you've got this incredible career that you have now you've been clean for 15 years so you're living under the 405 and at what point do you decide you need to get clean and how did you just make that decision and make it happen that's a hard thing to do well I I knew I knew the answer was there. I knew, you know, my mom was sober for 40 years. So I was raised by sober people. And, you know, I knew that's where the answer was. It just wasn't,

I didn't seem to be on the list. You know, I've seen it working for other people, but it was like, I don't know the secret handshake or something because I was, I was going, I was in and out and in and out of recovery for 12 years. It took me 12 years to get in 90 day. You know, I couldn't be, I couldn't stay sober for 90 days. And did your mom know where you were? Well, the way they kept track of me was checking with the LA County jail system. That had to be heartbreaking. Oh my God.

I, once, once I did get sober, I talked to my mom and dad every day for, for, till they died after that. Um, I can't imagine cause now I have kids and I can't imagine not knowing where my kids are. No, the pain would just be terrible. Yeah. Yeah. I don't.

Yeah. No, I track my daughter everywhere she goes. So I can't imagine. That's smart. Yeah. Um, so, but, but you got the 90 days and then, I don't. Yeah, no, I track my daughter everywhere she goes. So I can't imagine. That's smart, yeah. So, but you got the 90 days. And then, I mean, at what point, like, what made you finally, what made it stick? I was just thinking about that the other day. Because that's a common thing that comes up when you're, you know, sometimes you tell your story and stuff and people, or even in interviews, what was the thing?

What made it different? What made you stop? I never stopped trying, but I just, it was the first time that I actually applied what was being, you know, suggested. All those years, those other 12 years we were talking about uh being an egomaniac with an inferiority complex well that's what it was because i could be right off the streets 60 pounds lighter than i am now and and asking someone you know to help me get sober and they're suggesting well you do this and you do this and you do this and and i

would say yeah i don't need to do all that i mean he does because he looks like he's like a landscaper or some some manual labor guy he's not as smart as i am i'm much more involved than he is as you know and this is a scrawny sucked up heroin addict off the streets covered in abscess school source and i know better than that guy that's how do you think that's common with with a lot of the addicts sure i mean it's not you know it's just only it's the only disease out there that tells you you don't have it you know yeah and and but i actually i was always pretty forthcoming with with admitting that i was

you know so you can't live in the bushes and try to convince yourself or anybody else that you don't have a problem. Yeah. You know, I was, I was like, yeah, I'll give you that. I'm definitely an addict and alcoholic. I just don't think, I don't think. I have to jump through. Yeah.

I still, yeah. I'm going to alter whatever suggestion you come up with. I'm going to give it my special spin because I'm so wonderful. Right. You know, and I just kept getting kicked in the ass every time I tried. And I went to 20 detoxes. I went to five rehabs. I spent three years of my life locked up.

And, you know, you're not, so every one of those times I was clean, you know you're not so every one of those times i'm i was clean you know kicking heroin on a you know concrete floor in the la county jail not fun yeah terrible that's how my uncle had to kick it too oh yeah that's awful but um so for whatever it was there was this guy named gus on the streets and and i just i'm like if I ever find that guy, and he's probably dead, but if I ever did come across him, I would thank him for saving my life. Because he was talking about it one day. You know, there's plenty of time to talk. That's what you do, you know.

And he was 30 or so years old. It looked like he was 60. Skin and bones, alcoholic. Always had a pint of vodka in his pocket. Yellow skin, jaundiced eyes. And he was dying. And he just said, you know, everybody's on parole. I wasn't on parole, but I was on probation.

I'd never been to prison. But he'd said, yeah, man, I'm a dope fiend. I'm a drunk. That's what I do. So they're going to catch me again. And I'm going to go back upstate on a parole violation and do six months or nine months or a year. And when they let me out, I'm running.

I'm not trying to pee for the man and have an address and a job and all this stuff because I'm a trying to pee for the man and have an address and a job and all this stuff. Cause I'm a dope fiend. And my thing that kept me relaxed about how serious it was, was telling myself that I'm just passing through. This is life experience. You can't, you can't, I'm going to write about this someday. You know, this is, I'm sucking the marrow out of life. You know, I'm sucking the marrow out of life.

You know, this is real life. But I'm just passing through. And it occurred to me that Gus probably talked that way at one point. Yeah. And if I wake up tomorrow talking like Gus, I'm doomed. I'm not getting out of here. If I wake up. There's some point where that needle shifts.

Yeah. And now. And you've given up. It's too far. Yeah, there's some point where that needle shifts. Yeah. And now. And you've given up. It's too far. And you're like, yeah, no, this is me. I'm a heroin addict. If they catch me, then when I get out, I'm going to do heroin. You know, how does that guy get out?

Right. He doesn't. And so the people dying around me left and right every week, someone, you know, got murdered or overdosed and, you know. And those are the kind of friends that you have on the streets of my my best friends were the ones who were willing to wait for me to overdose before they took all my shit you know those were my good ones those are my my buddies. I'm going to have nightmares tonight. I'm going to have like night terrors. It's crazy. It's like my worst nightmare.

I thought it was bad having a heroin addict live in my house when I was little. This is like terrifying. Yeah. No, it's just, it's, it's, because that's the other thing. There's always, there's always those guys on the fringe that are, you know. Just watching you. You see them. They're, they're, they're thinking about taking it now.

Right. And there's a couple. And they're willing to do some're thinking about taking it now. Right. And there's a couple of them talking to you. And they're willing to do some nasty things to take it, probably. Yeah. I mean, every week, it was like I felt like I was in Vietnam or something. And somebody died every week. Crazy. Got murdered.

So that time it stuck. You got your 90 days. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that time, you know know and like I got hospitalized three days in a row in LA County Jail three days in a row and when I got out of there because there were riots every day and um you know I always talk about this like you never know what the gift is gonna be right you know so whenever something bad happens today I I'm like, this is good somehow.

Don't know. Don't know yet. But I learned that because I got broken ribs that saved my life. Yeah. I have three questions. Whenever something really awful happens, I have three questions that I've learned to ask myself. What can I be thankful for? What can I be grateful for?

And what can I learn right now from this awful thing? There's got to be something I can be thankful for, grateful for, and I can learn. So, and if you can do that, I think it really changes your perspective on life. Yeah. Yeah. No. And I've seen that happen. Like, you know, I get kicked out of a place that we're in and you're like, oh, I love this place. I can't believe we have to move. And then you end up in an awesome place that you never would have found if you weren't kicked out. In a healthier situation. Yeah. Yeah.

And that's like what I'm in now. I'm living in a house with people that I care about. And I was in a terrible situation before. But now I'm in. And if that hadn't blown apart the way it did, I wouldn't be where I'm in. I said I had broken ribs that saved my life. Because being in jail, I got in a riot and got a concussion, woke up in the infirmary, my head all bandaged up. Then they put me back out in general population.

That time, we were in the chapel and they rocked the pews out of the floor. They bolted to the floor and they stood them up and they were tossing them, like falling them on trees. Oh my gosh. And I was like, ah, and crushed me. And I got, and I'm back in the infirmary.

Now my head's bandaged up and I got one of those rib protector, plastic belts, you know, hard plastic things, Velcroed. And I can't breathe. Back out to the general population. And,

and this place, the third place was in a, one of the general population. And this place, the third place, was in one of the dorms. You have about 150 people in there. And they'd been there for a while, so they'd had time to make tools, make weapons, take a piece of metal and just grind it on the concrete for a month until it's a point and wrap a bed sheet and string. And when that jumped off off i ended up with a guy on top of me um with and a couple of a couple other gang bangers from from the other gang were just shanking him and like every other time they'd miss him and they'd hit me and and i got

pierced in the arm right here and and it was an artery, and just blood started going out. And I was like, oh, God, here we go again. Passed out, woke up in the infirmary, and they had a stitch in this, and the doctor said, you're lucky to be alive. And I'm like, really? He goes, no, look inside. Inside my gown, that plastic belt was so dug up with notches from the shanks. Just stuck.

So your broken ribs really did save your life. Saved my life. Yeah. That's a great perspective. Yeah. So you never know what the gift is. You never know what the gift is. Yeah.

So I love the story. And I want to talk about, because when I met you, what I love was you were talking a lot about purpose. And we talk to our community a lot about purpose, about people who are purposeful live 11 years longer, but they're also happier. So they're much happier, especially people who have been through a lot. If you can find a way to turn that around and either help others, help someone less fortunate than yourself, you'll just always see the brighter side of things and when I first met you you were talking about like the thing that struck me the most I mean of course I with what we do I hear a lot of stories about addiction about abuse about trauma but I don't always hear the comeback and the story of purpose that goes along with it and that was the thing that really caught me and that's when I started talking to you about

how you need to write a book. And like your story is a book. I mean, this is a crazy story. I mean, I know everybody listening right now. And if you're listening, please, you know, send us your questions, your comments, love to know what you think. But this is a book. And it's, you know, here you are now 15 years later, and you've had your ups and your downs. You've talked about that, but you keep going and you're doing so much for other people and you're very humble, you know, in spite of your success, you're very humble. And it was really refreshing for me to see because we see, we see a lot of people, we see a lot of celebrities and a lot of them are struggling.

Not all of them are humble, but it's, it's just a really refreshing thing. And you just talked so little about what you have and who you are versus what you were doing for other people. And I thought that was really cool. So let's come back and talk about that. Okay. I would love to hear that. If you're enjoying the Brain Warriors Way podcast, please don't forget to subscribe so you'll always know when there's a new episode.

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