Sober Motivation: Sharing Sobriety Stories - Paul Holley had to decide to get sober for himself and to get to that place it took 6 times in jail and 4 DUI’s and much much more.

Episode Date: April 6, 2023

Paul Holley struggled with alcohol for many many years and never thought a way out was possible. Paul was in jail 6 times and had been arrested for drinking and driving 4 times. Paul had to attend meetings and never took things seriously.  Paul would go on auto pilot most times he drank and did not have an off switch. On January 1, 2017 Paul reached out to a sober friend and has been sober since. This is Paul's story on the sober motivation podcast. --------------- Follow Paul here on Instagram Follow Sober Motivation on Instagram Download The SoberBuddy App More information for Soberlink Support the Podcast Editing Costs here

Welcome back to season two of the Subur Motivation Podcast. Join me, Brad, each week is my guests and I share incredible and powerful sobriety stories. We are here to show sobriety as possible, one story at a time. Let's go. Paul Hawley struggled with alcohol for many, many years and never thought a way out was possible. Paul was in jail six times and had been arrested for drinking and driving four times. Paul had to attend meetings and never took things seriously. Paul would go on to autopilot most times he was drinking and did not have an off switch.

On January 1st, 2017, Paul reached out to a sober friend and has been sober ever since. This is Paul's story on the Sober Motivation podcast. This podcast is brought to you by the Sober Buddy app. The Sober Buddy community is one of the most supportive I've ever seen, starting with the meeting host who lead with support, kindness, and understanding. When someone follows, the community rallies to help support and encourage. People from all different countries who show up as strangers leave as friends. It is a true example of community and connection.

What makes sober buddies special is everybody is working on the same mission. To get another day sober so we can live our best lives and to provide a safe place so no one feels they have to do this alone. Check out the app today. your soberbuddy.com or your favorite app store. This episode is also brought to us by Soberlink. It's hard to find the motivation to get sober when you're in the trenches of addiction. It's easy to say I'll stop tomorrow.

I'll cut back tonight. What's harder is putting action behind those words. That's why I've teamed up with Soberlink. Soberlink's remote alcohol monitoring system was specifically designed to help in your recovery, not just some breathalyzer you buy at the store. Small enough to fit in your pocket and discreet enough to use in public. Soberlink devices combine facial recognition, tamper detection, and real-time results so friends and family know instantly that you're sober and working towards your recovery goals. Visit soberlink.com slash recover to sign up and receive $50 off your device.

Welcome back to another episode of the Sober Motivation podcast. Today we've got my buddy Paul Hawley with us. Paul, how are you doing? Doing well. Thank you, my friend. Yeah, amazing, man. I'm happy we could connect on this. how we started the podcast is. What was it like for you growing up?

Well, for me, growing up, it was a pretty good life. Private school, kindergarten, through 12th grade, Catholic school. So it was good, right? My parents worked hard, my brother and I, we could have had access to what we wanted. And we saw what hard work would get you. And growing up in elementary school, middle school, high school, the whole thing, I never drank. And you can ask anybody that, I never touched it. I didn't drink. I didn't soak. I didn't do drugs. Nothing all through those years. Wow, that's incredible. I'm with you, too. I never did anything when I was in high school. I wasn't part of the crew for me personally. I wasn't part of the crew for it. What did you do? Did you, you know, just focus on your education or sports? My thing was baseball, golf and basketball, right? But I went on to, like, allegedly golf. You know, golf has led to a lot of doors being open and met a lot of people. So I stood most of the time in high school. I wish I could say it was studying, but it wasn't. But it was mainly playing sports. and having fun. It wasn't, you know, the ladies' man or any of that stuff. It was just play sports,

try to do as good as you can, almost obsessively. And then that got me into VCU, Virginia Commonwealth University, playing golf, which we'll get to how quickly I destroyed that here at a second. So what were things like for you after high school then? So do you go right to college? Yeah, do you want me just kind of go into the next few years? It was chill, right? Private school, it was fun, Catholic school, all those things, right? So I went from a graduating class of maybe 22 people. My senior high school to a university that had 20,000 plus. The golf guys, the basketball, we all kind of share our apartment top pledge. And I'll never forget it.

I went to a party. One of the guys was like, hey, you want to go to a party? Like I don't drink, blah, blah, blah. And went to a party. And the first time I drank, it was a boon swarm, a mad dog, and a six-pack of MGD. And I will never forget that feeling how good it fell, right? In my mind, it was like, I'm free, you know, that buzz, that warm sensation. and it was fun and I didn't get in trouble.

I woke up with a terrible headache. I threw up, you know, all those things. So I really didn't think anything other, right? I was 18 years old, no big deal. I kept going. I ended up with a 0.8 GPA. I think I got one D because I ended up never going to class. I started skipping practice.

Not drinking every day. You know, I wasn't the typical, or what you think is a typical drunk or abholod, right? I didn't have a brown paper bag. I wasn't living under a bridge. I wasn't hiding out on my house, right? When I drank, I didn't stop. It was never, let's go have a drink and then call it a night. What's the point?

Like in my mind, I don't understand that. I can't comprehend it. So that progressed. And then I had to leave VCU because I couldn't play golf anymore. And then transfer to a smaller D3 school, Christopher University. They just won the national championship in basketball in D3. And kept going there, man, got kicked off that golf team from drinking and acting a fool. You would think I would have realized what's going on and seen all that.

It graduated from Christopher Newport. and then gotten to radio was my first job. And if you're familiar with radio or entertainment, it was a rock station, and anywhere you really go, you know, it's unlimited drinks. And it's not a shot of vodka. It's a five-second pour type of thing. And that kind of helped to progress things. And then I ended up getting my first DUI at 23.

And I blew a 0.2 something, right, which, you know, isn't normal. A lot of people will maybe stop or reevaluate their drinking. after their first DUI. Well, I think I'd had to do some ASAP classes, AA, you know, get the little slip sign. I'd go in, sit in the back, didn't care. Everybody here was quitters. How wrong was I, right? Man, fast-forward and out. I used to think these guys were quitters, losers, it was a call, and I get my slip sign until I found out. You don't need to get your slip sign because they can't check the courts, right? And I hope that's okay to say, but because of anonymity, I found that out. So I start signing my own and took them back to court,

right because I'm the smartest guy in the room and I'll beat the system. Kept doing that, man. Got another DUI at 28, got another DUI at 31, got another DUI at 37 or 38, somewhere right there. So you can do the math, that's four. All right, three of them within 10 years. And down here in Virginia, they don't play. Three DUIs, I've got sentenced to a year in jail. And all through that, right?

I went to jail six times. And every time, man, I found a way to get out. I never really had any severe punishment for my actions. You know, yeah, I spent time in jail, weekends, got six to a year, I don't know, 20 weekends or something like that. But it just didn't stop me. But when I would get trouble, I would pause. Yeah, I pumped the brakes for a week or a couple weeks. The longest I ever went was 90 days.

And that's only because I had an ankle monitor, alcohol sensor on my ankle. I quickly found out that only tests for alcohol. So I wasn't drinking, but I wasn't living correctly. So that thing came off. Fast forward to 2017. I had lost my license. My house had caught fire, so I wasn't living at home. I was living some friends with no license. I didn't have my dog because that was staying with my parents. And guess what I did? I decided to go out New Year's Eve with no license, no house, really nothing to have one drink because what can be bad, right? I'll stop it too. Blackout drunk, woke up at 6 a.m., saw my car, sideways in the driveway. It's like we talked about early.

right? Something came over me, man, and nothing was stopping me. I wasn't going to die, right? I knew I wasn't going to die, but I was going to end up in prison, I was going to kill somebody in that car. And I did not want to go to prison. I did not want to kill somebody. I didn't want to die, but I didn't want those other two options. So I texted a friend of mine, 6 a.m. January 1st of that year, and he responded. And I said to him, I can't keep doing this. And I didn't think he responded six of the morning, January 1st, New Year's Day. And he did. texted him because for the last two years, he quit drinking two years before me. And over those two years, I would still see him out at a restaurant or a bar and he wasn't drinking. He had waters or sweet tea or

whatever. He would always say, I'll see you soon. I said, no, you won't. And I hit him up. That afternoon, I texted about 2 o'clock. I said, man, I have a headache. I can't do this because he wanted to go a meeting. And he says, I'm not the one that reached out to you. And I was like, okay, cool. So we went to a meeting that night. And it's so weird how things happen, man. In that, meeting, there was a guy in there who shared who had killed somebody drinking and driving. He'd done a bunch of time. And I guess maybe I was never paying attention in meetings before, but when he shared, that hit, oh, man. And I was like, that guy's going to be me and I don't want to be that guy. But he was sober now. Now I want to be that guy. And so I started at a program and the rest is history, man, but

it was fun, a lot of fun at first. And everybody that drinks most can say the same, but you cross that line and it just becomes a disaster, a liability, because I didn't know what was going to happen. I know right now if we could go over the store and buy a 12-pack, whatever, that's easy. That's the easy way. The hard way is to do this one day at a time and keep it going, right? And you have to do the work. And if you put in the effort, it is worth it and is life beyond your wildest dreams, man, as you know. So powerful.

It's interesting that you say that about how it was fun, because I can relate to that too, right? it was really fun. When did you notice that change? Or did you notice that change? Like, it wasn't fun anymore. It was just a necessity. I mean, I don't know if I really realized that until that day of January 1st. Then I started looking back that it's not fun, right? Because it would always start out fun. Every night or whenever I started to drink with a football game, whenever the first 30 minutes an hour was fun. I had a good time. And then the lights go off. It's like a light switch. And you can ask any of my friends at Solvay, the way I drank, it wasn't slow. It was as fast as I could get them. down as quick as I could, and it was lights off, man. I mean, you know, towards maybe the last couple years, it stopped being fun. When you start getting the DUIs, it just ceases to be fun. But in my

mind, I was like, I'm not powerless over this little drink. And then the trouble just keeps adding up and adding up. Don't get wrong. I still have life problems, right? Have bills and, you know, relationship issues and all those things, which everybody does. It's not perfect by any means, but I'm not waking up in jail tomorrow morning. I can promise you that. No, that's powerful. And then what were people saying around you, though? I mean, you're getting these impaired driving and is there somebody around parents or friends or anybody that's like hey paul like what's up here everybody towards the end was saying you've got to stop my lawyer was like i'm not representing you again so for the fourth i i had to get another lawyer because you know the other one for the first

rate he's like you get another i'm not helping you're the fourth one then i had i remember it clearly man he goes wear all whites to court and if you've ever been to court jail prison whatever the only thing you can wear under your suit your suit is whites at least here in virginia beach, right? And so I didn't know what that meant until he told me what was looming, right? It was getting sentenced to a year of jail. And that hit, oh, man, the last thing my dad had rid me off, and he was my biggest supporter. Paulie was trying to help me to give me out. And then the last person was my mom, right? Moms will never let go. But she said these words, she goes, I'll leave you in God's hands because there was nothing anybody could do at that point to help me. Nothing.

You could pay me a million dollars. Fact that I wouldn't have stopped. I would have said, okay, I'm never drinking tomorrow. I'm never drinking again. Famous lab. words. But yeah, everybody had written me off, man, except the guys I partied with. And those guys today, I don't hang out with, because you change three things, right? The people places and things. And I don't hang out with those same people. I'm sure they don't miss my phone calls, and I don't get phone calls from those people anymore. Yeah, when you get sober, things make a little bit more sense in a different way, right? Like, what was fueling it for all those years? I mean, if you put a finger on that, what kept you going back time and time again? I think it was just

dealing with life, at least what I drink. all my problems in Hawaii, right? I would drink because I was celebrating. I would drink because I was sad. I would drink because I was angry. You name it, right? But it just makes everything

to go away. At least for me, I got in this state of euphoria where everything is happy. I don't have to worry about bills. I don't have to worry about relationships. I don't have to worry about my parents of my back or the police or any of these things. And so I don't know if I was intentionally

covering up those things, but unintentionally, you know, I was and it was probably intentional, right? Because now, for example, my dog that I had for 12 years passed away in October, right? And back in the day, I would have got drunk. I didn't want to feel those emotions, right?

I didn't want to hurt. I didn't want to cry. And it's tough, man, when you deal with something like that, a loss of a family member, you're dealing with relationship issues, right? It's just easy to make it all go away with a couple drinks or whatever you want to put in there. Yeah, so true there.

That's one of the things in sobriety, the emotional part that we have to learn, right, is how to go through those hard things in life without drinking. I'm married now, so double that. Oh, my goodness. is okay so this big day January 1, 2017. So this day comes about a party in the night before and then you sort of have this maybe an aha moment

of like I can't do this anymore. And you've probably been thinking like this for a couple years, right? And then that day you did something because I think it's so important for that day. I feel like sometimes the people that are still struggling, right, are looking for like this big blow up for a reason for us getting sober. And, you know, sometimes, and I share a little bit of my story with you before we jumped on here, it's similar in that way of the reaching out for help about at the end of

the day, our best thinking ended us up here. And we need to somehow figure out how to get out of our own way and ask somebody else for help. How hard was that for you to do? It was the hardest thing I've ever done. Everybody, whether they're thinking about quitting or they're brand new, they just stopped. It's the hardest thing I've ever done. I'm not going to lie, man. I've done some crazy stop because you have to want it, right? Nobody's going to make you do it. I didn't have anybody beside me at 6 a.m. telling me, hey, Paul, you might not want to quit. I didn't have a judge sitting outside of my house saying, you need to quit. They all tried that, right? And it didn't work. But for everybody, it's different, right? Some people might crash a car. Some people might lose money or an house or hurt somebody or

do something crazy, right? And then that's their reason for stop. If everybody has their own reason. I didn't want to hit. For me, I guess that's what you call rock bottom, right? Was that really rot bottom for me? Probably not, man. Rock bottom probably prison or killing another family. I didn't want to be there. And I'm not the smartest guy in the world, man, but I guess it all came too foolish when I sold my car sideways on the driveway. I didn't have a driver's license. I didn't have a girlfriend. Everybody had ridden me off. Start adding all that up together, right? But on the outside, I still had a job and I still had a house. And so some of those optics, you know, the book cover looked great. The pages were empty. It was a disaster and a train rack. And it was the best decision. I

ever made, man. And what I did, and I called that guy, he responded, it's weird how people will be placed in their lives or make appearances or show up. And I don't think it's by chance. Everything has a purpose, man. And I ended up that day throwing in the towel. It's the only thing you can win by quitting. Yeah. Wow. Especially now you've come full circle, right, from your early days of going to the groups. And then, you know, everybody's a quitter and everybody's this. And then now, now the full circle happens, right? And now you're introduced to this new perspective. And I go to meetings weekly, right, and I'll be at once night at eight. And it's interesting, right?

I'll always see these, and not typically a younger person, but I always see like a younger version of me. I don't once a month come in with their slips. You'll sit in the back and they're just like, looking at the time. You know how it is. I'm like, man, if I could go back to that. But, you know, man, everything happens for a reason. If it didn't happen like it did, I wouldn't be talking to you. You wouldn't be talking to me, right?

Wouldn't be able to perhaps help other people. I've also said, like, I would rather hear from somebody like you who's got the real street cred, right? that experience rather than somebody's that's got a degree up on a wall that can talk about it, right? Because people that have been in the trenches, been to war or battle and have fought that fight, they get it, man. And that's when the people that I surround myself now with, mainly, or friends of the program, and they all understand. I thought they were all quitters, losers. They have no idea how to drink. Little did I know. Well, they know how to drink. And it's mind-blowing, man. So, yeah, that's where I'm at now.

So what are things like for you now? I mean, after you make that decision, you start hitting the meetings? I mean, how long is it before things start to really change for you? Yeah, I did 1990. I got a big book. I got a sponsor. And the 1990 was, I did it, right? If I missed the day for whatever reason, I'd double up. If I couldn't, I'd phone an or so on it. But I would talk to somebody in the program every day. I stayed out of the bars. This guy who had 40 years, 50 years this variety. He was like, stay out in the bar, take all the out of your house at least for six months. And that was his suggestion. And I was like, how am I going to stay out of the bar? So I didn't listen and I went and I didn't drink but I drank about 15 glass to the water at about 20 minutes you know

it was one after another and I was miserable I'm watching all these people around me have a good time and for a second I was like I can do that here's how stupid I was I was like I can do that I could be like those guys over there that guy taught them to that girl and I can only have maybe one or two and then it clicked right it was like I can't man I just can't that's how I'm wired and so I just did that man And then after about six months, the obsession to want to drink left. I don't know how to explain it. You probably get it. There's probably people that are going to listen to this that get it.

But it took me about six months. The obsession to want to drink totally left. I'll go to a football game or play golf now. And I have a zero desire to drink because I know what will happen if I do take a drink. I know what's going to happen. It's guaranteed. What was that like, though, to dig into that a little bit deeper? So the obsession was there for six months, but what did that feel like for you?

And then what did it feel like when you say kind of went away? Is this like you're thinking about it? Yeah, like if I would see a beer commercial or something like that, it would trigger me. Right? I mean, like, hmm, that looks good, man. They're having fun on that commercial. I could do that. I quit in the middle of the winter, right? So there's a lot of indoor, fun type of things going on and a lot of house parties, stuff like that. And I would still get invited these things by that old group of friends and that would trigger. But what I did, I picked up my phone and I called my buddy. I phone my sponsor. He taught me off the ledge. Go to a meeting.

Okay. I don't really want to. Well, he'd always say, you called me. I told you I would suggest these ideas that helped along the way. And I listened, man, and I put in the work. And here we are. And then after that six months, again, it was like a feeling of freedom, man. It was cool.

Did you ever think that was possible? Absolutely not, ever. My timelines, if I can make it to 30 years old, I'm good. 35, what was my next one? Because I made it. And I'll even take a step back. It went 25, 30, 35, and I barely made it to my 40th. Luckily, I quit drinking a year before that.

But that's how my brain thought, again, you're young and you don't care, maybe, or whatever. But who comes up with these timelines, right? If I can make it to 25, I'm good. If I can make it a 30, I'm good, but that's how I'm wired. So there you go. So after the six months there, what else are you doing in life? What were you doing for a career? What did that stuff look like?

Did your relationships? Did you start to improve those or find new ones? because a lot of people have a struggle there, right? Especially if they don't go to 12-step groups, right? Somebody just decides to get sober, right? You have all your old buddies. They're probably not the best for you. It can be scary.

So how did you navigate that? So with work, we kind of started the company, right? I was one of the first guys. And I did well. I did good enough. So they kind of turned the other way. And they also helped me a lot with some of my legal battles. And I will always be thankful to those guys.

They could have fired me 15 times. and they kept me around and kept me around. Very generous what those guys did, right? I'm thankful. I've been there 19, almost 20 years now. So these folks have seen the beginning, during, and then the other side, right? And it was funny when the first year I quit, we always give this award. It's not the salesperson of the year, but it's like the good person of the year type of award.

And I never thought I'd win it. I didn't want it. I didn't care. And it was in memory of this lady who had passed away at the company, right? She always did good deeds and kindness and all this stuff. And I wanted that first try, I quit. It was super emotional and all those things. I was like, man, I'm on to something now.

This thing's going to keep going. And I'm still with those guys today. From a relationship perspective, and the girls I dated, they were all crazy. It wasn't me. It can't be me. I'm perfect. And so I could have been more wrong there, right? And I tortured people, man.

It wasn't just a grow up at the time. It was my parents. People that cared. People that really stuck around and didn't have to, right? like, why would you stay? I wouldn't stay with this person if they were acting the fool, going to jail, lying, cheating, stealing, all these things, faking like they're going to sleep and going out. Those are all things I was doing. So relationships were just destroyed, not only with a girlfriend or whatever, but friends and family. My brother didn't want me in his

wedding. And I didn't understand at the time, and I get it now, right? I didn't do the best man's speech. And I get that now. And it's all good. You know, I was a liability. I think I tackled the Virginia Tech Hokie Burr the night of his wedding, because guess what? I got drunk. And I told everybody, I'm not going to drink tonight. And here he goes, you know, give him a couple drinks and watch the monkey dance type of thing. It was just so much instability, man. It was chaos. What about the relationship with yourself? Was that ever something you thought about? What was that like? That's a good question. It was it wasn't that I didn't care about myself, but I didn't care about myself. That probably doesn't make any sense. It was reckless. It was selfish. I would

use people to get what I wanted and I didn't care. And if I did do something, I expect something out of it, right? Now, a day is, you know, the old man next door, I'll go pick up his newspaper and put it on his front door. No questions asked. He probably has no idea how the newspaper keeps showing up. But it's there, right? It's just like apps of kindness and caring. I was always a nice kid.

I wasn't a thief and I wasn't a criminal. But when I drank, it's the Jacqueline Hind thing, man. If you come to horns and all these things and just turned into a lot. Cheeing thief is what I turn into him, you know. I can imagine, and I'm just guessing here, just meeting you here, Paul. Is that might have made it even a little bit more challenging to get sober because when you were sober, those voices were just glaring and blaring. And it's hard to feel good about ending up in a place like that because I can relate with you 110%.

I just didn't feel good about where I ended up. The shame was just enormous. And then when I was drinking and doing drugs, I felt like the voices would quiet down. and then I was somebody that I could tolerate, and that became like a big cycle. So when I was sober or whatever periods I was, the voices just became so loud about how terrible of a human I had become and how far away from the values and everything that I was raised with.

I had just felt like I just took a complete wrong turn from everything I knew, and that really just kind of weighed on me. I feel like that kind of kept me stuck. I don't know if it's anything for you, but... Yeah. It's like hitting the mute button. When I drank, it was like hitting the mute button, and everything was good. There was none of the voices.

I didn't have to worry about who I had disappointed, who I let down, that I let down my folks. I let down my girl at the time. Who did I hurt? All those things, because when I drank, man, like I did, blackout, lights are on, nobody's home, but that mute button is pushed. And then it just intensified and intensified, and that snowball just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger, right?

And I didn't want it to stop because I didn't want to stop. I liked the way alcohol made me feel, and that's the truth. I just had a terrible relationship with it because as good as it made me feel, it brought out the worst and made me do some pretty bad things that, at least for today, I'm not doing anymore. I hear you on that. How does your relationships look like now? Paul is showing me his ring here.

Yeah, I got married a bad, so, you know, the quit drinking six years ago, and I don't have kids of my own right, because I party, but I had a good time. And I never thought I would have kids. I never thought I'd have a family. It was just me and my dog, golf, all the quote-a-foot fun things. And I ended up meeting somebody, right, who appreciated me for me. A lot of things happen when you quit drinking. How am I going to do anything, right? How am I going to meet somebody? How am I going to date somebody? How am I going to play golf? How are they going to have sporting a vet? How am I going to really do anything, right? Because you think the drinking takes a lot of time, man, and it consumes you. And so you've got to put some work in to get drunk. You don't get drunk after a sip.

you've got to put some effort into it. But when I quit, I was able to meet somebody eventually. I knew my story. I don't have to hide anything, man. I've been married since November 5th. I might need to check that date. No, but it's November 5th of last year. Hopefully she doesn't hear this part. But yeah, it's the 5th of November of last year we got married. So she has two kids, 10 and 11, and I could take care of myself six years ago, right? I was lucky to be able to take care of a dog. And now I've got a 10 and 11 year old boy that depend on me helping them get out, helping them, you know, throw a ball or do anything, right? Getting them around, treat them like my own man and just try to do the best I can with them and lead by example.

The one thing I can, at least today, promise, and I hear this in the rooms a lot, and my kids will never see me get drunk. I couldn't imagine and couldn't live with myself. If these guys saw me like I used to be, right, it was a disaster. Like, you have no idea. Well, you do have an idea. But that's the one thing I can promise today and hopefully tomorrow, a day at a time, they'll never see me have a drink with alcohol. And it's cool. We went to Turks and Caicos, and it's funny how much fun you can have on a vacation, not drinking.

You could enjoy everything at the sights, and me and these two guys are in a pool, and we go up to the pool bar, right? And they know I don't drink, and they get these virgin dairies or something like that. And the bartender makes them two, one, and the bartender goes to make me one, but starts to pour Bacardi or whatever. And the one kid, it was cool, man. I guess he was nine at the time. He reaches and grabs his cup. He goes, no, he doesn't drink. That was really cool.

Wow, that is so cool. Without your sobriety, like, would all this stuff be gone? First off, you've got to love yourself. If you can't do that, you can't love somebody else. And I don't want to lose everything that I've worked too hard to get where I'm at, and I don't want to ever go back to where I was. I can't promise that it's going to happen tomorrow, but I know I've got the tools and the steps and put in the work

to be able to get me through situations and all those things, but I don't want to go back. You could pay me a million dollars to go back to what it was. before you couldn't pay me a million to get sober. And here I am saying, you can't pay me a million to go back. I mean, that's crazy talk, but does it make sense? Yeah. So what can we pay a million for just to give you a million?

Can we do that? Can we just donate you a million? Yeah, I mean, it gets you a round of golf without me and Michael Jordan if you want to do that. Just one round, eh, nine holes? Yeah, he bouts a lot. That might get us through two holes of betting with him. Yeah, I mean, you know, there's cool things that happen, too. I'll share some of that. I used to think cool or fun was going to the same bar on a Friday night

and getting drunk with my buddies. And fast forward, right? In the last six years, I've had some pretty cool shit happen and impossible drinking because I was a liability. A couple years ago, a friend of mine were able to get in touch with Jay Leno. And we were on Jay Leno's garage and got to meet Jay and all those things. You know, when I was drinking, I didn't have a license, right? I couldn't drive. So there was no way I'd be able to do the thing on Leno's garage. And just going out there meeting him, the funniest, wittiest guy I've ever met super cool, again, sober, right? So for people listening, that's a pretty cool story. And then I was sharing with you about two years ago, year, so I was playing golf with a buddy of mine up here, he used to play in NFL, and he's friends

with this guy that lives in Jupert, Florida, who used to play in the NBA. And some people call him the goat. Anyway, that guy's name is Michael Jordan, and I had the opportunity to go down there, play his golf course. He was with us, super competitive. After the round of golf, I sat beside my buddy, and in between my buddy and Michael Jordan for four hours, playing cards. And again, man, I can't stress. First of all, I probably couldn't leave the state of Virginia back of the day, much less get into his golf club and play a round of golf, man. Unbelievable, very cool experience. And, impossible while I was drinking, totally possible in sobriety. Wow, dude, that's incredible.

I used to work at his dealership when I lived in North Carolina in Durham there, Michael Jordan. I never met him. I never played golf with him. Who won the golf game? Like, did you win this one for the boys or what? I'll have to text you that. I don't want to put that on public. I'm on a public platform, but he's good, man.

He's like a two-handicap or something. And it's funny. The golf course, he built it, right? It's Grove 23, as I am. It's a private course, and it's made for him to win. I feel like a big thing too is the energy we put out. Like once we get into sobriety, we have a different vibration and it just opens up doors. I hear it all the time for people to have these incredible opportunities that never would have been possible had we still been on the old path.

Yeah, I mean, look at us now, right? We wouldn't have been talking. We probably were both incarcerated at some point together, but who knows? I mean, just looking at you on the call of you, right? Full of energy, bright eyes, all those things. My face would get red, right? I would be super dry in the morning. I would have a headache.

Eyes were red. I didn't want to get up. It was just lazy, man. It was bad. But yeah, that energy you give off now, it's a positive vibe. And I try my best not to be negative, man. I've seen negativity and I know what it does. But if you can just kill them with kindness and be positive and try to do the best you can do one day at a time, those days add up to weeks, months, years, right?

And it was just like yesterday that I quit. So stay positive. Yeah, I couldn't agree more. That's so important. And one thing that you shared before all this that really hit me, man. I really love this, is that we got to be able to learn to love ourselves. And the reason this hits home for me is I used to work at this treatment center with teenagers, 13 to 19. They all want to fall in love.

They all love the girl. And I was trying to explain to everybody, like, you can't necessarily give something away you don't have. If you tell someone you're going to give them $100, if you don't have $100, you can't give it to them. Trying to basically get them to maybe see that they've got to look internally and start to develop love for themselves before they give it away. You mentioned that. How did you begin that process because I hear it a lot that people get stuck there? How do you begin that to start to love yourself? I mean, for me, it was really doing the steps, right? 12-step program where you have an inventory, you write things down and really analyze yourself. I'd never done any of those things where I wrote down different things about myself or others.

And if you look in the mirror and you're not happy, let me, he'll get you wrong, you're not going to be happy every day you look at the mirror. Sometimes you're going to be like, oh, man, here we go, whatever. But most of the time, when I look in the mirror, I'm happy with what I see, man. I'm happy with what I was looking back. It's not an empty shell of myself. I would have friends that would say, man, your eyes just look empty. And I never understood what that meant. And now you look like you're full of life, right?

Look how adamant we both are. We just met. And it's like we're best friends because we've both been through similar things. But the whole thing about loving yourself, you can't love somebody else unless you love yourself. And you're happy with yourself. It's like you can't give somebody a hundred bucks if you don't have it. You can't give somebody sobriety if you don't have it. At least I don't think so.

If I could love myself, it allows me to love somebody else being sober. it allows me to share that with somebody else. So if it's really got to start off at the ground level with you being happy with yourself, you've got to love yourself and care about yourself and respect yourself before you can do all this. I was not marriage material for 25 years, right, because I didn't care about myself, which means I'm not going to care about the person that I'm going to marry if that were to ever happen. And it wasn't that I didn't care about a girlfriend or whatever at the time. It was just because of the way I was feeling about myself that was pushed on to a family, member or a girlfriend of the time and doing the 12 steps and living a life of sobriety man it changes and

you see it and you feel it right so once that happens it's go time no that's our true is go time i was always told early on because i struggled with that i already mentioned here i didn't like looked back at me but they told me man we'll love you and tell you love yourself i didn't get it but after a while i got it what they were saying and i mean extremely grateful for that look paul if someone's listening to the show here and they're struggling to get or stay sober what would you say to somebody that's in one of those two spots? The only thing that worked for me, again, was a 12-step program. And I've got phone numbers of a lot of guys that have been through it, right?

Some guys have five years. Some guys might have 50 years. But I would say have access to somebody else's phone number because we will pick up. When I say we, people that have been to the program, you know, reach out to somebody. Don't sit there by yourself. Don't sit in a room. Don't stew and don't over your own thoughts. Like with me, right?

if I'm sitting by myself, especially early in sobriety, and I start thinking, am I doing the right thing? Did I go out and have one? That's bad thinking, right? And it's not stuff that you want to start. Pick up the phone, call a friend, go to a meeting, and get out of your mind in a good way. Don't go crazy. I would absolutely call somebody because the fellowship that I have now is the strongest thing that I have. Those three things, right?

The people place to the things, especially for a newcomer, somebody is thinking, you change those three things. You change the people that you're hanging out with because if you keep going and hang out with the same people doing drugs or drinking, you're going to have a hard time keeping that going, right? Gambling or doing those same things with those people, nothing's going to change. And like the places, the third thing. I don't go to the same places I used to. You will not see me at a bar or a nightclub, probably after 9 o'clock. I'm usually in bed. But if you've got to change those places because those places where people like us, or me anyway, are toxic. It's like putting a lion in a grocery store, a meat market full of steaks and expecting him not to eat. And just having

of say there to stare at them. What's the point? It's pointless for me, so I'd rather be home and get to bed and wake up early to work out kind of thing. Yeah. No, those are incredibly important. People, places and things, yeah. I just feel like sometimes early on for some, there's a resistance there, right? I hear a lot, too, like, well, I've got this vacation plan, and I've got this going on, or I've got this party I have to go to. And I think we've got to really take that good, honest look early on that, you know what, you just might have to miss out on a few things. 1,000% my grand sponsor or whatever was like, you're going to have to miss happy hours. You're going to have to miss certain events.

You're going to have to miss weddings. But your sobriety has to come first because this will change your life. And once you do that, your life will change. And I didn't understand it. And even today, right, I see people that come in and out of the rooms to get another white ship. I've got no problem. The rooms aren't locked, right? You can always keep coming back.

But I did not go to any weddings. I didn't go to happy hours. you've got to say no to some stuff, man, and it's okay to say no. And the cool thing is from like a work perspective, when I let a couple people know, this is my deal, zero questions. And I can promise you that anybody that cares about you or whoever is thinking about quitting or making a change, if they care, they will be cool with it. They're not going to question it.

They're not going to say, oh, come on, man, you can have one. It's not possible, man. So, you know, that comes from the quality of the people that you'll start meeting as well, the people that really care about you and not just partying with you. That's incredible. that because that's something that a lot of people I think worry about, right? Is what are you going to do? But that's, I think, the thing to hit home here is that it's going to take you some time and you may feel

alone for a bit and you might have to navigate these relationships. But when you do find the right people, well, it's going to be just real good relationships that are built on more than happy hours and football games where you're just drinking all the time. It's going to be built on, like, actual genuine friendship, I think. I say it a lot, too. It's the whole four quarters and hundred pennies. I'd rather have four quarters than a hundred pennies because I had a time in my life where I had a bunch of

different friends. And now if I got four people that I can talk to, like, I'm good. I'm happy with that. And the people pleasing and being everybody's buddy, that stuff just kind of goes out the window. And for me personally, I just don't worry about being everybody's buddy buddy anymore. And I used to be like, I wanted everybody to like me. And I just don't care about that stuff. Right there with you, man. I can count my close friends on one hand. But I wanted to make everybody happy, right? I wanted to be the lies of the party. I wanted to be like I didn't want anybody to hate me.

But little did I know about how many people I was making hate me along that journey that I was going through. But when you change it up, man, you'll get four quarters of the 100 pennies. That's a good one. I've never heard that. Yeah, takes up less space. And it just has more value, right? Even though it's the same value, I think, in people's minds, a quarter would be more. I don't even know where you spend pennies at anymore.

Yeah, it takes a lot of work to spend all those pennies. The quarters of quality, the pennies are quantity. I'd rather have quality over quantity every day. Yeah, for sure. Well, look, Paul, this has been incredible, buddy. We've covered a ton of ground. I appreciate you. I know everybody's going to love this.

Do you have anything for closing that you'd like to share? I always say I leave a lot of stuff. I just do it one day to time, Red. And if I can leave it on those three things I really could on, change the people, places, and things, man, do it one day to time. You can do it. And if I could do it, others can do it. You've got to surround yourself with similar people. Don't ever fear. It's the only thing that you can win by quitting. And I can promise you that. Yeah. True example of it. Thank you so much. Yes, sir.

Huge shout out to Paul for jumping on that episode. That was incredible. It went fast. My goodness, that episode went fast. I mean, I could second it and go on here for so much time. I'm not going to. about what Paul touched on there at the end is changing people, places, and things. It's very important to have a look at those three things when we get into recovery, when we're looking to change our lives because some of those things are definitely going to have to change.

Because some of the people, places, and things are fueling our addiction. And most of you know how the saying goes. If you hang out at the barbershop long enough, sooner or later, you're going to get a haircut. Look, if you're enjoying the podcast, you love what you're hearing. Be sure to leave a review. Everyone, if you made it to this point, jump on Apple, jump on Spotify.

Leave a review. If it's not five stars, we still love you. And I'll see you on the next one.