Soul Boom - Hunter Biden Pt. 2: How MAGA, Crack & Catholicism Changed My Life

Episode Date: September 27, 2026

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Where some see heroes and others see egos. Bloomberg sees the era of billionaire athletes. A fad to some, the future of money to others. We see crypto's trillion dollar swings. The end of jobs or the end of human struggle. We see the endless funds fueling the AI hype. While others follow the noise, we follow the money. Learn more at Bloomberg.com.

one of the things that has resonated about you telling your story so much is that everyone knows addicts everyone has an addict in their family um everyone has had addictive struggles even if you're not an addict you know we're making poor decisions having compulsive behaviors that kind of rule you for a time um and american culture is finally starting to see that addiction isn't just like this you know um this idiot making bad choices, but there's a panoply of kind of addictions and how it works. I mean, we have these sugary donuts out there. Sometimes I feel completely like a sugar addict. Like, I don't know how I would get through a day without having some. Yeah, can we get the donuts back?

Sugar. We get the donuts in here, place? Junk. Have you ever mainlined a donut? Yeah, I probably came close. You probably tried. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, like Ozzy snorting ants or something like that.

Hey there, it's me, Rain Wilson, and I want to dig into the human experience. I want to have conversations about a spiritual revolution. Let's get deep with our favorite thinkers, friends, and entertainers about life, meaning, and idiocy. Welcome to the Soul Boom podcast. Our show would not be possible without our sponsors, Cowboy Colostrum and Fetzer, links and promo codes on screen and in the description. Enjoy the show. But I'd just love to hear this part of your story. And, you know, there's family trauma at the root of some of this stuff.

I'm sure there's a lot of arrogance and entitlement at the root of some of this stuff, too, as there is for every addict. And some chemical misfiring and neurological misfiring and some genetics. But how did this addiction journey? Where do you think it started? Well, look, I first, the longest time in my recovery journey, you know, I stood up in 2003 and kind of raised my hand within my family and was willing to admit that I had a problem. And over, you know, 23 years ago. And I went to rehab. and I went and I stayed sober for seven years.

At that point was it drugs, alcohol, sex, all of the above. Alcohol. Alcohol. Just alcohol. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Which I think is the most destructive, at least the most destructive to me in many ways. But we get back to that.

I've seen pictures of you with a crack pipe. I'm not sure I would agree. Yeah. Well, no, let me, I'll give you my thinking around that because people give me shit all the time for when I say that. But I really mean it is, um, but. I really struggled with the idea that trauma had anything to do with it, that there were any other forces as it related to why I drank other than I was genetically predisposed to it.

And there was an answer. The answer that I found was in the program and the community of the 12 steps. And I kind of felt like in that way, I still have. had some control over, you know, my, you know, my story, my narrative of why I drank, you know, I drank because, you know, blah, blah, blah. And it was really interesting. It said about over seven years ago now, leading up to when I got clean and sober in June of 2019, is I became obsessed with watching Kaboor Monte.

Yeah. Yeah, who's, I think, just genius. Absolute genius. Yeah. Yeah. And he said something in his extensive work with addicts in Vancouver, he said that at the root of every addiction lies trauma. And he has a very broad definition of that trauma.

Sure. But I agree with it. And I think that more than anything is, once I was able to answer the question, of why to myself in an honest way. I was able to start to be honest with myself about all of the factors that made me and continued to make me designated as an addict. I'm in recovery.

I'm a reformed addict. But for me, trauma plays a role. Genetics plays a role. But the real answer to why I used was that it worked. It worked. At first, it worked. Before it became my prison and my executioner, it worked.

The first time I ever took a drink, I remember I was, you know, and when I say took a drink, I snuck a drink off of a table. Hey, everybody, make sure to click subscribe. It's right over here somewhere. Please, pretty please. It would help us at Soul Boom so much. Click subscribe. I've told this story before and hit under the table and drank a, you know, a,

flute of champagne at a party with a hundred people in it. My brother and I running around. And I remember, I distinctly remember the feeling before. How old were you? Like eight, eight. Yeah, but it was like, you know, I mean, I didn't even know what I was doing at that point. And then, and then when I, you know, started to drink like, you know, normal drinking in high school, it gave me the, it gave me the, it gave me the, uh, confidence. as a 4-foot-11 90-pound freshman in high school to, you know, ask the girl to dance, you know,

until then I ended up, you know, throwing up on the dance floor kind of thing. And you never, never was ever really, not never, but it took me a long time to see the connection between the two. The, the advantages that it gave me. as compared to the consequences of engaging in it. And so why was I in that? Because at first it worked, you know, I feel like, and I don't know where that feeling, whether, and emptiness, the feeling of being alone in a crowd,

the feeling like you're a fraud, like extreme anxiety. came from. But it was there. And, you know, after that first drink, my, my most trusted organ, you know, had an answer for me, which was, you know, you want to be able to do this. You want to go be able to make that, you know, speech. You want to ask that girl to dance. You don't want to feel the way that you're feeling right now. You know, I got an answer for you. I thought you were referring to a different organ. We can talk about that organ later in the show.

Let's get to know each other first, okay? Take it slow. Did I go too far? We'll take it slow. No, exactly. But I do like that idea that it works until it doesn't. And my case really worked until it didn't. Yeah, but that idea that you weren't able to control the amount.

So you were the one vomiting where other people were having like, like, well, my other friends of having three beers, why do I always have to have nine beers and end up with my head in a ditch? And when did that start to, did you have people speak to you about this in high school or college? Or kind of like, were you one of those drunks like your personality changed? No, no. And so I didn't become a, and I, when I said thrown up, I, the problem was is that I didn't. I didn't have, I could drink more than anybody. I could, you know, I could.

And I started to take real pride in that. I could stay up longer than anybody. I could, you know, and I didn't have like a huge, you know, I didn't get violent. I didn't get, you know, insane. I wasn't completely out of control. Yeah. And I got in a lot of fights. But other than that, I didn't have these kind of like extreme swings and behavior when I, when I drank.

Would you make yourself promises of kind of like, like, tonight I'm going to go out. I'm just going to have a couple of, you know, every time. I want to not drink tonight. When I go out. Yeah. And that's when you know that that's the beginning. The deal making. The deal making.

The beginning of, of that self-awareness always starts with that. It's like, I'm not going to do this this weekend. I'm only going to drink on, you know, beginning Thursday night. And those deals become kind of bigger and more elaborate. it. And that was the kind of the final straw with me. I would say like no defense against the first drink and the big book. And then it also says like, and once you've started to drink, no ability to limit the amount. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And so this is interesting about the trauma. And recently you have come back to this to embrace some trauma that might be at the root of this. And it talks about in the big book how there's three

elements to addiction. There's the physical allergy, the mental obsession, and the spiritual malady. And I think what Bill W missed, and I think it's only because this is, you know, a hundred-year-old program is those three things like, and the inherited trauma or and the, and the, I think they just left trauma out of the big book in a way. And I know in the early days of AA, there was a lot of disdain if you talked about trauma. So it doesn't matter. That's your story. By the way, when I started, it still was, it still was. Yeah.

Storytelling. Doesn't matter. Yeah. Just don't drink today and do the steps. But that, I think that trauma piece is so important. Yeah, I do too. And, you know, what I know, the way that I reinterpreted the big book from that the spiritual malady piece is that spiritual malady piece is that trauma piece.

It's your disconnection from that spirit. however you define it. Yeah. And now I really embraced it for the purpose because I think it's also a part of, which is critical, at least in my recovery, is being honest with yourself. And part of that honesty is like, you know, this fucked me up. And let me give you why, okay? My brother and I were in a like a horrific accident with my little sister and my mom

when I was almost three years old, my brother was almost four. And we were coming back from picking up a Christmas tree. My dad had just been elected to the United States Senate at the age of 29. That doesn't have anything to do with this part of the story. Is that they were killed. My brother and I were trapped in the car, in the station wagon. It was a tractor trailer that hit his broadside. We were trapped for an extended period of time.

And they became very, very, very. very, very close to dying. I had a traumatic rain injury. My brother had a, was basically in a body cast and traction for over a month in the hospital. And clearly, you know, I watched my mother and sister, we, we all died in proximity to each other in a very, very violent event. Okay. So after that, my memory is love after that my um uh what what the my narrative the story that i always took from that was literally how my brother and i were enveloped with love my aunt valerie moved into the house and um and helped raise us my uh my uncle jimmy turned the um the garage into an apartment and lived there and was with us every day.

We were, I spent almost every day my grandmother and my grandfather and my dad's side were there for us. We spent every summer with my grandparents on my mom's side. The entire community, the whole state of Delaware, basically adopted Bo and I as kind of like, you know, sons. The story that was told in the story that I adopted was all love. And in my childhood mind, what I really think is, is that there was no room to see, you know, like for the sadness. There was no space. And for all for good reasons. I mean, literally, for real.

I mean, by the way, on top of that, my dad, I mean, my dad is the greatest dad of ever. I mean, I haven't read in fiction about a better dad. he was always there and always present, even though he had, you know, like, really, really, really important job. And with an enormous amount of pressure and time-consuming, but, you know, he made it. And he was always there for us.

And I mean always. It still is to this day. And, but that love, that story of love, I felt like, well, it was a betrayal if, and I'm only coming to terms with this now. seven years into sobriety, well, maybe in these last seven years, is willing to admit to myself, is that, well, that's, this really fucked up. Like, the idea that I was going, I was betraying those who were supporting me then

if I, you know, focused on what was lost rather than what was gained. And nobody ever told me that. No one ever tried, you know what I mean? It wasn't, it wasn't through ill intention. It was all from love. But just the idea of like the reconstruction of the accident itself, that violent event. Yeah. You know?

And the absence of, you know, mother. I mean, I always thought about it, you know, when I was my children. Yeah. Is like, you know, what, I mean, what an incredibly difficult thing. Now, here's the other side, too. I get to sit here and talk to you about it. I get to here and sit and think about it and pontificate it with the world watching.

And that's kind of been the story of my whole life too because my dad is a public person. And what I learned more than more acutely this time around than any other time because of the kind of the dehumanization campaign against me over the last four years. I'm no victim, but like the release of my entire life to the world is that.

But I'm not even remotely alone. Like, I lost my mom and sister. You know what? You walk down the street and every third person can tell you the same story. Sure. You know, I, you know, I suffer from addiction and grief and I've had violence, you know, a traumatic event in my life. Like, I walk into the coffee shop and, you know,

nine out of ten people will raise their hand. And it's the craziest thing. is that we rarely ever acknowledge that in each other. So when someone like me comes on, I never get to ask you, what was the traumatic event in your life? What was, what's your dad going through right now?

You know, tell me about your brother. And, and I think that the most beautiful thing that's occurred and the reason why I'm doing what I'm doing is this, is that one of the things that trapped me in my addiction also was the feeling that I was totally alone, that I was uniquely,

that this terminally unique, as we say, in the program. And the realization that if I told my story and people were able to identify with it, I found that far, far more people identify with it than identify out across the population, not just with addicts purely. Yeah. Yeah. I'm a taking cowboy colostrum for a while, and colostrum is not a word I imagined to becoming part of my daily vocabulary, and yet here we are. Every morning, I put a little in my coffee or in a smoothie, and the biggest difference I've noticed is my digestion. It's feeling more consistent. I feel more regulated. My stomach and I are getting along, which, after almost six decades together, is kind of touching. And the benefits go beyond digestion. People report less bloating, more regularity, feeling

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And I'm Jonathan Cohen. On our podcast, Myambialic's Breakdown, we explore the biggest questions about consciousness, quantum physics, healing, and what it means to be human. Featuring conversations with Neil deGrasse Tyson, Michiukaku, and other leading scientists and experts, our podcast is where science and spirituality meet. Listen to new episodes of Myambiolics Breakdown every week.

Follow the show on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Watch full video episodes of MiamiMialics breakdown at YouTube.com slash MiamiMialic. For 50 years, Canadians have wondered what the names of IKEA furniture mean. Like Natopa, the guardrail for children's beds. Natopa means giving your favorite person room to grow. It means their safety and your piece of...

No. In Swedish, Natapa means night monkey. Mark! IKEA, 50 years of Swedishness at home. Look! He's wearing little pajamas. So cute. One of the great things is in the rooms, we do get to share that.

Exactly. It's an extrapolation of that. Yeah. And, you know, whether it's a leader meeting, you have a long story. And even in a short chair, you get to share your trauma of the week. No, but you're absolutely right. We talk about mental health a lot on the show. And this is a component of mental health across the board.

It doesn't matter what you have is you have, is you feel. feel alone. And addiction is a mental health. It's also a physical and mental and spiritual health things, but it's especially a mental health issue. And this idea that we are suffering alone, you know, that every addict has, that every depressed person has, you know, that every borderline person has. Everybody with terminal cancer has.

Yeah. That's why these stories heal, Hunter, is what I'm saying. These stories heal because it's like. like, oh shit, Hunter Biden? Wait, the son of the senator and the future president, like, felt awkward, alone and unloved and unable to connect with people as a teenager. Like, that's my story. Yeah, yeah. You know, and here's the path he took. Hey, boy. Yeah. Hello. Yeah. And here's the path I took. Um, it unites us. It totally unites us. Our struggle, our human struggle unites us. Pain. I always put it this way. It's the only emotion that you'll ever be guaranteed to feel as a human being is pain.

And it sucks. Yeah, exactly. And we all think that we're alone in it. And when we find it, I can't tell you, you know, social media sucks. I mean, particularly certain platforms. But I will tell you this, there's a beautiful. You spend a fair amount of time on. Yeah, no, by the way, for this reason is this. Because underlying the, if you can get through the junk and the trolling is thousands of messages from people that say that exactly what you just said. Exactly what you just said. And like, as you and I both know, the whole purpose of the steps, And I don't want to get into, you know, neither promote nor, you know, of the program that I'm a part of. The whole purpose at the end is to be of service.

And it's not a simply because of some like altruism. It's a purely selfish thing on the part of the attic. And the greatest kind of selfish, which is this. This is the only way to get out of your worst enemy, your head, is to be of service to somebody else. And that alone, for me, is engaging in that way and have somebody say, I voted for Donald Trump three times, but I saw what you just said, and I'm not drinking today. I mean, my day. Yeah. And I get those all the time.

And then they say, I don't agree with the goddamn thing that you said about X, Y, or Z. And that comes across the board. You know what I mean? Sure. But thank you for talking about, you know, whatever, any one of those topics that we were just on. Yeah. And it's really, really, really, really cool. That's beautiful.

I had a scientist, psychologist, and social scientist, Dr. Angela Duckworth on last week. And I don't think the episode has aired yet, and I think it's going to air later on. But we had a wonderful conversation about the 12 steps because, as I've been learning a lot about the neurology of addiction and mental health and depression, I've been reading Daniel Siegel's work, if you've read any of. of his. And it's what's amazing is that, you know, addiction is at the core of the brain. It's in the it's in the amygdala, you know, it's in the fight, flight, fright part of the brain. That's why it's so hard. Like if you have the idea like, oh, a drink would be a great idea or porn would be a great idea or hitting a casino would be a great idea. Placing a bet would be a great idea or eating this donut would be a great idea. It's not coming from your prefrontal cortex. It's coming from a much

deeper part of your brain's wiring. And everything in the 12 steps, before they even knew what they were doing, is trying to rise that little neurological fusion, fission, fizzy stuff going on down there and move it up here. So when you share at a meeting, when you journal, when you pray, when you meditate, when you call someone, when you hear other people sharing, and especially when you. you give service to others, all that wiring goes from that base need stuff, the fear stuff. I'm unlovable. No one likes me. I need to medicate that anxiety and moves it up into more of the decision-making part of the brain. You still go one day at a time, but you're flexing. It's a little

mini weight room up there with little weights. And I exactly. I really wish that people were more adamant about getting to that service. I mean, did you ever read Susan Cheever's book about Bill? My name is Bill. No. It's fascinating. It's a biography basically of the program and

Bill. And number one, he was genius. In a sense, not genius. Yeah, he was. He was a genius. And he was deeply, deeply read and connected. And terms of psychotherapy, in terms of, I mean, he went with Carl Young.

Carl Young. And what he did is he kind of was able to pick and choose from all of these different strands of philosophy and faith and bring it into this program, into this 12-strap program. And what I always am fascinated by, though, is the singular thing that he did on a personal level that changed was when he met Dr. Bob. And they went to hospitals and they sat and tried to help other alcoholics. Because I also don't think that understandably, the people understand, before this program, what you did was you were either sent to jail or you died in a ditch

or you were in a mental hospital. Yeah, you sent to a sanatorium. Exactly. You were there with schizophrenics. Yeah, exactly. They'll sober up and we'll say some prayers and share a little bit and then, you know, good luck. Exactly. And so for me, one of the lessons that I took this time around is this, is that not only is more than anything, the things that trap me in my, and particularly my cycle of relapse and addiction beginning in, I stayed sober for about seven years and then for a nine-year-long kind of odyssey of relapse after relapse, after relapse.

loves. And up until 2019. And more than any period of time of my life, that period of time just layered on the shame, you know, because then it was all lies. You know, everything was a lie. You know, every drink was a hidden one. Yeah. Every, you know, kind of shady behavior. And what I mean by that is like, you know, going on a business trip. and telling my family that I'd be back on, you know, Friday evening and not getting back until Wednesday, you know, from a business trip in Chicago where I end up in Topeka, Kansas. You know what I mean? Like, literally, you know, I've been that kind of shit. And so you start lying about it and you start hiding the bottle. The shame just layers on it. And then you get a little bit honest and you say, for me, this is my story.

You go back to rehab. You have every intention. And you know it, but you know what you didn't do? You didn't get honest with the people around you or yourself. You didn't tell the whole story. And so it hides in you. And it creates that intense discomfort. And you're still close enough to the neurological event of the alcohol, of the drug.

that your amygdala screams to you, you're going to die. Take a drink. You can't feel this way. And you relapse. And that was the difference between then and now, at least in my estimation. I don't, for better or worse, for all the world to see, they've seen all of me. Yeah, that was done for you. Yeah, exactly.

And I always say, you had no choice in the matter. No, exactly. And I, you know, I talk about it. We're talking about it, to Annie Lamont about it. Okay. Who's one of my, who, by the way, if you haven't read Annie Lamont, if you want to understand about recovery and understand about spirituality, it's one of the most beautiful writers in the world.

She's been on the show. Yeah. Help Thanks, Wow, her book about prayer is one of my very favorite books. I came to Annie. We can make a commercial for Annie. Bird by Bird is, I've read, I think, a thousand times as an aspiring writer. She's just such a dear, incredible human being.

But anyway, that now made me lose my train of thought. But the shame, the shame locked me in. Well, you were talking about the laptop being exposed. Your worst, darkest secrets. Every, every fucked up thing you'd even thought of, or tried to text out, was laid out for all of the New York Post to read. Yeah, over and over and over and over. a single day.

And, but it ended up being a beautiful thing in this. And I really mean it is that. That's crazy that you're saying that. You're coming here and saying your laptop and every disgusting dark secret in your life laid bare before Fox News turned out to be a good thing. Yeah. My digital life for 20 years without context or preamble of anything. and utilized by the most vicious people in politics in the history of the world,

literally. Yeah. And deployed in such cruel way. And weaponized against your father. It was all about my dad. None of it was about me. But it all became about me in the sense that I was the one on the front page of the New York Post smoking a crack pipe over and over and over again.

But what it gave me was this. I had to make a binary choice almost every morning. And that was, do I get out of bed and live or do I just literally curl up and die? And the curl up and die part is ultimately the choice that you always have, no matter what, is to walk down the street and buy a bottle and you're off to the races. And for me, I knew that was a death sentence. I truly knew it was a death sentence. And so I had to make that choice over and over again.

And once you make that choice, and it's that stark, it's like working out. You know, it's like it's like really, really developing not only that neurological pathway, but that strength to be able to do that. And I always say to people, it was, it was, I don't recommend it to anybody, but it wasn't by any, you know, any courage on my own. I just had to make it one way or the other. And I didn't go to Rishi-Kesh for seven years and, you know, and meditate in order to be able to come to this kind of, you know,

feeling that I am truly grateful for it because I don't know whether I had, and there's the humility part of it. I don't know whether I had the capacity on my own to get as honest as I was required, I was forced to be. As they said, I really don't. God did for you what you weren't able to do for yourself. And that's exactly. And they almost getting chills.

God hits you in the balls, man. Yes. Yeah. And continues to. And the beauty of it now, though, is that I am able to internalize it much more. and with a better understanding of myself than I've ever had in my life, of what it is that when I'm doing the next right thing or when I'm pretending to do the next right thing.

And by the way, to your point at the very beginning of this, you know, engaging with the public, and you have an enormous amount of experience with this, but doing a podcast or being on a show or being a public person in a way, it can play with your head, you know, in the sense of, you know, like, you know, six months ago, everybody was, you know, talking about, if they were talking about me, they were talking about me in almost purely negative terms. Sure.

And six months later, you know, whether it's a joke, or not a joke, people are asking whether or not I'm going to run for president. And that can fuck up your head if you let it. You know what I mean? And one of the things that I've been, I also was given the gift of is the realization that all of it is ephemeral. All of it is temporary. None of it is permanent.

They've said the worst things about me and three months late and you think like you can never top that. And three months later, they forgot about that one because they found something worse. You know what I mean? Yeah. And this like cycle, living it in the public eye is all different thing. But here's where people can identify with it in their own life. You know, it's in their own lives in their in their community.

And, you know, like being hacked. I don't know. You know how many stories you've heard from. Your son's cohorts or people in your life or people in your industry that have had their picture stolen or a text taken out of context or a conversation recorded that they, you know, that they didn't intend for public consumption. Yeah. And it can either give you perspective or it can destroy you. And hopefully I keep gaining perspective about it. This episode is brought to you by Fetzer.

You know, there's this tendency in modern life to believe that every problem has a material solution. More technology, more productivity, more money. More apps reminding you to breathe while you ignore the fact that your soul feels like a raisin. But the folks at the Fetzer Institute believe something deeper. They believe that behind humanity's biggest challenges are spiritual ones. Loneliness, division, disconnection, our inability to see each other, the planet, or even ourselves as sacred. and they're asking a really beautiful question. What if shared flourishing begins with the sacred?

Fetzer supports stories, communities, and spiritual solutions from people around the world who are healing division, caring for the earth, and creating deeper human connection through faith, spirituality, and reverence for love itself. Not dogma, not forcing one belief system, just the radical idea that, hey, maybe the soul matters. Honestly, that's a conversation we care deeply about here at Soul Boom.

You can explore there's spirit. Spiritual Solutions Library and learn more at fetzer.org. That's fete zer.org. Thanks, Fetzer. Going on vacation? We're here for it. With kids who turned the backseat into a courtroom drama over whose tablet is louder, whose charger is faster, and while watching the same cartoon for the hundredth time is a human right? Yep, we totally have vehicles to handle that. Because whether it's a road trip or a business trip, where your flight's delayed,

your phone's at 2% and your dinner is whatever is open? Yeah, here for that too. Enterprise, we're here for it. I'm Richard Roper. This is the movie of your life. Now, think about it. Every one of us gets top billing in our own movie, but no great story happens alone. Life comes with an ensemble cast. On this show, we're going to explore that connection between life and the movies we love. Now, often I'll be joined by people who have amazing stories,

and we'll talk about the films that shape who they are. Other times, we're going to go on deep. dive, maybe the best movies for the holidays, unforgettable performances, to paying tribute to the great actors of our time. We also want to hear from you. What's the movie of your life? The one film that you'd watch again, if you could only watch one movie, one last time.

It's the movie of your life podcast. For me, I never really, truly, I've realized, understood the serenity prayer. Really? Until this time around. Oh, okay. Yeah. I really mean it. And, um, can you say,

for the folks who aren't familiar? Oh, my gosh, to put me on the spot. God grant me the serenity to you, accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference. Yes.

Yes. But you didn't understand it previous to this last round of recovery. I don't think so. I really don't. And because what are the things I can't change? I can change everything. Are you talking about my relationship?

My relationships? Are you talking about, you know, my job? you talking about like the you know and i i kind of would go through my list like well what can i change i you know i uh you know and now i i i fully understand the things i can't change um and what it really comes down to is i can't change other people places or things that's it you're powerless over those things powerless no only thing i can change is my reaction to them that's it then it's as simple as that.

And so whether something good happens, a good thing or a bad thing, the only thing that I can change is the way in which I react to it. Yeah. My sponsor always says, what other people think of you is none of your business. What you think of all of other people is all of your business. Yeah. And that is within control. I think it's interesting because, yeah, the powerlessness is interesting because if an addict relapses, there's probably, a series of steps that happened before the relapse. In fact, there most certainly is. There always is a series

of steps before the relapse. It's not just like, you know, there's a series of decisions, secrets, lies, compartmentalizations, resentments that are building, festering things that haven't been called out, work that hasn't been done. So if you have the relapse, you know, you're powerless over your addiction, whatever that might be, but you also are fully in charge of your relapse because of the steps that you didn't take along the way. So it's this curious balance of like personal responsibility and yet powerlessness. And the thing I liken it to is like if you grew up in a family where rage was the norm and your dad raged and you're in a safe way parking lot and someone backs into your car and you just lose it like,

Is it your fault that you lost it? Yeah. Is it also not your fault that you lost it? Yeah. And you're also, you're triggered, your endorphins are firing, you're back in that base brain and you're operating from that place when you're yelling at the person. We've all been there, right? That's just how addiction works on a daily basis around a behavior or a substance.

Yeah. I felt like this time, too, is that one of the gifts that it gave me, I think there's this combination of things that occurred that isolated me. But it isolated me with a, with Melissa, who took an entirely new approach to how to help me. Does your wife? My wife, yeah. Your current wife, yeah.

Yes, exactly. South African. Yes. And she is not an addict, but she has this incredible intuition. She bristles against the idea of powerlessness. And I think more than anything, she wants to tell me, like, you know, this is you. Like, she wants to build me up in that way, which I love about her. But this time around is that one of the things,

that was, that remains just like a center to me is art, is painting. I've always painted. Your paintings are damn good, by the way. Thanks. I know that some parts of the political spectrum

kind of will mock them sometimes. I'm like, that's actually really good. Yeah, yeah. Oh, thank you. I appreciate it. No, for real. Oh, there's an example of like not caring about the opinions of, you know, the chairman of the Oversight Committee from Kentucky, whether he thinks about my paintings or not.

Yeah. In your studio in Malibu. Exactly. But painting, the creative act, but more than anything, is the meditation of it. And at the very beginning of my spread this time is that I would spend, and for, for, for, for, for, years 12 hours a day painting. I mean and I don't know for your what your experience was in early recovery but like the gift of having something to do with your hands taking out of your head and allowing you to I would masturbate that's how we're different. Yeah exactly 12 hours is a long

time it's happening. Yeah I don't know whether that's that's exactly. I don't know whether that's exactly Keep going. I just derailed your beautiful, creative moment about art. But that was for me. That was for me. It really was. Do you still paint? Oh, yeah, every day. Every day. Yeah.

I mean, I want to paint my house? Yeah, I could paint your house. By the way, I was a great house painter, too. My dad, we had this old, old house that he bought that he didn't have any money to keep up. So me, we would literally, we'd start painting one side of it. And like, we'd just keep going around. And by the time we got down to the other side of it, we'd have to start.

again. That's great. Yeah. Tell me about your relationship with your higher power. How has that changed over the years? You grew up Catholic. You worked a lot for the Jesuits. You did a year of service.

Yeah. Jesuit Volunteer Corps. Jesuit Volunteer Corps. I'd love to hear a little bit about that. Yeah. And how your kind of relationship, definition of your higher power has changed over the, over the decades. You know, my, my, I'm a Catholic.

A Catholic who listens to the Bhagabad Gita over and over again. Yes, God bless you. And you know what I learned that from? And Krishna bless you. I learned that from the Jesuits that I was trained by at Georgetown, who were incredibly learned learned men. And I think more than anything is that my faith was larger than the church. And what I mean by that is that as a kid, you know, and my dad to this day is, you know,

My dad makes every holy day of obligation and never misses a mass on Sunday. Unfortunately, I haven't been to mass since I was back with my dad. And, well, it's just, but by the way, I'm very comfortable with that. And that my approach to the God of my understanding is more than anything, I think, formed by my grandmother, which was that God is love. That's it. It is the manifestation and the realization and everything that love encompasses. That is God.

It's everything. You're God, I'm God. The squirrel out on the street is God. It's love. We are all connected. And we know that we are all connected in the book. both metaphysical and the physical sense, literally down to our atomic structure. And our DNA connects us all.

Yeah, exactly. And, you know, to be completely trite, you know, but realistic. But did you have hangups with a higher power when you were doing the acting out, when you were relapsing, when you were keeping secrets? Was there a struggle with like God, the Father, Jesus, the Son? I feel shame in front of these forces. No. How you never had a struggle there.

No, and that's because my grandmother, who was a devout Catholic and practicing Catholic, had a deep disdain for the, for the, for the dogma of the church. And she showed me an expanded way to view faith. And it's the same as with my father. You know, I and also by the way that from the the the Jesuits when I went to Georgetown It became very close with a number of Jesuits that you know I started a program at Georgetown with a guy named Ted Deziac father Deziac and me and ten other students and he started the Jesuit International Volunteer Corps

the summer program in in Dengrega Belize and which now is in like I don't know, probably like 15 countries and, and, and that's why I ended up going to the JBC. You make 80 bucks a month. You pull your money. You live with other volunteers and you have a year of service. And I worked in a basically. How much crack can you buy for? Yeah, no, not then.

Okay. Yeah. I was good then, but you can't buy much at all. You can't buy much at all. Yeah. You talk about egg prices. Yeah, exactly. Exactly right.

Gets. Gone up. Gone up. And diesel. But that's what I did. Well, I'm surprised to hear that, that, you know, one of the struggles that I had, even though I grew up a member of the Baha'i faith, which has a very loving idea of God, the Creator, you know, the mystical power that is within us, within molecules, within galaxies. I just had this idea of a father God that didn't hate me, didn't disdain me, wasn't like ashamed of me, but was just a little, always a little disappointed in me. So I just had this like, I would like try and pray and I just had this vision of like of God like, no, that rain, yeah, you know, I give you a C plus at best.

And just like just this facing this presence, this being this love that was there for everything in the world. But for me, it's like, you really could do a little bit better. And I joke, but that really was it. And that would always just keep a little bit of distance that would allow for, you know, tension. I guess my feeling was, is that it was all me. not God. Yeah. You know, I saw, so that, you know, I never, I was never taught that there was any judgment

from love. And so, and I still believe that. That's beautiful. Yeah. You had said earlier in the interview how you think alcohol is the worst addiction, worse than crack. What can you possibly be thinking? Okay.

From a physiological standpoint. Mm-hmm. Alcohol impacts every single organ in your body, every single pleasure center of your brain. Really? Yeah, exactly. And also, it's the only drug that you can die other than benzodiazepam from withdrawing from. You will go into seizures potentially and die, depending upon the level of addiction. At a certain level.

And you go cold turkey. Exactly. Yeah. Crack can be more compulsive and it can lead to more dangerous. And here's the other thing. I also, just statistically, the amount of violence and death that is caused by alcohol alone is 10 times. Every other drug combined. And so you can look down boating accidents, drowning, wife beatings, just like child abuse.

Exactly. Down accidents, just blah, blah, blah, blah, alcohol is alcohol. Alcohol. And it's not only because it's ubiquitous and socially acceptable. It's because also of the physiological consequences of alcohol. And that's what threatened my life more than anything. The thing that turned me into an unrecognizable human was crack in the sense of the just constant compulsive nature of it. And, but most of that, too, I don't know, with your experience with drugs and alcohol in this way, but most of that is driven by the fact that, that illicit narcotics are, are not necessarily fully socially acceptable, you know, so.

They don't have crack bars. They don't have crack bars, you know what I mean? But by the way, in the same way, they didn't, you know, I, I, I, there's a distinction. But, you know, I mean, like, marijuana, you know what I mean? Like, I was growing up, you know, that the, like, the idea that you would ever, you know, if you smell the joint, you know, walking down the street, the sidewalk. I mean, that would have been like that, you know, holy shit. Yeah.

You know, who's risking their life right here? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So I say it not to minimize it, but to do this, is that, I don't think alcoholics should ever identify out of addiction. Do you know what I mean?

Like, oh, I'm an alcoholic. You get an ism at the end of your name. If you do the socially acceptable thing of you're just a drunk, you know what I mean? And like, you know, it's okay. But if you're an addict, if you're an N.A., if you're in a car, you know, if you're a drug addict, it's like this whole other thing, you know what I mean? Like, well, you suffer from some kind of other disorder or disease that's so different than alcoholism and I think it's a huge cop out and I think it's a really easy way to identify out

with what your real issue is it's the same addiction yeah you know I stopped drinking and I stopped using you know what I mean I know that I cannot do either of them um but you know it's not as if there's a you know I'm well and it's also it's the same way with behavior addictions you know because I think that people minimize a lot of people in 12-step programs uh minimize my essay and Yeah, yeah, exactly. They minimize, like, porn addiction. You know, I've met people that, like, their porn addiction has ruined their lives. Yeah.

And gambling addiction. Yeah. And shopping and eating and food addiction. And I had a guy I knew in program early on, and he would go early in AA, early. And he asked a guy to be a sponsor and the sponsor be like, hey, you didn't drink today. That's great. Let's go over to the whorehouse, you know, and celebrate. And it was fine because.

Hey, you didn't drink. Yeah. You didn't drink. So there's still a ways. There's a ways to go there. Yeah. One question we ask every guest is this cookie word soul, soul boom. What does the word soul mean to you?

Soul to me is connection. It's the thing that allows me to realize that I am. connected to all things. I always, and sorry for this, probably too many words. But when you asked me before about, like, my, the way in which I characterize God in my mind and how that plays in my life, is soul and that all souls will be reunited. And I really, really truly believe that.

I really truly believe that my mother, my sister, my brother, remain inside of me through that soul. And that I can, if I'm in the right place, I feel it constantly. That's soul to me. That's beautiful. said that God is love and you said that soul is connection. And we're talking about the future of America.

I think we need to bring back America's soul. Bring back and visualize what a soul of America could look like in the future. In the future. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks, Hunter. It's been a pleasure getting to know you and have this conversation.

Likewise. I really, I'm a huge fan. I'm a huge fan of the show. too, but a huge fan of you as a human being. So thanks. You're very kind. Thanks. And I see you brought these glasses.

They're very Dwight Shrut-like. You want to put those on a little bit? Look, they're a little shrewdy in my readers, too. Yeah. Look at that. Yeah. Yeah. And I got, so that I can also read because I've lost every single pair of sunglasses

because I wear my readers. Yeah. I take my sunglasses off and I put my readers on and I leave the sunglasses. So now I got them combined. There you go. Thanks so much. Soul Boom is also on Spotify video. If you've got Spotify Premium, you can enjoy it free of Spotify ads.

If you don't, you'll get even less ads if you hit subscribe to Soul Boom. Also enjoy on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Pandora, or wherever else you get your stupid podcasts. For 50 years, Canadians have wondered what the names of IKEA furniture mean. Like Natopa, the guardrail for children's beds. Natopa means giving your favorite person room. to grow. It means their safety and your piece of... No. In Swedish, not opa

means night monkey. Mom, he's back. Ikea. 50 years of Swedishness at home. Look, he's wearing little pajamas. So cute.