The Rich Roll Podcast - Mishka Shubaly: The Long Run To Sobriety

Episode Date: April 20, 2013

Today on the podcast we GO DEEP. In the short lifespan of this show, I've had the honor of interviewing a wide variety of incredible guests — paradigm busting thought leaders pushing the boundaries of conventional wisdom on a myriad of health & fitness related subject matters. But there is an elephant in the room. I've been waiting for the right guest to get into the issue closest to my heart — addiction & recovery. If you read my book you know my story. But I have been reluctant to use the podcast to discuss in depth the most integral part of my life & struggle. I suppose I was waiting for the right guest for the job. Someone equipped to handle this kind of discussion. Somebody who understands. Well, I found him. And when I say we go deep, I mean it's intense. Big love to Mishka for the willingness to be vulnerable; open and considered in his responses. It takes courage to be so transparent, and he's got it in spades. In many ways, our stories are vastly different. And yet they are exactly the same. Alcoholism, struggle, recovery, writing, ultrarunning, redemption. My long lost brother. My peer. My comrade in arms in the battle against the demon that wants both of us — and untold millions — drunk, imprisoned, institutionalized, and eventually dead. Disclaimer: If you are stumbling onto this episode merely looking for training/nutrition tips, this interview might not be your cup of tea. And if so, that's fine. But I also know for a fact that there are a lot of people out there that will glean insight and inspiration from Mishka's redemptive journey. All I can say is that I'm really proud of this interview. And I hope you enjoy it. NOTE: there are a few moments of explicit language in case you are language sensitive. ANOTHER NOTE: The song used to bridge the intro to the interview? “The Only One Drinking Tonight,” by Mishka Shubaly from “How To Make A Bad Situation Worse” Enjoy! Rich

Welcome to episode 27 of the Rich Roll Podcast with Mishka Shabali. The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey everybody, welcome back to the show. My name is Rich Roll. I am an ultra distance triathlete. I'm an author. I'm the author of the number one bestselling book, Finding Ultra, the paperback version of which drops on May 21st, which you can pre-order now on Amazon or Barnes and Noble or any of the other online retailers. I'm a plant-based nutrition advocate. That means that

I don't eat anything with a mother and nothing with a face, just plants. 100% whole food, plant-based diet. If you don't know what that is, it's like a healthy vegan, I suppose. I'm a public speaker. I'm a holistic lifestyle entrepreneur. I'm a recovering attorney. I'm a public speaker. I'm a holistic lifestyle entrepreneur. I'm a recovering attorney. I'm a family guy. I've got four kids, happily married. I started this podcast back in December with the goal of sharing the people and personalities that I've met along this journey and path to wellness in the hopes that I can help inspire you and make you more self-empowered about your health and your fitness goals. I've had doctors on, nutritionists, trainers, world-class athletes, entrepreneurs, a wide variety of different kinds of personalities and people, all of whom are very forward-thinking and, in many cases, paradigm-busting in their perspectives when it comes to food, nutrition, healing the body, how to get fit, and a wide variety of perspectives, not just people that

share my point of view. I try to provide a safe forum for people with different kinds of ideas about different things to come here and share that with me and have an adult conversation, a level-headed adult conversation. Imagine that in this day of media. And today's guest is sort of different. He's unique in the pantheon of the guests that I've had to date, but a very important guest. And I'm really proud and excited about this interview. As I mentioned, I've kind of covered a whole variety of subject matters on the podcast, you know, all different ways of how to train for strength and endurance and different kinds of diets from, you know, low carb to fruitarianism.

But I have yet to kind of get into one very important aspect of health, at least very important to me personally, which is the subject of addiction and recovery, which if you read my book, is a big part of my story. And I've been sort of waiting for the right guest to come onto the show where I could kind of get into the meat of this issue, what it means to me, my perspective on my alcoholism and my recovery. And I guess more specifically, the kind of interrelationship between the recovering addict or alcoholic and endurance sports. If you're an endurance athlete, you probably are aware that when you go to these races, there are a lot of sober people, a lot of people in recovery. And why is that? What is the attraction of endurance sports to the sober alcoholic? You know, is it the obsessive compulsive nature of it? Is it the self-challenge? Is it the redemption? Um, and what is that nexus? And, and that's an interesting subject matter.

And it's a question that I get a lot, you know, have you transferred your, your addiction just onto ultra endurance sports? And I have a response to that and we get into it in the interview. Um, and Mishka really fit the bill. I mean, he's, he's, you know, not only is he a recovering alcoholic like myself, uh, he's also, also an ultra runner and he's also a writer. So we, we share, you know, three huge aspects of our, of our life. Um, and he just seemed the perfect guy to have on the show to kind of roll up our sleeves and get into this, get into this subject matter. i have to tell you i don't know if it's a disclaimer but uh we go deep man i mean this interview was intense and i knew it had the potential to be intense

uh but i think even i underestimated just kind of you you know, how deep we went. And that's a credit to Mishka, you know, for his willingness to be vulnerable and to, you know, really think about the questions I was asking him and to be honest, you know, which is hard and takes a lot of courage. I applaud him for doing that. And it is, uh, when we finished the interview, we both looked at each other, like, what just happened? You know, are, are you really gonna, you know, put that up? Uh, and, you know, I actually thought like, maybe, you know, maybe I shouldn't, you know, it's a very vulnerable feeling to talk about your failures and talk about your weaknesses and, and, uh, in a, in a public forum. Um, but I think it's also really powerful and I've seen that with my book and that doesn't mean that everybody who listens to this podcast is going to respond favorably to this interview. I think it's going to be a divining rod. I think there, there's going to be, uh, you know, one aspect of the audience

that isn't going to relate at all. And I, But I think that there is also going to be a significant portion of the audience that this is really going to speak to. And I feel strongly about that. So I am proud of this interview. And I can't wait to share it with you. It's very long. We talked for quite some time. And like I said, we dug really deep. So I'm going to cut the intro short.

And we're going to get right into it but before we do i just want to say that uh mishka uh the reason that that um i was able to get him on the show is that dean dwyer a fellow podcaster in canada introduced us online and i knew who mishka was because he wrote a kindle single a Kindle single is essentially a digitally delivered short story through an Amazon program that allows writers, certain selected writers, to self-publish through Amazon. And this little tome went on to hit the number one spot in the Kindle single store, deposing or dethroning, I should say, Stephen King. And if I was to check the Amazon rankings in the running category, his book has always been above my book. It's a wildly popular book. And I was like, who is this guy who wrote this book? I'd never heard of him.

And I have to say that his book, The Long Run, is a really beautifully composed polemic about addiction and recovery and the redemptive powers of running. And if you haven't read it, you should check it out. He's written a couple other Kindle singles that you can check out if you like his writing. He also just wrote something called Shipw called the ship called shipwrecked about being shipwrecked, which is pretty cool. And bachelor number one, which is sort of his adventures in reality TV. And most recently I tweeted, uh, a little post that he put up on CNN, uh, about a self-supported marathon that he's going to run himself in New York city, uh, today's Friday.

So it'll be tomorrow, Saturday, and just his thoughts and opinions on the tragedy that has occurred in Boston. And as I mentioned in the interview, it could have been a simple blog post or an announcement, but he wrote this really heartfelt, beautiful little piece, and I'll put the link up in the show notes of the podcast. And I encourage everybody to go check it out and read it. And we talk about Boston, of course, in the interview. So let's get into it. First, I'll cut the ad short.

But I have to say, if you want to support the podcast, a great way to do it is to click the Amazon banner ad on richroll.com. If you're going to buy something on Amazon, just click that banner ad first or put it up into your toolbar on your browser. You can just copy the URL and put it up there so you don't have to think about it anymore. And it won't cost you anything extra on any of your purchases, but Amazon will throw us some loose change, which keeps us going. We're brought to you today by recovery.com. I've been in recovery for a long time.

It's not hyperbolic to say that I owe everything good in my life to sobriety. And it all began with treatment and experience that I had that quite literally saved my life. And in the many years since, I've in turn helped many suffering addicts and their loved ones find treatment. And with that, I know all too well just how confusing and how overwhelming

and how challenging it can be to find the right place and the right level of care, especially because, unfortunately, not all treatment resources adhere to ethical practices. It's a real problem. A problem I'm now happy and proud to share has been solved by the people at recovery.com, who created an online support portal designed to guide, to support, and empower you to find the ideal level of care tailored to your personal needs. They've partnered with the best global behavioral health providers to cover the full spectrum of behavioral health disorders, including substance use disorders, depression, anxiety, eating disorders, gambling addictions, and more. Navigating their site is simple. Search by

insurance coverage, location, treatment type, you name it. Plus, you can read reviews from former patients to help you decide. Whether you're a busy exec, a parent of a struggling teen, or battling addiction yourself, I feel you. I empathize with you. I really do. And they have treatment options for you. Life in recovery is wonderful, and recovery.com is your partner in starting that journey. When you or a loved one need help, go to recovery.com and take the first step towards recovery. To find the best treatment option for you or a loved one, again, go to recovery.com. All right, so without further ado, let's get into it. Again, this is a long one, but it's a good one. So put those earphones on or earbuds in and settle into your treadmill run or

your trail run or your commute to work and enjoy. Mishka Shabar. There's a lot of, no, there's a lot of creative energy in this place, man. Yeah, I. Although you, I have to say, I didn't know it was possible to live in New York City and be that far away from a subway station. As I'm like lugging 50 pounds of recording equipment with me from over here. I didn't realize you were bringing as much stuff as you brought. i would have uh there's probably a much easier way to do this well this is the problem though when you run you know five ironmans in under a week is that it uh

nobody's will nobody is willing to come and pick you up and give you a ride where was my town car man pick me up in manhattan and shuttle me out here. I know. I've actually spent, we're here in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. And on this visit to New York, I've spent more time in Brooklyn in the past couple days than I think I have combined in the last several years of coming to New York. Actually, even when I lived here, which I think is a testament to how New York is changing. Actually, even when I lived here, which I think is a testament to how New York is changing. Yeah. I mean, the only people who haven't been priced out of Manhattan at this point are the fashion people, the Wall Streeters, and the Coke dealers.

Because cocaine is what keeps those other industries running. Of course. But yeah, I mean, and in five years, I'll be in philly because i won't be able to afford to live here yeah i was in um dumbo this morning and uh i mean that is just it's such a cool neighborhood but you can see what it's going to be like and i mean it's the next tribeca you know it's it's it's gentrifying quickly over there yeah i used to uh train at a boxing gym down there and it was, you know, it was awesome because it was, you know, sort of like the old guard and, uh, you know, I got to spar with a guy who fought Tyson and like, um, you know, and, and, and now, I mean, I'm sure

that gym is there, but it's, um, you know, it will have been transformed. Or it's, or it's turned into a graphic design business or something like that yeah yeah a new startup yep um it is cool down there and i thought oh i'm in you know i'm in dumbo and i'm gonna i'm gonna go over and see mishka i'll just jump a subway i had to actually the only way here was to go back into manhattan on the subway and then loop around yeah yeah i walk 20 blocks you're remote dude it's i i like to think that this is the last dying breath of of uh of green point you know there's i've got like the sewage treatment plant behind me like the cemetery on one side this is the last outpost of humanity

it's it's authentic though what it's like a polish neighborhood right i mean that was sort of what i was getting walking through yeah yeah yeah it's pretty much a straight uh polish hood yeah and it it looks like it's relatively unchanged from probably what it looked like you know 20 25 years ago yeah i mean a lot of these people have been here for a long long time i mean i i been here. How long have you lived in this apartment? It'll be seven years that I've lived here. And that's the longest I've ever lived anywhere in my life. Yeah.

And actually, I used to live here with, I found a place on Craigslist. And the guy I lived with was this horrible blackout alcoholic. Perfect. horrible blackout alcoholic and perfect coming from me like that i wasn't the worst drunk who lived here you know it was that was something else you know and and it you know i had like a folder of emails where i would be like hey man you know like throw up in the toilet not in the bathtub you know and sort of little post-it note reminders yeah stuff like that and then finally it got to a point where there was like this smell in the apartment that wouldn't go away so my roommate lived in the part of the apartment that we're in right now and i

actually like i broke in here one night because i was like i gotta find out what the smell is is this like a decomposing hooker or what you know and so i broke in and um he was morbidly obese and he had he had lost his job and become addicted to uh to online gambling and he had been like hoarding jars of urine because he didn't want to like step away from the computer and miss his miss his hand so he would just like piss in a bottle and there was like four of them here. So I finally went to the landlord and I was like, yo. You got to do something about this.

I mean, that's heavy. That's dark. Yeah. That's some seriously dark stuff. What happened to that guy? I don't know, man. I mean, I think that, I think that that was a,

actually I got a really nice email from him. That was a bottom of sorts for him and, you know, and sort of like getting kicked out of here. And he found a new place and got a new job and actually like dropped some weight and, you know, seemed to be doing much better. So that's good. So I deserve a gold medal for throwing him out, I guess. Well, you did him a favor. You were not codependent in that relationship, I guess. Yeah.

Yeah. So it's cool to, uh, thanks. First of all, thanks for having me over, man. Yeah, man. I gotta say it's a, it's a big honor. Uh, the, the honors, you know, I'm the one who's honored, man. I've been, uh, I've been watching your, uh, you know, your book just consistently kick my ass on Amazon. I was like, who is this guy? Like, what is this? It's a single, it's a kindle single and it's consistently at the you know the top of the list and the running books and the category like

I'm not I'm not going to like the kindle singles category to see who's number one there but like you know you transcended that and showed up in you know the rankings for all the other books like way up there man and I was like wow somebody wrote a kindle single is like killing it on amazon like what's what's the story here and i've been thinking i was sort of just ruminating on that you know i didn't know anything about you and that's when uh dean our mutual podcasting friend kind of introduced us over the email and i was like oh that's awesome i'd love i'd love to meet that guy i've been thinking about that guy yeah Yeah, I had a target on my back. That competitive nature in sport going over into the Amazon rankings.

Well, you have to give me that victory then because that will be the only place where I'll be. Oh, you own it. You own it. You own it. I mean, you were number one, the number one Kindle single for the long run atop Stephen King for how long? I mean, how long were you sitting on the top of the roost there? I mean, for a while, like more than I can believe. I mean, had I done it once for one day, that would be more than I would have ever hoped for. Right, get the screen grab yeah i do i sent i did send a couple of those to my mom like mom like forgive me look like i did it you know but um no it's it was it's been an amazing ride and you know what's what's most ironic about it is that i didn't want to write

that story and i i resisted writing it um you know my editor basically said he was like um he was like this is your next story this is what you're going to write about and uh and it's going to be called the long run and you know and i was like d, Dave, this is a guy, this David Blum, established writer. He's been working as a writer and editor in New York for a long time. Knows his game. And of course, I was like, Dave, you don't know what you're talking about. No one wants to hear my drunkologue. Yeah, exactly.

I was just like, nobody wants another whiny book about how I totally screwed my life up and then just doing the real hard work to sort of get it back. And I was wrong. People love that stuff, man. It's the hero's journey. Yeah. And I think, too, that America is really a place where people come to reinvent themselves. I mean, this is the nation of second chance.

This is like, we'll give you another shot. I mean, historically up till now, we love as much as we root for the underdog to triumph like Rocky or something like that, we also root for people who mess up and who make mistakes and then have to try and put it back together. Because it's very human. We're all flawed and we all make mistakes. And I think people can emotionally identify with that. you know, I think people can emotionally identify with that. I, I have to say, man, I, um, you know, one of the worst things about me is, or two of the worst things. Okay. Two of the many bad things about me are that I'm, I'm really dismissive and I make really snap judgments.

And, um, I knew your sort of your, your resume as an athlete before i read any of your book and i was like you know and you know i hate to say but one of the downsides of the sort of ultra you know competitive community is that you run into a lot of ultra egos too and one of the first things that leapt out at me um you know when i was reading your book was uh you know you said something about like you know balance that thing that's you know that still eludes me and uh and it's like as a reader right there that's when i was with you you know it was because i was like oh this guy has gone out and done all these superhuman things. And one of the first things that he's going to exposit for us is that he

still, here's something that he still hasn't figured out. No, it's a, it, it constantly eludes me. And I think that that, you know,

that's, um, you know, something that will, I'll have to, you know, continue to work really, really hard on for the rest of my life. And, you know, being a, you know, that will i'll have to you know continue to work really really hard on for the rest of my life and you know being uh you know being an alcoholic being an addict being in

recovery and and knowing myself and my tendencies and and you know my sort of attraction to extreme behavior and you know and and many of which you know many of those don't serve me. And grappling with that and like how to kind of, you know, live in the world with that, carrying that around is, you know, it's not easy. And I'm not perfect at it by any stretch of the imagination. I'm usually very, very far, you know, from perfect. you know, being a, you know, being a drunk for a long time and watching people, watching other people getting sober and sort of reading these sobriety narratives, you know, I just sort of operated on the, you know, the assumption that once you stop drinking and once you got past the sort of, uh, you know, the sort of garish, you know, Hollywood dramatic, uh, DTs where you're sweating and there's like bugs crawling through the walls and stuff like that, that then your life is sort of, you know, the sort of garish, you know, Hollywood dramatic DTs where you're sweating and there's

like bugs crawling through the walls and stuff like that, that then your life is sort of, you know, like sunshine and roses. That's not the case, man. It's not the case at all. It's not like, oh, I'm sober now and life is perfect and great and look how grand everything is and the sun shines every day, you know? And I mean, certainly, you know, I don't know if you have this, but you know know you do have the pink cloud and that that lasts longer for some people than for others and you know i experienced that but you know then life sort of intervenes again and and you know you know you have problems that creep up like everybody else does and and in many ways at least in my experience it's oftentimes more difficult to

manage that because you know i'm like an emotional baby you know because i medicated myself for so long that when i finally got sober i had the emotional maturity of you know like a 17 year old like when i started using and drinking you know i hadn't i hadn't been able to develop tools like a normal human being for how to manage that kind of stuff and so i'm really sensitive you know i get really bent out of shape by small stuff and it can be very easily overwhelming for me yeah i mean that's my experience with uh with sobriety is that sobriety is not the finish line. It's like the starting line. Exactly.

You've gotten yourself far enough to get to the point where you're in good enough shape to do something that's incredibly hard. And man, I know exactly what you're talking about. Because people tell me all the time, they're like, why do you still live like you're 16? And I was like, I still am 16. I'm starting from, you know, I'm starting from scratch. So, I mean, at this point, you've been sober a couple of years now, like three years, two and a half years or something like that. Coming up on four years. Right.

Which I never thought that I would do that. Which is huge, man. You know, congratulations. It's amazing. right which um i i never thought that i would which is huge man you know congratulations it's amazing and and yet at the same time you know you're still you're still new you know you're still new and the nerve endings are you know there's probably a lot of nerve endings that are still really kind of raw yeah um it one of the parts of of, of finding ultra that I really loved was like sort of the slack period after you did the first ultra man, because you're like, it's like, I went out and did this ridiculous, grueling race, this, you know, and, and now what, you know, like what's, what's next? Do I, you know, like, what do you do after that? You know? And, and,

and that's been my experience. Um, you know, I, you know, I started running, I went out real hard and real strong with, you know, just running on anger really. Um, you know, with no training and no idea of like form or what to, you know, what the right shoes were to wear or what to eat or any of that information. Um, you know, and then went out and overran and injured myself. And then, you know, had this awesome, like massive year where I just, you know, did like race after race after race. And then, um, you know, and then I burnt out a little bit and, and. Well, you kind of proved to yourself that you could do it and you, so you crossed a

couple of finish lines. Yeah. And then, and then you kind of get to that place where you're like, well, what does this mean to me? Why am I, you know, what is it, you know, why am I doing this? What's driving this? And what is important to me about this pursuit? Yeah. You know, and that was one of the things is that for me, uh running was a tool um you know and it was just

like i i was gonna if if you know for example if you're writing and you don't know where the story is going to go and you go out for a run that's on your mind for the next four hours or however long you're running you know you figure it out you know and i think that that's because i mean it's on your mind but also when you're running you're able to engage a different part of your consciousness and kind of tap into an you know you're unconscious on a certain level it's in some ways you're turning your brain off and you're kind of letting go and it becomes that active meditation state that allows some of those you, creative pathways to engage in a different way. And, you know, I know when I'm struggling with something, whether it's a creative

problem or just a life problem or an emotional problem, you know, oftentimes, you know, I find the solution on a run in a way that I would have never been able to if I was grinding at home, trying to figure it out. Do you remember those? I mean, this is probably like late nineties. There were like optical illusions that they would print in the newspaper. And what you had to do was like, look at it and then like unfocus your eyes. And then you would see a 3d image. Vaguely.

You mean like the, the lamp and the two faces kind of thing or no, it, it was, um, it was more sort of like i'll figure out the uh exactly what it is but you know there's like an image there but you can't see it if you look directly at it and if your eyes focus but you have so you have to focus your eyes on like

an imaginary point six inches in front of what you're looking at and then you'll see you know a wizard riding a dolphin or something right you that, you know, and, and, and that was my, you know, that's been my experience with running is that, um, you know, when I go, you know, when I go out, I'm concentrating on sort of the discrete, you know, the, the discrete task of like, okay, I've got to, I've got to keep my speed up or I've got to not run too fast. So you're focusing on smaller things like that. And then it's like while you're focusing on that, it's like, oh, I forgive my sister for that thing that she did when I was in fifth grade or whatever. You just get sort of like little gifts like that where it's like oh oh yeah i just figured that out oh okay cool right it's it's almost like you're you're unplugging from you know the loops you know the i don't know about you but like i'll just i'll get into a rut and my mind is loops on some thought you know and whether it's a resentment or you know a conflict or whatever it is and i'll just walk around like obsessing

on some little thing and the, and I can't unplug, you know, like I can't, and I have to do, I have to change my environment. I have to change my behavior and I almost can't will myself to stop thinking about it. Like I have to take an action that's going to shift that. And for me, you know, the easiest thing to do is to go work out you know like that almost does it for me yeah i it's it's fun well this this will actually sort of bring up another question i want to raise a um a friend of mine uh jacob who i lost in uh 2001 he was a uh he was a like a pretty hardcore weightlifter and a heroin addict which two things don't really go together but um you know and i asked i said you know and you know and i was

pretty hardcore drunk and i was like how can you bear to go to the gym you know and uh and he said you know it's it's the one thing that i know that removes that sort of nattering voice in your head um you know better than drink or drugs is you know if you just to just work out hard to the point where you're like so exhausted that voice is quieted and it's like quiet in your head for a second. There's no doubt about that. And I mean, when I was drinking, you know, if I could somehow find my way to go for a run or do some kind of physical

activity, that was fuel for my thinking that I didn't have a problem, you know, because it's like, as long as I, if I, if I can get to the gym, even if for a half an hour and I,

and I get through that, then like, I'm cool. You know, like I don't't i don't have anything that i need to look at in the mirror yeah i i man i know that logic too well i mean you know that i i used to do the same thing you know with my drinking you know where i was like well you know all right i'll quit for a week there i quit for a week i'm not an alcoholic let's go get some whiskey right yeah like i said to you before we started recording that you know if i wasn't an alcoholic i'd get drunk every night you know it's only an alcoholic thinks that way and unless you're an alcoholic like it's hard to relate to that that mentality and it's i i think it's something that you know is just distinct to

the to that kind of personality and you know you're the first person i've had on the show who uh is in recovery and there's a lot of people have been like when you're gonna you know kind of talk about the addiction stuff and you know i haven't really addressed it in audio format before so this is this is like new territory and, and I think it's important and I'm, I'm at peace with talking about it, but it's also like, it's a, it's, it's a vulnerable feeling, you know, and I wanted to know what it was like for you when you were writing the long run, which, you know, is, is a fantastic work by the way. I mean,

you're a very gifted writer. Thank you. And I love the story and, and I love the story, you know, and obviously I relate, you relate you know incredibly to you know kind of your it's it's the inner demons and the kind of grappling you know with the addiction that just like i can tap into immediately um but to kind of sit down and go all right i'm gonna i'm gonna pour a lot of this you know dark stuff and and you know kind of inner demons and secrets out on the paper for the world to see i mean what was that emotionally like for you in in two words it sucked like it was um it was you know it was incredibly exhausting and it was, um, it was, you know, it was incredibly exhausting and it was, um, you know, and it was, it was, it was scary and I, you know, and I dreaded it. And, you know, there were, you know, there were a lot of times where I was like, ah, you know, like I got to just not write anymore or I can't stop writing. And often I would, you know, I sort of have like both feelings at the same time.

writing and often I would, you know, I sort of have like both feelings at the same time. And, um, this is the thing though, is that, um, when I was writing that, I really had to go back and confront a lot of things that I'd, you know, I'd put behind me or I felt that I'd put behind me. And, you know, it's, it's sort of like saying like, okay what what are the two things i'm scared of the most okay i'm scared of the dark and i'm scared of the snakes i'm gonna fill up and i'm scared of drowning i'm gonna fill a pool with snakes turn out the lights and jump into it you know and so so that sucked but the end result of getting out of the pool alive and turning the lights back on you know i was like huh even that didn't kill me you know and and then it's um it's cathartic

and well yeah it's more than it's more than that there's a sense that. There's a sense of, yeah, there's a sense of relief isn't the right word, but I guess freedom. Because just the simple act of writing it down on some level is making peace with it, or at least acknowledging it. Yeah, I mean,

I was really, there's a lot of stuff in that story too that I was really reluctant to put out there, you know, because, um, there were secrets, you know, it was stuff that I stuff in there and um you know and and most of it you know just sort of like deep deep nihilism and uh it it's we it is it's weird and alarming at times that you know that information is out there um man, the response that I've gotten from people has just been so overwhelming. It's been, um, you know, I mean,

I've gotten so many, you know, emails and Facebook messages from people who are, you know, who are like, Oh, you know, this is just like my journey or,

um, you know, this was so meaningful to me, uh, you know, and also like I've had so many, I've had a bunch of people who who don't run who aren't athletic who don't have substance abuse issues who have read it and said man this really

spoke to me you know and it's weird right yeah yeah um and then and that makes me so you know you know so happy that you know that dave pushed me to write it and that I had the chutzpah to go through with it. Well, they say in recovery that you're only as sick as your secrets. And when you hold on to those secrets and you harbor them and they fester, you're only fertilizing them to grow larger. they fester, that you're only fertilizing them to grow larger. And when you expose them to the light, they perish or they diminish. And so having the courage to do that. I mean, first of all, I applaud anyone who's willing to be that vulnerable. And I think that you're being authentic to who you are.

And it takes a lot of courage to say, this is who I am. And, uh, and you know, I'm kind of staking my claim for that and you're going to think whatever you're going to think about it. Um, and for you to be at peace with it enough to share that with the world is,

you know, it's, it's a triumph for anybody to do that. Well, I mean, thanks man. And I think that, and I, and I think that, um, and i think that and i and i think that um and i think that

that's why you know this single has done well because it's you know it's authentic to who you are as a person and people see that so even if they're like they're not an athlete they're not a you know in recovery they're not an addict or whatever they can feel the authenticity you know and that's and and that's what they're connecting to yeah yeah i mean you know the way that i wrote it when i was writing it was i just tried to imagine that i was writing like a long journal entry that no that nobody else would see you know and and to just be completely honest as if you know as if i was like you know speaking to a priest or something like that and nobody would nobody would ever see it nobody would ever hear it you know no problem um so i just wrote with

that in my mind and then before i could stop myself i sent it to my editor like that and he was like he's like this is great i have a couple small changes and let's go you know and i was like wait that is i'm laughing because that's exactly what i did i said you know i would sit i would sit down and i'd start to write and i go the only way that i can get this out is if if as if i get in the mindset that this that nobody in the world is going to read this i'm just writing it for myself it's a private journal entry and uh but then every once in a while i'd like flash to some you know image in my mind of the book on a shelf at barnes and noble and i would just absolutely panic be unable to write for a couple days and and i still remember um you know and i and i kind of overwrote everything because I just wanted to get it all out. And then I'm like, now I have something to work with.

And the manuscript that I turned in was like 150 pages longer than the book ultimately ended up being. And a lot of my drunk-a-log got cut down. And it was much darker and gnarlier. It got whitewashed a little bit, uh, by my editor. And I think, you know, in the best interest of the book and mine was a little bit different because I was trying to balance, you know, essentially three different stories. It's like the addiction story, the athletic story, and then, you know, kind of weaving a diet book in there at the same time. Like I was, you know, I was like, how am I going to make this

all work? And so a lot of stuff got, you trimmed and i had some you know pretty dark uh episodes from from the drinking days in there that ultimately didn't make it in but i remember when i turned the turned the manuscript into my editor i just looked at my wife and i was like i hope this isn't the biggest mistake of my life. It's terrifying to be that exposed. Do I really want to do this? Is this really a good idea or not? Before I was getting ready to publish The Long Run, I was speaking to a friend of mine who's a writer,

and I said, I have grave misgivings about sending this out into the world because it sort of exposes me as just like sick crappy human being you know um and you know and not in a glamorous way just like scumbag and uh you know when he looked at me and he was like mishka honestly there's nothing you could publish now that's gonna that's gonna make you seem worse than the stuff that you've already published. And I was like, great. So I guess that is the thing, though, is that once you come out with these stories and you're're like, Oh yeah, I got really drunk and then I pissed the bed,

you know, then, then no one can embarrass you with it because, because you own it. Cause that's your story. And you, you know, and you've told that story and like,

and the other thing is that, um, inevitably, like if you tell that story, somebody will come up to you later and say, man, one time I pissed the bed too. And that person may be a really hot woman.

Which actually, this leads me to my next question. And this has been like my burning question. Who's interviewing who here? We'll pass the hat back and forth. Does your wife, Julieie have a sister because that's when i was reading your book i was like i was like man this woman is like like the patients of gandhi or something i mean because i know what drunks are like and i know what it's like to live with a drunk and you know and and to live and and not only that and to live to live with somebody in recovery to live with somebody who's trying to get back on their feet and to

live with somebody who's training as much as you were and and as hard as you know as you were and she really stuck with you through a radical transformation yeah she did i mean uh she's first of all she's much more spiritually evolved than i am for sure and uh and she walks her walk um i mean we met we met after i got sober so she didn't you know she didn't see me in the you know in the in the depths um but you know a lot of those behavior patterns you know crop up and you know it's sort of like it becomes less about not drinking and it becomes more about like the you know the sort of um acting out or kind of behavior patterns that you know you see in alcoholics that are that are dry or you know not actively engaged in you know whatever works for

them to keep them on the straight and narrow and yeah she's been amazing and none of this i mean in all honesty like none of this would have happened ultraman the book everything that's come from it all starts with her you know patience and belief in me and sort of um i guess i guess what it is it you know initially she was like you know you you know you should try this you should do that she put books on my nightstand that i wouldn't read you know she would say you should be trying this or you know what you need to change your diet it's not looking good you know i mean she's always like call you know she'd call me out like she called you know she's a strong person and she'd say you know you look like a hell dude like what are you doing you know and i and she and that wasn't working like she fatigued of that pattern with

me and and she got to a place where she was like all right if i'm gonna stay married to this guy like i'm gonna have to just love him the way he is and let go of my desire or need for him to change even if i can see through this mirage of who he is and i can see a better version of him and i can see how he can get there but he's not listening to me and i'm just banging my head against the wall and it was when she finally kind of let go and detached from that completely that i began to change and so there's this weird kind of like spiritual calculus that took place in that and maybe on some unconscious level i was registering like oh wait she's not pushing me anymore like now it's on me you know so it wouldn't be like i'm doing it for her like i have to i have to own this situation that i have to i have to own this

situation that i'm in i have to own my behavior patterns and i have to want to change for myself and honestly you know you can't sustain any kind of lifestyle change anyway unless you inherently want it inside of you yeah i mean that's the thing is you can't um it's incredibly difficult to force someone to change and even if you force them to change it it's not going to stick it's not going to no of course not because they're not doing it for the right reasons they're doing it to please somebody else rather than they're not internally driven to do it like oh i don't want my wife to leave me so i'm going to change well that's you know although i understand that and it's not a bad reason but the chances of that um being a sustainable change are not good you you can't

force someone to want to change and you know and i and i think that you know she recognized that and it's it's funny i mean you know i mean it's a it's a very big very like gracious gesture that you make by saying that like none of this would have happened without her but i think that also that's it speaks to your strength as a writer because that's totally transparent in the book and you may you know you make it abundantly clear you know to readers that like that this is a group effort you know that she that she really had your back at every step yeah and i acknowledge the support i mean left to my own devices i mean you know i'm pissing the bed and eating jack in the

box and living like it you know like a like a hobbit you know in like 10 day old underwear i mean you know it's like i'm not good on my own you know i know i don't trust myself so what i meant to say is i have no idea what you're talking about, Rich. I've never been like that. I don't, yeah. But no, it's true. And she actually wrote a blog post on that very subject that was on MindBodyGreen that did really well. Kind of like navigating relationships and pitfalls in relationships and how how she kind of approaches me when i'm difficult which is you

know on a regular basis and and her ability to kind of like just be non-plused by whatever i'm doing and kind of like hey man that's that's you you know don't don't invade my space you know with whatever nonsense that you're coming you know at with, whether it's negative energy or whatever it is. And it takes a strong constitution for that. Yeah, yeah. And so I'm lucky. I'm blessed in that regard. And I realize not everybody is in a relationship like that, and I don't take it for granted.

You know, more than one friend has commented to me that I'm an angry guy and that I get angry easily. And that, you know, the, when I get angry, it's, it's explosive, you know? And, um, and that's one of the things that like like that's one of the things about getting sober that's tough man is because you know back in the day when when i got mad i'd have a drink and i'd feel better or when i got sad i'd have a drink and i'd feel better or like when i was when i couldn't get to sleep i have a couple of drinks then I could sleep and when I couldn't wake up I'd have a drink and that would wake me up you know and you know and then I got to the point where I was taking all these different pills and stuff too like oh I'm too stressed out I'm going to take a Xanax you know I need to like you know I need to do a line in order to get through the show or whatever and then then when you get sober you're left with nothing right all

your medicine is taken away i mean you used you used all these substances to manage your emotional being and you know it worked for a while or obviously you wouldn't have you know done it as long as you did and then it stops working and then you're faced with this dilemma uh you know and and this letting go process and then you're you have that momentary elation of being sober and you know the great accomplishment that that is and then that wears off and then you're like now what you know i'm you're you're like we said before you know a raw nerve without the without the tools to kind of deal with those emotions when they come up and you know i i think that it gets into

a little bit i mean for me you know, without kind of like, you know, breaking anonymity or whatever. I mean, I work like, you know, I work a certain program that works for me, you know,

and, and I know that you have a kind of a different approach to your sobriety, but I know that if I'm not using the tools that I, you know, that I learn and that I utilize, you know, in the rooms, as they say that,

you know, I'm in trouble. Yeah. And, you know, listen, I mean, uh, you know, in the rooms as they say that, you know, I'm in trouble. Yeah. And, you know, listen, I mean, I, um, it's funny, you know, when, when you, when you do something that people take attention to, you often become the poster boy for several different causes, some of which you, you don't support or you, you're uneasy, you know, uneasy with the amount of support, you know, you're uneasy in the way you've been cast um i you know i yeah i i quit you know i stopped drinking on my own um after i had been quit for a little while um i started going to talk therapy and that you know and that was helpful for a little while you know the counselor i was talking to wasn't incredibly helpful um and then i switched and started talking to another counselor and that was better. But, um, you know, I didn't, um, you know, I didn't go through any sort of, you know,

peer network or I didn't go to any kind of group or group therapy or anything. Um, you know, and so a lot of people look to me as the guy who's, you know, going to, you know, sort of puncture this horrible organization that is AA and that's not how I feel. You know, I, um, I have a lot of friends in the program and I think there's a lot of wisdom that's come out of it. Um, me who i am this sort of you know pig-headed guy that i am i gotta do it my way man you know and that's and that's the only way it was going to work for me and you know if i had to like if somebody you know if i had to get sober in in jail then it would have lasted until i got out and And if I, especially if in the early days I had people telling me,

you've got to do it a certain way, you've got to do it a certain way, I would have just, that would have driven me right back to it. Yeah, and I'm not here to judge you in any respect. I mean, you've stayed sober for four years and you've found a way that works for you. And I have no opinion on that. I just know for myself, my way, you know, for many years. You know, I didn't want to come into AA. I wanted to do it myself. And I had my ideas about how I could solve the problem. And none of those worked. And the hole just got deeper. well maybe there's a better way or set aside my notion of what i thought was best and and and really you know not try to will myself into the solution but to you know surrender and

allow other people to help me and to take direction and to kind of have that humility which is not you know my default setting by any stretch of the imagination um was when you know i i allowed this solution to take root and that's what worked that's what's worked for me and continues to work for me yeah and i mean it's funny um you know what you said you know about having no judgment i mean that's that's exactly the same way that i feel uh you know towards you actually no it's it's it's more it's it's deeper than that which is that um i support you no matter what way you're using to make your life better you know and that's the thing is that if you know if someone if someone gets sober by doing jigsaw puzzles four hours a day and like that's their thing i'm for it i support it you know whatever whatever process you need to you know to feel better to live better to have a more

fulfilling life whatever works for you i totally support you know Right. And one of the most interesting stories that I've sort of run into after the publication of The Long Run is my friend Gerard in Portland. And I met him a couple of times, you know, when I was like on tour and stuff like that. Big boy, like over 400 pounds i think he's lost 80 pounds to date which you know just blows my mind i mean it makes me think that like what i did of like you know stopping drinking and you know running a couple of 50 mile races is nothing you know because when i think that's one of the things that we're for you know that you and i are fortunate in um you know being primarily drunks is that you don't need alcohol from day to day to live but you need food but you need food yeah so you know and food is

you know i look at i tend because of my experience I tend to look at a lot of things through the prism of addiction and recovery. And, you know, the kind of longer I sort of walk this path, the more I'm convinced that, you know, it transcends alcohol and drugs. And it really, you know, it invades all of our behavior patterns, you know, and our relationship to television or, you know, food and foods that don't serve us or exercise or gambling or, you know, porn or whatever it is, like whatever your kind of vice is or your secret is or whatever, I think that it's rampant. And I think that it's sort of like the analogy is sort of like in the 70s when they called smoking a habit.

And the idea that nicotine was addicting was not even part of the discourse. And it's sort of like, oh, I know, I have this habit of watching reality TV or I have this habit of doing this or that. And it's like, no, actually, you know, you need to look at it like these things really are, just because they're behaviors and not substances, they have equal power over us, you know? And somebody who, you know, I have a friend

who has been sober a long time and so we're like 21 years uh amazing guy uh former heroin addict and he's like i never thought that anything would be harder than kicking heroin but i'm having such a hard time with food like i just can't solve this problem you know and and he's finally starting to really realize like how his relationship with food is addiction based and breaking those patterns because you do have to eat every day can make your life really unmanageable and the health consequences are profound. Yeah, I, um, it's ironic. I, for the last couple of months, I've been working with my, my buddy, uh, Jed Collins, who works, uh, who lives downstairs. Who's a, uh, he's a comic artist. Um, so we're putting together a comic book, uh, from a story that I wrote 10 years ago,

15 years ago. Um, you know, and it basically it basically follows you know there's one episode when i was a little kid where i like stole a big bag of chocolate chips and then my mom busted me with them uh downstairs you know just sort of like like chocolate all over my face it was like the summertime and i think i was like the i think the only thing that i had that had pockets was my winter coat so i like put my winter coat on so i'm way too hot in my winter coat with the you know chocolate chips in my pocket like chocolate all over my hands my fingers all over my face and she just she just had this response like when she caught me that she was like oh no like what's coming you know and

i think she knew then that i was going to wind up to have big problems down the line issues yeah you know and um and i i still you know i have a uh i have a a friend who i just love to death who's in the program. And, you know, he and I used to be drinking buddies. And he actually taught me how to drink. And to watch him eat is like, it brings me right back to when we would go out drinking together. And, you know, and just be like you know bring me bring me four jack and cokes and uh you know to see him with with you know stirring a big thing of ice cream with a snickers bar and like putting honey on the ice cream and stirring right i mean that

is you know that's an unhealthy relationship with food right there and yeah you know and when you're you know when you're an addict or an alcoholic and you remove the substances again it's like the behavior patterns are still there you know like there's work that needs to be done to modify that when i was when i was talking about that my mouth started watering because i was like oh shit that sounds really good yeah i mean you know it's it's powerful for sure i mean you know and when you were talking about your anger issues and you know i mean sort of like what are the tools that you use to quell that or manage it or you know what is your plan for you know overcoming that or transcending this you know behavior pattern that isn't serving you or is you know causing you you know is disruptive in your life rich i'm starting to figure it out man i'm starting to

grow up i think i've grown up from uh you know 13 to maybe 15 now and i i'm i'm proud of myself for that i um a a big thing is it's not unfamiliar for me anymore so now when i when something happens and i get angry it's like oh i i i'm ready for this you know it's it's the uh it's the enemy i know versus the enemy i don't know and um you know when i you know when i got really mad before i would just you know go out and run until i couldn't run anymore like do push-ups until i couldn't do push-ups anymore and and i think those are fine outlets because um you know that's a great way to get motivated for a workout but and it's not always it's better than picking up a drink or you know popping a pill but i i think the you know and i think this is a part that you know the place in our lives that we're both in

now is is we're trying to sort of narrow the aperture you know so you get you get alcohol out of your life and that's a huge step you know and then it's breaking that like food addiction that's another huge step and you know you just sort of like you know each day or each month or each year just get a little bit better yeah absolutely i mean they say the road gets narrower you know what i mean because certain things that used to not bother you that you know in your behavior or should speak for myself um then suddenly they become bothersome to me like you know what that's no longer it's no longerome to me. Like, you know what, that's no longer, it's no longer acceptable to me that I do this, whatever it is. And then it's like time to look

at that pattern. But it's also like squeezing a water balloon, you know, like once you feel like you've pushed down and gotten a hold on one kind of thing, then it pops out, you know, somewhere else. And so there's no destination, you know, it's a life journey, uh, that will never be fully mastered by any stretch of the imagination. So it's just about, you know, what is the progress that you can make and where are the improvements, you know, where, where do I need to be? What do I need to be working on next? That is that, you know, the, the next frontier.

Yeah. And it's, you know, it's like, um, I think that annoying mantra that your buddy kept thrown in your it's you know it's like um something that annoying mantra that your buddy kept throwing in your face you know that's why they call it a challenge it's like it's hard but like it's hard because it's supposed to be hard if it was easy it wouldn't be worthwhile and like am i going to be fighting this fight for the rest of my life? Yeah. Am I up for it? Hell yeah. You know, it's worth doing, man. You know, I mean, I really just went from, you know, I couldn't even hold down a job in a bar.

And, you know, the guys at the bars were always like so nice when they fired me, or usually they were. You know, and it was just sort of like, you know, the shrug and the smile like what he wants to do yeah yeah like you know and i know what you're doing yeah i uh and it's that thing like here's something i wanted to get i didn't mean to interrupt you i had one boss once who said we just feel like you don't care. Bingo. Yeah. Yeah. You tend not to care when you're, you know, when you're drinking a lot, but there's this

thing that, that I got, you know, that I'm getting from you that I relate to a lot, which is this idea of, you know, on the one hand, you know, when you're out there and you're, you're using, there's that deep shame, you know, cause you're harboring this secret and and it's just it's horrible right you don't want anyone to know and you just feel like the lowest person on earth um and yet at the same time simultaneously while you're sort of kind of you know letting that fester this idea that you're better than everyone else like this superiority complex and inferiority complex kind of operating at absolutely the same instant it's funny you know i mean i i called a really good friend out on that the other day and when I was driving home I was like how how was I able to recognize that in him and then I was like oh yeah that's

because that's what I do you know and um yeah you know and that and I I did I mean I definitely had that, you know, that combination of arrogance and insecurity, you know, where I was like, I'm the worst thing ever. I have, I have no merit whatsoever. Um, but if like, you know, if I'm a drunk and I can still, you know, do the stuff that I do and you guys aren't drunks and you can't do it. Then you're more pathetic than I am. And that's a horrible way to live. It is. It's a weird false pride that I had as well. And I think our stories are different in many ways.

But the important aspects of our story, I think, are very common. better than you at this testing college or write a better paper than you and get the a or whatever, or, you know, get into Columbia, you know, all these sorts of things that, that kind of, um,

they keep you out there because you think that, you know, you can keep, you can do this and you can do it better than anyone else. And, you know, burning it at both, both,

you know, burning the candle at both ends. Yeah. It's, I mean, and I mean, academics are a great example of that because it's only in the last six months maybe that i'm starting to like now i'm figuring out that it it just comes easier to me than it does

to other people because i you know i watch you know some of my musician friends who will just like hear a song on the radio and just pick up a guitar and figure it out or like um you know they're playing it lefty they're playing it righty and they can just you know they can just figure learn new instruments you know no problem and and i i'd labor you know at playing guitar i'm just i'm you know been playing for 30 years and i'm the worst and um yeah but you're also you know you're not the worst dude you know i mean you're here i mean you're in these bands and you've played with all these people and you've toured and you've got albums and you've got an apartment here that's got like 7 000 guitars in it like amp stack floor to ceiling and you know and i heard you say that on dean's show too you're like i'm a terrible musician and and you know that's kind

of an alcoholic thing to say too because that's not that's not an honest account of of who you are as a musician i don't think yeah and i don't think you believe that either or you wouldn't be trying to finish this next album that you're trying to finish that's i mean that's a tough question um i i keep you know i keep coming back to music as something that's incredibly meaningful in my life the same way that running is meaningful the same way that sobriety is meaningful is that i can i can do it and do it and do it and do it and never feel like i've beaten it you know like like i've found something bigger than me you know and that was a big thing you know when I was when I was younger is just that um you know even if I didn't win the fight like I could you know I showed people that I could take a punch you know and um and that I could suffer really well you know I was good at

I was you know when it was you know those battles of attrition you know i would i would outlast other people and um and i you know that's the that's this the the power of the self-will you know like this incredible self-will that you have that i think is is is you know germane to the alcoholic yeah it's you know it's funny like being a sort of like a real strong-headed guy um i think that's what kept me drinking for as long as i did in the face of the mounting evidence that i was an alcoholic and that and that i had to stop um you know when when i finally stopped drinking people were like well you know what happened you know, when, when I finally stopped drinking, people were like, well, you know, what happened? You know, it must've been something really horrible.

And I was like, no, there wasn't really any like one new horrible thing. It was like just all the other stuff that I'd ignored sort of finally sunk in, you know, that, um, you know, in no way it was this fulfilling life. Right. I mean, just, you know, you hear it all the time. Like one day you just, you wake up in no way was this a fulfilling life. Right. I mean, just, you know, you hear it all the time.

Like one day you just, you wake up and you're done. It doesn't have to be some epic, you know, like a building doesn't have to fall on your head or you don't have to, you know, kill somebody in an auto accident. You can just say,

I'm done. Yeah. Yeah. And that's, that's what happened for me. I just, um, I don't want to say I've never craved a drink since then, but you know,

it's like this, you know, the spell was over, you know, and I, and I could just see that, uh, I'd had every, I'd had every good night on alcohol that I was going to have and that the bad nights were just going to repeat themselves. Right. Until I had one night that I didn't, I wasn was going to have and that the bad nights were just going to repeat themselves right until i had one night that i didn't i wasn't going to wake up from and i think it's a fallacy in recovery what you know this idea that oh now that you're sober you know you're not going to crave it or there aren't going to be moments that are you know going to be tricky to to navigate i mean that's the miracle is is that you know an alcoholic isn't

drunk all the time you know it's it's a miracle that you're not drinking and so i think it's important to acknowledge like hey i'm still you know an alcoholic i'm choosing not to drink today um and some days are easier than others but but uh to sort of did not you know like this pressure to like be this person who you know holds themselves out to the world like i'm recovered and i don't think about it anymore and all of that that's great but that's not every day for me for sure yeah i mean i i know that my that my experience has been atypical. And I know that there are people who struggle every day. And man, I mean, my heart really goes out to them.

Because for me, I think for me, it's a lot more about sort of, it's more about alcoholic behavior than alcohol itself at this point um i don't have to stop myself reaching for a glass as much as i have to stop myself from having a thought you know or thinking in that way um you know i mean one of my you know thoughts and emotions are going to happen though it's what's important is how you behave in in in reaction to those well one of the things that i am really proud of is that uh my mantra the last couple of years before i quit drinking was just you know fuck it you know, fuck it. You know, everybody's got to die.

I've got to die someday. What, what day is it today? Monday, Monday night, great night to go out, you know, fuck it.

And I, and now when I'm in traffic and somebody cuts me off or I knock one of the million guitars that you see around the apartment. I knock one of them over and you know, it puts a dent in the fingerboard or something like that. I think, fuck it. It's not such a big deal,

you know? And so I've sort of been able to invert that um but yeah man those thoughts still you know that's the thing is you there is no uh there is no firewall that's uh that's perfect um you know and in fact one quitting alcohol was working in a bar because every night that I worked, you know, there was like the entire alphabet of alcohol there available for me free, the alpha and the omega, you know, of alcohol there available for me free the alpha and the omega you know of alcohol and uh you know so i knew that i wasn't avoiding temptation you know that it was sort of like it was because that's the thing is if you want to drink man you'll find a drink whether it's

vanilla extract or rubbing alcohol or mouthwash if If you're determined to get a drink, there's always one available. And so seeing it there, seeing it all right there in front of me, that made it clear that the change had happened in me, that it wasn't just a situational thing. And then also towards the end of my shift working at the bar when you see people just behaving horribly. Right. I was like. The romance is no longer.

Yeah. I was like, oh, yeah, this is done. This is totally over. All right. I got to go to the bathroom. Hold on a second. We've got to pause. Please hang up and try again.

I feel much better after the break but uh no i wanted to um circle it back to you know you were you were kind of making this distinction between your musical talent and your writing talent and how you know music essentially what you're saying correct me if i'm wrong is that you know music comes hard to you and you have to really apply yourself and and and you know that there's sort of a glass ceiling for you in terms of your innate talent but that with writing you're finally accepting that you know you you you do have like a gift for this and then it comes easier for you and you're you're embracing that in a I guess in a new way yeah I mean I think that you know i mean we talked a little bit about

you know sort of going out and boozing it up and like you know still you know doing fine academically and um when i was younger you know it made me think by the way i'm gonna interrupt you just for a second so do you get like shit for like coming off arrogant in in your account of that like oh yeah i'm supposed to feel sorry for this guy he's like you know he got into columbia when he was a drunk you know do you do you get like blowback if if i ever have the good fortune to teach a writing class the first writing or the first reading assignment will be for people to read all my one starstar reviews on Amazon. Right. I got a few myself too.

I've got some really, really nasty ones for people. My favorite, I'm going to, this is so great. I read it to my kids the other day. My favorite one-star review on my book is, this book is fantastic if you're George Bush. And it goes on to talk about how I you know crazy privileged background where my dad bailed me out of every like you know pitfall that i ever had my whole life and took care it's like the way that this guy projected whatever baggage he was carrying onto my life you know and i i'm like when i told my story is like i can't get around the you know i grew up in a very you know nurturing household like you know i had my you know, nurturing household. Like, you know, I had my, you should never apologize.

And I'm not going to, I'm not going to apologize. And I'm not going to, you know, for the sake, the sake of creating additional drama, take, you know, poetic license with that and make it sound like something that it wasn't. It just is what it is. And like people, some people will connect with that and other people won't. And, but I've taken flack for that. Like, oh, you know, you went to Stanford and, you you know i'm supposed to feel bad for you or yeah i mean the you know the columbia thing like people make a big deal about it and um you know what i'm still ninety thousand dollars in debt from columbia

so if if anybody's if anybody's jealous of me i'm willing to trade places with you on that one come on man you're supposed to be here telling me how you're hammering these huge Amazon checks every day. They come in the mail on a daily basis. Dude, look around the apartment. Where do you think it's going? All right. But to get back. So sort of embracing this talent that you have. And by the way, I just retweeted today the article that you put up on the iReports on CNN about running a marathon on Sunday to honor the Boston victims. And I want to talk about that in a little bit.

honor the boston victims and i want to talk about that in a little bit but you know that could have been a very kind of bland post that just said you know i'm going to get out there it could have been a very straight up the middle but it's very clear and i don't know how much time you spent writing that but you read that and you're like oh this is not like just an average blog post like this is written this is beautifully composed the way that you wrote that. Well, thank you. I mean, this is, this is the thing is that like, you know, I mean, I probably drunk from like 15 to 32, you know, so through most of my academic career, you know, and so, you know, a typical thing is i would go out and get wasted and then spend an hour writing a paper and turn it in thinking this is total garbage and then my professor would write something saying like you know this this is a fantastic paper you know this really really moved me or you know new insights or whatever and and i would take that feedback and say oh well

this is proof that the world is meaningless if i can if i can crank this out on a couple hours um and like impress people then it's proof that um you know that that the literature doesn't exist or that trying to communicate through these little, you know, these little squiggles is meaningless. Well, and what it is actually in actuality is just incredibly poor self-esteem that, you know, that, that,

that your, your talent still was able to transcend that low self-esteem to be able to, you know, deliver pros on that level. Rich, the next nice thing you say about me, I'm going to give you charlie horse because i can't deal with it it's like this is the thing and that's your low self-esteem right there i know

this is the thing like if if you were just giving me like a series of direct personal attacks i could i can handle that way better than i can handle you saying somebody who whose work i admire and whose uh whose accomplishments i'm envious of to like sit on my couch in my filthy apartment and say nice things about me that's a that's a specific hell right there i'm talking to the guy who like is you know bent on the moth like you know you've done like some amazing you've done some amazing things man like just own it i i know i can't yet i can't it's uh let me back it up all right so i to get this great feedback from from my professors you know at esteemed academic institutions i would just think oh it's all bullshit

when really now i'm getting to a point where i can go back and say no um i was gifted and and and i am gifted and i have a gift to be able to you know to write well and i seem to be grateful for it and and appreciate it and um it's a lot to learn, man. I mean, learning something like that, it's not like, uh, it's not, you know, the, the paradigm is not losing your virginity. Like you do it once and then it's done. It's like, it's like making your bed, you know, like I have to, I have to teach that thing to myself every day, you know, I forget it. And then I'm like, Oh yeah, I have a gift for writing. It's great. I need to appreciate it. I, you know i forget it and then i'm like oh yeah i have a gift for writing it's great i need to appreciate it i you know i have some merit as a human being i need to remember that you know

i'm probably not going to end up electing the carts at a grocery store or working as a squeegee man which is what i how i assumed my life would end you know um do you and and so do you feel an added sense of responsibility to tend to that um to to tend to my own sense of self-worth or no to to kind of get to a place where you're in acceptance of this talent that you have and say okay well what this talent comes with responsibility like it's my responsibility to pursue this seriously and and lean into it as opposed to deflect it um well i i think there's a third option um my my father was was sort of, you know, he's a very gifted, uh, physicist and,

he was sort of oppressed by his father as a child, you know, saying like, you have this gift with that gift, you have this responsibility and you have to do this. You have to take care of other people. And I guess the way that I try to frame it is that I have an awesome opportunity. And I'm just waking up to it now, man,

that like, I can have this life where I go and do like crazy races with my friends and hang out and like, you know, eat watermelon on the trail, like running the finger lakes fifties with, you know, some amazing runners and i get to i get to hang out in my underwear all day and like basically write the equivalent of you know like a long funny email to my mom and and people will read it and people will dig it you know and so i'm trying to just say trying to learn to go with the flow, man, and say like, oh, work to your strengths. What do you think is, I'm obsessed with creative people. I'm obsessed with artists. And there's definitely like a jealousy aspect of that, you know, going on.

And I find that, you know, in recovery, I just meet some of the most brilliant, creative people that I've ever met. Your thoughts on, you know, there's this nexus between, you know, sort of the romanticization of using drugs and alcohol and how that fosters creativity or the sort of misidentification of that relationship. And then getting sober and saying, oh my God, I'm never going to have another creative thought how am i going to be an artist without this crutch that i thought was stimulating all of my creativity yeah i mean as a musician and as a songwriter i certainly built built all my writing around alcohol and around you know around being a drunk and um and around drinking and failing you know um hold on i'm gonna close the door all right no problem so i mean as a musician and as a songwriter i really built my sense of self around, you know, alcohol and failure, which were like my two sidekicks, you know? And then now I find myself in a really bizarre situation where I think I have an audience of people who would be interested in my music.

and i i really feel weird about playing my old stuff and i'm not writing a lot of new stuff so yeah that's you know that's a corner that i've yet to turn i mean the you know what i hear all the time is you know is that there is that fear and then ultimately um you know with the foundation of sobriety these artists are are able to become you know creative fonts far in excess of anything that they thought they would be prior and and you know and despite like grappling with this idea that i'm never going to be able to create again without my without my drug of choice yeah i mean my um my writing has certainly exploded and uh and you know i'm so grateful for that and actually you know what this is really funny this is an interesting thing i sent out a book proposal recently which you know there was all this hype going into it and i was like oh awesome

i'm going to get a book deal didn't happen didn't get a single bit on the project and uh and it was heartbreaking and you know i went to my kickboxing class and like you know beat some people up and uh and then i was driving back um and i was like i'm i'm still crazy about this. What am I going to do now? Like, am I going to go out and run until the sun comes up? And then the whole next day will be shot? Am I going to go and take a drink? No. And I came home and I showered.

And then there was a song that my friend had sent me that he wanted me to write, uh, lyrics and do vocals for that. I've been putting off and putting off and putting off because of this writing, because of the book proposal, I finished the song and I recorded it. And, uh, I didn't really think much of it until the next morning. And then I was like, oh, okay. You know, I, I got this really negative information that I'm not going to sell a book proposal I was counting on selling.

And I was able to convert that into another creative project and harness that energy for creativity. Right, and the bigger issue at play really is having a healthy relationship with things that you can control and things that you can't. Right. So you have no control over other people's reaction to your work, whether it's a five-star review on Amazon or a one-star or whether a big publishing house wants to buy your book or not. those are things that are none of your business you know the only thing that you have control over is the quality you know of the work that you're putting down on paper and putting out there or you know putting on you know putting on a cd with your music or an mp3 so everything else is is you know they say it in recovery all the time it's not your business you know and like detaching from that is where the hard work has to come in and i you know, they say it in recovery all the time. It's not your business, you know, and like detaching from that is where the hard work has to come in. And I, you know, I have friends that do the same thing all the time. They get, they have a, you know, they, they, they become attached to

a certain outcome with respect to a project they're working on. It doesn't go that way. And, or you're sitting around waiting, you know, like that you sent your proposal out, like how long did you wait before they were getting back to you and that's the worst thing and that's like you know you have no control right or you're an actor who's auditioned for a part and you're sitting around waiting you know knowing that if you get it your life changes forever you know like yeah and in those situations your mind just turns on you your mind just starts to consume you and it's you know it's horrible yeah it's not a it's not a healthy headspace so you know the only thing you can do is like oh i'll go create like the only way you can exercise any control over whatsoever you know over your destiny you know being a creative person who makes a living

off you know things that are coming out of your brain is to just create something new yeah you know i said this to a stand-up comic friend last night, which is to pursue a life in which you have a creative profession is to become a professional failure. You're going to fail more often than you're going to succeed. And you have to be okay with that the the successes have to be meaningful enough that it's going to sustain you through the failure and that and and that you can deal with it you know and you know the you know the analogy is you know it's like making a baby like only one of those sperms needs to you know hit the right every other one of them fail yeah and you're good you just gotta land one you know right and and you know and truth be told you know 15 years ago you sent

a book proposal out you don't get a deal like that's it dude you're done but like you're you're mr number one kindle singles guy you have you you know, you can own your distribution method. I mean, you have an audience, you know, and so you don't need that gatekeeper to give you the stamp of approval over your work. You still have the ability to, you know, should you choose to publish that? And you know that there are people out there that are interested in hearing what you have to say. Well, and you phrased that in the right way you know i mean a lot of it has to do with confidence and self-esteem and stuff like that like do i do i believe enough in this material to put it out there um you know and and control and or you know creative control and am i and and and you know and and what's driving me what's motivating me why do why

am i doing this am i doing it to get a you know to get that gold star from a gatekeeper or am i doing it for my man gerard in you know in portland who's like hitting the gym every day changing his diet to like you know he's i think he going to lose another 150 pounds, you know, I'm writing for him more than I'm writing for anybody else, man. Um, you know, I do, you know, this is the thing is that I do have faith in editors. Um, I've, I've had the good fortune to work with a couple of editors who have

totally transformed a piece of writing where at the end of the night, I hate them, I hate myself, I hate writing. I go to sleep, wake up in the morning, look at the piece with fresh eyes, and it's like, not only is this dramatically better than it would have been had I, you know, been left to my own devices. It also reads start to finish like it came from me, you know? And,

and that's, and I, that I think is the sign of a good editor who can, who can make a writer more of what they are, you know? So I, I, you know,

this proposal went out to like you know 20 of the top editors in new york and if nobody bid on it i think that's a good indicator that there's problems with it um does that mean that i'm going to go back to them who knows right you know the i mean the publishing landscape is changing so much that i you know i just i have other options now you do yeah it's not the end of the story and yeah you know i think that's a healthy that's a healthy perspective though because you know you could be like you know your anger could flare up you know you don't know what you're talking about don't you know who i am and all this kind of thing

and not able to hear like well 20 for 20 like maybe there is something here and in okay i'll objectively go through this again and see you know where it's missing a beat or you know where i can dial it in and and you know turn it into maybe something that is you know has the mass appeal that would interest that kind of house or you can just say no i'm i'm going to be true to who i am and i believe in this and you can put it out and your audience will respond yeah you know you hold the cards they don't hold all the cards that's that's one of the it's funny that's one of the things that i really learned about um getting sober, being sober, continuing to be sober is that, and perhaps this is just being a teenager for 20 years, or this is, you know, sort of back to

alcoholic behavior. But I found that like, I was like a biplane, you know, I had two speeds, a hundred percent and zero, you know? So if, um, if I like you, then I love you. And like, we're going to be best friends forever. And if, if you, if you annoy me, then I hate you and I'm going to kill you, you know? And when, so when I got, you know, you know, sort of critical feedback from these editors, critical feedback from these editors, I was finally able to have a nuanced response and to say, you know,

I, I think some of what you're saying is true that I do think that, that, you know, the narrative may be hard for people to follow at a certain point. And if it was told, you know, from, from point A to point B,

um, it would be easier for readers to grasp and um but but also um i i think that you're missing something where you see me as purely a a digital phenomenon you know it's not a um my my sales online have not been sales of like an app or a game or something i've been selling my writing you know it's people have been consuming it it you know digitally why do you well what i'm hearing is you're feeling like the publishing houses are dismissive of you know kindle singles sales or you're you're sort of this you know niche performer or i mean yeah that's like that like oh those little kindle single things over there that's not real writing or exactly that you know that kind of

thing you know that the uh the paper world and the digital world will never uh you know will never meet well that's that's about as i mean you know for them to have that perspective is sowing the seeds of their own destruction i mean that, that's as myopic as it gets. I totally agree. And that's the, that's the same logic we saw the music industry use 15 years ago. And that's why a lot of those guys are now like selling collectible figurines on eBay instead of working in the music industry. You know, I mean, the future is here, you know what I mean? Like this is, this is real and sort of, and get on, you know, evolve or die. Yeah. And, you know, I don't know if real and sort of, and get on, you know, evolve or die. Yeah. And, you know, I don't know if you're doing this or not, but, you know, on your website,

on your blog, like you should, you know, give people the ability to subscribe to your site and collect those emails and, and, uh, you know, cultivate your audience so that you, you know, you can directly serve them with your writing, you know, and it doesn't have to be a million people, you know, it's just people that enjoy what you have to offer and, uh, and, you know, that can grow organically and not in any kind of pitchy sales way, just, you know, people who gravitate to it, to what you have to offer and, and you become self-sustaining in that way yeah you know and and that's what appeals to me is not um you know not a white mercedes-benz you know but just to

i i would be grateful for the opportunity why why white that just seemed to me like the most ridiculous thing ever with the bejeweled uh license plate holder yeah yeah well i mean driving a nice car in new york is is just the height of stupidity anyway but i mean if you live in la you know like how how quickly a white car gets there's a lot there's a lot of white mercedes and you know but yeah and and that's not what i want man i just i want to i want sustainability that that was the thing drinking was not sustainable i could not continue that and i could just could not continue the level i was at and and to take every drink that was offered to me or that was

bought for me you know would be my end and um so i i you know with my writing now my goal is just to create something sustainable i want to i want to i want to be able to support myself from my writing now, my goal is just to create something sustainable. I want to be able to support myself from my writing, and I want to always have an audience. And that's it. And you have that, and you can continue to have that. Yeah. All right, we've got to shift gears a little bit because we're like an hour and a half in here.

We haven't even talked about running. It's like, I thought this was a health podcast. What are you guys talking about? addiction recovery and running. Like, what is it, what is it inside of you or what do you think that it is that's, that's common, you know, with the kind of sober alcoholic that, that seems to gravitate towards long distance running, whether it's marathoning or, or ultra running, because you go to these ultra rates, there's tons of sober people. Oh yeah. I mean, so, and they tend to have a lot of tattoos, you it's like there's an extreme nature to the personality that like you know it's like uh moth to the flame yeah so what what do you you know how would you what do you think that's about i mean i have my ideas about that but you know i get the question all the time like oh you've just transferred your addiction

you know i i was gonna bring that up because i let's talk about that okay yeah i i get slammed with that all the time i'm sure you i bet you get it far more than i do um and this is the thing for me taking a drink was always easy piece of cake the easiest thing in the world even now i have to like goad myself into getting my ass up off the couch and getting out the door and it's it's still day in and day out it's hard for me to force myself to go and kickbox with my buddies or to like sign up for a big run and like um and to do the training and stuff like that that points to me that it's not an addiction because i i never had to goad myself into taking a drink man but there is a reward system kind of embedded in you know like when you finish a long run or you kind of you know you get that runner's

high or there you know there's something about it that is alluring yeah i mean there is it there is a reward system this is the thing though is that you can never get away from that reward system that's how we're biologically programmed we're we're programmed to feel uh to feel pain or to feel fear when you know when we're cold or when it's dark and we're in a dangerous situation and stuff like that and we're programmed to feel pleasure when we when we get sex when we're cold or when it's dark and we're in a dangerous situation and stuff like that. And we're programmed to feel pleasure when we, when we get sex, when we get shelter, when we get food, when we get fed, when we get water, you know, when we get the things that we need to survive. So we're, we're never going to be able to escape that, you know, pleasure pain thing. Um, and you know, my, my counter to, to, you know, it's like I go nuts about the runner's high thing.

Because for me, the nomenclature or the lexicon is important. When I get high, I wake up in the street, man. When I get high, I wake up at 7 p.m. the next day. You know, when I get high i wake up at 7 p.m the next day you know when i get high horrible things happen right and when i my sister has two dogs two stinky dogs like every time i see them they slobber all over me like i'm not even a human being to them i'm just a dog on two legs her dog karma um when i pat her on the head or when i like scratch her ears i feel pleasure that's not dog patters high that's life that's just me hanging out with the dogs you know and yes there is a chemical reaction that you get you know the release of endorphins and whatnot but but I don't run to get high, man.

I run to live and it's a way for me of confronting my problems and a way for me to confront something that's difficult in my life, something that scares me. I mean, you know, the last 10 miles, whatever race you're doing, you're just like, I hate this. I'm never running again. You know, you're really, you're just gutting it out. And, um, running for me is a way to embrace life and to, to say, yeah, I care. I finally, I care. I care about my life. I care about my friends.

I care about my family. I want to be here. That's beautifully put. And that's, that's put in a, in a way that I hadn't heard it before because I, you know, I entertain the question a lot and I've,

I've heard other people answer the question and, you know, I usually say, and I believe this, that it allows me to access a better version of myself for whatever reason i don't know why you know i don't know why i'm attracted to it i don't know why i have a certain aptitude for it but i know that when i am engaged in it that i am a better person than when i'm not doing it yeah i mean just not knowing you personally but just knowing

you from reading your book i mean what i see is self-actualization you know i think you went from you know unfulfilled potential to extremely fulfilled potential you know you know to verging on superhuman you know and and and i think we've seen you know a similar thing you know with me from getting sober starting to run and then watching my writing take off man i mean it's just been like the last couple of years they're not disconnected exactly you know and that's that's the thing is that um you know writing writing running living sober you know all those things they they feed off each other and they play off of each other and like if um you know if i'm addicted to running then i'm also addicted to being sober and that's an addiction i can live with right right right right right

you know the other thing is rich not for nothing you know like you you and i are like pretty you know intensely self-evaluating people we we try to look at ourselves um with no filter and make hard evaluations um you know a lot of the people who are telling me that I'm addicted to running are like 40 pounds overweight or they got a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other while they're telling me how addicted, how I'm going to destroy my knees. Right. You know, and it's like the big ruddy face dude who's telling me that like, um, you know, I'm not getting enough protein eating the way that i'm eating i'm going dude look in the mirror yeah and that's the thing

you know got you know there's there's a lot of people in this country that would benefit from not getting enough protein and not getting enough food not getting enough calories being addicted to running you know it's like this nation has an obesity problem you know like there's no question about that if only more of us were addicted to running yeah i interviewed this guy the other day on the show michael arnstein who's an incredible runner oh yeah i know him i've run with him you run with him guy's amazing right so and he is bouncing off the walls with energy yeah and all he eats is fruit raw fruit and he's like i mean he evangelizes this you know and he said when he's training really hard super hard like he's eating upwards of 30

pounds of fruit a day right like it's intense that's a lot of time on the can and i'm like i can't have an opinion negative or positive on it because i'm not him i haven't experienced what he's experienced i can't make you know i can't i can't you know i can't judge him and i can't judge something that i don't have any direct experience with and he looks you know he went from 242 to 228 right and i mean it's like he ran a 228 marathon eating fruit you know it's like who's gonna tell him that what he's doing is wrong he's been doing it for years he looks fantastic the the proof is in the pudding you know what i mean like that's and this is the thing too is that

i you know i feel the same way about um it's about sort of like ultra eating like how you eat when you race and how you eat to prepare for your race. I feel the same way about that, that I feel about, you know, sobriety. Whatever works, man, if it works for you, like Godspeed. You know, I know from my own, you know, sort of making a laboratory out of races and stuff like that. Uh, you know, if I eat a handful of M and M's and stuff like that while I'm running,

I'll feel great for a minute. And then I crash. Right. And then I fall apart. And if I eat like bananas and potatoes and stuff like that, you know, foods that are easily digested, but that,

um, uh, but that don't have that you know the insulin spike right um i don't feel as good right away but i feel a lot better at the end of the day you're not going to get a super high boost but you're going to get a more sustained energy you know infusion over time yeah i mean also i'll tell you i like i'm the like protein guy you know i i that's my mom always you know you know you gotta have protein with every meal that's what you need you know and uh she's the expert yeah hey don't mess with mom right and for the last couple of days i've

been trying to do your uh trying to do your powered thing yeah how's it going i feel pretty good man you do all right i um prepared for you to tell me you feel horrible well dumping caffeine and sugar is a hell that i and uh i i did um i did have a couple of eggs the other day because i just felt like beat up from the weekend right um and and also i mean you know i think that's one of the things that you know you make a great point about in your book is you can sort of like narrow the aperture you know just okay just cut out jack-in-the-box to start right you know and then get it to you know and then you can sort of you know keep you know tuning it up and improving it and stuff like that yeah i mean

you know i know for me like i had to go all in immediately just like going to rehab or something like that that's what works for me but that's not what works for most people might work for you though you know i was just gonna say i'm just gonna say rich come on look who you're talking to but i think you know i'm the all-in kind of guy exactly uh but well and it's sort of like okay you're you're off caffeine you're off sugar you're detoxing it's like well you know you know what a detox feels like you know how to weather a detox that's familiar territory yeah yeah i was gonna know it's like so there's there's all there's kind of like a comfort in that for you because you know you know you know that it will change and that it will and then you'll be able to come out the other side of that yeah because for many years i was in the business of feeling bad something i do well yeah right so

it's like oh i i know what this is all about but you know i'm i'm starting to see the um you know the same thing that that you've talked about and that i've noticed a lot of my life with um you know with alcohol and stuff just sort of feeling bloated and feeling slow and you know low energy and stuff like that. And when I'm sort of grazing throughout the day and eating a lot of, I've been eating a ton of fruits and vegetables, my energy is much more consistent throughout the day. It's a balanced energy.

Yeah. I don't have to like wait. A food coma. Yeah. I don't have to write 45 minutes into my schedule to recover from breakfast yeah and that in and of itself is huge yeah i mean i mean yeah for guys like us to have like a little more time in the day it's massive right and you know get to your point about you know closing the aperture it you know, I think that part of the problem oftentimes, you know, if you suggest to somebody, oh, try a vegan diet or, you know, plant-based diets are like, well, they'll do it for a couple of days or a

week or however long it is before they slip and misstep. And then they just say, well, that was way too hard. Like, I couldn't even make it a week, you know, forget that. say well that was way too hard like i couldn't even make it a week you know forget that as opposed to you know i would i would submit that a healthier reaction to that would be like okay well i'm a human being you know it's like yeah i bet i've been eating that food x for you know 30 years like you know it's no surprise that i suddenly craved it you know yeah so let's just all right let's adjust and you know make the next right choice and move forward and and the more that I kind of just root it in the day, like, don't worry about what you're going to eat tomorrow. Just like, what are you eating right now? Like, just focus on that. Like, try to make a better choice about that. It doesn't have to be perfect. You know, progress, not perfection. Like, all these sort of recovery tools that I think are so applicable to, you know, how we, you how we develop our habits around food. Yeah. Yeah.

No, it's totally true. I mean, I remember being a kid and being like, okay, I'm in ninth grade now. Nobody's going to pick on me anymore. I'm going to do 50 push-ups every day. And I would do 50 push-ups the first day. And then I'd do like 40 the second day. And then third day i wouldn't do any and then i'd be like oh i give up i hate myself why do i suck so much and what you got to do is instead of saying i'm going to do 50 push-ups every day say i'm going to i'm going to do 25 push-ups five days a week and then

i'm going to start to ramp it up and then then when you miss a day, get back on the horse, man. Right. You know, just say, oh, all right, I screwed up. Okay. Back to it. Back to it. Back to it. Back to it. And that's the thing is if you just, you only fail when you give up.

Right. If you, if you get, it's, it's only when you get knocked down and you stay down, that's when you lose. You keep getting back up. You keep getting back up. Well, and I think it's about the stories we tell ourselves like these narratives that we create in our minds about things that are going on that aren't necessarily the truth you know so it's sort of like all right

you missed up you fell and then what's the narrative there's oh i'm a piece of shit i can't do this i'm terrible you know everybody told me i wasn't going to be able to do it and then you create this self-fulfilling prophecy around that. Yeah. Whereas you actually have, you have control over that narrative. You know, you can choose to, you know, create a new narrative around it, which is, wow, that's so interesting that I did that. Like, Hmm, that's cool.

Well, I can file that away for next time. And, you know, now I, I kind of know how that happened and I i know how to avoid that like you know giddy up yeah you know and i mean the other thing too is like i i've been doing a lot of uh boxing and kickboxing lately and uh you know i've been punched once or twice. But to get back in there and to go into a spa with somebody and know that, oh, man, I'm probably going to get punched in the face. The last time I got punched in the face was that bar fight where I fought those six dudes. And that didn't end well. So you go into it dreading it. And then you get punched in the face and it's like oh i'm still here

all right well now you know now that i know that this thing that terrified me so much didn't destroy me now we can get down a bit all right now we're talking yeah it's just information yeah exactly now i got a lot of information this weekend man all right well let's talk about your uh your run tomorrow your uh so this you threw this uh this post up on cnn um you know let's talk about boston a little bit which my plan was i was going to start talking about that because it feels weird yeah i can't talk about Boston a little bit, which my plan was I was going to start talking about that because it feels weird. Yeah. I can't talk about anything other than Boston right now.

I kind of can't believe we didn't start with that. And I'm also glad that we didn't. Right. Well, once you get into it, it's kind of hard to shift gears. And then you feel weird for like, okay, well, enough of that. You know, like, let's talk about. Yeah. You know, like on Mondayay i was just in shock like just

you know as i think we all were just really you know couldn't believe it um you know i've been through a bunch of crap you know like i went through a school shooting when i was 15 at my school i was really i was i was in new y 9-11. I got shipwrecked. You know what I mean? Like, I'm no stranger to that stuff. For some reason, Boston really shook me, man. I know. This is the point where I should jump in and go,

wait, what? You were shipwrecked? But, you know, I already know the story, and we've been going on for a long time. I know, I know. But if you want to hear more about Mishishka's shipwreck story it's another kindle single yeah thank you for the plug um but um and then where were you uh on 9-11 um i was hungover man i was asleep and uh and my girlfriend's roommate woke me up and she was like

mishka you gotta wake up you gotta they they just attacked the world trade center and i was like what and you know i just sort of walked out of bed and watched on tv as the second tower fell and it was just like you know um sort of like our jaws dropped then and we have yet to pick them back up um just you know just blew my mind and uh this is the thing though man like post 9-11 new york awesome place to be i mean i uh i remember being in the subway um you know years after 9-11 and uh this girl you know i think ipods are like the new generation of ipods had just come out and you know this girl dropped her ipod and it bounced on the platform and then fell into the tracks she's like oh man i just got that and uh there was a train coming

and her boyfriend sort of was sort of like looking around and he looked at me and i was like i was like i'll pull you up and he jumped right in grabbed the ipod threw the ipod reached up to me i grabbed his hands pulled him up the train came in we got on the you know on the train you know and it was just like we're in this together man you know like all of us we're in this together right there's something we've got a problem here we got to fix it i need your help i'm in let's do it done you know i never got their names they never got my name you know i hope they do the same um but um the thing that was so heartbreaking about boston is that you know and and this is what i wrote you know about for cnn is that it's, you know, it's like an inversion of new town.

And, and, and that was so horrifying to us because here's someone who's attacking human beings with infinite potential before them. Those children could have grown up to be anyone. We'll never know the contributions that they could have made to, and Boston is, elites, the best marathoners in the world there to compete. And the globe is represented there.

It's not a Northeast thing. It's not an American thing. It's not an American thing. It's not a North American thing. Everybody's there, man. And if you're a Bostonian, oh, man, we don't have any. I didn't plug my power cord in here. Hold on a second. I've got a.

Yeah. That was stupid. This is good, too. I didn't want to interrupt you. I know. I didn't either. oh there's one in uh there's one in the bag there yeah just grab it in there I know. I don't have any cups. The amount of... Yeah. There we go. Thanks.

all right where were we uh you were saying infinite potential as a bostonian oh yeah you know and as a Bostonian. Oh yeah. You know, and as a Bostonian, uh, you know, it's the marathon is, you know, it's a pastime. It is emblematic of the city. Yeah.

It's a, it's a huge cultural event. And, um, that's the thing, man, no matter how, no matter how gifted you are,

what shape you're in, you have to really try to run a marathon, any marathon in, you have to really try to run a marathon, any marathon. And you have to really try to get into Boston, to qualify for Boston. So these are people who are ambitiously striving to be the best that they can, to excel at something, to do something incredible, to live beyond the ordinary. to live beyond the ordinary and to strike at that. It seemed, it seemed to me as just,

I mean, that's terror right there. Like, like if you, we will not allow you to dream. You will not be allowed to be ambitious. You, you can't, can't think about doing something incredible because we'll kill you

and to which my response is fuck you and uh you know i just i got mad about you know tuesday it made me cry and then you know and then finally yesterday i just i got mad about it. And I was like, no, this, this will not stand. You know, um, you want to destroy this race and, and, and you want to destroy it in an ironic manner in which the projectile caused the people who survived to have their legs amputated. So they'll never run again.

Well, we're going to, we're going to respond to your irony with another irony, which is that Boston this year will be bigger and better and more memorable and more meaningful than ever, because it's going to be like a pandemic. runners who care about themselves and who care about other people and who care about competition and humanity and ambition and dreams we're going to go out together and we're going to go out alone to show you that you didn't win man and that you never will i think we got to end there, man, because you nailed it. That was beautiful. So mad about it, man.

I'm so angry about Boston. I wish we could use the podcast to get people who are going to listen to come out and run with you, but it's tomorrow. I don't think I'm going to get the podcast up until tomorrow night. I'm going out Saturday. Saturday. Oh, tomorrow's Friday. Tomorrow's Friday. Tomorrow's Friday Tomorrow's Friday

Yeah I'll try to get this up Friday night And I'll And also I'll tweet and post it See I mean this is the thing too man If people want to run with you

What How should they How should they get in touch with you Write to me on Facebook Email me I mean If you want to get in touch with me You'll find a way

Right And And I'll respond And we'll meet up and we'll run together and and and if everybody and if tons of people want to do it then awesome then tons of us will do it and if nobody wants to do it i'll do it on my own man you know and uh and it won't be any less meaningful for that you know right cool man well if people do want to find mishka he's on twitter at at mishka shibali s-h-u-b-a-l-y that's it in the websites mishka shibali yeah the website is just uh mishka shibali it's m-i-s-h-k-a

s-h-u-b-a-l-y and see him on facebook and all that kind of stuff yes ubiquitous all right and uh you can pick up the long run and shipwrecked and you have another you have another single up there too i have uh bachelor number one which is about uh my misadventures with reality tv and uh are you lonesome tonight about a particularly committed stalker that i have right we you don't have to come back on the show because i don't hear more about that is there anything else coming up is your band plan um i am working on my next kindle single which is uh which is about being old and still needing to rock yeah nice have you uh have you seen uh anvil the story of anvil

oh my god that that talk about a triumph of a triumph i mean those guys should have given up and they didn't and they succeeded and you know it's amazing that guy lips like i don't think i've ever rooted for anybody more in my life yeah it's an amazing he cares so much he's so positive yeah for for the listeners out there uh there's a documentary called anvil the story of anvil and it's the story of a heavy metal band that uh was sort of poised for greatness very early on and and uh made a few left-hand turns when they should have turned right and ended up not making it.

And yet they, they held firm to their, their, their dream and, and continued to, you know, rock it out and record albums every year, even though,

you know, they had a tiny following in Toronto and it never made it big. And it's, even if you hate heavy metal, have no interest in it whatsoever. It's a beautiful story about the human spirit and what, you know, what happens when you refuse to give up and you hold true to your dream.

Yeah. It's, I, I, I never thought a heavy metal documentary would be so meaningful. Yeah. It's a sweet movie. It is. Yeah. Cool. All right. We got to get out before garage man explodes on something right thanks for coming

man that was awesome rich such a pleasure we went deep dude yeah you feel all right yeah i uh i'm yeah i feel a little beat up i may have to eat some eggs but i'm all right you little beat up. I may have to eat some eggs, but I'm all right. You feel beat up. Come on. It was like, that was intense, dude. You asked some tough questions. Well,

you know, that's where the gold is. You got to dig for it a little bit, right? Fair enough. All right, man. Thanks for being a good sport.

Thanks a lot for having me. All right. Peace. Plants. plants. Thank you.