SoberNotMature - Episode 157 (Alex S. - Cheese And Poppies)

00:00:01.54
Bill
All right, everyone. Welcome once again to another episode of Sober Not Mature. And there's good news tonight. Well, it's the start of season seven, which is not even the good news.

00:00:10.66
Mike
Right. All right.

00:00:12.85
Bill
The good news is, is everyone out there, you don't just have to listen to us tonight. We have a guest. um He will introduce himself here in a minute. But um get out your notepads, get out your workbooks, because we're going to talk about heroin tonight.

00:00:24.12
Bill
Yeah.

00:00:24.87
Mike
ah right

00:00:26.74
Bill
But um Alex, ah go ahead and introduce yourself, ah ah introduce yourself, where you're from, obviously ah plug your book real quick. We'll talk about the book a little bit, obviously in more detail later, but to introduce yourself to begin with and let everyone know who you are.

00:00:40.76
Alex 
Absolutely. Well, my name is Alex. ah My name is Alex Shotton. if you're looking if you're If you're looking up for the author bio, you got to look up the full name. ah There's a lot of Alex's in this world. But I'm 30 years old. I am originally from Wisconsin, right outside of Green Bay. a huge, huge, huge Packer fan.

00:00:58.44
Mike
Oh, Christ, I'm outnumbered.

00:00:58.44
Alex 
um

00:00:58.46
Bill
Aha.

00:01:01.87
Alex 
um I now live in Tucson, Arizona. I just moved here about almost almost two years ago. Now I go down to school at the University of Arizona here for psychology. And yeah, I just recently released my second collection of poetry. it is called I Learned How to Love from Heroin.

00:01:19.64
Alex 
It is basically, it's it's the closest thing to like a memoir in the form of, you know, short stories and poems and sort prose and poems that kind of highlights and, you know, dives into the trauma and the life of addiction and heroin addiction.

00:01:36.65
Alex 
And I kind of frame it in a way where it's more of like a relationship. So it's kind of like me and like my my love of heroin. So yeah, that's that's kind of that's kind of the short spiel

00:01:43.76
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:01:46.92
Bill
Okay. Yeah. So when Mike said outnumbered, I lived in Wisconsin for, God, 30, if I'm doing the math, 35 plus years.

00:01:55.40
Alex 
Oh, very cool.

00:01:55.42
Bill
um

00:01:55.93
Alex 
Awesome.

00:01:56.33
Bill
Yeah. Milwaukee area, again, huge Green Bay Packer fan.

00:01:58.07
Alex 
Cool.

00:02:00.24
Mike
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

00:02:00.51
Alex 
gotta be.

00:02:01.30
Bill
So real real quick, where outside of Green Bay, what town did you live in?

00:02:04.39
Alex 
Appleton, since so you know, because you'll know Appleton.

00:02:05.18
Mike
That...

00:02:05.82
Bill
ah my

00:02:07.06
Alex 
Oh,

00:02:07.50
Bill
My daughter, my son-in-law, my grandson live in Appleton.

00:02:09.96
Alex 
oh wow. Such a small world.

00:02:11.48
Bill
Yeah.

00:02:11.52
Alex 
That is amazing. That's that's awesome.

00:02:12.79
Bill
Yeah.

00:02:13.12
Alex 
My sister's there still.

00:02:14.81
Bill
Well, and and guess where I'm going to be tomorrow? I'm going to be in Appleton because I'm babysitting for my my grandson. But um yeah, I mean, I'm super familiar with that.

00:02:20.38
Alex 
Wow, that's awesome.

00:02:23.08
Bill
And they've yeah, they've they've lived in Appleton for a number of years. ah When my ex and I got divorced, her and her ah boyfriend at the time and then husband moved up to Appleton. So my daughter, she's 37. Yeah, 37. She's been up there shit.

00:02:36.33
Bill
um she's been up there shit if not 30 years close to it. I think there were, she was probably eight or nine, I think when they moved up there. So um yeah, I so i've spent a lot of time in Appleton all all around Wisconsin, but yeah, I'm going to be there tomorrow.

00:02:49.01
Bill
So, Hey, we got nothing else to talk about during this next hour and a half.

00:02:51.32
Mike
who

00:02:52.43
Bill
Well, let's talk some, let's talk some Scotty.

00:02:52.56
Alex 
Right, exactly.

00:02:54.23
Bill
We'll talk some Scotty shit. We'll drive Mike fucking nuts.

00:02:55.99
Alex 
Absolutely. Where are you two located at now?

00:03:00.72
Bill
Mike.

00:03:01.94
Mike
I'm in Cleveland, Ohio.

00:03:03.31
Alex 
Okay, cool, cool.

00:03:04.60
Bill
Yep. And I'm actually in, I'm in Valparaiso, Indiana at the moment. I'm at our our sister's house.

00:03:07.86
Alex 
Cool.

00:03:10.00
Bill
The short story is when our our mom was sick about almost three years ago, I ended up, gave up my place and in Milwaukee, came down here to help out with our mom as she was getting towards the end of her time.

00:03:21.10
Bill
And she died, she, two and a half years ago? No, a little over two years ago now, right?

00:03:23.80
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:03:24.46
Bill
Like two years, three months, three months, four months?

00:03:25.00
Mike
Yeah, right. October. Yep.

00:03:26.94
Bill
Yeah. October of 22, right? Yes. right yes

00:03:29.18
Mike
Yep.

00:03:30.26
Bill
And yeah I travel around also, but that's a whole and nother story that everyone else is probably sick of hearing about. But if you ever hop on Instagram, yeah you'll see plenty of posts about that.

00:03:36.56
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:03:39.02
Bill
But yeah, this is my, this is HQ, HQ for the podcast, HQ for me when I'm not running around the country.

00:03:42.78
Mike
and sir

00:03:45.09
Bill
But yeah, before, and don't let me forget, Alex, I want to get, make sure I get your, you're on Instagram, Facebook, anything like that, I want to make sure that I put that in the episode.

00:03:51.99
Alex 
Yes, absolutely.

00:03:53.50
Bill
So we'll either email it to me later just as a side note, but I want to be able to get that on there too. So, um We were talking just briefly before we started. And I mentioned, obviously, we have we don't really have a format, don't really have a structure, except for one thing, right, Mike?

00:04:06.75
Bill
I mean, Alex, I'm guessing you're going to get into your story.

00:04:07.02
Mike
he

00:04:09.31
Bill
We want to hear about your story. We want to hear about the book.

00:04:10.67
Mike
Absolutely.

00:04:12.16
Bill
um Basically, be a whore and whore out your book, because that's what that's one of the reasons we we love to have people on.

00:04:16.43
Alex 
all right.

00:04:18.44
Mike
why we're here.

00:04:18.58
Bill
It's not just ah yeah not just to talk about this stuff, but if you're doing something and promoting something, whether it's this, it sounds like you might have done something before, anything you're involved in, um talk about it. the i I could put links to everything and, you know, we want to do that. But if you're going to tell your story, Mike, how do we handle that?

00:04:36.19
Mike
he Right. Well, we already know how to get fucked up, fucked up our lives, and fuck up the lives of everyone around us. We know how to do that.

00:04:46.80
Mike
um You know, obviously qualified, that's all cool, but we fucking hate drunk-a-logs.

00:04:52.72
Alex 
Absolutely.

00:04:52.89
Mike
So... yeah Or drugalogs or whatever. doesn't matter. The substance doesn't matter. ah yeah So, yeah, that's that's basically it, man. You know, we don't want a druglog. Qualify yourself. That's cool.

00:05:06.86
Mike
But, you know, tell your story. We're interested in the solution.

00:05:11.72
Alex 
Absolutely. I agree. I agree with that. a hundred percent. um I can dive into my story a little bit right now, actually, if you want to, yeah, yeah.

00:05:17.24
Bill
Yeah, go ahead. Absolutely.

00:05:17.79
Mike
Do it.

00:05:18.71
Alex 
I'll give you a little bit more of a background of me on honestly, like I used to, I remember like my first couple of times in like treatment when, you know, I would get on the war story path. And like, now that I'm now that I'm like, you know, 30 years old, I look back and it and my story isn't much different from the hundreds of others of peoples that like I've met, you know what I mean?

00:05:36.54
Mike
Nobody's is.

00:05:37.68
Alex 
It really isn't like, you know, I've, I've talked to so many people, heard so many different stories that like there isn't really much that I can I can spiel on about that. Anybody else hasn't you know experienced or know somebody that's experienced. But ah I lived a pretty you know, I lived a pretty simple childhood. i had some childhood trauma. I was a a victim of sexual assault when I was, you know, a very small child, like seven or eight years old. But beyond that, I had like one of those amazing. You know, my parents are were amazing. You know, my sister is amazing. You know, my whole family.

00:06:08.51
Alex 
is amazing. There wasn't really anything that was, you know, huge or, um you know, super, super traumatic beyond that. I don't want to minimize that, but I also want to, you know, you know, you know, help people understand that like I, I lived a great life, but the one thing that was very apparent growing up that I think is one of the most important things as I kind of learned from how to recover and learn how to find fulfillment to my recovery is I noticed very early on that like, I just didn't feel right.

00:06:36.70
Alex 
You know, nothing, just nothing really felt right. I always felt like I was, I was chasing after something and it wasn't good enough whenever I got to it. So like I had those, I had those like feelings and those thoughts very early on in my life, you know, a middle school, you know, high school. And, you know, as I got into high school, I basically, you know, for lack of a better term, I was your stereotypical, um you know, athlete that got hurt and I got diagnosed with a chronic illness at like the exact same time.

00:07:03.49
Alex 
And I ended up in the hospital and I was just basically the stereotypical athlete that got put on opiates really early, really early on. And this was kind of before there was the opioid academic or opioid epidemic, for lack of a better term.

00:07:19.77
Alex 
And it wasn't really, there wasn't a lot known about it.

00:07:20.41
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:07:21.81
Alex 
There wasn't a lot of studies done about it. It was still very early on. And yeah, that was just, that was kind of it. It was just a straight downhill path. The doctors started giving me opiates and they fixed everything. They fixed, you know, my injury. I had a torn meniscus in my knee and then I had been diagnosed with Crohn's. So it fixed all the pain. And then it also fixed that feeling in my head where I felt like I was chasing after something that I couldn't get.

00:07:45.57
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:07:45.58
Alex 
So it was basically, it was a, it was an absolute cure-all. Like if I could go back and and look at the 16 year old me, I thought I found the answer. Like I was, I was convinced that like, oh, these, cause I didn't know about, you know, like how it was going to end up.

00:07:53.34
Mike
Right.

00:07:58.91
Alex 
I didn't know that I was going to be homeless. I didn't know that I was going to be in prison. I didn't know that all these like awful things were going to happen. I just knew at the time that like, hey, I found, i found the answer.

00:08:09.23
Alex 
You know, I found, I found exactly what I need to make sure that I live the life that I want to live.

00:08:09.45
Mike
Yup.

00:08:14.46
Mike
Mm hmm.

00:08:14.47
Alex 
And, and, you know, it didn't last long. You know, it was a, it was a quick, you know, I mean, I say it didn't last long, but you know, six, seven years, years, it was, it was over and it ended up with, with me in prison. I ended up getting, uh,

00:08:27.37
Alex 
getting in trouble for selling heroin, you know, eventually, eventually you go, you go, I went from the stealing. I went, I went through all the, all the different modes of, of, you know, getting money and the stealing and the ruining relationships, all that stuff, you know, put it all into there and, and pretty much threw all that away.

00:08:34.34
Mike
easy

00:08:43.50
Alex 
But I ended up getting sentenced to prison and did about, uh, Did about two, two and a half years for some heroin charges. And yeah, that's kind of where, that's kind of where it all, where it all changed for me.

00:08:53.91
Alex 
i'll I'll dial back a little bit and I'm a yapper. So like, sometimes i sometimes I go all over the place, but, but I hope, i hope that'll be all right for y'all as well.

00:09:01.34
Mike
That's just fine.

00:09:01.35
Bill
You know what? That's, that's the, that's the basic of this podcast literally. And I tell Mike, I listened to a lot of different sober podcasts, ones that I enjoy. and ones that are usually a few that are very structured, other ones where they'll be talking, they're like, well, this is off topic.

00:09:15.82
Bill
But, and then I tell Mike, I'm like, that's everything. Everything we talk about is off topic.

00:09:19.49
Alex 
Yeah.

00:09:20.95
Bill
I mean, we have an idea. The only thing, the only structure that we have in every episode is the reading that Mike does at the beginning And we started that because he literally, Mike, you missed that from doing it in group.

00:09:32.15
Mike
yeah Yeah, exactly.

00:09:32.41
Bill
um And it's ah it's number one, it it fulfilled something for him, but it's ah it's a wonderful discussion point for us and literally keeps our heads straight for what, 20 minutes an episode?

00:09:42.25
Mike
And then we start rambling on about a bunch of other nonsense.

00:09:43.12
Bill
don't

00:09:44.85
Mike
and Right.

00:09:45.63
Alex 
Hey, 20 minutes is 20 minutes, though, you know?

00:09:47.12
Mike
Right.

00:09:47.30
Alex 
I mean, what can you...

00:09:47.70
Bill
know. yeah we're We're connecting with something in that 20-minute period. But no, I mean, it's to Mike's point. Yeah, ramble on. go

00:09:55.20
Alex 
Perfect.

00:09:55.34
Bill
Go for it.

00:09:56.12
Alex 
Perfect. and And to your point there, when I listened to that last episode, I, it has been a long time since I have been a part of like a daily reading like that, that brought back, like that brought back a lot of memories that brought back a lot of like, just a lot of, a lot of emotion, even at the same time.

00:10:04.40
Mike
hmm.

00:10:11.37
Alex 
So I'll kind of dive into that before i like, I got to prison, you know ah I was in treatment. i'm like a you know I've been to treatment seven or eight times so all over the place.

00:10:19.85
Mike
sure

00:10:20.90
Alex 
I've been to treatment in Arizona. I've been to treatment in Florida. i pretty much My pretty much rotation or cycle was... get treatment. Um, my treatment would sponsor me to go somewhere cause they said that I needed to, you know get out ah get out of the city, get out of Wisconsin. I would go there. i would use, use everybody and everything and every, and squeeze everything I could out of whatever I, whatever opportunity I was given. And then I'd, yeah I'd go back to using wherever I was at.

00:10:49.46
Mike
Right.

00:10:49.54
Alex 
And, uh, so I kind of just did that cycle all around, um, all around, you know, the United States for a little bit there. But I think it's important to, you know, mention that before i ended up in prison, I was introduced to recovery multiple different times through multiple different programs.

00:11:03.30
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:11:04.13
Alex 
And, uh, like it's just they It planted such a seed. so like By the time that I got to prison, like i was i was pretty I was pretty beat down. and i was i So many people had tried to help me. i had worked the 12 steps you know in in multiple different communities with amazing, amazing men.

00:11:22.26
Alex 
and i like So many people had had poured their poured their cup into me. there were There were so many seeds planted in me that when I got to prison, it was like... It was like a game changer. Like I know there's a there's a lot of people that will be like, you know, prison doesn't work. Incarceration doesn't work.

00:11:37.89
Alex 
for For me, it put me in a position where those seeds that were planted. in me through those you know seven or eight treatments that it just blossomed in there. I had i had such a such an interesting and you know diversely cool experience in prison, for lack of a better term.

00:11:55.35
Alex 
And that's not to minimize you know the trauma. I do that a lot. i don't i I'm pretty self-aware, and I do happen to minimize minimize a lot of the trauma I went through. and um But in all things considered, like I had a really good experience in prison. I was around a lot of men that, you know, were on or trying to be on the right path. And a lot of older people that saw themselves in me as just a young, you know, 22 year old kid. And they they saw that those seeds that i had planted,

00:12:24.72
Alex 
the the talking points came out really well. I had, uh, I had, I had learned how to be a very good at lip service and I could, you know, I could teach an AODA class.

00:12:27.30
Mike
Right.

00:12:34.27
Alex 
I could run a treatment center. If all it required me to do was talk, you know, the action wasn't the, the the action was not going to be there at that time.

00:12:38.98
Mike
Right.

00:12:42.26
Alex 
The action was not there, but

00:12:43.90
Mike
right

00:12:44.20
Alex 
if But if I could, if I just had to talk my way through it, I, you know, i was, I was perfect in that, you know, as as as much as you could be.

00:12:49.63
Mike
yeah Absolutely.

00:12:52.06
Alex 
And I think that I was lucky enough to be, you know, to be put around people that saw that in me in ah in a place, you know, in ah in a prison where you don't get a lot of that, you know, recovery.

00:13:02.89
Alex 
And ah yeah, it just kind of, it just kind of blossomed. And that's where I started writing poetry again. That's where I started, you know, writing again. That's where I started journaling again. And it's kind of where, it's kind of where I first found recovery for lack of a better term.

00:13:16.68
Alex 
I had been introduced to it like, you know, so many times and, you know, people always ask me, you know, like, why didn't it work?

00:13:17.13
Mike
Yeah.

00:13:22.08
Alex 
Why didn't it work? And I, I don't have a good answer besides I was just an immature kid. You know what I mean? That just didn't, didn't really, you know, understand, you know, what was really going on inside my own head, inside like my trauma and all that kind of stuff.

00:13:35.98
Alex 
But, But once I got there, man, it was just, it was kind of like everything was able to flow out of me freely. and it was cool. Yeah. I started, ah that's where poetry got started again.

00:13:47.05
Alex 
i actually, that's how I made most of my money in there. I teamed up with the guy and we would like, I would write poems and he would draw cards and we would, we would sell those. So we kind of had like this little, this little Hallmark card hustle thing kind of going on and

00:13:58.50
Bill
Nice.

00:14:01.28
Mike
Ha ha ha ha ha.

00:14:01.45
Bill
ah

00:14:02.65
Alex 
in prison for lack of a better term. And that's, that's kind of where I realized that like, I really love doing that. Like I really just love writing sappy poems, sappy soft, sappy soft poems was kind of, kind of what made my brain feel okay if for lack of a better term. So it was, it was a really cool and interesting experience to to find my recovery in prison.

00:14:21.62
Bill
so So real quick, and and Mike, maybe you had the same thought, but um Mike, do you have any any input about why why it worked when he was, regardless of who where he was at the time, do you have any any idea why it might have worked at that time?

00:14:33.74
Mike
Yeah, absolutely. He started putting all those those principles into practice.

00:14:36.59
Bill
yeah Yeah, as you you did the work, Alex, is why it worked. And, you know, and here and here's the thing, and i we kind we both kind of laughed at that because I was 41 when I got sober.

00:14:42.11
Mike
Yeah.

00:14:42.43
Alex 
Exactly.

00:14:49.68
Bill
Mike was 43 at this run through. And ah we've known people that have been older than us. We've known people as young as, you know, 19 and 20. There was two, three guys that, you know, had multiple, I mean, like decades of sobriety when we came in that were only in their 40s.

00:15:04.59
Bill
So they were like early 20s when they got sober.

00:15:06.97
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:15:07.03
Alex 
Right.

00:15:07.21
Bill
And I mean, all these stories that we've heard, it's when when people start to do, it's doing the work, you know?

00:15:12.23
Mike
yope

00:15:12.28
Bill
And like you like you just said, you know, the the the lip service and all that stuff, but the but the action wasn't there. And that's, we talk about that all the time, is it it's one thing we can all... I think most of us, some of us talk more. I talk more than Mike does, but Mike can talk a good game.

00:15:28.10
Bill
Clearly you talk a lot like I do, Alex, but you know, we, we all can talk a good game, but it's like, what are we going to do behind that? I mean, talking is one thing, but we've got to get out there and we've got to fucking do something, you know, it's talking about, it does nothing. So that, that would be our thought maybe that you started doing the work.

00:15:44.81
Alex 
Yeah, that's I think that's exactly it. And I think it came out in like my my actions too. you know like i i wasn't involving myself in like shit that I shouldn't have involved myself in.

00:15:55.79
Alex 
you know like i was i was i was I was going to the gym twice a day.

00:15:56.80
Mike
Yep.

00:16:00.05
Alex 
you know I was going out and I was taking a morning walk and I was taking and a walk before they closed the yard at nighttime. like i was I was doing all these things that I knew... Even at the time, like at the time, I really wasn't doing it consciously. At the time, i was just trying to live the most comfortable lifestyle I could live. And that's how I felt that I could do it.

00:16:18.37
Alex 
But those little habits and those little things all started to add up that when, you know, now looking back on it, it's like, oh, yeah, I understood what I needed to do without even consciously understanding what I needed to do.

00:16:18.43
Bill
Mm-hmm.

00:16:29.32
Alex 
I just I did it because so many people had, you know, poured so much into me that I just kind of already knew what needed to happen.

00:16:37.39
Bill
And you, it sounds like you got from what you had said, you got around um some good, good, solid people when you were in there too, which helps because then, you know, same deal. You get the right influence. I didn't want to get sober. Everyone's heard that me say that before. I don't need to get into the whole story, but the thankfully when, cause Mike and I met at the the Keating center in Cleveland,

00:16:56.31
Bill
um You know, we we met it in that facility and around the same people, blah, blah, blah. But the whole point is, is there was a really good group of guys, a good group of solid guys, good group of guys coming in to do group and do the meetings and all those sort of things.

00:17:09.49
Bill
So so these these people, these really positive influences, people that were doing the work and had already had this this level of sobriety and level of peace and serenity.

00:17:09.88
Alex 
Right.

00:17:21.08
Bill
And um decent lives that they were living. Right, Mike? I mean, and then it's, you know, so that's what we got to live with.

00:17:23.68
Mike
Oh, absolutely.

00:17:26.44
Bill
Right.

00:17:27.34
Mike
Yeah, right. I mean, that was it. We had the same thing, man. You know, it doesn't matter if you're in prison, you're in a center, you're just going to a bunch of meetings all the time, whatever you get yourself around support group, a good group of guys or girls or whatever you need to be around.

00:17:43.00
Mike
And right. And you start doing what they do and shit. What it fucking works.

00:17:47.75
Alex 
Right.

00:17:48.83
Mike
Right.

00:17:49.52
Alex 
Lo and behold. Yeah. Lo and behold.

00:17:50.75
Mike
Right.

00:17:51.08
Alex 
Exactly what they told you was going to work. Works.

00:17:53.18
Mike
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

00:17:55.13
Bill
You're like, it Mike, tell them about our buddy Tony, what what he did. yeah

00:17:58.90
Mike
Oh, yeah.

00:17:59.53
Bill
Yeah.

00:17:59.62
Mike
Okay. So our buddy Tony, right? he He was married. He still is married to his wife, Angel. They both had guests on the show here. And um his wife went into treatment, and she got a sponsor, and the sponsor says you can have nothing to do with them. They've been together for a long, long time. They've been running for like 15 years, married together,

00:18:19.82
Mike
partners in crime, all that good stuff. And so she started working the program and it pissed him off.

00:18:21.77
Alex 
Oh yeah.

00:18:25.51
Mike
Right. And she, could she wouldn't have anything to do with them until he got his shit together or didn't or whatever, but wasn't going to have anything to do with them. And he said, fine, I'm going to go get myself into a program. I'm going to start working this program. I'm going to work all these fucking steps to the best of my ability to prove to you motherfuckers that it doesn't work.

00:18:46.27
Mike
And he's right.

00:18:46.42
Bill
yeah

00:18:47.49
Mike
And he's sober, like 12 years now.

00:18:49.37
Alex 
Yeah, yeah, exactly.

00:18:49.75
Bill
Yeah.

00:18:50.05
Mike
Yeah.

00:18:52.51
Bill
It's the, i mean, and I, and I've known Tony for a long time. And I just, the first time I heard that story um was within the last three years. Once we started doing this, Mike brought it up one time.

00:18:59.64
Mike
Yeah.

00:19:01.13
Bill
I'm like, are you fucking kidding me? They did that.

00:19:03.51
Mike
Yeah.

00:19:03.73
Bill
And then, yeah, we had Tony on and made him tell the story and it's, it was brilliant. You know, I'm going prove, prove to you motherfuckers that this doesn't work.

00:19:08.16
Mike
yeah

00:19:11.59
Bill
I'm going to do everything. Like you said, I'm going to follow the directions, but this is going to show you. It's not going to work. yeah

00:19:18.51
Mike
And it worked.

00:19:19.28
Alex 
Exactly.

00:19:19.77
Bill
And it worked.

00:19:20.40
Alex 
Exactly.

00:19:20.69
Bill
And it worked. So real quick question, Alex, though, with the with the poetry and the writing and the journaling, because you said you started doing it again ah when you were in prison. So was that first of all, I guess, two questions.

00:19:31.43
Bill
So that that's when you started your I guess your your string of sobriety in prison. And then also, did you did you do writing and journaling prior and then pick that back up?

00:19:41.59
Mike
Thank you.

00:19:41.72
Bill
Or how did that or did they coincide?

00:19:44.08
Alex 
Yeah, so I've always been like a book nerd. Like I was the when I was a kid, like I i found solace in just reading books and and just writing and just scribbling stuff down.

00:19:56.25
Alex 
ah It's actually funny. Like I'm a huge Harry Potter fan. And like all the books, all my parents books have just grease stains on them. It's complete grease stains because I wouldn't even like leave.

00:20:06.66
Alex 
The table, like I wouldn't eat dinner at the table unless like I had a book to read in my hand. I was that like i was that attached to ah to literature. So but as a young kid, it was kind of there.

00:20:17.24
Alex 
And then I kind of got away from it. I started playing sports and sports was, I fit in a lot more when I played sports. It was a lot easier for me to fit in. It was a lot easier to like for me to feel okay when I was like playing sports and like around other people rather than when I was just always reading books. So I got away from it.

00:20:33.44
Alex 
kind of as I got older. and then, ah and then it was just out of boredom, honestly, and in, in, in prison that I kind of got back into it.

00:20:40.55
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:20:41.81
Alex 
And it just, I realized how much I loved it. I started out reading and I would just, I read so many books while I was in there. And, and after a while I'm like, well, why not, why don't I try writing again and see how that feels?

00:20:52.43
Alex 
And it was just, it was just kind of a spiral after that, a good spiral.

00:20:56.52
Bill
Right. No, that's cool. And i know I know a lot of people do that. I mean, when we went into the Keating Center, I hadn't literally picked up a physical book and in years. And I couldn't i couldn't get enough because i I needed something to do other than just, I didn't know how to just be with myself.

00:21:12.24
Alex 
Right, exactly.

00:21:12.53
Bill
And, you know, I did. I read, we had this... This chapel um area. And then, you know, a ton of books in there. And I don't even know what I read, but I just kept reading and my mom had books and my sister had books.

00:21:23.33
Bill
And I would just sit around in my downtime. It was a it was an escape for me, you know, at that time frame. And now I sit on my lazy ass and I watch TV. At night, but I mean, I do I get out and I get like hiking trails and all that sort of stuff. But I mean, I don't I still I can't I can't sit down and read i listen to audio books, I'll take in information because I do a lot of driving.

00:21:42.99
Bill
um But I can't I can't sit down and read it makes me tired.

00:21:46.58
Alex 
Right.

00:21:47.19
Bill
um But I love taking in the information, but I do it in audio books now. But so so the writing and the poetry started up in in prison. Were you writing about, you know, kind of like what you're talking about now, your experience as you're using and you're, you know, obviously that type of experience or was just the general stuff?

00:22:04.92
Alex 
Yeah, back then back then it was pretty much, unless I was doing like the cards, like when we were doing like the Hallmark kind of cards, those were just kind of your like actual typical like Hallmark, what you would see if you were buying like a card at the store, because like what we were literally doing was you know helping people you know like get cards to their family for birthdays and stuff like that.

00:22:17.35
Bill
Right.

00:22:22.63
Mike
he

00:22:23.80
Alex 
So beyond that, if I was just writing like by myself and myself, it was pretty much all like using and addiction-related at that time. There wasn't really much... to branch out from beyond that, I think, because my head was so consumed with, you know, being in, yeah, yeah, exactly.

00:22:39.04
Mike
Yeah, you write what you know. Mm-hmm.

00:22:41.26
Alex 
And like be exactly. and being in prison, it was like every single day, it was like a reminder, like every single thing that I did, every time a guard made me stand up for a count, like everything was a reminder of like, Hey, this is,

00:22:54.16
Alex 
This is your addiction. So that's that's pretty much all I wrote when I was when I was in there. A lot of some of those poems did end up in the book, like some of the poems that I wrote like back then, maybe not like the full poem, but there might be a couple of lines that i scribbled down in a notebook that turned into a poem later on that ended up in in my latest book.

00:23:13.31
Bill
Okay. It was just so I was kind of curious if, and I know that a lot of people bring out, I mean, you know, we joke about it all the time. and Right, Mike, what are you going to do You know, what are we going to do now that we, you know, now that we're sober?

00:23:23.38
Mike
That we're not drinking and using, right?

00:23:24.60
Bill
yeah And there's there's a lot of people that we know that, you know, they, the the again, the creative side comes out or, you know, certainly they start to be good people and they get pick up new hobbies and that sort of thing. But um we've had a number of people on here, what, five, at least a handful of people now that have written books.

00:23:42.27
Bill
And it's always interesting to me where that where that motivation, I like to write,

00:23:42.61
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:23:46.49
Bill
You know i don't I don't do it like I don't know. I don't I don't I never and not never. I'll write some articles that are sobriety related if it's for a particular website or something like that, that I talk about usually more of a I don't know, sobriety thing, societal thing. But I've never done like my story type of thing. And the reason it is is because two things.

00:24:05.59
Bill
um There's plenty of other people out there. It's like podcasts. Everyone's got a goddamn podcast. Um, but everyone, everyone's got a sobriety thing. I'll let the people who really know what they're doing. Stick to that.

00:24:16.38
Bill
I'll write about something else, but it is, it's a, it's a, it's a comfort zone for me and it's a release. And sometimes it's just good to, to get shit down on, on paper, um, like that. So, um,

00:24:28.27
Bill
When, when did you actually get, when's your sobriety date or when did you actually, when was the date for you that you, and I don't know how you, what your, what your background is. I know you talked about 12 step or whatever.

00:24:38.74
Bill
Do you consider yourself sober, alcohol free? What do you consider yourself? I guess to begin with.

00:24:43.70
Alex 
Yeah, let's let's let's dive into that because I honestly – I always find this interesting too because I had like – before I went to prison, like I say that I was introduced to recovery like multiple ways. I tried like all the all the programs like before I went to prison.

00:24:56.09
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:24:56.79
Alex 
I tried the AANA, like worked the steps. Probably at my time I thought it was the best of my ability, but I'm sure that I could go back and dive into that 19-year-old kid's mind and and and get some more out of them now, you know now looking back.

00:25:11.07
Alex 
But I tried Smart Recovery. um I forget what the... There was one other one that was pretty popular not too long ago that I tried as well. But um I consider myself... like I consider my date to find recovery like September 27th, 2016. That was the day overdosed and ended up going to jail and ended up in prison. like I didn't get out after that. But...

00:25:32.47
Alex 
but good old Alex, when he got out of prison, i wanted to being from Wisconsin drink successfully uh, yeah, like I had to, like there was, there was no way that I was going to get out of prison and not try to drink successfully when I first got out.

00:25:38.54
Mike
Sure. true

00:25:47.84
Alex 
Um, and I, I bartend, I, it's pretty much, I still, to this day, I'm still, I'm, I'm the local sober bartender in my neighborhood now. But, uh, so, ah so I, immersed myself immediately out of prison into the alcohol culture of Wisconsin. And,

00:26:03.08
Alex 
For lack of a better term, I like to say if for lack of a better term, I drank successfully. but what I mean by that is like I didn't have any like major like huge consequences that that like heroin brought on for me.

00:26:14.42
Alex 
But I didn't like myself.

00:26:14.47
Bill
Sure.

00:26:14.46
Mike
Hmm.

00:26:16.14
Alex 
I didn't like the person that I was. i didn't like alcohol in the first place. I've i've never been a i've never been a drinker whatsoever. i've never really liked the taste of it. So...

00:26:26.93
Alex 
I just completely forced myself to try to be a part of this culture, which is my addiction just screaming at me. uh, but after about a year of doing that, I just couldn't, I couldn't do it anymore.

00:26:33.17
Mike
existence

00:26:38.28
Alex 
I didn't like myself and I quit drinking. So, so I say the day that I entered recovery was September 26, 2000, 2016, but stopped drinking somewhere around 2019, 2020. two thousand and sixteen but i stopped drinking somewhere around two thousand nineteen two thousand twenty But I don't know the exact date.

00:26:52.77
Bill
Okay.

00:26:54.29
Alex 
But yeah, that's kind of that's kind of how i how i explain it

00:26:57.82
Bill
Right. And you know, the the reason I asked that and and Mike and I, Mike and i were, were brought up. Well, Mike, and you can talk about minute. You've gone through, you've dealt with a couple of different types of programs, but ah my dad was sober.

00:27:08.07
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:27:09.59
Bill
My dad was an Alcoholics Anonymous. I knew of it. My dad died 29 years of sober. So, I mean, that's a program I knew. And when we went into the Keating Center, that's the program that they introduced us to.

00:27:20.77
Bill
um I knew somebody, I knew a number of people, actually a handful of people in Wisconsin. When you mentioned smart recovery, I've heard it in other areas, but there's a focus, it seems, of smart recovery around Wisconsin.

00:27:32.26
Bill
You know, I've just, I noticed that a little bit. I went to, i don't think I went to any meetings with it, but I know of it a little bit.

00:27:38.39
Alex 
Right,

00:27:38.57
Bill
But then, you know, since we've been doing this, the podcast on Instagram, we've met and had the pleasure, quite honestly, of ah being introduced to a lot of different things, you know, a lot of different ways that people are staying sober.

00:27:51.30
Bill
And I think it's interesting. Our mindset is it doesn't really matter what you do. Mike says it best. And, you know, long as you're not out there, you know, fucking hurting anyone. He doesn't care what you do.

00:28:00.25
Alex 
right. right

00:28:01.08
Mike
Right.

00:28:01.45
Bill
Um, you know, but Alcoholics Anonymous is our thing, but this is not, uh, and we, from the start, we decided we, we talk about AA openly. We talk about the fact we're members we went through, it's our thing.

00:28:13.08
Bill
Um, you know, but somebody's out there doing their, their own thing or whatever their thing is. Um, you know, so be it at the, we've had people on that's like, you know, dip their toe in the AA for whatever reason, it didn't work. They got their foundation, their start in AA, uh,

00:28:27.00
Bill
That wasn't for them. So they did this. And these are people with long-term sobriety. So who who are we to say, you know, that sort of thing. But Mike, when you were in California, that program that you were in, was that through the Salvation Army?

00:28:37.66
Mike
Right.

00:28:39.28
Bill
No, no, no.

00:28:39.86
Mike
ah like Yeah, that was one of them.

00:28:39.97
Bill
Or yes? Yes.

00:28:43.58
Mike
um Yeah, but I mean, everyone I ever went to, um they all encouraged us to go to 12-step meetings one way or another. You know, AA, NA, whatever, CA, HA, all of them.

00:28:56.39
Mike
um But they're all, you know, and and even... from my experience, the other programs are still kind of based in it. You know, it's, it's, it's getting out of yourself.

00:29:04.62
Alex 
Absolutely. Yeah.

00:29:06.58
Mike
It's smashing your ego. It's being of service to other people.

00:29:07.93
Alex 
Yep.

00:29:09.84
Mike
You know, however you get there, I don't give a fuck. Like Bill said, I don't, you know, as long as that's just it, man, making yourself a better person for the people around you. That's all that fucking matters. And if you're doing that,

00:29:22.42
Mike
More than likely, um you're not going to need to pick up a drink or a drug. You're just not. You're making yourself a better person and you don't need that crutch anymore. You don't need that garbage to fill the hole that we have in us, that we all have in us.

00:29:38.30
Bill
Right.

00:29:38.57
Alex 
Yeah.

00:29:40.08
Bill
Yeah. So it was just, ah like I said, just interesting to me that, so you consider yourself to be, again, you know, more of an, you don't necessarily identify yourself as sober, but entering recovery and it's, it's words differently, but you, you live a life that does not have substance abuse in it anymore.

00:29:56.36
Alex 
Right, exactly. And like honestly, like i i spent so much time in and out of the rooms of AA that like I still...

00:29:58.25
Bill
yeah

00:30:04.21
Alex 
like to this day, like when I talk about my sobriety, when I talk about my recovery, like it's almost all aa and NA principles that I'm talking.

00:30:11.74
Bill
Right.

00:30:11.76
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:30:11.77
Alex 
like it's all It's almost all... And I agree a lot with like what you said, Mike. is pretty much

00:30:15.82
Mike
Yeah.

00:30:16.24
Alex 
Smart recovery is and NA. It's just the goal is a little... I feel like the goal is a little bit different. They just shift the goal just a little bit different just so it... appeases to different ways of thinking and different ways of learning.

00:30:28.74
Alex 
But in in in all, the essence of them all is exactly the same.

00:30:29.21
Mike
right.

00:30:32.74
Alex 
And so, yeah, I like to i like to nowadays say that like I entered recovery at this day or I'm just, I'm in recovery.

00:30:39.53
Mike
Mm-hmm. All right.

00:30:40.28
Alex 
And yeah, that's just that's just the easiest way for me to put it. I think the other thing I think is really cool is I've seen this shift over since like since I found recovery and what I found in prison for recovery.

00:30:51.81
Alex 
And then that kind of short period where ah you know I thought I was Superman and could drink in the Wisconsin culture.

00:30:56.87
Mike
Sure. Right.

00:30:58.37
Alex 
I've seen a little bit of a shift in the stigma towards like different pathways.

00:30:58.45
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:30:58.93
Bill
Oh,

00:31:02.69
Alex 
like I've seen this shift where where people are just kind of way more accepting of medically-assisted treatment.

00:31:03.46
Bill
oh yeah.

00:31:03.64
Mike
sure

00:31:08.11
Alex 
you know I have a lot of friends that are very successful on medically-assisted treatment. I was not. I tried both methadone and Suboxone, and neither one of those worked for me.

00:31:15.67
Mike
a

00:31:17.24
Alex 
It was it almost it was almost just as bad, if not worse, than

00:31:17.79
Mike
right

00:31:22.14
Alex 
than the heroin addiction for me. But I also know people that have successively been on Suboxone for 10 years and then, you know, tapered off and are successfully living a great life now.

00:31:23.67
Mike
see

00:31:28.82
Mike
Sure.

00:31:31.26
Alex 
So it's like, I I'm really, I'm really happy that we saw that shift in like, in like the stigma, because there' there's always going to be stigma from the outside. There's always going to be the normies for lack of a better term are always going to look a little bit differently at us.

00:31:39.60
Mike
Mm hmm.

00:31:44.05
Mike
Sure.

00:31:44.74
Alex 
But, but I think it's really good that we've kind of tackled the stigma within our own community because, there's no point there's There's no point to ever you know fight alongside one or the other because we're all after the exact same goal.

00:31:54.57
Mike
Right.

00:31:57.38
Mike
exactly Exactly.

00:31:57.81
Bill
right

00:31:58.46
Mike
Yeah, right. Hopefully. Yeah, the goal is to, yeah, right.

00:32:00.25
Alex 
Right, right, hopefully, right.

00:32:01.91
Mike
Stop hurting ourselves and stop hurting the people around us. Period.

00:32:05.48
Alex 
Exactly.

00:32:05.55
Mike
And however you get there, who fucking cares as long as you get there?

00:32:10.27
Bill
Right. You know, and the the funny part, too, so both of us, so both Mike and I got sober in 2010. And, you know, I didn't really know. I heard about i moved back to Wisconsin in 2013, probably 2015 range is the first time I met somebody um and she was involved in smart recovery. And I knew nothing about it up until that point.

00:32:32.47
Bill
I'd never even heard of it. And then when we started doing the podcast and what, that's when I joined Instagram under the sober and amateur thing, which is coming up on three years ago. That's when, well, first of all, here's, and I say this all the time.

00:32:45.47
Bill
So I get on Instagram and I hear about everyone everyone's talking about their sober Instagram, just search this. And I met a couple of people that are like, yeah, just follow the people that I follow and you'll grow this network. And you know we have, but Um, and I, I keep seeing all this AF stuff, AF this and AF that. And I'm like, oh, these people like ass fuck whatever, you know? And I'm like, I said that to somebody that like, that stands for alcohol free, you fucking Nimrod.

00:33:06.29
Mike
Hehehehe.

00:33:06.37
Bill
And I'm like, I'm like, oh, I'm like, I don't know. You know, and didn't know. I didn't, I never heard of alcohol free. I never heard of sober curious. I never heard a gray area drinking.

00:33:13.64
Alex 
Right.

00:33:15.58
Bill
I never, I never even understood. i got it. You know, on the concept of people, you know, trying to stay sober without, it was mainly, i knew people who, were, you know, the alcoholic variety of that that probably needed AA, probably needed that type of structured program, strayed from it, could never stay sober.

00:33:33.71
Bill
So I didn't understand all these other processes and all these other things. And it's been a real eye-opener. And I love, you know I love to learn things and take on new things. And we've had plenty of people on the podcast. We don't have...

00:33:46.76
Bill
it's not like we have guests all the time, but when we do, there's always a little bit of something different, but we've had straight AA people on here, Mike. I mean, we've had people, all the people from Cleveland, ah but then we've had people that are just not, you know, so it's, it's interesting to me.

00:33:53.97
Mike
Sure.

00:33:59.44
Bill
The, the path can be, everyone's on the same path. It's a wide roadway with a bunch of different lanes.

00:34:04.51
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:34:05.53
Bill
Somebody's on the inside lane. Somebody's in the middle lane, but we're all going to the same goddamn place, you know, and it's, it's really cool.

00:34:09.95
Alex 
Yep. yep

00:34:11.73
Bill
But the changes in that, Between, you know, again, 2010 to now, um there's been so many, again, eye-opening things. And you're right. There's been so much more of an openness.

00:34:24.29
Bill
I see more people on LinkedIn, you know, this professional, you know, network talking about recovery. You see more people on Instagram. You see people just in general, um you know, these bars, these stores, these restaurants, all that have non-alcoholic, you know, drinks and, you know, huge menus and huge sections and, know,

00:34:42.83
Bill
You know, it's just that there is there's been a change in a cultural change in a really positive way, I think. But there's still people out there that, oh, you don't drink. yeah

00:34:52.42
Alex 
Right. Oh, yeah, absolutely. That'll never change.

00:34:55.04
Bill
Right. So you mentioned the the Wisconsin culture. And I kind of laughed at that because, you know, here's the thing. I couldn't have stayed in Wisconsin. At the time, I didn't know what I want what i needed to do. I sure as hell didn't want to get sober. But, you know, I was taken out of Wisconsin to Cleveland and obviously got sober out there. Not obviously, but got sober out there.

00:35:13.24
Bill
um But then moving back to Wisconsin and being around, um you know, different people, And it was, it was a change. it It was, it was amazing to me. It was easy enough to find sober people.

00:35:23.74
Bill
If you're looking for them, go in a meeting or that sort of thing.

00:35:25.75
Alex 
Right.

00:35:26.06
Bill
So that was easy enough, but it is, um, it was a real eye opener to me, uh, getting back around that situation. I don't want to say, i don't know, were we sheltered in Cleveland right away, Mike, I suppose, you know, I mean, that's all we, that's all we did.

00:35:38.47
Mike
Yeah, yeah. yeah

00:35:40.40
Bill
You know, first few years is hung around, you know, meetings and sober people all the time. Right. You know, for the most part. But, um you know, it was it was kind of amazing. It was eye opening everywhere that you went. I just realized that every part of my life um involved alcohol. Whereas, you know, I mean, if somebody is a drug user, every every they didn't maybe I'm only going here because I can I can use or I'm only going here because I drink.

00:36:01.92
Bill
It's just what everyone did, you know.

00:36:03.54
Alex 
Right. Absolutely.

00:36:05.17
Bill
So do you think that was, I mean, was that truly difficult for you to to be, or is it now, you know, to to be in an area where, um I don't know, where where people are drinking? Do you still find challenges to that or no?

00:36:17.03
Alex 
Well, that's interesting, you know, cause I do, I work, I work at a bar. i work at like a pretty much ah a little mom and pop dive bar down here in Arizona now. And like, it was, it was interesting because like,

00:36:29.19
Alex 
I'm the only sober one there. You know, all that's not true. We just, we just hired somebody else in recovery, which, which is awesome. She's an amazing person and it's been awesome to, to connect with her as well.

00:36:36.77
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:36:39.21
Alex 
But, um but like for a while it was just me and, you know, like it it's in like, you know, a not, it's in like a very industrial part of town. So it's a very like, you know, we get a lot of like blue collar and we get a lot of like, we get a lot of like, you know,

00:36:52.52
Alex 
you know, rough and tough people and you know, theyre their their first reaction when I tell them that, you know, I don't drink because they'll offer to buy me a drink or they're offered to like, you know, buy me this.

00:37:01.66
Bill
Thank you.

00:37:02.06
Alex 
I'll be like, well, I don't drink. And their first reaction is that like, what? And then they find out I'm from Wisconsin. And then they're like, this makes absolutely no sense. You know, why are you, what are you doing?

00:37:08.86
Mike
Ha ha ha ha ha.

00:37:10.66
Bill
yeah

00:37:10.77
Alex 
What are you doing behind the bar or making me a drink right now? And I'm just like, and and it's awesome because every single time that I have this conversation with somebody, like, because most of them know me or they like have had enough interaction with me that like,

00:37:24.61
Alex 
they know my personality and they know my character and they know how like I interact with people respectfully. We have a really good conversation and it's led to, it's led to like, it's led to a lot of conversations that I never expected to have with people that I never expected to be open to that kind of thing, you know?

00:37:41.96
Alex 
and and And it really shows how much addiction and alcoholism touches everybody's lives because every time that I have the conversation with somebody, they've usually been affected or know somebody that, you know, has been,

00:37:42.25
Mike
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

00:37:53.74
Alex 
has been deeply affected. So I think at this point in my life, it's not too difficult. When I first got out of prison though, and I was bartending in Wisconsin, even with me not liking alcohol, I drank every day, you know, just because that was just, it was what was around me.

00:38:06.60
Mike
the

00:38:09.20
Alex 
And the effect of it still made me feel better. You know, like it's still, it was, it was enough of an effect on me it numbed enough, but it also wasn't too much so that I could still minimize and be like, well, this isn't heroin.

00:38:23.61
Alex 
You know, like I'm not doing heroin.

00:38:24.24
Mike
Right. Right.

00:38:25.60
Alex 
and that And that was good.

00:38:26.29
Mike
Right.

00:38:26.56
Alex 
Like I sat kind of in that middle ground where I'm like, well, I'm not getting so fucked up that like I'm getting like heroin fucked up, but I'm also, you know,

00:38:34.42
Mike
right

00:38:34.90
Bill
Thank

00:38:35.44
Alex 
But I'm also not feeling all of my emotions. So it was like this really cool middle ground that I convinced myself was like healthy because I wasn't having these profound consequences that, you know, like I wasn't, I wasn't losing everything. You know, I wasn't going to jail every other week and like everything was pretty normal. I would have maybe a wild night out with my friends every once in a while. But beyond that, I didn't have the behavioral consequences I had.

00:39:00.47
Alex 
through addiction, through my heroin addiction. So it was like, it was a very, it was a very easy way to justify it all in my head, even though I knew it was, it was doing damage like to my mental health.

00:39:12.03
Bill
Yeah, but you're like, hey, but it's not heroin.

00:39:14.05
Alex 
Exactly.

00:39:14.30
Mike
Right.

00:39:14.53
Alex 
It's not heroin. Yeah, we're good.

00:39:15.49
Mike
z

00:39:17.10
Bill
It just kind of made me laugh because so and it it it usually gets brought up in certain circumstances, ah but I've never done any drugs, you know, and um I just did really I was just a boozer and that's all that I ever did. um

00:39:29.05
Mike
Yeah, he's that weirdo.

00:39:29.21
Bill
And, you know, was Yeah, I am. Yeah. And people, yeah everyone, everyone that we know with very few exceptions, all of our friends, Mike included, Mike's done everything.

00:39:38.78
Mike
Right?

00:39:39.75
Bill
Mike's done all the things, whatever I thought I might want to do. He's done, he's done it four times, you know?

00:39:42.14
Mike
I have. Mm-hmm. ah have

00:39:45.09
Bill
And, uh, but I mean, all of our friends, everyone was at least dual, if not triple or quadruple addicted to something, you know? Um, but the thing of it is, is that, you know, I was just, I was just killing myself slower, you know?

00:39:57.25
Alex 
Yep.

00:39:57.71
Bill
And I'm convinced that based on my, my mentality and my, the way my mind was and what I was, you know, clearly searching for in the, I want to get fucked up range. Um, all the drugs would have done for me is they, they would have got me there, but it would have killed me, you know?

00:40:12.02
Alex 
Right.

00:40:12.54
Bill
And I mean, I was close enough to death. I would have, I probably would have been, not even probably I'm, I'm convinced that if I would have ended up doing drugs on a regular basis, I would have liked it and I would have died, you know, long before I even had the chance to get sober That's why it made me laugh, you know, at least it's not heroin.

00:40:29.80
Mike
instance

00:40:30.42
Bill
Because, I mean, yeah, on a certain extent. Yeah, but yeah, I was I was getting myself. ah i was close enough to death on my own anyhow without without getting ah getting the drug use in there. So but, um you know, this ah actually seems what do you think, Mike? Seems like a good good breaking point.

00:40:45.27
Mike
It does. It does. We'll be right back with more Sober Not Mature and Alex, and we're going to find out more about his book right after these words from our sponsors.

00:41:04.01
Bill
All right, everyone. Welcome back. And yes, speaking of heroin, that's a hell of a good segue, Mike.

00:41:10.66
Mike
Ah, sure.

00:41:11.92
Bill
Thank you. Thank you. very You know, you set that up perfectly. But yeah, so yeah tell us about the book, anything and everything you want. And then your your email, and I looked up the website. So the poetry thing, are you involved in like a poetry group? Is there another book you did?

00:41:25.82
Bill
Tell us all the shit that you're into so everyone can everyone can buy some stuff from you.

00:41:30.76
Alex 
Absolutely.

00:41:30.92
Bill
Yeah.

00:41:31.16
Alex 
I would absolutely love to do that. So ill I'll tell you a little bit about how I kind of got back into poetry, because, of course, when I when I went back into that drinking culture outside of prison, I didn't write, you know, who I can who wants to write?

00:41:43.06
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:41:44.22
Alex 
I don't need I didn't need that anymore. The the writing that was filling the void that the alcohol was now filling. I didn't need to do any writing. So. I fell off from that. I got a great career working, doing epoxy concrete with Buddy's small ah company.

00:42:00.17
Alex 
And I kind of just convinced myself to like, hey, I'm just going to do this career path. I'll just drink in this Wisconsin culture and I'll just be an absolutely normal human being.

00:42:08.88
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:42:08.92
Alex 
And like I kind of mentioned earlier before i got, it didn't work, you know, what very, very quickly. it did, it did not work. um So like, and I, and you mentioned how the alcohol kind of like kills slowly. And I, I really resonate with that because it did a number on my mental health, but it wasn't a like, it wasn't a, an apparent thing right away.

00:42:29.27
Alex 
um i ended up going to therapy after like, right when I was trying to get sober, right when I was sober curious is the word they use now, right when I was trying to get sober curious from alcohol, I started going to therapy because the relationship I was in just wasn't going well. We were arguing about really dumb stuff. And I noticed a lot of what was going on in my head wasn't like wasn't good. like There was something not right there.

00:42:52.64
Alex 
And I ended up

00:42:53.10
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:42:53.77
Alex 
Ended up finding a therapist that i I loved. He was an amazing man. He worked in prison before before he worked on the street as a psychologist, and i ended up getting diagnosed with PTSD.

00:43:06.03
Alex 
And it it it didn't make a lot of sense to me at the time. i had always kind of... I'd always kind of, i had friends that served and family that served in the military. And so PTSD to me was always like this like major thing that like people went through like incredibly hard times and like, and like war and like, you know, just, just crazy, crazy, crazy trauma.

00:43:25.79
Alex 
And I didn't realize that like the, the small bits and pieces of trauma that I had, you know, experienced throughout my whole life without ever dealing with had snowballed into this, you know, big, huge, you know, mental health problem in my head. So after I was diagnosed with PTSD, I kind of started looking at ways that I could, you know,

00:43:48.95
Alex 
help my mental health. So I started going to the gym and like, so while while I'm trying to be sober curious, I started going to the gym again. I got in, I got in good shape. I ended up quitting drinking as I was getting more into the gym just because, you know, I started to get kind of back into that prison mentality where it was like, okay, I know what I need to do in order to feel good. And now that the alcohol isn't in the picture, like i kind of,

00:44:10.14
Alex 
I was kind of able to put the puzzle pieces back into place. And, but it still didn't work after about, you know, like six, seven months, I was still feeling like super miserable. i I couldn't really figure it out. I was going to therapy.

00:44:22.21
Alex 
ah you know, the relationship that I was having trouble in was going really well. I had a great career. i was making really good money. i was going to the gym every day. you know, I was doing literally like everything in my head that like I thought that I could do.

00:44:35.72
Alex 
And I remember sitting down with my dad one day and he's a career psychologist. He's retired now, but I sat down with him one day and I'm just like, i kind of need you to treat me like your client right now because like, I can't really, can't, cause he always tried really hard not to do that. He was always really good at like, not, you know,

00:44:51.50
Alex 
Not treating me like i was a client and treating me like I was his son.

00:44:53.87
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:44:54.74
Alex 
And I always respected that, you know, from him a lot. But I kind of said to him, I'm like, I need you to treat me like a client. I need you to help me figure out, you know, why I'm not feeling fulfilled, even though I feel like I'm doing everything that I should be doing.

00:45:07.34
Alex 
And it was like, it was apparent to him. and He's like, I haven't, I haven't seen you pick up a pen or a book since you've been out of prison. And that's all you talked about while you were, while you were in there. And it was like a light bulb just flipped in my head. I was like, Oh, like, Oh, hold on. I want to make sure my computer just, my computers went item mode for a second.

00:45:24.53
Alex 
Can you hear me?

00:45:25.52
Mike
Yes.

00:45:25.60
Bill
ah Yeah, we can hear you.

00:45:26.07
Alex 
All right. All right. All right. Cool. Cool. Cool. My computer went idle.

00:45:28.30
Bill
yeah

00:45:29.24
Alex 
um But anyway, he was like, he was like, yeah, you haven't, you haven't picked up a pen or read a book since, since you got out of prison. And I was like, and it and it was literally like, oh, this makes perfect sense. um So I kind of I dived into it right then. This was probably,

00:45:43.18
Alex 
this was probably after all this came to fruition, 2022 sometime. And I quit my job. I quit my career. um And I decided that I was going to figure out how to do something in poetry for my career and for my life. So I went back to just just straight bartending.

00:46:02.18
Alex 
um I had gotten to the point after I quit drinking, it was very easy for me to not drink again. I didn't really ever crave it again, i guess, because I think I I think I realized pretty quick that there wasn't anything about it that I really liked. i was just doing it to do it for lack of a better term.

00:46:17.47
Alex 
So I went back, i just went back to bartending and I formed the collective that I called the Lifted Poets Society. And that happened in about 2022. um And the goal with this society was to be able to create safe spaces for people to like publish, share, and like express and like view art. So it was kind of the idea in my head was a community that advocates through art, for lack of a better term. It started out...

00:46:45.62
Alex 
It started out in like the the depths of like just a bunch of random little ideas that I was throwing around. But then as it kind of came to fruition, um I realized that it was something that I could do.

00:46:58.24
Alex 
So I started writing a lot more and I started working on my first collection, which is called Tomorrow Stole Today.

00:47:04.23
Bill
you

00:47:05.64
Alex 
um and it was a book of – it actually is based off – like the meditation books that I would read in treatment. So it's a book of 365 poems, one for each day of the year.

00:47:17.57
Alex 
And it's kind of set up like a meditation style book. So like each poem, each poem you read a poem and then you like, there's a little excerpt at the bottom that kind of, explains my thoughts and feelings. And they're all poems that I had written sometime throughout my life. So they were poems that I wrote in prison. They were poems that I wrote before prison. They were poems that I wrote in different treatment centers.

00:47:36.93
Alex 
And it was a it was a way for me to figure out how to self publish because my kind of, my large goal vision for the collective is to be able to, um publish books for people that are in recovery. Like that's kind of the, that's kind of the long-term goal is to have an affordable way for people that are in recovery to like publish art, publish poetry, publish books, publish their photos, you know, photo photography exhibits and stuff like that is kind of the, the large vision to it all. And so I started writing that book and as that kind of came to fruition, I decided that I needed to get out of Wisconsin.

00:48:12.25
Alex 
And um it was largely due to the drinking culture, not so much of, I guess, not so much of me being worried about drinking or me feeling, you know, tempted to drink. But I just I really wanted to experience a culture that promoted wellness and and kind of promoted poetry and promoted art more than what I was finding in Wisconsin and my parents had started snowboarding in, uh, in Northern Tucson, Arizona. And the couple times that I had visited there, they had brought me around to different cultural and, you know, art museums and stuff like that. And I realized that the community down there was exactly, you know, what I was looking for.

00:48:54.46
Alex 
And so I decided in 2023 to pack up everything and officially make the Lifted Poets Society like an LLC, an actual company, and go out to Arizona and just kind of go out on a limb and try to do this thing.

00:49:10.52
Alex 
And so I did that. ah And things went really good and really, really bad all at the same time, which I think is just, I think that's just the balance of life.

00:49:16.86
Mike
ccc

00:49:19.88
Mike
Right?

00:49:21.20
Alex 
But um when I got down there, I immediately tore my ACL. Immediately. I mean, like two weeks two weeks there, I'm in the mountain. oh i I did a lot of like marathon running and mountain running um for a while there. And two weeks into my my move in Arizona, I tore my ACL in the mountains. And it was just like...

00:49:39.70
Alex 
That was a thing. And then like my cat died, like immediately after that, it was just like this whirlwind of like bad things started happening as soon as I made this decision. And I was, I was so lost at first. I remember thinking to myself, um,

00:49:53.75
Alex 
Like, what do I do? I just packed up everything. You know, I quit my career. You know, I took all the money I had to come down here and like get this apartment. And like, you know, I have a I had a brand new job bartending that, you know, I'd only worked like three shifts at.

00:50:10.19
Alex 
um Everything was just kind of falling apart. Like my my cat was my best friend. And like everything was just like I didn't really know what to do. And dos so I did the only thing that I knew would work for the first time in my life. Like for the first time in my life, I took the actual tool that I had and that was poetry.

00:50:27.59
Alex 
And I went to some random open mic um at some random coffee shop that I had never been to I was a distraught human. um I had written a poem about my cat that ah that I knew I was just going to absolutely just ball over and cry And I just went to this open mic and I just shared it with them. And I cried with a bunch of strangers. And it was like the most healing experience because I met people, everyone came up to me. They were people in recovery, people that, you know, had family in recovery, people that ran treatment centers. Like it was just a, a poetry community of people that either were in recovery or understood recovery from like a firsthand or secondhand experience.

00:51:09.16
Alex 
And it was just like, yeah, it was one of those experiences where I was kind of like, Hey, like this is, this is the whole point of why I came down here. This is like what i what I want to do. And it was like, it was like everything went bad and then everything started to go good right away. So I entered that poem in a contest and actually won and was flown.

00:51:29.10
Bill
Nice.

00:51:29.71
Alex 
Yeah. i was flown out to Washington, d c for mobilize recovery. I don't know if you've ever heard of the, the conference called mobilize recovery, but they'll go to like different cities and they do kind of like uh,

00:51:39.13
Bill
Mm-mm.

00:51:43.31
Alex 
a big joint like style conference where they bring a bunch of like different advocates and pathways to recovery all together. It was a really cool experience. I was a part of a storytelling narrative there. I got to perform a poem in front of Macklemore.

00:51:56.86
Alex 
so it was like, it was all this, like, it was all this really cool, cool stuff. But I mean, I've been yapping for a while. So, so if there's, if there's anything you want to ask, I'll, I'll kind of, I'll kind of stop there, but that's kind of where, that's kind of where everything started.

00:52:09.24
Alex 
So we kind of, yeah, yeah, that makes sense.

00:52:11.87
Mike
Yeah, well, so, okay, I've got two things I got out of all that.

00:52:14.08
Alex 
Absolutely.

00:52:15.35
Mike
um First of all, right, you you you took a chance and you went out and you followed your heart, which is good. um Yeah, it started shit started to go bad because you were, like, by yourself, man.

00:52:30.02
Mike
And so you you took that that next step and you went and you got out with other people. You got out of yourself. And really the whole thing with – This collective is, i mean, what you're saying is you're you're, yes, you're helping yourself and you're doing things for yourself and you're writing, you're trying to promote your own poetry, whatever.

00:52:50.28
Mike
But you're also trying to help other people, being of service, bringing other people's lives, making other people's lives better, which is the fucking key to this whole thing.

00:52:54.10
Bill
Right.

00:53:03.45
Mike
you know No matter if it's a 12-step or any other whatever recovery in itself, in its bare essence, is making other people's lives better. And we talk about it all the time. And then somehow our lives get better because we're trying to do that.

00:53:19.75
Alex 
Absolutely. Exactly.

00:53:21.35
Mike
That's it, man. You fucking said it without saying it in the cliche ways that we hear in church basements all the fucking time.

00:53:28.31
Bill
yeah Yeah.

00:53:29.48
Alex 
yeah it's cool.

00:53:29.61
Bill
And you know

00:53:30.12
Alex 
it's

00:53:30.99
Bill
Well, i was just going to say yeah real quick, I don't mean to interrupt you. Sorry about that. But it's, it's so funny.

00:53:34.05
Alex 
No, no, fine. don't.

00:53:35.46
Bill
There's been ah two or three people I can think of right off the bat, Mike, that um we've really talked to on here.

00:53:40.82
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:53:40.85
Bill
One guy's name was Nico. Same thing. He went through this, you know, hardcore stuff and tried a little 12 step thing. Wasn't for him. But then he's telling us about all these things. He's like, I got involved with some people and I,

00:53:52.78
Bill
was doing this thing and I got a mentor. And that's the word that he used.

00:53:55.21
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:53:55.81
Alex 
Yup, yup.

00:53:56.15
Bill
And this guy started walking me through this process. He's going through this whole thing. And I'm trying not to laugh because it's a very heartfelt story.

00:54:01.58
Mike
Right.

00:54:03.16
Bill
Then at the end of it, I'm like, Mike, did any of that sound familiar to you? and he's like, yeah.

00:54:06.42
Alex 
Yup.

00:54:06.67
Mike
Yeah.

00:54:07.07
Bill
He goes like, yeah.

00:54:07.30
Mike
Yep.

00:54:07.59
Bill
you just We're like, Nico, you just ran through the 12 steps without running through the 12 steps.

00:54:12.46
Alex 
Exactly.

00:54:13.13
Mike
yo

00:54:13.39
Bill
And he's like, he's talking about it He's like, yeah, because he would, he again, he had these outskirts of the of the recovery thing. And that's the coolest thing. um Literally what we talk about. Mike's the one that came up with the saying, making our little corner of the world a better place.

00:54:26.96
Bill
Okay. So when we do that and when we help other people and our our sponsor and his sponsor and all these guys and in Cleveland, always call it AA math. We, we give, we give, we give, and we get back more.

00:54:38.36
Bill
None of it makes any sense, you know, but it is really, you could label it recovery math if you wanted to, it doesn't have to be AA math.

00:54:39.02
Alex 
Yep. Nope. Yep.

00:54:45.22
Bill
It's just what we were taught. But, but the other thing too, is what I thought about is, is all this bad shit, you know, So you, again, you take the chance, you follow your heart, everything that Mike said. And then my, my thought, not just getting around people. And I'm like, life does this to us every once a while. Like, okay, you want something motherfucker? How bad do you want it?

00:55:02.74
Alex 
Yep.

00:55:02.95
Bill
I'm going to punch you there. I'm going to kill your cat. I'm going to do all these different things.

00:55:06.01
Alex 
Yep.

00:55:06.61
Bill
And then do you still want it? Yeah. Get your fucking ass out there and cry in front of people. You don't know. It reads, it reads some shit.

00:55:11.44
Mike
he

00:55:12.21
Alex 
Exactly. do some do some hard shit.

00:55:13.77
Bill
How fuck. Yeah. Yeah, how fucking bad do you want it?

00:55:15.44
Mike
yo

00:55:17.48
Bill
you know And it's it's beautiful because not being little bit crass about the whole thing, but that's really what I think about. Every time you know weird shit happens and Mike and I talk about, we sat in a meeting years ago. we were really raw, new, two, three, four weeks, maybe a month sober.

00:55:33.66
Bill
And this guy's up at the podium and he's talking and he's telling a story and he's five, six six years sober. And he tells us, he's like, I don't have any egos. I don't have bad days anymore. And we're all we're all fucking brand new. We're like, you're fucking nuts, dude.

00:55:47.39
Bill
you know Look at where we are. there's this is This whole place is bad days. you know

00:55:50.73
Alex 
right

00:55:51.60
Bill
And in what he said, he goes, I have bad moments.

00:55:55.08
Alex 
Right.

00:55:55.11
Bill
He goes, these things that happen, and Mike and I talk about it, every day that you have is bad. ah Whatever happens, all this messed up stuff happens throughout the day.

00:56:04.76
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:56:04.80
Bill
Every one of us can pick out good moments. We can pick out these bright moments. Was it, you know, um I don't know, was it 23 hours and 55 minutes of bad moments and you had five minutes of peace and serenity?

00:56:16.68
Bill
Then it wasn't a bad day. You had a bunch of bad moments in there.

00:56:19.82
Alex 
right

00:56:20.03
Bill
You know, and and that's the thing is every time I get these these things, these things that are you know thrown at me and I don't we talk about it, too. It's not things that are happening to us. Why are what are these things trying to teach us? What do we try? What do what can I learn from this? You know.

00:56:35.33
Bill
We're not special. I'm not. It's why not me? You know, I mean, I got to go through stuff.

00:56:38.55
Alex 
Right, right, exactly.

00:56:39.82
Bill
Everyone's got to go through stuff. But what a great what a great thing, because all these things you the it's the tenacity. It's the you know, the the matter, the action, the the will and whatever you want to call it to keep moving through all this garbage to get to this point where you're.

00:56:54.12
Bill
Yeah, I mean, you get you know, everyone's you start living a ah relatively happy life and you're helping people, which is wonderful, you know.

00:57:02.20
Alex 
yeah Yeah, absolutely. um And i was going to I was going to piggyback. I figure I better tell a little bit like what we got going on now, too. Because ah since since since since kind of that inception and all that happened, there's been a lot that's happened since then, too.

00:57:10.86
Bill
absolutely. Okay.

00:57:17.82
Alex 
ah Right now, I've been working really closely with a nonprofit in Wisconsin called Rise Together. They do a lot of storytelling and youth outreach and stuff like that. So we've been doing a lot of, I've gotten a chance to go to you know Philadelphia to go to a summit. We go to a lot of different youth centers.

00:57:34.66
Alex 
in prison So kind of that like that helping people and like that that larger vision that I kind of explained before has really started to come to fruition this last year like I've gotten a lot of opportunities to get out there with the public and do like actual outreach and like actual advocation through art.

00:57:41.15
Mike
Mm-hmm.

00:57:51.62
Alex 
which is kind of like the whole point of this at the end of the day. And like, I've been able to partner with a local poet here named Chelsea. And we have we have a slam poetry competition that we are getting going and, you know, writing workshops for, for youth and marginalized groups out here, because we have a lot of that in some of our, you know, less,

00:58:10.56
Alex 
ah less wealthy neighborhoods. So all these really, really cool things have been able to come to fruition. And it really, it really is like pushing through those times where it's like, do you want it bad enough?

00:58:22.66
Alex 
Cause I've had so many of those, I've had a I've had a shit show the last, you know, six months to a year.

00:58:23.75
Bill
hey

00:58:24.74
Mike
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

00:58:28.07
Alex 
So like, I've had a lot of those moments where I kind of, you know, have felt like, I don't know if I can do this anymore. You know, I don't know if like I have it in me to continue pushing through all this stuff.

00:58:38.86
Alex 
But every time that I do, it's like this immediate, you know, immediate strong word. It doesn't always come immediately, but I'm always, I'm always, I'm always getting back, you know, so much more than what I put in every time.

00:58:45.30
Mike
hey

00:58:50.68
Mike
Absolutely. Yeah, there is gratification. It's just not fucking instant anymore.

00:58:53.98
Alex 
Exactly. all right Exactly.

00:58:57.91
Bill
So, and as you were talking about this, and I want to make sure i'm going to, I'm going to put all these notes or all these links in, um be at least in Spotify. I don't know if it clicks through on everything else, but so I see you have a website.

00:59:10.19
Bill
um You're Alex shot in poetry.com. There's your lift poet society or lifted poet society.

00:59:12.46
Alex 
Yep.

00:59:16.05
Bill
um Do you want me to direct people to your book through Amazon? Is that preferred? Cause I got, I have,

00:59:20.74
Alex 
Yeah, that's stay that, that it's on Amazon and Barnes and Noble is where it's at so far, but Amazon is probably the preferred. Yes.

00:59:26.51
Bill
Easiest one. Okay. So I've got that.

00:59:27.30
Alex 
Yep.

00:59:28.23
Bill
And then I was just trying to look up, um, rise Wisconsin. Is there, is there a website with that?

00:59:34.44
Alex 
It's called, I think the website is we all hold on. Let me,

00:59:39.42
Bill
You're like me when I type, we all come on, dude, you're, you're fucking young too.

00:59:40.68
Alex 
Yeah, that's exactly what I'm doing. Oh, what is

00:59:45.23
Bill
We're, you know, we're, we're in our mid fifties here.

00:59:47.94
Mike
Now I'm in my late 50s.

00:59:49.53
Bill
i was trying to give you the benefit of the doubt, you know?

00:59:51.02
Mike
I appreciate it.

00:59:51.69
Alex 
together.org.

00:59:53.42
Mike
No, as of last Tuesday, I am no longer in my mid-fucking 50s.

00:59:58.80
Alex 
ah it is we we all rise together dot org

01:00:03.64
Bill
okay Sam, now I'm going to do it.

01:00:05.16
Mike
cool

01:00:05.84
Bill
since We all rise together.

01:00:07.09
Mike
yeah yeah

01:00:10.07
Bill
okay but yeahall I'll put the link to that too. um ah Awesome.

01:00:13.82
Alex 
I did follow you guys on Instagram too. I got, I got you over there too.

01:00:16.63
Bill
Okay.

01:00:17.34
Alex 
So my Instagram Alex shot and poetry, but I'll, I'll send all that over to you in an email too. Just so it's, just so it's.

01:00:23.61
Mike
cool.

01:00:25.84
Bill
Okay. But um yeah, and I'm not trying to cut you off. I mean, we're don't worry.

01:00:28.68
Alex 
Oh, you're fine. You're fine.

01:00:29.32
Bill
We're not even close to ending necessarily yet, but um I just, I need to, I need to, if I want to make notes about these things, I obviously, obviously want to do it.

01:00:37.18
Alex 
On the exact same way.

01:00:37.43
Bill
So yeah, it is, but it's weallrisetogether.org though, correct?

01:00:38.16
Alex 
I understand.

01:00:41.91
Alex 
yep

01:00:42.54
Bill
Okay, perfect. But, um, okay. So you got the thing in, still back in Wisconsin, you're doing the thing down in, in Arizona. Um, I mean, when the book itself, when did you, I don't know, when did you put the book together? When did you, when did it come out? Was, was there a book beforehand you said or?

01:01:01.41
Alex 
There was.

01:01:01.54
Mike
Yeah, the meditation style one.

01:01:02.54
Alex 
Yep.

01:01:04.13
Mike
Right.

01:01:04.29
Bill
Oh yeah. Yeah. Okay.

01:01:05.35
Mike
what waves it God, it was a cool title, too. Say it again.

01:01:08.13
Alex 
It was Tomorrow Stole Today. i love the title.

01:01:09.97
Mike
Yeah, that's it.

01:01:10.31
Bill
Sure.

01:01:10.37
Alex 
Yes.

01:01:10.69
Mike
Yeah, yeah, that's great.

01:01:11.05
Alex 
If.

01:01:11.57
Mike
Well, and that's that's fucking recovery shit, too, man.

01:01:13.57
Alex 
Yeah, absolutely.

01:01:14.41
Mike
Right, yeah.

01:01:14.48
Alex 
Absolutely.

01:01:15.38
Mike
Right. You're letting the future or the past steal today. And all we have is right fucking now.

01:01:21.26
Alex 
Exactly. Exactly. ah I want to quick quick side note on that one. I really want to redo that book.

01:01:26.66
Bill
sure

01:01:27.67
Alex 
I put that book together, um not hastily, but I had no idea what I was doing.

01:01:28.38
Mike
Hmm.

01:01:32.68
Alex 
I wanted to learn how to be able to self-publish. Yeah, I just i wanted to be able to learn. I was like, if I want to do this for other people, I need... just like AA and n a you know if i want If I want to do this for other people, I need to learn how to do it myself.

01:01:42.12
Mike
Yup.

01:01:46.18
Alex 
So like that was a real big learning process for me.

01:01:46.52
Mike
Yup.

01:01:49.45
Alex 
And I really want to go back through it and kind of re-edit it and like and get it, because I really think it could be a lot better than what it was, but i i still love it and I still love the concept of it.

01:01:56.27
Mike
Hmm.

01:01:58.92
Mike
Right.

01:01:58.98
Alex 
But that one that one came out right around right after I got back from, or no, right before I went out to Washington, DC. So kind of the same time that I won that contest, that book came out. and And then when I got back, actually, it was kind of, it was kind of the same situation as when I lost my cat and I wrote a poem there. I didn't really know what to do. I think,

01:02:22.21
Alex 
I think a lot of people, and I don't know if this is, this is probably just a human nature thing, not just addicts and alcoholics, but when a lot of really good things happen or like, like for all this easy example, when I got like flown out to DC and like, I got to perform a poem in front of like, you know, hundreds of people. And I had a bunch of people come up to me afterwards and be like, Oh, we can't wait to see, you know, where you go from here.

01:02:44.91
Alex 
You kind of get this, like, I got this inflated ego and I got like, and I exactly and

01:02:47.79
Mike
me is how just I was just thinking, stroking your ego, right, it and it makes you lazy.

01:02:51.89
Alex 
Yeah, exactly.

01:02:52.12
Bill
hey

01:02:52.73
Alex 
And so, exactly.

01:02:53.92
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:02:54.55
Alex 
So then I get home, then I get home and that's all stripped away from me. You know, I don't have Macklemore's phone number. He's not calling me and telling me how great I did anymore. I don't have all these people, you know, showing up and being like, Hey, you're doing this amazing job.

01:03:07.80
Alex 
It's just me alone again. And it was kind of like nothing was coming out.

01:03:10.35
Mike
see

01:03:12.50
Alex 
You know, I was waking up at like 4am and I was drinking a bunch of coffee and I was trying to, force as much of this creativity out after that whole experience. Cause I'm like, Hey, I can't stop now. Like we just got a little bit of momentum. We got to go, go, go, go. go And nothing was coming out. Like I was just like, it was, I was coming up empty. I was just staring at my computer screen. I was just staring at notebooks.

01:03:34.62
Alex 
And so I got coffee with like my only friend down here, her name's Angelica and she's this amazing poet. And we caught we got coffee one day because we used to have these little writing sessions where we would just bounce ideas off each other. And I'm just like, i need your help because I don't really know what to do.

01:03:50.14
Alex 
And she's like, well, what did you do last time? you know what happened What happened when you were feeling like this?

01:03:54.11
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:03:55.87
Alex 
And, you know, the whole, my, my cat Bravo passed away. and I'm like, you know, that, that makes sense.

01:04:00.80
Bill
Thank you.

01:04:01.01
Alex 
Like I kind of saw where she was going and she's like, you kind of need to try to channel that same, that same feeling of like wanting to get it out. It just didn't want to come out as much as like my cat passing.

01:04:13.14
Alex 
Cause that was like an immediate traumatic thing. This was like something that was deeper inside of me. And so I went home that day, from the coffee shop. And I wrote this poem called, I learned how to love from heroin. That was the, that was the title. That was literally the title of the poem. And it's actually the prologue now to the, to the book.

01:04:32.30
Alex 
And I just wrote it out and it was like this spoken word piece. And it was amazing. Like it was, it was, it's to this day, probably my, my favorite poem that I wrote, but it just describes how, how I was a human and how like heroin was this woman that I fell in love with.

01:04:46.03
Alex 
And it describes her as like, it describes her as like, it it identifies her as a human rather than a substance.

01:04:46.26
Mike
e

01:04:52.27
Alex 
And, and it really, it really helped understand,

01:04:52.82
Bill
Right.

01:04:52.86
Mike
Right.

01:04:56.78
Alex 
put into perspective all of these feelings that I had unpacked in years and years of therapy, but I kind of repacked because I didn't need them anymore. You know what i mean? I didn't really need to, I didn't really need to talk about, you know, like my experience with heroin.

01:05:05.52
Mike
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

01:05:10.22
Alex 
And now I was able to channel these emotions in like a way that felt really healthy. So like for, for the first time since probably prison, I was writing about my use and my addiction in a dramatic poetic way, but in a way that felt really healthy to my soul.

01:05:26.89
Alex 
And I just did the same thing. I ended up, I ended up going out to San Diego, actually me and my dad took a little six hour trip out to the coast of San Diego. And there was a, there was a poetry slam competition, which is basically if for people that don't know what a poetry slam is, it's an open mic.

01:05:42.15
Alex 
So think of like an open mic for a musician or like a comic or like a poet.

01:05:45.78
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:05:46.52
Alex 
And, um, And it's just like, it's a competition. So like the people in the audience judge, instead of it just being like a random open mic, they give five people scorecards and you're judged by five random humans at night. And that's just kind of, it's a subjective way to kind of look at poetry and make it a little more fun.

01:06:03.78
Alex 
But I performed this, this poem out there and I didn't realize that I was in the presence of like, uh, like poetry royalty. Like there were people out there that had won, like national competitions and were like repeat world champions. And I had no idea what I was getting myself into, but it was amazing. Like my poem really resonated with people. It's like one of those poems where like when I perform it, I like kind of go into a trance because it's so like, it's, it's that much of like a part of me that like,

01:06:32.24
Alex 
it really just puts me into this emotional trance and people really resonated with me.

01:06:32.34
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:06:36.67
Alex 
i had multiple people come up to me afterwards. I got so much contact information and it just, it was another one of those experiences where it was just like, you know what? Screw it. Like I remember telling my dad, cause he's retired and he was like, yeah, well if you want to go, we'll go.

01:06:50.63
Alex 
You know what I mean? He's like, I got, I got nothing else going on.

01:06:53.00
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:06:54.49
Alex 
And but i but the the funny part is I needed him to drive home because I worked the next day. So it was it was a Monday poetry slam and we live six hours away. So it's a 12 hour round trip drive.

01:07:06.14
Alex 
So we could be left that day at like 6 a.m. and I drove out there. We did the poetry slam that was at like 7 p.m. and then we got back on the road. at like, you know, 10 and my dad drove back.

01:07:18.28
Alex 
So like, we just did this 12 hour trip and I was like, i feel like a starving artist.

01:07:20.80
Bill
Yeah.

01:07:22.60
Alex 
We're like, you know, we, we packed up the van, we got the guitar and the drums and we just, we just headed out West to the first, the first performance we could find.

01:07:27.57
Mike
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

01:07:30.22
Alex 
But it was such an amazing experience and it it just, The floodgates opened after that. I got home and the book just kind of, the book just flowed out of me. And um honestly, I wrote the book in probably less than two months.

01:07:39.17
Mike
see

01:07:43.84
Alex 
It took me, it took me about nine months to edit it because that part was just, that part is really, really, really hard for me. So, but again, I wanted to learn how to do it all myself because in the future I would like to, you know, be able to be able to publish books in like a professional manner for people in recovery.

01:07:50.88
Mike
a

01:08:00.31
Alex 
So So yeah, that's kind of, that's kind of how that got started. And then it released on, oh, why am I blanking on the date? ah ah released on, I believe, November 12th.

01:08:11.81
Alex 
I could be completely butchering that, but it was sometime, it was sometime middle of November.

01:08:12.23
Mike
Okay.

01:08:16.37
Mike
Gotcha.

01:08:16.89
Bill
So just this past November, right?

01:08:18.50
Alex 
Yes, correct.

01:08:19.24
Bill
Okay.

01:08:19.25
Alex 
Yep.

01:08:19.85
Bill
So here's here's a weird thing. And again, probably something that maybe maybe we talked about in all the emails back and forth, but there was a time when when I got your email, and I only say I because I just happen to be the one that that fields the emails, but we.

01:08:33.62
Mike
I don't do shit.

01:08:35.10
Bill
Yeah. yeah But um so when when the email came in from you, there was like, God, probably there had to been one, a handful, because I was forwarding all these things to Mike, too. Anytime we get, um obviously, a guest request or ah somebody like yourself, anything like that, um you know, Mike and I...

01:08:52.67
Bill
Well, most of the time, there was one that we just got today. We're like, yeah, I answered before I even said it to him because this one, we I know he wants anyhow, but we'll talk about that in the future.

01:09:00.33
Mike
yeah

01:09:02.54
Bill
But um so send it to him. We always talk about it, but there was yours and probably five other people that had either projects or books. And the emails almost looked like they were all structured the same.

01:09:14.89
Bill
Okay. So my question to you is, how did you hear from us? Where did we end up on a mailing list? I guess just curiosity wise.

01:09:21.48
Alex 
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So I just used a, I just used like a freelance like marketing website, not mark marketing is the wrong word. It's like a freelance literature website. it's So it's like Fiverr, but for um like literature, if that makes sense.

01:09:35.82
Alex 
And there was just, there was an author on there that had just lists that he compiled.

01:09:36.26
Bill
OK. OK.

01:09:40.20
Alex 
So he compiled like library lists, he compiled like self-help podcast lists. He just, he basically had just spent his time compiling all these lists. and Anyone that had anyone that had open guest requests.

01:09:51.54
Alex 
And then you like I literally just, I paid them a small amount of money and I got the list. And then I used MailChimp to just send out basically a mass email so to everybody.

01:10:00.02
Bill
okay

01:10:01.57
Alex 
And then honestly, I didn't hear back from a lot of podcasts. I was excited when I heard back from yours. I heard back from a lot of libraries, surprisingly. libraries Libraries are all about ah self-published books, which I was not aware of whatsoever.

01:10:09.24
Mike
hey

01:10:09.41
Bill
Huh.

01:10:15.75
Alex 
But yeah, that's how that's how I found out about y'all.

01:10:18.46
Bill
Interesting. So there was, there was somebody else, um, John that we had the, uh, Mike over the summertime when he had the book about the of the monkey, the, I can't think of the book that he wrote.

01:10:30.76
Bill
It was a recovery book. John's been around for number, but he, same thing. He had like an assistant that, you know, said, Hey, he wanted to get ahold of different podcasts in the same thing. It was like within minutes, this lady found, ah um, found the list of a podcast. We we've ended up on a, a few of these different lists, but it,

01:10:46.71
Bill
it It baffles me because I don't know how people i don't know how people i don't know how people find us.

01:10:48.77
Mike
Hehehehe.

01:10:49.74
Alex 
Yeah, right.

01:10:52.38
Bill
we're um We're a small podcast. We're not out there really. i I haven't signed up for any lists or anything like that. um we've got There's one website that I don't know if I had to join or whatever it was, but it's called Feedspot.

01:11:07.75
Bill
And it ranks podcast. And I think it said if you want to submit your podcast out and here, and I did. And we rank very well on there, which quite honestly, have no idea how. um I don't know.

01:11:16.47
Alex 
I do.

01:11:17.02
Bill
I don't know.

01:11:17.35
Alex 
Listen, you guys are entertaining. I listened to the whole last podcast and I listened to the whole hour and 44 minutes. So, I mean, you, yeah, you, you y'all are entertaining.

01:11:23.70
Mike
wow

01:11:25.34
Bill
Well, thank you. But I mean, we're we're we're ranked, when we first came out of Feedspot, we were in like, I don't know, we 25, 29, 30 something. We've been in the top five for like a year and a half. We're at number two right now.

01:11:38.99
Bill
And the only reason I look every day is the the one that's ahead of us right now is Recovery Elevator. And they're ah they're a big deal. Recovery Elevator, now if you've ever heard of them. They're a podcast. They do retreats. I heard about them to begin with the first podcast, Sober Podcast, I ever started listening to to Mike.

01:11:53.56
Bill
Um, that's the first podcast that she listened to. So I know of these folks and they're, they're a big fucking deal. They're always number one. I want to knock them out just once. All I want to do is get a screenshot of being number one on feed spot one time.

01:12:02.10
Alex 
Yeah.

01:12:02.30
Mike
He he he he he.

01:12:04.45
Alex 
Hell yeah.

01:12:05.92
Bill
I don't care if it never happens again, you know? So if I, if I think about it, I'm like, fuck, I got to check that today. But you know, parts of these things, um, thats said That's the interesting part. I mean, it's always interesting to us how people hear about us because, again, we're not one of those you know big podcasts or anything like that. But um you know we've had a lot of people say, too, that, my God, you guys responded right away or I can't believe you even got back to me.

01:12:29.72
Bill
And I'm thinking to myself, well, we get back to virtually – well, we get back to everyone. We respond to everyone. We've we've said a lot of no's. Yeah.

01:12:37.79
Mike
Yes, we have.

01:12:39.10
Bill
And we're not afraid to say no, we don't take everyone. I don't mean that for you to feel special, Alex, because we said yes.

01:12:43.73
Alex 
yeah

01:12:44.54
Mike
who

01:12:44.68
Alex 
Don't stroke my ego, okay?

01:12:46.04
Bill
No, that's it's it's not, you know, number one.

01:12:46.08
Alex 
Don't stroke my ego.

01:12:46.10
Mike
e

01:12:48.50
Bill
Well, yeah, well, we need it.

01:12:49.06
Mike
Shut down his creativity, man.

01:12:50.94
Alex 
All

01:12:51.87
Bill
Well, here we go, Alex. We needed a guest. So you just happened to be around whatever.

01:12:55.90
Alex 
right, all right.

01:12:56.43
Bill
It's OK. You know, you know, bar time where do just everyone that's every chick that's walking out? You're like, you want to go home with me? you want to go home with me? You said yes.

01:13:02.37
Alex 
I was the winner, huh?

01:13:03.21
Bill
That's it.

01:13:03.45
Alex 
Yes, all right.

01:13:03.99
Bill
Yeah. You said yes.

01:13:04.25
Alex 
Hey, we'll hey we'll take the wins where we can get them.

01:13:05.45
Bill
Yeah.

01:13:07.32
Mike
Ha ha ha ha.

01:13:07.49
Bill
but tell But no, it's just that we respond to everyone. But, you we've become very particular. We've been approached by people that want us to, um you know, promote non-alcoholic beverages. i Neither one of us have any problem with people who drink them.

01:13:20.44
Bill
We just don't. So we're not going to promote it.

01:13:21.87
Alex 
Right, right.

01:13:22.86
Bill
There's been, you know, certain things, you know, whatever this and whatever that. And there's people on there that we look at. We just don't if we don't think that, number one, that we line up with it right or we think that the people who listen to us are going to get the most out of it because that's really what it comes down to with a guest.

01:13:35.49
Alex 
Right, absolutely.

01:13:36.68
Bill
is Is somebody going to get something out of this? Because going back to whole selfish and self-centeredness, when we started this podcast, Mike, what was our goal of this?

01:13:46.31
Mike
Our goal is to just hang out on Friday night, man.

01:13:50.14
Alex 
Absolutely.

01:13:50.58
Bill
Yeah, that's literally, that's all we were going to do. We, you know, I was listening to this over podcast. I'm like, we're sitting here at at our sister's house, sitting up, standing outside of Thanksgiving. ah Yeah, Thanksgiving.

01:14:01.62
Bill
And i'm telling about all these fucking podcasts and I'm listening to them. I'm like, we could do that shit, right? We could just, you know, talk a bunch of shit into microphones, right? But we had no idea how to do it. So we just, I made a couple of inquiries and we were, we started off on our phones with um just, you know, if you ever, if I,

01:14:18.19
Bill
I feel bad for people to listen all the way back because the audio was terrible.

01:14:18.40
Mike
he

01:14:21.83
Mike
Yes, it was.

01:14:21.95
Bill
um You know, but that what we use now, the studio that you're in now, Alex, at Zencaster, it's very cool and it's cheap. It's 20 bucks a month, but it's wonderful. It's all that we need. um You know, but literally we figured let's get together. Mike and I wanted to have a meeting, wanted to talk and tell some stories.

01:14:38.15
Bill
And then, you know, people started listening and it's kind of cool. And then we turned, you know, realized the fact that we started getting a little bit of feedback and, That feels really good. It's humbling when somebody's like, you know, I listened to you.

01:14:49.46
Bill
This is exactly what I wanted to hear. Whatever the case may be, that shit, that's yeah that's fucking golden, you know?

01:14:55.30
Alex 
Exactly.

01:14:55.85
Mike
Again, yeah, helping other people, man.

01:14:56.06
Bill
it's It's a...

01:14:56.10
Alex 
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

01:14:57.98
Mike
It's the whole fucking point.

01:14:58.43
Bill
Yeah. Yeah, which is, I mean, ah pretty much what you've been talking about, Alex, with all of this, with your books and, you know, with your poetry and, you know, get up getting out in front of people. I mean, you're you're out there helping other people.

01:15:09.96
Bill
I mean, that's got to be, it sounds like it's very gratifying. i mean, I know it is, but right. Right.

01:15:15.33
Alex 
Yeah, yeah, no, it absolutely is. I, I, and it's weird because this, is this wasn't, I never thought that that was going to be like the fulfilling thing. Like I always knew, I always knew, like, especially when I was like in and out of the rooms, I knew I liked talking to people.

01:15:24.45
Bill
Right.

01:15:29.70
Alex 
Like I liked being able to share my story and I liked being able to help people, but I didn't realize like when I finally like let go of like being ah self-centered asshole,

01:15:40.21
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:15:40.27
Alex 
And like, I, I actually like like when I actually genuinely started enjoying helping people and not, because I think back in the day, i enjoyed, i enjoyed talking because I knew I was good at it.

01:15:40.53
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:15:50.88
Alex 
And I knew that selfishly people were going to tell me that like what I said resonated with them because I was able to weave it in a way that, you know, resonated with a lot of people.

01:15:51.40
Mike
he

01:16:00.31
Alex 
And like, I was able to drop that somewhere along the line through a lot of therapy, a lot of therapy, if I'm being honest. But I was able to drop that. And now it's like I just I genuinely find so much joy in just being able to like do the next right thing.

01:16:13.55
Alex 
And that's like the motto I live by is I just I always try to just do the next right thing no matter what.

01:16:14.16
Mike
Hehehehehehehehe.

01:16:15.15
Bill
yeah Really?

01:16:19.68
Alex 
And honestly, it's turned into like such a cool experience, like the opportunities I've had, the people I've met, like it's just been amazing. it's been so cool where like life has like started to take me and that's through a lot of bad shit. Like I've had, i had a few, sir I had two major, pretty major surgeries over the last six months that just came out of nowhere. And I've just been able to like, I've been able to, like you said, recognize those bad moments, but they haven't, they haven't gotten me back to that place where, where I was, or like, I haven't been able to not deal with it in like a healthy manner. So it's just been,

01:16:54.03
Alex 
It's been such an amazing experience actually enjoying genuinely like helping people rather than like enjoying the part of my ego that gets you know petted every time you know someone tells me I did a good job for helping someone else.

01:17:06.50
Mike
see

01:17:10.13
Mike
Yeah, pretty fucking nice, isn't it?

01:17:10.66
Bill
Right.

01:17:13.21
Alex 
It is.

01:17:13.79
Bill
Yeah. In the whole, the, the, do the next right thing, man. We were taught that almost like it had to be day fucking one. Right, Mike. But, uh, we say, we say that on on here all the time, you know, do the work, get the results, do the next right thing.

01:17:19.00
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:17:24.31
Bill
If all else fails, if you do those two things, do, you know, do the work and do the next right thing, whatever that thing might be. Um, you got a pretty goddamn good chance of making it through the day without hurting somebody else, you know, at least not, not intentionally, you know, so,

01:17:37.50
Alex 
Right, right.

01:17:38.48
Bill
um But yeah, it is ah it is amazing because you know some of some of this stuff, and I mean, we've been we've been around you know the sober community and we've been sober for a little bit, but um you know the the the character defects and the problems and um you know we need to do what we talk about it all the time.

01:17:54.20
Bill
We're not fixed. We're fixed. We're certainly not recovered. um You know, we're, we're not, you know, ah we're not just all done with this stuff. It it is every single day. We're in, this is explained to us at a retreat.

01:18:07.79
Bill
We're sitting in a group and kind of one of the breakout meetings. And this, this, this one, this one female got up and she was telling telling her story, whatever. And she's like, she's like every, every morning when I wake up, she's like, I'm standing at that, my toes at the end of the edge of a cliff.

01:18:22.17
Bill
And she said, every day, I wake up that way and that's where I am. I'm about ready on the edge of the cliff, ready to fall over the cliff. But she said, I just got to keep, you know, I do my readings, I do my prayers and I do this and I do that. And she's like, every everything that I do for my recovery allows me to take a step back. And she said, by the end of the day, if I'm doing everything properly, she's like, I can't even see the edge of the cliff anymore. But she's like, guess what? In the morning?

01:18:46.80
Bill
She's like, I'm right back at the edge of the cliff again.

01:18:47.50
Alex 
right back there I love that

01:18:49.17
Bill
And that was one of the, both Mike and I were like, that is,

01:18:52.34
Mike
Heh heh heh.

01:18:53.13
Bill
That's amazing, you know?

01:18:54.30
Alex 
yes

01:18:55.86
Bill
It's just, it was just, I'm a visual person. It was such a great analogy. um But literally, yeah, I mean, getting out there and and doing these things. Yeah, we got to do it every day. We got to get up. like Both of us do readings every morning. We're trying to do that. You know, we do this podcast. This is part of our recovery.

01:19:10.25
Bill
um You know, we get out and in the world and um even sometimes not even thinking about it, trying to do, you know, that next right thing. But, but man, same thing we were talking about before. What we get in return is, is absolutely amazing.

01:19:24.52
Bill
Just amazing.

01:19:27.85
Bill
So quick question. Um, and we're going to, you've obviously had, uh, did somebody contact you from the sober curator, Alex, to do a book review or did somebody just do the book review for you?

01:19:37.69
Alex 
i believe i believe ah i was in sent some emails back and forth with somebody about the book review.

01:19:37.91
Bill
Do you know?

01:19:44.13
Alex 
Yes.

01:19:45.01
Bill
Okay. So, um, we're part of actually the sober curator also, um,

01:19:48.58
Alex 
Okay, that's what that's what I've kind of was able to deduct from the last episode I listened to. Yes.

01:19:54.60
Bill
Yeah, so um the the short story there, it's been about a year and a half. um we We actually, it was a fun fun fun story, fun way that we ended up ah meeting Elise, who was the one that created the Sober Curator. but um So we got involved with her.

01:20:08.00
Alex 
Yes, Elise, that was the name, yes.

01:20:09.74
Bill
yeah she's really cool. She's very, very cool. um But she's the one that started it. She's got this whole group of people called Sober Curators, all volunteer people, submit content, blah, blah, blah. So that's what Mike and I do. um So I wanted to let you know that because I saw in the book review up there, although you know it's a relatively short book review, um basically what we'll do when we've had it happen before where we've had a podcast guest on.

01:20:31.90
Bill
We tell Elise, they'll put it up on the on the Sober Curator so they can they could feature this episode with you on the Sober Curator, lest you object. i That was my plan to let her let her know to do that.

01:20:41.55
Alex 
No, no, I love that. I've been, I've been checking out the sober curator a lot, actually, since that, uh, since that review went out, they have a lot of, I i love everything they're doing.

01:20:50.81
Bill
Yeah, and it's ah it's ah it's a very cool setup, and they're very focused on – it's not that they're not – that they wouldn't cater or that the website doesn't cater towards the newcomer, but it is meant for more more so people that are in – got a couple of years under their belt type of thing.

01:21:07.21
Bill
How do you stay sober? Because their tagline is ah you know getting sober is great, but staying sober is the best or something like that.

01:21:08.79
Alex 
Right, right.

01:21:14.54
Bill
um But so, and again, I was going to say, unless you, you object, basically what they'll do is they'll take this episode, they'll put it up on the sober curator and obviously, um you know, usually refer back. It'll be a companion piece to the book review and hopefully get you a little bit more, you know, exposure on that. But um it's been, the sober curator has been good. We, we do a lot back and forth.

01:21:33.88
Bill
um You know, they, they promote us. We try to promote them as much as we possibly can. um But it's a good group of people and, you know Again, if you're ever looking for somebody, you know to ah as far as, again, you know other podcasters, a bunch of different podcasters on there.

01:21:47.87
Bill
um you know I don't know a lot of these individuals with the exception of the meetings and stuff that we have, but it's a it's a great community of people um that that help each other. So just be mindful of that too.

01:21:58.98
Alex 
Absolutely. Absolutely.

01:22:01.45
Bill
But yeah, so um so what else? I mean, in in kind of wrapping up here, I mean, what else do you want to get out to to people? I mean, I'll put links to everything we talked about. The only thing that, do me a favor, as soon as we get done recording here, send me a one, send me the link to that Wisconsin one, um because that's the one I couldn't find, the We All Rise Together one.

01:22:14.95
Alex 
Okay.

01:22:17.74
Bill
That one i couldn't I couldn't locate, but shoot me an email on that one.

01:22:17.79
Alex 
Okay.

01:22:20.91
Bill
um But I'll have links to everything, obviously the book and the different websites and that sort of thing. But um I don't know. What did what did we miss or what else do you want to talk about? You know, obviously, it's your your opportunity and your chance to, you know, tell the people a little bit more about you or or what you want to say.

01:22:35.98
Alex 
Yeah, ah I think – what else is there? um i think I think the main thing that I want to focus on now, I think the main – kind of the plan, ah kind of the immediate plan moving forward for like me and for the Lifted Poets Society is really to try to get out there in the community more. Yeah.

01:22:55.74
Alex 
With me being connected to Wisconsin through Rise Together, i have found like i've found a lot of ah I found a lot of fulfillment being you know a part of the community up there and being able to do you know outreach and stuff like that up there. But you know the the main plan for you know the Lifted Poets Society moving forward here is I really want to spend these next...

01:23:15.99
Alex 
couple years really entrenching myself in my community down here and really trying to get a lot of workshops going. I want to be able to do that online as well. i think that I think that in the digital world these days that there can be a lot of extra reach and a lot of lot of people that can be affected if if I get that stuff going online. So I think, I think the main thing that i that I want to want to leave this with, with, you know, lifted poet society stuff is that, is that advocating through art is definitely ah not utilized. I think as much as we can, I think, I think you both mentioned it. If I'm just a step back a second, when you mentioned that, that woman who spoke at that conference and use that analogy, that's such a,

01:24:00.30
Alex 
The thing I love about art and the thing I love about poetry is it's such a complicated way to look at something that makes it really, really easy to understand. You know, they they they took a really she took a really simple concept and turned it into like an elaborate story that allows you to paint a picture in your head that completely got rid of the thoughts.

01:24:08.34
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:24:18.17
Bill
Right.

01:24:19.47
Alex 
You don't have to think when someone provides like an image, when someone provides an art piece that elicits emotion from you and he elicits healing from you, it kind of it kind of gets rid of the thought process. You don't have to worry about those fleeting thoughts jumping in everywhere. And you can kind of just focus on like the feeling and focus on, you know, the healing aspect of it. And I think that's the really cool thing about art. So I'm really excited over these next couple of years to ah to see where these workshops, both online and in person down here in Arizona go, because I think that

01:24:52.57
Alex 
I think we're just getting started. You know, there's been a bunch of times there's been a bunch of times where I felt like I was at like the climax and, you know, each time, you know, I kind of feel like I get knocked back down humbly. And like, I feel like we're we're starting to get to that point where things are going to become more tangible and things are actually coming to more of fruition. So i'm I'm excited. I'm excited for the next couple of years.

01:25:13.76
Bill
Well, and when, as you, uh, in two things, um um, I'll say it again, keep in touch with Elise at the sober curator. When you have events, when things go, all these things you're talking about would be, um, things that I think, and I don't think, I don't think I'm wrong, but I think that Elise and the sober curator would be interested in being involved in, um, they're all about promoting, um, events and recovery things.

01:25:33.56
Alex 
Right.

01:25:36.59
Bill
And, different ways to promote a recovery. And yeah I never thought about it when you just said it through an art piece like that, but I am, I'm a, I'm a visual learner and I would have never thought about like, when you just said that, that individual took that thought of doing the work and made a, made a picture, made a story out of it.

01:25:53.06
Bill
And I'll never, Mike and I will never forget that, you know?

01:25:55.31
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:25:55.85
Alex 
right

01:25:55.97
Bill
And it's a, it is, it's, it's beautiful. And when you, when you read something or have somebody show you something that has that that sort of meaning, that's a great point. But so number one, keep in touch with them when you got things going on.

01:26:07.26
Bill
um Even if it seems like ah like a minor thing or a minuscule thing, mention it to her.

01:26:12.30
Alex 
Okay.

01:26:12.48
Bill
um You just never you never know. she's ah She's all about, she wants to be able to promote things like that, especially more less of the mainstream, something new and different, you know, that invokes people in recovery and that sort of thing.

01:26:25.88
Bill
So that's number one. Also, um if there's anything that we could ever help out with, if you got an event going on, um Once again, we're not a huge podcast. We don't have a huge following on Instagram, but if you have something going on, um shoot us an email.

01:26:40.02
Bill
We can do a post for you on Instagram, or if you want us to collaborate with something on Instagram, um just all you need to do is invite me to collaborate. I'll i'll include it in its the easiest way.

01:26:50.45
Bill
I don't give a fuck. We'll put it on our Instagram page.

01:26:52.48
Alex 
Cool.

01:26:52.61
Bill
Okay.

01:26:52.68
Alex 
Cool. I appreciate that.

01:26:53.49
Bill
And then and Same thing, too. You know, i we had we had ah a guy, Gary, who's been a guest on here twice, showed up on another podcast a few weeks ago, a month ago, I think, Mike, when we got that spike.

01:27:05.31
Mike
Mm-hmm.

01:27:06.23
Bill
And Gary and the the guy he was on with, John, we had both of them on as guests. They literally talked about our podcast. for like four minutes and it's, it doubled the number, like the number of people that were listening to us.

01:27:19.28
Bill
And again, we don't have this huge following.

01:27:20.33
Alex 
That's awesome. That's cool.

01:27:21.59
Bill
um but I mean, just this little mention, I never would have expected it.

01:27:25.39
Alex 
Right.

01:27:25.41
Bill
You know, neither one of us would have. So whole point is, if you got something going, let us know, even if we got it, I don't say got to, and that's the wrong way to put it. Even if we just, you know, spend a couple of minutes and say, Hey,

01:27:36.26
Bill
You know, you remember Alex that was on about the book? He's doing this. Check him out here. We're more than happy to do it. But and that's all this whole point of this. We're all in this together is kind of my whole point.

01:27:45.21
Mike
isn

01:27:45.21
Alex 
Absolutely.

01:27:45.24
Bill
OK. So. All right.

01:27:48.89
Alex 
Yeah, that's awesome.

01:27:49.13
Mike
First word of the first step, man.

01:27:52.87
Bill
We.

01:27:53.94
Alex 
We absolutely.

01:27:54.13
Mike
heard

01:27:55.01
Bill
yeah So it's a it's it's a we program you're saying, Mike. Yeah.

01:27:58.58
Mike
it's so i've heard of that somewhere.

01:28:00.51
Bill
Right. All right. So, um Alex, you know, stick around here. If you listened to the old whole episode last time, you know what's coming up, but it's Mike's turn. It's time for you and I to get quiet. Mike's going to close out the episode, but we're not done yet, so don't go away, Alex, okay?

01:28:14.83
Alex 
Got it.

01:28:15.09
Bill
yeah

01:28:15.85
Mike
All right. Well, thank you everyone for listening to another episode of sober, not mature. Thank you, Alex, for coming on and making our little corner of the world, a better place tonight.

01:28:26.95
Mike
And now go out and do something nice for somebody else this week. You know, do something for yourself. Do something and don't tell anybody you did it. Now it is time.

01:28:39.07
Mike
From the bottom of my heart to the depths of my soul. From the beginning of time to the ends of the earth. Always and eternally, fuck you. And now it's time, kids.

01:28:51.38
Mike
It's time for you to fuck off. Keep fucking off. Keep fucking off until you get to a gate with a sign on it saying, you cannot fuck off past here. Climb over that gate.

01:29:03.06
Mike
Dream the impossible dream. And keep fucking off forever.

01:29:10.63
Bill
Ah, that's Mike's favorite part. You know why? Because it's the end of the episode.

01:29:13.47
Mike
it means we're done.

01:29:14.77
Bill
Yeah, these were done, but no, that's a fun part. My sister gave us that. Another friend of ours gave us the first part of it. It's the way we end off the podcast, and it's a lot of fun. But everyone, take a look. It'll be in the notes. on If you looked on Spotify, if not, take a look on Spotify. There'll be links to everything that we talked about with Alex.

01:29:31.74
Bill
um Obviously, take a look on on Instagram. If the links aren't there, you'll see where to find him. um All those sort of things. Alex, thank you very, very much for coming on. I mean, that's it's been a pleasure. I mean, yeah, you're talking it, but you know what? The number of guests that we've had on, and I'm not going name anyone, but there's been a few people. Like the first half of the episode, we have to kind of drag people through, yeah and then people get comfortable. You were comfortable right away. You mean you made our our jobs, if you want to call it that. They're making our jobs easier tonight, right, Mike?

01:29:59.71
Bill
yeah

01:29:59.75
Mike
Absolutely.

01:30:01.54
Bill
All right, but seriously, Alex, thank you very much. Mike, I love you, brother.

01:30:05.02
Mike
Love you too.

01:30:06.06
Bill
All right, we'll talk soon.

01:30:06.05
Alex 
Thank you both for having me. Very much appreciated.

01:30:07.98
Bill
yeah it don't Yeah, don't run away yet.

01:30:08.05
Mike
Absolutely. Thanks for coming on, man.

01:30:11.42
Bill
We're going to say goodbye.

01:30:11.58
Alex 
I won't. I won't.

01:30:12.14
Bill
vote Don't run away yet.

01:30:12.33
Alex 
Gotcha. Gotcha.

01:30:13.53
Bill
All right, goodbye, everyone.

01:30:15.09
Mike
Goodbye.

01:30:15.19
Bill
Mike?