From 25 Years of Addiction to 17 Years Sober: How To Rebuilt Your Life | With Jessie Tylre Williams

0:00 [SPEAKER_00]: So much of our healing journey really is in this place of going from rock bottom to rising of looking at our identity, who it is that we are through the pain and who it is that we choose to be, understanding the power of forgiveness, what it really means, and most importantly, get into this place where we're healing in our life in the moments that we're living today. [SPEAKER_00]: And in my own journey, so much of this has been about navigating all of those at once, which I'm sure many of you listening can resonate with, and especially that we'll get into with today's guest, Jesse Tyler Williams as we walk down her path and her journey of healing and overcoming our friend. [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you so much for being here.

0:40 [SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the show. [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you so much for having me here today, Michael. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm truly honored and I think it's going to be an [SPEAKER_00]: I'm honored that it's awesome to have you here. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I think that for so many people, we get trapped in stuck in this idea that we are our past that we are the person that we were destined to be because of the background and the things that have happened to us. [SPEAKER_00]: And we're gonna walk your story in your journey obviously, but for those listening or perhaps watching us today, why should they spend their time with us? [SPEAKER_00]: What are they gonna take away from today's conversation? [SPEAKER_02]: Well, I think we're going to touch on some really important things that are happening in our world right now in terms of addiction and I truly believe that anybody that's out there right now listening, I can guarantee you that if they don't have any sort of problem with addiction, they know somebody that does and maybe something will resonate with them and it will help them in some way shape or form.

1:45 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: I think so too. [SPEAKER_00]: And when you said that my very first thought was the very first time I walked into an AA meeting, I was eight years old, being there with my mother sitting in the room, watching her. [SPEAKER_00]: And addiction has just run rampant through my whole family for generations. [SPEAKER_00]: Something I deal with, siblings deal with, people around me have dealt with, like it's real, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Because we're all trying to cope with the pain of the reality of our human experience. [SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely. [SPEAKER_00]: for you what what does addiction mean to you like what role has that played in your life what does it mean to you before during current tell me about that. [SPEAKER_02]: Well addiction for me has been something that's been a huge part of my life for many, many years as far back as I can remember uh you know, preteen and so [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't grow up around any drugs or anything, but I grew up around a lot of alcohol and a lot of childhood sexual abuse and other trauma and so.

2:52 [SPEAKER_02]: Addiction was something, and you know, I often hear people say over and over again on how this addiction is a problem and that everything stems from addiction and then all the problems that people have is is from and based on addiction and. [SPEAKER_02]: I think we need to educate people more on addiction as the solution to an existing problem. [SPEAKER_02]: And if it wasn't for the addiction, a lot of us wouldn't be here. [SPEAKER_02]: And it's helping us cope with data data life. [SPEAKER_02]: And fortunately, for me, I've been clean for over 17 years.

3:33 [SPEAKER_02]: And I was addicted, I mean, heavily using for over 25 years. [SPEAKER_02]: Addiction is not just something that you wake up one day and say, this is it, you know, and then you wake up in another time frame and you're like, I'm clean, it's all good, but it's work. [SPEAKER_02]: And you know, people always talk about where it starts, the addiction, and then they talk about the story like mine and yours, where we've been clean for an extended period of time. [SPEAKER_02]: But they don't talk a lot about the stuff in the middle.

4:16 [SPEAKER_02]: The stuff that sustains you, the stuff that keeps you clean, the stuff that ugly, the dirty, the messy, you know. [SPEAKER_02]: And the, [SPEAKER_02]: the difficult, the real, difficult stuff that it takes to maintain that and to stay on that path and to keep going and having the tools that you need when shit gets real in life, which it does every day. [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we have stuff that happens on a day-to-day basis, whether [SPEAKER_02]: So we need to give people the tools that they need, that when things like that happen, what do I do?

5:02 [SPEAKER_02]: Do I go back to the bottom? [SPEAKER_02]: Do I go back to the drugs? [SPEAKER_02]: What do I do? [SPEAKER_02]: How do I deal with this without going back to the same thing? [SPEAKER_00]: What, what, as you're speaking my first thought was, you know, I think I've probably been an addict in some capacity since I was probably like nine or ten years old because of the abuse because of the homelessness of things that I went through and you don't have the [SPEAKER_00]: way to phrase that in childhood, right? [SPEAKER_00]: If, if I wrote a book and the title was the epidemic of childhood addicts, people would be like, that's nonsense. [SPEAKER_00]: That's not real. [SPEAKER_00]: But every person that I have ever encountered who was on some kind of journey, generally speaking, who had like a tremendous amount of childhood trauma, they all can point to some kind of addiction starting at the youngest age.

5:53 [SPEAKER_00]: food and sugar, right, because I mean, that's what we had access to. [SPEAKER_00]: And then by the time that I was 12, my best friend and I started getting high every single day. [SPEAKER_00]: And that was just weed at first. [SPEAKER_00]: But then it was prescription drugs. [SPEAKER_00]: And then it was over the counter things. [SPEAKER_00]: And then it was like, whatever we could get our freaking hands on. [SPEAKER_00]: And by 13, we were drinking every day. [SPEAKER_00]: And luckily, I had sports in my life and it was able to kind of get that under control somewhat, but it was still Friday night after the game. [SPEAKER_00]: We're partying our faces off, you know, Saturday. [SPEAKER_00]: We're going into watch film completely hungover. [SPEAKER_00]: Like it was crazy. [SPEAKER_00]: It was like Friday night lights and in a lot of ways, right?

6:35 [SPEAKER_00]: And the reason I'm saying this is [SPEAKER_00]: you know, I think about how much people lack the ability to kind of look at where it really starts. [SPEAKER_00]: What was childhood like for you growing up? [SPEAKER_00]: What are your experiences? [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: By the way, sure, whatever you care to share, I just don't know anybody who has had addiction in their life who did not have to walk through the flames of hell for lack of a better way to phrase it. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and I think you're absolutely right, and you know a lot of times you hear of, you know, the person that, you know, had the perfect upbringing, you know, like the perfect life, the white pick at fence, which I know nothing about, right, as I'm sure you do from, you know, what you've told me, and you get the odd time where they get involved in a certain group and they become addicts, but I agree with you a thousand percent on when you become an addict at such a young age.

7:33 [SPEAKER_02]: There's obviously something very dysfunctional in your life and your family life or where you're at. [SPEAKER_02]: So for me, again, it's very parallel to some of the stuff that you've touched on is the childhood sexual abuse, you know? [SPEAKER_02]: And telling my mom about it and her just telling me, oh, shut up and go outside and play, stop lying, you know, they'll be so stupid. [SPEAKER_02]: So, I mean, I got shut down right away [SPEAKER_02]: And it, for me, am I my first memory on what I can remember? [SPEAKER_02]: And I don't even know how old I was.

8:13 [SPEAKER_02]: But I was probably, I'm guessing like three or four years old. [SPEAKER_02]: I was not very old. [SPEAKER_02]: So, you know, and it's, that doesn't go away. [SPEAKER_02]: that it just doesn't go away. [SPEAKER_02]: So when you have no outlet, when you have nobody that you can trust and you don't have a safe zone, you know? [SPEAKER_02]: You have to create your own safe zone. [SPEAKER_02]: You have to create your own armor. [SPEAKER_02]: So whatever you need to do to protect yourself, you do it. [SPEAKER_02]: And most of the time, it's like the same as you, taking a cough medicine and drinking it and getting high [SPEAKER_02]: whatever you need it to to you know get that buzz or whatever and it was more you know playing with fire because what you're doing again is just masking that pain masking that.

9:11 [SPEAKER_02]: that memory, that trauma. [SPEAKER_02]: And so, and then it just gets more because of course the more you do the more you have to do and it's just this vicious circle and it doesn't stop, right? [SPEAKER_02]: So, yeah, I think it's something that just doesn't happen, you know, for most people, again, like for most people. [SPEAKER_00]: Was there, what's fast forward a bit because I'm curious about this, right? [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, obviously, [SPEAKER_00]: I highly doubt what there could be a handful of young kids or teenagers listening to this show. [SPEAKER_00]: I know that there have been in the past, but I've always made this show for adults. [SPEAKER_00]: And so we have very adult conversations on this show. [SPEAKER_00]: But the time that I was really like 18, 19, I mean, it was anything I could do to get high every day, right?

9:58 [SPEAKER_00]: It was just there was something that was freeing about it. [SPEAKER_00]: I've said many times the first time I smoked weed was the greatest day of my life. [SPEAKER_00]: To this day, because I've, you know, I've never had that thing of like getting married and have kids and people are always like, oh, I had a kid. [SPEAKER_00]: It was the best day of my life. [SPEAKER_00]: Even though I've done really amazing things like, you'll be a bestselling author and billboards in Times Square and this podcast and all those things. [SPEAKER_00]: nothing ever compares to that first time. [SPEAKER_00]: And so there's always been this chasing of that in some capacity. [SPEAKER_00]: And in my teens and 20s, I think that it is so normalized to watch your friends get like blackout drunk and wasted and make horrible decisions and nobody stops them.

10:44 [SPEAKER_00]: It's interesting because you see a little bit of a paradigm shift starting to happen with younger people now. [SPEAKER_00]: They're stepping into sobriety just because they realized how stupid it is to get drunk in high every day. [SPEAKER_00]: And they see the impact on their parents and their grandparents and societally at society as a whole. [SPEAKER_00]: But for us, like growing up, it was something that was soothing. [SPEAKER_00]: When did you realize that? [SPEAKER_00]: And I want to talk about a little bit more in depth because I want to hear the details of it, but what was the addiction journey like for you? [SPEAKER_00]: What was happening? [SPEAKER_00]: Obviously, you don't have to go into super specifics, but like I want to know about the experience you were having that you were like, oh, this is. [SPEAKER_00]: this feeling it's giving me, this is the experience that I'm having, this is the impact that it's having on my life, and then ultimately we'll get into the turning point here in just a minute, but I want to know more about the backside because there are people listening right now her struggling who feel alone and they probably are walking in a shoes that you've walked in before.

11:46 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so for me it was a gradual thing, but it was probably a lot [SPEAKER_02]: a lot quicker than I care to admit, you know, when I look now on the outside looking in. [SPEAKER_02]: So it was, I was, I was really sick as a kid too. [SPEAKER_02]: So I got a lot of these drugs in the hospital, which were helping me as well. [SPEAKER_02]: And so I think a lot of my illness, I always had pneumonia, you know, had all this pain throat, my body constantly and in and out of the hospital. [SPEAKER_02]: And [SPEAKER_02]: you know, my mom deemed me as crazy because I was sick all the time.

12:27 [SPEAKER_02]: Never looking for why I was said that why she wouldn't listen to me, right? [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm not putting any blame anywhere. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm just simply stating how it was for me. [SPEAKER_02]: And so then I was all ready to the point where [SPEAKER_02]: I needed more Tylenol than the average kid, right? [SPEAKER_02]: So nothing was working. [SPEAKER_02]: So I would take extra ones whenever my mom wasn't looking and she didn't even have a clue, right? [SPEAKER_02]: And so, and then after she took off, when we were quite young, I kind of did whatever I wanted. [SPEAKER_02]: And so I would hang out with people a lot older than me.

13:09 [SPEAKER_02]: And I [SPEAKER_02]: that's how it started for me. [SPEAKER_02]: It was a gradual thing. [SPEAKER_02]: I never liked smoking weed. [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't like hash, which was a big thing for us. [SPEAKER_02]: And I just want to kind of say something before I go any further, because if anybody out there, that's listening. [SPEAKER_02]: can be triggered by some of these conversations. [SPEAKER_02]: Make sure you're safe right now because some of the things that I say can be very triggering. [SPEAKER_02]: So I just want to make sure whoever's listening right now, make sure you're in a safe place. [SPEAKER_02]: The things that I would do. [SPEAKER_02]: And the drugs that I would do to get high would be more chemically based, you know, I did ask that I did mushrooms.

13:55 [SPEAKER_02]: I, you know, because it really took me out of my head. [SPEAKER_02]: I, I really needed to get out of my brain because I wanted to die so bad every single day, I would wake up and the first thing, and I remember this so explicitly, I was think, [SPEAKER_02]: of how I could die today. [SPEAKER_02]: And I would ask why am I still here? [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm going back 12, 13 years old at this point already. [SPEAKER_02]: And so I didn't have really any fear for what I was going to try.

14:36 [SPEAKER_02]: And so it just escalated. [SPEAKER_02]: I would try to not do the drugs, but it would never happen because, you know, there's just no way I could live with what was in my head. [SPEAKER_02]: So I just kept repeating these cycles and, you know, I quit, like I always tell everybody they're like, well, you know, I quit, but I started again. [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm like, well, as long as you're quitting, it's a good thing. [SPEAKER_02]: It doesn't matter if you quit for a day, a week, a month, ten years, just keep quitting. [SPEAKER_02]: just keep quitting and try again, because I probably quit a thousand times, right?

15:17 [SPEAKER_02]: Or more, probably. [SPEAKER_02]: But the thing is that for me, I needed to really get out of my brain, but I needed to get out of my brain because [SPEAKER_02]: Because I'm kind of not so much any more, but maybe I am a control freak, I couldn't lose touch of my surroundings, you know, and so I did all these drugs, but I wouldn't do that get so high, you black out, know that kind of stuff right until I got into, you know, the stuff like heroin and stuff like that, where you do the not, but I would then. [SPEAKER_02]: try to combat that with other things too. [SPEAKER_02]: And I think you know what I'm talking about.

16:00 [SPEAKER_02]: So that I was always in control on some level. [SPEAKER_02]: And it got so bad. [SPEAKER_02]: Like it was it was just it was almost when I look back at everything now, it's like I'm watching this movie. [SPEAKER_02]: playing the lead role in that movie. [SPEAKER_02]: It doesn't feel like it's even real, and I've got hundreds of journals that I go back, and especially when I was writing my book, I went through the fifth to tons of journals. [SPEAKER_02]: And it's just such a harsh reality.

16:45 [SPEAKER_02]: And so you really get, you gotta be careful not to get too caught up in that [SPEAKER_02]: grounded and focused. [SPEAKER_02]: And yeah, and so I know I kind of got off track here a bit. [SPEAKER_02]: But all in all, it was for me, it was, it was going really hard all the time. [SPEAKER_02]: It's go, go, go, go, go. [SPEAKER_02]: And you know, I would, I would only stop when I was forced to stop, you know, in terms of [SPEAKER_02]: You know, the whole story, right?

17:26 [SPEAKER_02]: So I just, I just couldn't ever see myself getting clean no matter how hard I try. [SPEAKER_02]: And I didn't want to. [SPEAKER_02]: I really wanted to live, but I didn't want to be alive. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, if that makes any sense at all, you know, I wanted more than anything to really live, but I so badly didn't want to be alive. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, well, I think a lot of people can, as you were talking, you know, I've said this many times on the show. [SPEAKER_00]: The first time I ever tried to take my own life, I was 14 and I down to a whole bottle of Advil. [SPEAKER_00]: And it didn't kill me. [SPEAKER_00]: It just made me so up everywhere and it was like, I had a really hard, you know, couple's days.

18:06 [SPEAKER_00]: But I was done at 14 years old. [SPEAKER_00]: I was done. [SPEAKER_00]: And so when I hear people, you know, and it's interesting as people say, oh, it's so selfish how can you do that on my call. [SPEAKER_00]: You're not living my life. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, you don't know what it's like to have a drug addict mother passed out on the couch and never met your father and the whites are off again, you know, and that whole thing, which I've shared many times on the show over the years and when I was in my 20s, it's funny because I, you know, I didn't have the words around. [SPEAKER_00]: Let's concept an idea of self-sabotage. [SPEAKER_00]: And I look at the behaviors of me in my 20s, which by the way, at 41 almost, I'm still fighting every day.

18:47 [SPEAKER_00]: Every day is a conscientious decision I'm making to not fucking ruin my life. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's been like that since I was 30, right? [SPEAKER_00]: was since I really, really got deeper into the work, but in my 20s, it was, it was these behaviors that I would constantly be involved with that now I have the language for understanding self-sabotage, but it was so deeply ingrained in me, like it was not unnormal to watch cheating and lying and money issues and health issues and, you know, you grow up in that so you think that's normal. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think [SPEAKER_00]: I think the one saving grace for me, like, even during that time, because I got, I think one of the worst things that happened to me, also the best is I got wildly successful at 20 years old.

19:31 [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I made 150 grand the year I was 21, which, you know, 20 something years ago, that's like $400,000. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like, I was living in insane lifestyle at 20, 21, 22, 3, 4, 5. [SPEAKER_00]: And instead of people around me being like, hey, maybe just don't buy everyone at the bar drinks all the fucking time and save your money and do something smart. [SPEAKER_00]: I was just going crazy. [SPEAKER_00]: And then you're surrounded by these yes people, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And so the more drugs I did, the more strangers I hooked up with, the more crazy purchases I made, the more they kind of encouraged it. [SPEAKER_00]: And then so now it's like, I know that I'm not necessarily doing the right things in my life, but I don't have any real negative reinforcement until it was too late.

20:20 [SPEAKER_00]: And that was this rock bottom. [SPEAKER_00]: We're at 26, you know, 350 pounds smoking two packs drinking myself to sleep. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's like, that to me was the moment when I realized, like, those weren't my real friends, because when I needed them to smack me in the fucking mouth, they weren't around. [SPEAKER_00]: But when they were there to, like, I don't say leech that's unfair because I was making my own decisions. [SPEAKER_00]: But when they were there partying with me, it was like, yeah, cool, and you see that. [SPEAKER_00]: And I look back on that now and go, oh, that's self-sabotage. [SPEAKER_00]: That, that is me taking success. [SPEAKER_00]: The very thing that no one had when I was growing up and me being like, well, I guess life should just be chaotic all the time.

21:02 [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: And you're sitting at, you know, that's fucking insane. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, why would you want to live like that? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, but it's something you wanted to and that's that's what I'm getting to right. [SPEAKER_00]: So our nervous system is set up into that and it's like you grow up in chaos you will do anything in your power to create chaos you come into my home now you come into my recording studio wherever I'm there's candles on in here and there's ambient music and it's quiet and it's just a place where I come in here and I create my art with people like you [SPEAKER_00]: And my home is the same right and so I think about that and it's like you have to make these decisions So I'm curious when you're like in the middle of this what was your community like what were the people like around you?

21:48 [SPEAKER_00]: What was the experience that you were having in the day and day out in relation to other people? [SPEAKER_02]: Well, I toured for a long time and I was a role dog, right? [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, being a professional musician, right? [SPEAKER_02]: So I was immersed in it, right, from my early 20s. [SPEAKER_02]: So it was around me all the time. [SPEAKER_02]: And again, same thing, it's just, [SPEAKER_02]: Basically the same thing as you is, you know, you have all these friends and you get more of these friends when when you are that person, you know, come to our show and they party with us later and, you know, you do all this crazy stuff and and so it was up and down, I mean, I [SPEAKER_02]: I agree with you.

22:44 [SPEAKER_02]: Like it was complete chaos and self sabotage because you get this [SPEAKER_02]: seed planted at some point in your brain that number one, you shouldn't have this. [SPEAKER_02]: You shouldn't be this. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm speaking for myself. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm not sure about you, but and you know, this is too good to be true. [SPEAKER_02]: Like this is just going to all go away. [SPEAKER_02]: And so all these constant, you know, the little devil in the good guy here, right? [SPEAKER_02]: And telling myself that, you know, I don't deserve this and so then I get into these relationships and of course being, you know, the lead singer in a band and that whole trip, you know, the guys would always be jealous and I would always attract the same type of guys.

23:35 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, this guy is a little better because, you know, at least he didn't knock the shit out of me, right? [SPEAKER_02]: And then you get to the next boyfriend a few years later. [SPEAKER_02]: And this guy's only slapping me a little bit, right? [SPEAKER_02]: And then so that one was better than that one, but they're still all the same, right? [SPEAKER_02]: Because that's what I'm attracting. [SPEAKER_02]: And so in the midst of all this chaos, and it was always the same too. [SPEAKER_02]: It was like chaos was my comfort, because it was familiar to me. [SPEAKER_02]: And so like you said, your body, your whole system is wired.

24:18 [SPEAKER_02]: to be comfortable in that discomfort. [SPEAKER_02]: So it's all you know, so it takes, it's like when you work out, right? [SPEAKER_02]: And you start working out and, you know, your muscles hurt and they're sore and you're like, oh my God, that hurts. [SPEAKER_02]: I don't want to do that anymore, but you push yourself to keep doing it. [SPEAKER_02]: You start getting muscle memory and you start training your muscles to act a certain way. [SPEAKER_02]: You have to do the same thing with your mind [SPEAKER_02]: To maintain this life that we now have, and to stay clean or sober or whatever words you want to put on it, but you have to work out your mind, your soul, your body, and put a balance in there that works for you.

25:11 [SPEAKER_02]: And every one of us is... [SPEAKER_02]: We're really all the same. [SPEAKER_02]: When it comes down and you simplify everything, it's kind of all the same. [SPEAKER_02]: The stories might be a little different. [SPEAKER_02]: The addiction might be a little different. [SPEAKER_02]: But we are all the same. [SPEAKER_02]: We are either wired to have as chaos and become addicted to that, even. [SPEAKER_02]: Or we have learned or trained ourselves [SPEAKER_02]: create a balance. [SPEAKER_02]: And when you can, I always say master it, like anything, even a master's degree, four years, okay?

25:54 [SPEAKER_02]: It takes time and you have to put in the time you have to put in the work to retrain your brain, to retrain your muscles in your body. [SPEAKER_02]: To again, when you first start getting clean, the detox is absolutely horrible, you know, and so you have to get through that and then you have to do things to keep your body healing all the time, heal your mind, heal your soul and the rest will come. [SPEAKER_00]: There's so much conversation I think about chemical addiction, drugs, alcohol, you know, and I think that's pretty straightforward.

26:36 [SPEAKER_00]: The thing that I think a lot is the mental and emotional and spiritual addiction that we can have at times, right? [SPEAKER_00]: The like choosing the same boyfriend or in my case choosing the same girlfriend, I dated the same woman over and over and over and [SPEAKER_00]: and you choose the same friends over and over. [SPEAKER_00]: And then there's like the little things that you do. [SPEAKER_00]: I was obitially late to work. [SPEAKER_00]: Like it's crazy. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I was making 150 grand a year and I'd be late to work every day. [SPEAKER_00]: And like if you're late again, we're gonna fire you and like, okay, like whatever who gives a shit, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And then as I started to do more of this deeper work, you know, 26 years old having a real rock bottom, [SPEAKER_00]: stepping deeper into therapy in my thirties going as deep as one can go into the journey.

27:26 [SPEAKER_00]: And looking at it, really was becoming, you mentioned this word safe a little bit ago, giving folks a trigger warning. [SPEAKER_00]: I realized that when I was in my early thirties, [SPEAKER_00]: I was spending the night at our friend's house, and it was the first time that I ever felt safe in my life. [SPEAKER_00]: And I slept like a freaking baby that night. [SPEAKER_00]: And then as I was like going through therapy and learning those modalities, one of the things that I learned to [SPEAKER_00]: to speak into myself for lack of a better way to phrase it and it wasn't even necessarily like a motto or an affirmation.

28:07 [SPEAKER_00]: It was more of just a conformation. [SPEAKER_00]: I do like I'm safe. [SPEAKER_00]: Because if I can make my physical body, my physical organism understand that it doesn't have to always be in fighter flight mode, guess what, I can sleep when I was young, I had the worst insomnia you could ever imagine, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And that carried through the party years. [SPEAKER_00]: I carried through my early 20s, my late 20s, my early 30s. [SPEAKER_00]: And it didn't really go away until [SPEAKER_00]: account of my surroundings and my environment, because I realized I was still addicted, even though there were these huge pockets of complete sobriety, mental, emotional, physical, spiritual, chemical, sexual, all that like I was like in monk mode.

28:54 [SPEAKER_00]: I still couldn't sleep, I was still addicted to doing weird things that made me get this adrenaline rush, like things I wasn't supposed to be doing, or I wasn't supposed to be. [SPEAKER_00]: And then I realized, [SPEAKER_00]: that the people who need the most work like me, I'm putting me in that category, are the people who feel the most unsafe in the world. [SPEAKER_00]: And so for me that the turning point really came in me taking a assessment of the reality of my life, [SPEAKER_00]: What am I doing to make myself feel unsafe? [SPEAKER_00]: And that question is what changed everything. [SPEAKER_00]: That's why I get to go back to a moment ago, the serenity of the candles and the ambient lighting and the things that make up this recording studio.

29:39 [SPEAKER_00]: But in my life and the day to day is just being like, you're safe. [SPEAKER_00]: your safe is constant reminder and that became a turning point for people who, you know, they're listening that I'm dating the same person again, I can't put down the bottle, I'm fucking up my work in this relationship that's going to end again because I don't know how to take care of my stuff for the other person. [SPEAKER_00]: what turning point did you have in your life that started to change everything? [SPEAKER_00]: Because I want to understand what the practicality is behind the decisions that you made that actually changed your life. [SPEAKER_02]: Primarily it was complete surrender.

30:22 [SPEAKER_02]: When I decided to get clean to really do it, [SPEAKER_02]: It was almost like, uh, I don't know if you've heard the phrase death by suicide. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm sure you have. [SPEAKER_02]: So I wasn't given a very good chance at survival if because for me, quitting meant no side box, no method, no, none of the above. [SPEAKER_02]: I was going to quit. [SPEAKER_02]: I was going to quit. [SPEAKER_02]: I was going to be clean. [SPEAKER_02]: Okay. [SPEAKER_02]: And the doctor came right out and told me like with the amount that you use and the length of years that you've been using, you know, it could be deadly, like it's dangerous.

31:06 [SPEAKER_02]: He said, and he said, I can prescribe you some sidewalks in methadone. [SPEAKER_02]: There was another one that he had mentioned. [SPEAKER_02]: I can't remember the name of it now, but and I said, well, no, I said, it's to me synthetic heroin. [SPEAKER_02]: And so I'm not willing to go down that road because. [SPEAKER_02]: I just, I knew what I wanted, and he said, well, he said, you know, a lot of people going to, you know, the word is set my mind from the withdrawals, from the detox. [SPEAKER_02]: And so the people can actually die from that. [SPEAKER_02]: And I got up and I looked at him and I said, well, I guess I'm going to die trying.

31:54 [SPEAKER_02]: I possibly could die trying. [SPEAKER_02]: I had given up. [SPEAKER_02]: I had completely said that's it. [SPEAKER_02]: I got in my car. [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't even know if I was going to get to my destination alive. [SPEAKER_02]: The roads were all closed that day. [SPEAKER_02]: It was January 31, 2009. [SPEAKER_02]: And there was one hell of a blizzard. [SPEAKER_02]: The roads were closed. [SPEAKER_02]: And I was in my blue car heading to my clean zone, right? [SPEAKER_02]: And so I almost didn't make it and my my car ended up sliding all over the place. [SPEAKER_02]: I ended up in the side of the highway on the side of a snow bay and I almost froze to death first of all and and then I almost hit that semi when this it was such a wild day the day I decided to do that.

32:48 [SPEAKER_02]: And so February 1st, even though I left January 31st to do this, February 1st is the first day that I actually was clean. [SPEAKER_02]: Like, that was the first day that I didn't have anything. [SPEAKER_02]: And I almost did die though, the amount of withdrawals that I went through and I ended up in the hospital twice. [SPEAKER_01]: And so it wasn't [SPEAKER_02]: It wasn't a matter of whether or not I was going to be successful doing it at that point in my brain. [SPEAKER_02]: I just said that's it. [SPEAKER_02]: Like, I can't go on this way.

33:29 [SPEAKER_02]: I looked like I was about a hundred years old. [SPEAKER_02]: I was about 90 pounds soak and wet. [SPEAKER_02]: And so it was. [SPEAKER_02]: It was, it was really hard and, and so finally I just said to have a bit, I give up, I said a few other true words, and I just completely said that's yet, you know, what if I die, I die, at least I die trying. [SPEAKER_02]: And, and so the first, you know, a few weeks, [SPEAKER_02]: I wasn't able to really process anything, but when I started getting through that detox period, I started just, you know, every day just trying to get through each moment and saying, okay, you know what?

34:19 [SPEAKER_02]: Try this, like, and I did a lot of meditation and yoga and writing and writing and writing and more writing. [SPEAKER_02]: I think you have to replace when you're early in the game and in the sobriety, you have to replace that addiction with things that occupy your time so that you can give yourself enough time to [SPEAKER_02]: work on the healing component or components. [SPEAKER_02]: And so you have to stay active in some way. [SPEAKER_02]: For me, it was yoga, walking, I love walking, right?

35:02 [SPEAKER_02]: And so all of these things combined and the writing. [SPEAKER_02]: And I found ways. [SPEAKER_02]: And I talk about it in my book about, you know, [SPEAKER_02]: what to do when you're dealing with this, how I did it, and everybody heals differently. [SPEAKER_02]: Everybody works differently in terms of writing and what works for them. [SPEAKER_02]: Some people want to go to the gym and work out for two or three hours. [SPEAKER_02]: The next guy is going to write a song and play his guitar and the next person Michael Swimming [SPEAKER_02]: that you like, but at that point, it's so hard to.

35:48 [SPEAKER_02]: So you really have to have to surrender first because that's the only way that you're going to be able to open up your mind to find that. [SPEAKER_02]: But it's having, yeah, and I didn't have, you know, a detox center and rehab center and all these other things. [SPEAKER_02]: And because none of that were I had already tried that enough times I knew it wasn't going to work for me I knew that I had to do it on my own and that was it. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Well, and congratulations. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, that's that's such difficult work, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And I think people underestimate it. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I watched my mother, I mean, she must want to rehab 20 times, you know, before ultimately she died overdose, you know, the whole thing.

36:36 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, it just took her, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And, and that happened to my grandmother. [SPEAKER_00]: My grandmother was a drug addict. [SPEAKER_00]: uncles in prison for life, he was a drug addict, like it's just everywhere. [SPEAKER_00]: And you know, part of me thinks, you know, that's, that's, you know, middle America, that's lack of education, you know, that's generational trauma so and so forth. [SPEAKER_00]: But it's also just, I don't think people have the tools to be honest with you, to be able to be like, I'm going to do something different. [SPEAKER_00]: the way they do today, then, I mean, even 10 years ago that the data and information is so different, continuing to grow every single day. [SPEAKER_00]: And you do see a lot of people who come on the backside of it, like, how else do I do a podcast of over a thousand episodes and coach thousands and thousands of people and continue to run multiple businesses and go to the gym six times, five, six times a week.

37:28 [SPEAKER_00]: It's like, because I'm an addict. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, if I, I was just a regular or a [SPEAKER_00]: No, because in the same it's that it's it's oddly my superpower, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And so but the thing that had to happen to is like I've always been this way. [SPEAKER_00]: I've always been the hundred mile an hour guy like I'm all in or I'm all out. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't have gray area. [SPEAKER_00]: Something I still don't have, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm okay with that and people are like find the middle. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm like, I don't know what that means. [SPEAKER_00]: I only do what I want to do. [SPEAKER_00]: And so it's you know, [SPEAKER_00]: making a cognizant decision to do things that make your life not fucking horrible is generally a good idea And so that's how I kind of look at it. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna do things that make my life not fucking horrible.

38:08 [SPEAKER_00]: All right. [SPEAKER_00]: What does that look like? [SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna eat well. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna go to the gym. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna do yoga. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna read books. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna learn skills I'm going to challenge myself to do wildly uncomfortable things all the time and Whatever happens on the backside happens, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And I've learned to let go and not force it [SPEAKER_00]: But I had this weird thing happen when I was younger, and I totally given up drinking, totally given up smoking, totally given up hooking up with people. [SPEAKER_00]: I've said before, my addiction was always women. [SPEAKER_00]: It was never the drugs or alcohol, those were just a by-product. [SPEAKER_00]: And then, you know, you do the work and go, oh, that's mommy issues and blah, blah, blah. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't need to go down my whole story. [SPEAKER_00]: But the thing that I realized probably at 29, [SPEAKER_00]: into 30 in the space of 29 to 31.

38:53 [SPEAKER_00]: The thing that I realized was like, I don't know who the fuck I am. [SPEAKER_00]: I have no identity because I, and here's what's interesting too. [SPEAKER_00]: I think about we ever said this one other time and a thousand episodes of this show. [SPEAKER_00]: I used to let people call me Mike. [SPEAKER_00]: I actually hate that name. [SPEAKER_00]: I never liked it, never have, never do. [SPEAKER_00]: And when I wrote my first book, I had mentioned, well, when I made this decision to like walk this path, I also killed that idea of who I was, this Mike person, who is the party guy who watches fucking football all day on Sunday and drinks and parties all day and gets high and smokes, not to mention smoke two packs a day for fucking eight years, right?

39:37 [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, well, I don't want to be that guy. [SPEAKER_00]: So I'm killing that guy and that version of me has been dead for a very long time. [SPEAKER_00]: Now, he creeps up sometimes and I got fucking kill him again, but like that idea of that version of me no longer exist. [SPEAKER_00]: And so in this window of 29 to 31, I had to figure out, well, who are you then? [SPEAKER_00]: like who is this person that you're going to choose to be every single day of your life because the reality is whoever that was like that's done. [SPEAKER_00]: But this is where people get stuck the most because they've seen it too many times. [SPEAKER_00]: They walk this path, they make the decision to create the change, they get the help, they do it spiritually, AA in A, whatever, maybe they do it through a church, maybe they do it, staying at the sisters house, and they're like, I'm gonna figure it out.

40:25 [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know, but everybody at some point who makes that decision, if they don't make what I believe to be the secondary decision, always comes back. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that the secondary decision is choosing to love yourself by doing really hard shit all the time. [SPEAKER_00]: and that creates a new identity for you. [SPEAKER_00]: So I'm curious for you when you made that shift in that jump, how was it just battling yourself to become yourself? [SPEAKER_00]: What was that? [SPEAKER_02]: That was really hard. [SPEAKER_02]: That was probably one of the hardest things because I always wore a mask of some kind. [SPEAKER_02]: When I was the artist, I was wearing that mask.

41:06 [SPEAKER_02]: When I was the daughter that wanted to be loved by her mother and accepted for who I was, there was another mask. [SPEAKER_02]: And again, people pleasing, you don't want anybody mad at you, you don't want to step on any toes. [SPEAKER_02]: And so, [SPEAKER_02]: And then my childhood name was Aggie, right? [SPEAKER_02]: And so I like you, I killed that bitch because I hated the name, I hated the life and the memories that that name gave me. [SPEAKER_02]: And I squashed it. [SPEAKER_02]: And even to this day, and it doesn't happen very often.

41:50 [SPEAKER_02]: If I get called egg, it's like, it's almost like, oh, like, why you call it, like, you know what I mean? [SPEAKER_02]: I've gotten better obviously at it, but I had to, because no matter if your name changes or you put a different identity on it, there you are. [SPEAKER_02]: So you can change your name. [SPEAKER_02]: You can ask people to call you this or that. [SPEAKER_02]: For me, it was fairly easy. [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't change my name until I was in my 20s. [SPEAKER_02]: And so for me, and because it was a pseudonym, primarily, like I still have to use my legal name for legal documents, but it's an actual register pseudonym, my name.

42:39 [SPEAKER_01]: And so changing the name, [SPEAKER_01]: When I did my healing, the name Aggie kept coming up. [SPEAKER_02]: And so I had to find ways around that. [SPEAKER_02]: So I started taking photos of me as young as I could find. [SPEAKER_02]: And I started healing that child through myself. [SPEAKER_02]: And I gave that child what I needed at that time. [SPEAKER_02]: I went through the many different phases where I suffered the most trauma and the most abuse and I really had to heal those parts of me in a really deep way.

43:29 [SPEAKER_02]: And so the whole concept of changing my name, it's still to this day, everyone's in a while, like yourself. [SPEAKER_02]: You don't want to be called Mike, nobody should call you Mike, you know, it's a respect thing too, right? [SPEAKER_01]: And so the point is that. [SPEAKER_02]: For me, it was important to share with people those parts of the healing process. [SPEAKER_02]: Because most of us that come from the level of, you know, that 100 miles an hour, you know, my name is Flash, right?

44:13 [SPEAKER_02]: Like it's like, I've got all these different businesses of all this stuff going on, constantly driven, right? [SPEAKER_02]: I've got huge drive, huge passion for everything [SPEAKER_02]: And if I don't like it, I don't do it now, right. [SPEAKER_02]: So, but it's because we now have a choice. [SPEAKER_02]: I have a choice whether or not I want to do it. [SPEAKER_02]: Nobody's going to tell me what I have to do anymore, which is half the battle, right. [SPEAKER_02]: And so going a thousand miles an hour and a thousand different directions is okay. [SPEAKER_02]: As long as I remember. [SPEAKER_02]: to keep myself balanced and not let myself go too far and to, you know, extreme and not hurting myself right in the process.

45:01 [SPEAKER_00]: There's, yeah, for sure, right, and also when you do being like, okay, just let's go again, you know, and I think that can be really hard to because especially depending on where you are in your journey, you know, that first fall down, which you're going to have because it's a part of this experience, sure. [SPEAKER_00]: can really cripple some people, but I might go get your ass back up, let's go, let's get back in the game. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that so much of it too is like you have to realize, this was for me, I'll speak for myself. [SPEAKER_00]: I just stop making so much of everything around me about me. [SPEAKER_00]: And I had to start doing it for other people. [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it was it was about how to why be a better brother.

45:43 [SPEAKER_00]: How do I be a better employee or how do I be a better business owner. [SPEAKER_00]: How to be a better friend partner. [SPEAKER_00]: All of these things. [SPEAKER_00]: It was always about recognizing. [SPEAKER_00]: To some extent, almost entirely being an addict is the most self-serving thing on fucking planet Earth, because it's only about you all the time, whatever your addiction is, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And that's why I think like entrepreneurs who had addiction patterns, like tend to be really good at entrepreneurs, because it's like, hey, I'm focused, I'm driven, this is where I'm going. [SPEAKER_00]: But I find the best people in the world, and I feel like I've slowly moved closer to it every day. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not quite there, but it's all about service.

46:25 [SPEAKER_00]: This podcast is about service. [SPEAKER_00]: The books are about service. [SPEAKER_00]: The coaching is about service. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's about me making the declaration of, well, I'm gonna do something different, because I'm not married and I don't have children. [SPEAKER_00]: And so, what mark do I get to leave on the world? [SPEAKER_00]: Well, this one. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's a huge turning point and so I always encourage people where you're at, if you're struggling or you're in this journey of the healing and the sobriety and your depressed or sad or anxious, it's like go out into the world and make it a better place than the world you came into because it'll pay dividends and that's a huge part of what you've been able to do, which is a [SPEAKER_00]: both beautiful and admirable. [SPEAKER_00]: We're coming on time here and before I ask you my last question, I want people to be able to learn more about you, to connect with you, to read this book, to get involved with what you're doing.

47:14 [SPEAKER_00]: So where can they find you and where can they learn more about you? [SPEAKER_02]: And they can find me on all social media platforms under Jesse Tyler Williams and I'm the only one with my name spelled T Y L R E so it's pretty unique and it's and it's spelling so all my social handles Facebook Instagram tick talk are all at Jesse Tyler you can go to my website jessie hyphen Williams dot com jessie is i e [SPEAKER_02]: And my book rising above hell is out on Amazon. [SPEAKER_02]: It's available in Spanish and in English. [SPEAKER_00]: Amazing.

47:55 [SPEAKER_00]: What, I'm asking another question because now I'm curious. [SPEAKER_00]: When you think about the Mark and the Legacy that you hope that this book leaves on people, what is it? [SPEAKER_00]: What is the takeaway for them? [SPEAKER_00]: Why should they spend the time to read the book? [SPEAKER_02]: healing. [SPEAKER_02]: I really, really believe truly and deeply in my heart that if people that are suffering, [SPEAKER_02]: whatever they're suffering with. [SPEAKER_02]: I really believe this book can help them because it's such as a book you read. [SPEAKER_02]: It's actually got a workbook at the end of each chapter so that's unique in itself so it can help them relate and kind of categorize the stuff they're going through.

48:38 [SPEAKER_02]: And I firmly believe in my heart and soul that it can and will change the world. [SPEAKER_02]: And if it [SPEAKER_02]: then it's done its job. [SPEAKER_02]: And I hope it heals millions, but, you know, realistically, I think that for me, I just want to know that it helped somebody because I felt so alone. [SPEAKER_02]: I felt so isolated from the rest of the world. [SPEAKER_02]: I thought I was the only one that these things were happening to. [SPEAKER_02]: And I was like, what the hell, like, you know, [SPEAKER_02]: It was just so, it was so important for me to make sure that people knew and really felt that they're not alone.

49:29 [SPEAKER_02]: that they do matter and that they too can make a difference as they heal, they can help others heal. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, and a huge part of my healing was because of all the work and service that I get to veterans and first responders and the whole PTSD tour that I did. [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, [SPEAKER_02]: And a lot of my healing came from that, you know, and so I think, like you said, when you're of service to others, there's something magical in that there's some magic that happens for you because it's like [SPEAKER_02]: As you're putting out your hand, your other hand is receiving the goodness that comes out of that and for whatever period of time that that resonates with you and you feel that in your soul and you do more of that.

50:25 [SPEAKER_02]: How can you not heal. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, beautifully said, and my friends, I encourage you to grab a copy of the book. [SPEAKER_00]: Of course, you can go over to thinkunbrokenpodcast.com for that and more in the show notes. [SPEAKER_00]: My last question for you, my friend. [SPEAKER_00]: What does it mean to you to be unbroken? [SPEAKER_01]: Well, it means that I'm not alone. [SPEAKER_02]: It means that I can be fixed. [SPEAKER_02]: And it means that [SPEAKER_02]: being unbroken is okay and it's okay to not be okay.

51:05 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I agree. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think so much of this journey as our willingness to look at where we are and ultimately you have to make a decision. [SPEAKER_00]: Is this where you want to be? [SPEAKER_00]: Do you want to be this person in a minute from now? [SPEAKER_00]: In a day from now, in a year from now, in a lifetime from now, I'm where I've always said this, you are one decision away from everything being different. [SPEAKER_00]: And that thing in you that scares the shit out of you is probably the thing that you need to do it's to get in the car on the snowy day it's to ask for help it's to go and give back it's to face the reality of the experiences that. [SPEAKER_00]: are, you know, well, your reality. [SPEAKER_00]: And so with that said, if today's episode brought any value to you, please share it with the friend, someone close to you, who also could use this kind of encouragement or maybe they're on the edge and they need a little bit of guidance and love and somebody who's been there and do me a favor, take care of yourselves, take care of each other.

52:00 [SPEAKER_00]: And until next to my friends, be unbroken. [SPEAKER_00]: We'll see ya.