Valiant Living Podcast
Welcome to the Valiant Living Podcast where we educate, encourage, and empower you towards a life of peace and freedom.
Valiant Living has been restoring lives and families since 2017 by providing multiple levels of care for men and their families. Fully accredited by The Joint Commission, Valiant Living has earned a national reputation as a premier treatment program, offering IOP, PHP, and recovery housing programs for men ages 26 and older. Founder and CEO MIchael Dinneen is a nationally recognized therapeutic expert, speaker, and thought leader in the behavioral health field.
On this podcast you’ll hear from the Valiant team as well as stories of alumni who are living in recovery. If you or someone you love is struggling to overcome addiction or trauma, please call us at (720)-756-7941 or email admissions@valiantliving.com We’d love to have a conversation with you!
Valiant Living Podcast
From Wounds to Wisdom: Michael Wagner's 45-Year Journey of Healing
Michael Wagner sits across from host Drew Powell, his nervous energy palpable despite 45 years of sobriety under his belt. There's a beautiful vulnerability as Wagner reveals the painful tapestry of his past – growing up with an alcoholic, mentally ill mother whose unpredictable violence shaped his early years. The moment he shares how he broke his infant son's leg during a drunken fall down the stairs, still keeping the tiny cast as a reminder, the room feels charged with honest reflection.
What makes Wagner's testimony so powerful is that even at 82, he continues experiencing breakthrough healing moments. Just months before this recording, he had a profound realization about compassion for his mother that fundamentally changed how he processed decades-old trauma. "How could my children have any compassion for me if I don't have compassion for my mother?" he asks, revealing how this insight helped break generational cycles of pain.
Wagner doesn't sugar-coat recovery's challenges. He speaks candidly about the shame that plagued him and the professional help required to process his wounds. Yet his story sparkles with moments of synchronicity and higher power intervention that feel almost magical – like randomly meeting the son of a man who helped him decades earlier, or twice being saved from the Vietnam draft by the same medical condition and doctor.
The rewards of Wagner's 45-year sobriety journey shine brightest when he speaks of his children. The son whose leg he broke is now a respected Buddhism authority who spends quality time with his father. His other children have thrived despite the challenges of their early years. "I didn't fuck him up," Wagner says with wonder and gratitude about his son, "I did for a while, but he got over it."
Wagner leaves listeners with a powerful message about our inherent worth: "You are magnificent, and all mankind will be judged on its likeness to you." His testimony stands as evidence that no matter how broken we feel, healing is possible when we embrace recovery, seek help, and remain patient with the process. Subscribe now to hear more transformative stories of healing and hope.
Well, hey everyone. Welcome to the Valiant Living podcast, where we educate, encourage and empower you towards a life of peace and freedom. I'm your host, drew Powell, and I'm a grateful alumni of the Valiant Living program. Valiant Living offers hope and transformational change to men and their families struggling with addiction and mental health challenges. So on this podcast you'll hear from the Valiant team, as well as stories of alumni who are living in recovery. If you or someone you love is struggling to overcome addiction or trauma, please call us at 720-756-7941. Or you can email admissions at valiantlivingcom. We'd love to have a conversation with you, but for now let's dive into today's episode. I'm really grateful to have you here tonight. So just a little bit personal before I jump into questions.
Speaker 1:For me, when I was in program, wednesday, for whatever reason, was my hardest day. I think Tuesday, as you guys are experiencing right now, tuesday is a long day. I would come in halfway through the week. We weren't doing experientials on Thursday, so I didn't. It was like, and Wednesdays were just tough. I was dysregulated a lot on Wednesdays. Wagner's group at the time was always Wednesday afternoon and the way you showed up every week to that group with so much joy and you created a space where you allowed me to be dysregulated. You didn't try to fix me or you didn't try to like, you just allowed me to. You met me where I was at and I'm really grateful for that. It really made a difference for me in programming and you're someone that I hold in high regard.
Speaker 1:I have a lot of respect for, and one thing I love about Wagner is his humility. He's been so nervous to share and I'm just like dude. He's just such a wealth of wisdom and experience and love and care, and that's what I love about him, though he doesn't carry himself as like I got all the answers, which is why I would encourage you, as a fellow brother, to lean in tonight, because those are the people we should pay attention to. So would you help me? Welcome, michael Wagner. Breathe, you're going to get through this. This is great.
Speaker 3:How many years has it been in sobriety for you at this point 45, on August 25th of this year?
Speaker 1:Guys, 45 years Unbelievable. Start by just telling us a little bit about your journey. What led you into sobriety 45 years ago, almost 45 years ago?
Speaker 3:you know um I uh, sorry, I'll get through this and hopefully you will with me I uh, I grew up in an alcoholic family big time.
Speaker 3:My mom, my father, one of my sisters never recovered. The other sister died of ovarian cancer at 56. My mother's father was institutionalized for alcoholism. My uncle it's all over my.
Speaker 3:I was pretty vulnerable long before I had any idea. We lived in a small town in Ohio, sydney, ohio. My father was very successful. He was the second generation. He and his brother were second generation operators of a business that was founded by his father, by my grandfather, in 1891. They ran a foundry that made cooking utensils, the Wagner Manufacturing Company. Imagine that and I say this with truth and evidence that they were probably the finest cast iron and aluminum cooking utensils sold in the United States and abroad. So I grew up in a very successful family, small town prominence. I had two older sisters, both very attractive, so they generated a lot of attention. I had a meeting with Bree a couple of weeks ago and I said where does my love for these guys come from? They're all strangers in the beginning. How come I so care for them? And she said it's the wounds that we share, it's the sadness we've known that keeps us vulnerable. Well, without going into a lot of details, I have my resume in the sadness department.
Speaker 3:My mother was ultimately diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. There was a lot of violence in our home. One of my early memories was on a New Year's Eve. I was sleeping in the bedroom of my sister with my sister and there was all this ruckus. We opened the door and my mother had hit my father on the head with a vase. There was blood running down his face. I can, honestly, I can almost feel my sister's arm coming around me to try to protect me from that sight. It only got worse. Make a long story short, with lots of challenges in between. My mother collapsed one night. This was 10 years later and I got her admitted into a psychiatric ward in Columbus through a doctor friend of mine. And when my dad and I went to see her the next day she lunged at him. Nurses had to get her under control.
Speaker 3:I'm not trying to relive the agony of all this. I'm just trying to say I know what it feels like and after all these years of sobriety and I don't want this to sound threatening, but part of the journey I'm still working on it. But part of the journey, I'm still working on it. I have a lot of evidence of why it's worth all the struggle. Maybe we'll get to that. I want you to know honestly and this is not unique to me I genuinely want you to get well. I have my version of getting well. I don't know how that might look to you at the moment or how it even feels to me, but I know what's possible and I want you to have some courage and I hope tonight I can share some of the rewards.
Speaker 3:I brought this as a prop Among my multiple incidences as an alcoholic. I broke my son's leg falling down the stairs when he was 10 months old and I've kept this to remind me. Wow. And about five years later, after his brother was born drinking again, I fell down the steps with him, banged his head against the railing, had to take him to the hospital for stitches. So I have my experiences. I'm not fully forgiving myself for all that, but I've experienced what comes from recovery. I warn you it's a long journey.
Speaker 1:Well, we're grateful. You had a very successful career in investment banking and all that. I was just curious. Like you, now, this season of your life, you've just dedicated yourself to this, whether it's volunteer or whatever. I mean you just have this is your life now, this is your world, whether you worked at Cedar or volunteered at Cedar, I should say. And now here at Valiant, you come in and invest these guys. I'm imagining that's just part of your journey of giving back and working that step. But, man, we're grateful.
Speaker 3:I might be a little generous. I started volunteering at Cedar because my wife was my wife, believe it or not, 57 years and a couple of you have met her, I think. But she's still a doll and she's even older than I am by a little bit.
Speaker 1:And you remind her that every chance you get.
Speaker 3:She looks about 50 years younger but at any rate she was volunteering at University of Colorado Hospital and she said you know they have a recovery program called Cedar. You should go check that out. And I thought, uh-huh, but I did and there's an interesting story surrounding that. But I finally went to their volunteer office and they said, sure, come to this orientation. And I'll tell you, I walked into Cedar. That Cedar, mike Dineen helped build that program and in the image that he created it was one of the finest hospital-based recovery programs in the country.
Speaker 3:So here comes this guy from Ohio and I walk into this setting with multiple doctors Everybody has a master's degree at least. There are piles of nurses that are some of the most powerful and most impactful people I've met in this recovery experience and frankly I was pretty intimidated. There was a guy by the name of Tim Rumsey there who kind of put his arms around me and said, hey, let's get going. He became a sponsor, a really powerful sponsor, for me that late. I mean I was sober what 35 years or something at that point and I gradually worked into it, went back to school, started the CAC thing and ended up here finishing my CAS Certified Addiction Specialist thing. It took a while, but it was honestly the hand of my higher power. It was honestly the hand of my higher power.
Speaker 3:We had lived in Fort Collins for 12 years before we moved here. We moved here because my daughter had our first grandchild and so I wasn't exactly lost. That was okay, but I didn't have an agenda. I was okay, but I didn't have an agenda. So to find myself in this arena and really touched by the experience of you guys was really a gift. Believe me, it had nothing to do with me giving back. I'm not saying I did it selfishly, I didn't but I didn't expect the impact it had on me.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, we're grateful. However, you got here. We're grateful you got here, so that's, it's meaningful for us. I have kind of three kind of buckets of questions and we'll see what we get to, because I would imagine these guys are going to have some questions for you too, if you're open to that.
Speaker 1:Sure, but and you've kind of touched on some of it but I want to talk a little about the impact of your trauma and your healing, cause that's a big part of your journey. I want to talk about the rewards of long-term sobriety, but I also wanted to talk about the role of your higher power, cause that's a big part of your story as well as well. And so if we can just dive, if you're cool to just kind of dive into some of these things, um, thanks for sharing your part of your story with us. I mean, that's, that's very powerful. Um it?
Speaker 1:I think anymore I feel a sacredness around and this is coming from someone who's spent a lot of his life avoiding pain that when people invite us into the painful parts of their story, it feels for lack of a better word like holy, and what I mean by that is just like set apart, like sake, like it's. It's almost an honor to be invited into that side of people's story and I felt that when you were sharing, it felt very sacred to me. So thank you for that. But I'm curious just about um the, the role of, of healing and and how you've kind of processed some of that pain, some of that trauma, or how you're continuing to process that Continuing is the truth.
Speaker 3:I mean, as I started to prepare for this, I went back and looked at all that and it was very emotional. But I'll tell you, a pretty significant moment of healing occurred fairly recently. I have worked with a guy that used to be a therapist here. He was the clinical director, shane, and we've done some of that FIS stuff. You know. I mean IFS internal family systems where you take a look at what Dr Schwartz called your parts. That was really powerful for me. I got to know these parts that were the witnesses to these moments of trauma in my life and I began to understand their role in my advanced age, that they were protecting me from that wound. They were saying, look, I got this, you carry on and I'll just hold on to these memories and protect you from them.
Speaker 3:I told the guys in my group, maybe last week, that in the midst of this work we were doing, I heard this interview with Demi Moore whatever the actress where she was sharing about some of the trauma she had experienced with her mother and that at a moment in her life, fairly recently and certainly as a consequence of treatment she said she began to appreciate the fact that who she was was very much influenced by her mother Good and bad, but that was, I'll tell you, tim, as you said a couple of weeks ago, addiction is part of me. You know, those wounds are part of me. And at any rate, demi Moore said in this interview. She said I all at once realized I thought how could my children have any compassion for me if I don't have any compassion for my mother, shane? When I said that to Shane, he said Mike, I'm not charging you for today and this part of the work is done. That was a real breakthrough for me. And how long ago was that? That was recently, a month ago. That's wild. Maybe two months ago, very recently, a month ago. That's wild. Maybe two months ago, very recently. You do this stuff.
Speaker 3:I haven't done very many, but you think the last thing you want to happen is for a guy sitting in the audience to say if this is what it looks like after all these years, I'm out of here and I don't want to generate that kind of feeling. So that was the moment I needed, right? I couldn't remember all the good things about my mom. They were all occupied by those moments of chaos. All at once she was present again in her whole self. When she was put on medication that calmed her down, she wasn't so much trouble anymore, but she wasn't herself anymore. The good part of her was all toned down. So all at once I could see her, as Demi Moore said, as the pure spirit that my miller entered this world, as that we all do. It wasn't her fault. And she also said when she said, how can my kids have compassion on me if I have no compassion on her, she said isn't that how we break the cycle? That's really powerful. I have to heal so that I don't pass that on to my kids and they pass it on to theirs. That's the truth.
Speaker 3:This injury goes from generation to generation and I have a lot of documented history to prove it. So it's a slow process. It doesn't have to be as slow as it's been for me, but it's a slow process. But you really have to address it, because those wounds, though they are the source of our brotherhood and, in fact, the source of our mutual community healing. We heal each other. You really have to look at them. You really need help. I needed help and I didn't get it for a long time.
Speaker 1:Yeah how can we, how can we um, for those of us that are in, like you know, I'm under three years I feel like early recovery still, compared to you know, 45. So how, for those of us that are in early recovery, begin to deal with some of these trauma and be able to heal without feeling overwhelmed by it? Because it can seem like a lot, or it can seem like even for you saying hey in, you know, 45 years into this, I'm still having these, these breakthroughs, which, for me personally, when I hear you say that, like if this is what sobriety looks like 45 years down the road for me, I'm all in. It doesn't scare me.
Speaker 1:This feels like, because what I desire more than anything is to be connected to myself to what I'm feeling to whatever, like that is, my desire in life is to be connected and I feel that from you, I see that You're connected to that.
Speaker 3:But for those of us early on, how do we begin to start this healing and this process without feeling like gosh? This is so overwhelming. For me it was therapy In the beginning. I saw the same psychologist who became a very close friend, just as they were talking about all at once. We were just in conversation. They were talking about that in the meeting before this, but I went to a very good therapist every week for three years. I needed help and I gradually came to appreciate that.
Speaker 3:So for one, don't think you can do it all by yourself. It's really not possible. You know, like I say, all the time, here we are in recovery in X number of days and I've been in retreatment this many times and blah, blah, blah. If it were easy, we would have done it a long time ago. It just ain't easy. So, number one do the work. Part of it is you need somebody that has enough professional experience to shield you from the overwhelm. You don't want to go back and relive all those. They open that wound, but you needn't be afraid of it either. It's over, it's past. I mean, michael is very much into meditation, has a real sense of the power of learning how to be in the present I'm not sure that's a very satisfying answer. But at this stage don't mess with it. Get help, use it and be patient.
Speaker 1:Is that help? Very much so, Because I think for someone like me I don't know if anybody else can relate, but I want to just fix it, I want to get in and I want to heal it, fix it, move on whatever. And it just often doesn't work that way. You have to be patient with it and you have to kind of let it unfold, right? I mean, that's kind of what I'm hearing you say.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but that's it's not like going into the engine of a car to repair it. It's not like that. I've got something I want to share with you that you don't get it yet, but this experience is a real gift. What I have grown into I hesitate to say this with too much confidence what I have grown to is so much grander than all the things I longed for. Early in my life, I was certain I couldn't be as good as my father from the time I was little. And then I flunked out of school over and over and got drunk a lot and crashed cars and did all that stuff. So I was a shit for a pretty long time crash cars and did all that stuff, so I was a shit for a pretty long time. This is a huge gift and I really don't know how to communicate this convincingly, but you should be grateful for being here. I am, I'm really grateful for being here. I am, I'm really grateful for being here. I mean here right now. Even as uncomfortable as this is, this is the most fulfilling part of my life is being with you guys. That's the truth. When I was in college in and out of college I worked at a black boys club for a while and I thought at one point I really like this, I really enjoy working these kids, I should do this, I should do this for a living, and I thought I'll never make any money. So I became a stockbroker and didn't make very much money. So at any rate, I really mean it. I know how uncomfortable this is, because it's uncomfortable for me right now. Right, because we're talking about serious stuff here. This is a huge gift. Don't mess with it. Jonathan knows, dan knows we grow almost despite ourselves to some extent. And you know something I grew up as a Catholic and we were a very devout Catholic family and that was I mean. I went to Catholic schools all through college and all that. But you are going to experience a higher power, much closer to the reality of the majesty of that mystery than is easily available in church, and that's something you should really look forward to. When I look back at my life, there are so many incidences you should really look forward to. When I look back at my life, there are so many incidences where that encounter was impossible without. I'll give you an example One of the reasons I look forward to talking to you Tim is in the midst of the chaos of my college years which went on for almost 10, I decided I should join the service.
Speaker 3:I mean, it was still the draft, so I was probably going to go anyway. But I thought I'm going to the service, I'll grow up there, I'll get it together. And I had a friend at my favorite bar at Ohio State, the Varsity Club, who was several years older than I. He was African-American black guy, madison Scott, and I went to him and I said Scotty, you're the ranking enlisted officer at Fort Hayes, which was in Columbus at that time. I said I think I should go to the service. Maybe that'd be good for me. Of course I'm in a bar. And Scotty said well, worked for me. I went in after high school and I have my master's in business and you know it all worked for me. So I went to the, I enlisted, I tried to enlist, I took the exam.
Speaker 3:I'm standing in my underwear in this room with all these half-naked kids and their doctor comes out and put your drawers down and he looks at my spine and he says you have a pyelonidal cyst and you're ineligible for the draft. And I thought, shit, now what am I going to do? So I pulled my pants up, and this is before Vietnam was all heated up. You know I wouldn't have been so brave, but at any rate I'd never reported that to my draft board and a year later I was called for the draft. In the meantime I have met Ginny, my wife-to-be, and I'm back in school and I'm starting to get a little bit together. I'm still drinking too much, but I'm getting a little bit of my life together. I go back to Fort Hayes. I'm standing in the same room in my underwear. The same doctor comes out. I pull down my pants. He says you have a pilonidal cyst. You are not eligible for the draft. And that was it. You tell me that isn't higher power. So here's the kicker of that story.
Speaker 3:About a year and a half ago I'm in my favorite coffee shop and there's this guy sitting there and I'm curious about a book he's reading. I go over and sit down. I said do you mind could we talk for a minute? He said sure, I said. He said where are you from? And I said actually I'm from Columbus, ohio. He said so am I? And out of nowhere. I said is there any chance you would have known a Madison Scott? And he said, and he said he's my father.
Speaker 1:What.
Speaker 3:You have so much to look forward to. You are not alone. I mean, it might feel like it and I might be scared as hell about what's next and the stuff. I haven't admitted or reported that. I'm still hiding all that crap that's going on and I have those too, but you have no idea what's coming. And I have another 50 examples.
Speaker 3:Benedictine monk that showed up at exactly the most desperate time when I'm at St Pete Academy in the middle of nowhere in Illinois. Let me just tell this story and then we'll go on. So I arrive at the beginning of my senior year and Father Richard, whom I've gotten to know and love, this great Benedictine monk who had spent his career as a chaplain in the army. He comes over to me and he says Mike, I'm going to ask you a question, I want you to answer it. And he said were you drinking here last year? And I said yes. And he said, if you had said no, I was sending you home All my friends that I had drunk with. They all got thrown out. Father Richard said the difference is, if I ask Mike the question, he'll tell the truth and praise God, I did so. I got to finish. You tell me there's not a higher power at work someplace around here. And I have many more examples, I'm not kidding, and they go on all the time Anyway.
Speaker 1:Talk a little bit about just the and this is the last thing I'm going to ask you. I want you guys to ask questions because, yeah, just this is so good. Mike, Talk about some of the rewards 45 years, some of the moments for you.
Speaker 3:I really do want to try to communicate this, so it looks like something to look forward to. I really do want to try to communicate this, so it looks like something to look forward to. I mean so the son whose leg I broke when he was 10 months old. He was supposed to be here tonight. He's an absolute authority on Buddhism. He's a wonderful son. His mom and dad are getting old and he's spending a lot of time with us and he's a great guy. We ski together, we play pickleball together. He and Dan have become very close friends. So I didn't fuck him up, you got it. I did for a while, but he got over it. His brother His brother has been a huge success.
Speaker 3:He's with Boston Consulting in Bangkok, married a gorgeous Thai girl who was named the number one model in Thailand about 10 years ago. She's a real sweetheart. She is the essence of what happens if you live a life of meditation and service. She's really something of meditation and service. She's really something. They have a son who's terrific. I have a daughter whom the staff has met. She came to a staff meeting last summer. I think she's a therapist. She's married to a physicist. They live in Maryland now. Unfortunately, they were here in Denver when we moved here from Fort Collins.
Speaker 3:Are those adequate rewards? I had a good career. You know I thought about this driving over here tonight that I was a stockbroker with Payne Weber, which was one of the premier firms at the time. That's full of miracles. I had no business being hired by them. They got me to go back to school and finish because I couldn't start training unless I had a degree and holy smoke I drank every night when I was in New York going through training. I used to say you know that bar I referred to where I met Madison Scott. It was called the Varsity Club. I used to say I've been on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange twice, but I've been on the floor of the Varsity Club three times.
Speaker 3:I'm 82, and I'm 82 and I'm not going to last forever. I know that Ginny and I are working on our plans. We're trying to figure out who's going to cremate us, getting stones in place. I'm clear about the reality of my age, but I'm in really good health at the moment. That's a gift man. Yes, I like to say matter of fact.
Speaker 3:Jill asked me once how have you managed to stay sober so long? And I thought that's a good question. And then, out of my mouth you guys have heard this before, but I said well, I became worthy of taking very good care of myself. That's really the truth. But worthy when you grow up with an abusive mom? I mean worthy. Where did that come from? Worthy, where did that come from? And it gradually, because I wasn't very open to being worthy for a long time. That's called shame.
Speaker 3:I finished college. I have an incredible group of friends, you and others, I and others. I really mean that it's intimidating to come here. You know, you think you're on this journey injured, sort of yes, I know what that's like. But you've been handpicked. You're going to get well and you're going to make a huge impact on your families, on each other. What rewards you want? I didn't get to win the lottery, but I made a fair amount of money in the end of my career, not in the beginning. I started to tell you this Do you know? When I was a stockbroker, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was at 1,000. In 1973, it went from 1,000 to 500. Try to make a living in that market. What is it now? 46,000? Patients, right, index funds, you know?
Speaker 1:all about this, Dan, that's great Tim sorry.
Speaker 2:That's great, dan sorry, that's great.
Speaker 3:Dan, I'm all over the place.
Speaker 1:What's coming up for you guys? I know we're getting short on time, but questions.
Speaker 3:Hey, I'd like to ask Mike, how do you forgive yourself? How have you learned to process that? Because I struggle with that? That's a really good question. Struggle with that? That's a really good question.
Speaker 3:Well, you know, for one I can linger and I'll tell you a story. Maybe you've heard this, but this guy, tim Rumsey, that meant so much to me at Cedar, when we were doing the steps, he said every night, 30 days, brush your teeth, look in the mirror and say I love you. So this is literally true. I'd brush your teeth, look in the mirror and say I love you. So this is literally true. I'd brush my teeth, look in the mirror and say I love you.
Speaker 3:You asshole, it's not easy. You can linger in the despair of all those disappointments. I told you guys once, when I made amends with my mom. At one point I said I'm sorry, I've been such a disappointment. You know what she said Nothing, nothing. You know, honestly, it's a spiritual thing, and I'm not talking about religion here. No disrespect to religion. But I need to get what it means to be a human being. That book, the Spirituality of Imperfection. You know, there's a great quote and I've said it over and over to you guys. But Rabbi Zizpah said in the next life they will not ask me why were you not Moses. They will ask me why were you not Zizpah, why were you not yourself? That's your gift.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 3:One of Joe's rimposhes said we have the freedom and the right and the power to choose how our precious life will be Precious life. When did I ever view my life as precious? I've been recovering since I was eight. It's a powerful question. Part of it is through therapy, where somebody can keep bringing you back to reality, because if I linger in that wallow in that regret, I'm going to stay there. I need somebody to help me lift me out of there, and your higher power will help with that too. He's never showed up face to face, you understand, but man, he's been close. Some big miracles and little miracles all over the place.
Speaker 3:My son, john's been really struggling with his job. He was working in New York, fell in love with New York and got lost his job at Facebook. Bcg went after them, offered him a whole bunch of money to come back to Thailand. He agreed to do it and then he really regretted it. I just got the beautiful letter from him saying good luck tonight, dad, I'm doing okay, I get it now. I mean, he's made a lot of money, he's got a hell of a resume. Why should he be dependent upon that shitty company? But he's healthy on that shitty company, but he's healthy. Can't that restore some of my regard for myself? I'm his dad and I apologize for the part I've played in him. Needing to constantly achieve that's one of my problems. That's a schema issue for me. I'm not really worthy of that. But you must keep striving. You've got to keep going. It's a hell of a question. I keep asking it. You know that. How do you have that to help at all?
Speaker 3:Yeah, very much I mean it took me a long time to hate myself. It's going to take a little while to get over it.
Speaker 1:Well said what else.
Speaker 2:Ski trips are a big highlight, experiential, for Valiant. And the number one fear, I hear, is I've never skied sober before. How am I going?
Speaker 1:to do this.
Speaker 2:Could you talk a little bit about how you re-entered your hobbies and how you began to find joy in early life.
Speaker 3:I really do have an answer to that, weber. One of my goals was to join the university club where a number of the brokers were all members, in Columbus, a beautiful club. They had a squash court. So I started playing squash and I'm still drinking, but I'm all at once. I'm surrounded by people that really take very good care of themselves. They're very good athletes. One of them was the only two-time captain of the Princeton squash team. He was 20 years older than I. We became very close friends, traveled all over the country playing together. They didn't have, they weren't drunk.
Speaker 3:So even while I was still drinking and, in fact, deteriorating, I was surrounded by people that really did take very good care of themselves. They were great athletes, great guys. A lot of them were very successful. So I had that community that was starting to gather. Not too many years later I finally got sober and that community was still there. And all at once I discovered that sober I was a lot better, I was stronger and I didn't have a hangover and I was starting to get over myself. And that carried on for 25 years and some of the coolest people I've known my lifetime only one of them's left that Dan just talked to on the phone.
Speaker 3:Don Mills in Cincinnati was named like the number five most significant coach in the history of the game. We were pals and so I didn't do a lot of well. That's not true. I just went back to Ohio to ski at this. I told you guys this to ski at this little hill where I taught when I was 19. And there is a picture behind the bar of all these attractive girls sitting at the bar and me. I mean this is 63 years ago and here's my picture. I mean I'm safe because, believe me, no one would recognize me At the entrance. There's another picture of me. That's impossible. And what's the message? I don't really get it. I mean, what the message is? You're okay, wags. You're okay, wags. You're okay, wags. You were okay then. You were just on the wrong road.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:So good dude.
Speaker 3:So, good. Well, it doesn't feel like it. I'm sorry, I don't have.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I feel pretty overwhelmed by your sharing tonight.
Speaker 3:But you would say that anyway.
Speaker 1:No, I wouldn't. I mean, it's really special what you shared with us. Is there any other questions? I don't want to belabor it, but this has been really, really special for us, man.
Speaker 3:This is going to sound weird, but I wrote this a long time ago. If I can get it out, I want you to know that you are magnificent. This whole world, the mountains, the forests, the beaches and ocean, the sunshine that you love, they were all created for you. Never forget it. You are magnificent, whether you were born to a rich family or a poor one, whether the world regards you as smart or beautiful or not. You are magnificent and all mankind will be judged on its likeness to you. That's the truth.
Speaker 3:What we become through this journey is really something to be proud of. This journey you are on will reveal the presence of your higher power, a personal, real presence that is far beyond the theological definitions we grew up with or maybe have dismissed. Your higher power is the source of your transformation, your recovery. It will be revealed to you and your friends, the groups in which you share, the miracles of forgiveness you will experience and all sorts of surprises that await you if you will just pay attention. All you have to do is trust the process and keep going. I'm glad that's over. Yeah, right, wow, thank you.
Speaker 1:Well, we appreciate you listening to this episode of the Valiant Living Podcast and our hope is that it helped you feel educated, encouraged and even empowered on your journey towards peace and freedom. If we can serve you or your loved one in any way, we'd love to have a conversation with you. You can call 720-756-7941 or email admissions at valiantlivingcom. At Valiant Living, we treat the whole person so you not only survive, but you thrive in the life you deserve. And finally, if this episode has been helpful to you, it would mean a lot to us if you'd subscribe and even share it with your friends and family. You can also follow along with us on Instagram and Facebook by simply searching Valiant Living. Thanks again for listening and supporting the Valiant Living podcast. We'll see you next week.
