You know that expression, “The only way out is through?” It’s a truism that has never been truer than in the case of Ryan Mack, who fought his way back from serious addiction, mental anguish and a toxic lifestyle. How did he do it? It started by learning to take control of his mind. Today a successful coach (you can check him out @Instagram), Ryan is sharing his inspiring journey with Host John Sheldon on this episode of the Beyond Belief Sobriety podcast. The path wasn’t so much straight-ahead as a patchwork of lessons collected and behavioral choices made on the way to recovery. And when he’s talking about recovery, Ryan means not just a return from the hardcore cocktail of drugs he’d been using but also establishing a strong sense of self based on awareness and discipline. He outlines for us the variety of techniques and tools for self-discovery that ultimately brought him to a transformational tipping point.
You’ll learn about the importance of “doing the opposite” of what our reptilian minds most often want us to do: the easy thing. Exercising what Ryan calls “extreme discipline” is foundational to the lifestyle framework he provides his clients (online through a combination of his fitness app, one-to-one coaching and a range of trackable measures related to diet, fitness and mental hygiene). But, he says, meaningful change doesn’t start without making an informed decision – and sticking with it no matter what. “If you’re struggling, you just need to take control,” he says. “It’s up to you. It’s a choice. Don’t be weak. We get strong by doing what’s hard.” If you need help defining a personal roadmap to being your best self, Ryan’s coaching program might give you just the kind of insight and accountability you’ve been looking for!
If you’d like to support this podcast, please consider clicking here to become a patron. Your contribution of just $1, $3 or $5 a month goes a long way towards building this community!
To view this and other episodes of Beyond Belief Sobriety on YouTube, visit this link.
Key Takeaways

* Ryan shares his trajectory from managing depression, anxiety, suicide attempts, a dysfunctional long-term relationship and the grip of addiction to find his way to mental and physical wellness with a wonderful partner and successful online coaching business.
* Some of the more traditional routes (like psychotherapy, anti-depressants and rehab) were of only marginal help to Ryan.
* The heart of his awakening took root on two fronts:

* Mental: A wise mentor with a shamanic background taught Ryan about the power – and inner workings – of the mind.
* A “militant” physical trainer who understood the role of discipline in cultivating self-esteem taught Ryan how to commit and move forward, one choice at a time.
* By interweaving the physical, emotional and mental, Ryan has established a holistic sweet spot in which each of the building blocks reinforces the other.


* Ryan explains the spiritual hierarchy – atop which sits our souls, followed by mind and body.
* About the lower part of our brains, which is primal and reflexively seeks comfort – unless we use our higher awareness to redirect it through better decisions. Instead of reaching for that drink, we can interrupt that thought and practice something different.
* Meditation may be a helpful adjunct, but Ryan believes at the end of the day mental and physical wellness is built on action. It’s about choosing daily to do the hard things, even when we don’t feel like it.

Everyone’s recovery story is unique, but in the case of my guest for this episode, there are some unmistakable parallels that resonate with us both. Matt Gardiner is a certified recovery coach, sound therapist and podcast host whose journey has been marked by turning points that share some similarities with John’s, as their conversation illuminates with humor and insight. We learn about how Matt came to AA, his reaction to that first meeting (the laughter took him by surprise!) and the way his father’s death inspired a powerful shift in his mid-30s. Moving with curiosity through the toughest of times, Matt has found his way to authenticity and a coaching business he loves.
In addition to sharing step-by-step the modules that constitute his Recovery Roadmap 30-Day Program, Matt explains exactly what sound healing is and how his breathwork credential complements it. The conversation also touches on how The Beyond Recovery Podcast was conceived and the wide variety of resources available to anyone in search of support. It’s an exciting time to be in recovery, which is why Matt’s closing advice is so compelling – and realistic: Don’t be alone. Reach out and you will find just the right community awaits!
Key Takeaways

* Transgenerational Beginnings: Drinking’s allure traces back to the fun Matt perceived his parents were having with their adult beverages, subsequently picking up steam when his parents divorced and his childhood in rural part of British Columbia “blew up.”
* Music afforded Matt a great way of expressing his feelings about being bullied or disenchanted by the fragility of his home life, but it also turned into a gateway for emulating the rock ‘n roll lifestyle.
* Hospitalized for an attack of pancreatitis at 27, Matt’s eyes were opened to the fact that his partying was wreaking havoc. It was supposed to be a wake-up call, but another several years of habitual drinking ensued.
* When he reached a point of acknowledging the problem, Matt was concerned about the kind of reception he would get. Friends and family couldn’t have been more supportive.
* Ego and Relapse: Because he’d learned so much over more than three years, Matt deemed himself ready to reintroduce alcohol. He could drink like everyone else, right?
* Four years later, after trying every possible variety of moderation, Matt returned to sobriety in 2019 after the death of his dad at the age of 66.
* The power of laughter, levity and lightness: Both John and Matt were surprised and comforted by the upbeat vibe they found at their first AA meetings. It was a sign of optimism and hope for a brighter future.
* John and Matt also have in common the powerful impact that the loss of their respective fathers had on their life paths and decisions to reassess.
* Working harder, pushing further, surely happiness and a sense of achievement was around the corner. But for all the motivation, it was essential that Matt break through to the next level of energy … which is where his journey and purpose started to shift.
* As soon as he started a six-month sabbatical inspired by floating feelings of dread and anxiety Matt knew there would be no going back to his 9-to-5 job. He was open and following his intuition, creative impulses and new, entrepreneurial ideas.
* Taking a Leap Isn’t Easy! Among the hobgoblins we often encounter:

* Mixing up financial status and personal value.
* Letting Impostor Syndrome undermine our agency.
* Isolating and not reaching out for help.


* Matt found his sweet spot after reflecting on what he’d liked and excelled at professionally: Coaching, mentoring and helping people believe in themselves.
* Recovery, mindset, business and other types of coaching share parallel focuses:

Are you ready to meet a secular force of nature? Then you won’t want to miss this episode. Our guest, LaDawn, shares with us the harrowing passage she made from hardened alcoholic to master of a YouTube channel that regularly delights, inspires and informs viewers on a range of mental health, lifestyle and sobriety-related topics. A woman unafraid to be 100% herself, LaDawn gets real in a way that will resonate with anyone who has ever had no choice but to make Alcoholics Anonymous their own. She has come back from childhood trauma and processed through tremendous loss in her own very personal way, with smarts, laughter and warmth. No standing on ceremony for this original thinker. Nor is this powerhouse woman capable of accepting traditions that do not serve her – as a mother, nurse, community member, ravenous researcher and online personality.
LaDawn’s subscribers know much of the story she shares here, including the sexual, emotional and physical abuse she experienced as a child; her undiagnosed mental health issues; and the roots of her heavy drinking habit, which started in early childhood and exploded as life heaped ever more stress upon her in adolescence. “I wanted to drink to get away from (bad) feelings and I just couldn’t,” she says. “I wanted to check out because I was so overwhelmed.” She told herself she was a woman and women aren’t alcoholics. She tried to stop by white knuckling, but the bottle always called her back. Battling back from suicidal ideation, the loss of her mother and a boatload of self-limiting beliefs, LaDawn shows us that there is a way through and tools out there to be had. She brings to life in vivid detail the unique path she carved out for herself – and inspires us with a simple truth: We can all find the recovery that is unmistakably our own. Enjoy this uplifting conversation with a YouTube personality who is as authentic as it gets, both to her lived experience and independent beliefs. 
Key Takeaways

* You can hit the block button! LaDawn and John share thoughts about how to manage internet “trolls” who try to derail livestreams.
* LaDawn shares her recovery story, which starts in August 2020 after decades of alcohol use that trace back to an unstable home with a single mom and three older brothers who exposed her to a lot of partying at a very young age.
* Emotional, physical and sexual abuse set the stage for LaDawn’s descent into blackout drinking when she was still a pre-teen – a situation that her mother, who suffered from mental illness, was unable to manage.
* By the time she was 14, LaDawn’s drinking had escalated and her own mental health deteriorated (to the point where she attempted suicide) under the strain of caring for herself, paying the bills and going to school.
* In and out of school, at one point stopping drinking altogether, LaDawn did manage to earn her GED and started college to get a nursing degree that was interrupted by an unplanned pregnancy.
* It was a free-for-all. Her childhood in Cleveland, Ohio, included many friends, neighbors and relatives (including her biological father) who were alcoholic or drug-addicted and very little in the way of education or exposure to recovery programs of any kind.
* In her early 20s a rehab doctor suggested bipolar might be a root issue, but LaDawn’s nonstop drinking made a diagnosis impossible. And because she had a job, was in nursing school and managing her kids without government support, she was sure she wasn’t like anyone she met in her recovery meetings. She now sees the layers of denial.
* Work, school, trying to be there for her mom, her kids, her husband … Rinse and repeat. LaDawn used large amounts of alcohol to manage an endless, exhausting cycle.
* By 2016, blackouts were becoming a regular occurrence and people around her were weary of dea...

The following essay was authored by John Huey for the purpose of outlining the discussion of our third episode in the Atheism and Sobriety series.
Abstinence and The Purity of Atheist Thought
By John Huey
As Atheists we see things not only as they are in personal terms without the veneer of belief, but, as we look at ideas and states of being as they may apply to the wider world, we can, if clearheaded at the time, come to conclusions that may very well have more universal applicability than might appear to be so on the surface.
Additionally, we can grow to understand that the true essence of Atheism lies, in good measure, in the realization and actualization of our all too human and finite limitations. It is only there, after we fully embrace our true limits, that we find their essence and begin to harness our energies and talents in an effective manner. Given this, in terms of our sobriety, there is no more important intersection than in the acknowledgement of the limits of our humanity and the contingent nature of our continued presence here, as it embraces an unconditional commitment to not drinking or using.
While fully realizing the limits of what we don’t know, we grow to appreciate the hard-won value of what we do know, without the ability to escape the implications of the facts at hand by retreating into a so called “spiritual” world view or other fantasy life. The facts, as we found them, are impossible to escape and, in the context of an ongoing recovery from alcohol or drug addiction, the centrality of abstinence is always present.
Thus, sooner or later, sometimes immediately but often painfully, over time, as sobriety settles in and fully manifests, we come to the facts embodied by the topic in hand. These facts are impossible to avoid or deny if we are, in the end, to be the beneficiaries of a consistent and, hopefully, lifelong sobriety.
To employ an impressionistic analogue, when the sun shines, on a clear day, we see inanimate objects as well as the complexities of the living in well-defined relief and we are able to operate in the shadows which can take on sharp edges and present us with hazardous dead-end streets that we are able to avoid. We can then join in the processions and rituals of daily life with our fellows with purpose and dedication as we traverse the more even paths ahead.
The Atheist possesses this clarity as the birthright of those who navigate the darkness and bring the facts to light in an inherently rational way. This clarity, this purity of thought, that brings us to our appreciation of abstinence as an absolute value is in no way mediated by “force fields”, distortions, or undifferentiated “impressions” that have no true basis in nature.
Despite all of this, as we progress on our own path without any form of belief, we always need to remember that religion works for many people as a primary motivational force that propelled them forward to what seems to be, on the surface, a better way of life for them. This undeniable human tendency can, when harnessed, provide sufficient basic changes in the life structure, thought processes, and behaviors of addicts and alcoholics (without the myth of a so-called “personality change”) to produce dramatic and life changing improvements in the ability to stop drinking and/or in the use of other substances. All this, of course, is a perfectly reasonable way forward for those who chose to believe these things.
The problem this can present to a committed Atheist only arises when the path toward permanent abstinence is somehow conflated with these religious fantasies that permeate the major conventional recovery programs. The sad fact is that many of the adherents to these programs claim universal applicability for them and they attempt to (passive aggressively in most cases) impose those so-called “Steps” and structures on the non-believer. They even sometimes try to “secularize” these religious...

Although relapse is often a source of shame, it needn’t be. As we learn on this episode, there are ways to understand such stumbles as part of the larger process that is recovery. This livestream conversation features co-hosts John Sheldon and Mary C., who together explore the healing opportunities available to us when we respond to, reflect on and ideally avert relapse altogether. They are sharing personal experiences as well as fascinating highlights from an article, “Relapse Prevention and the Five Rules of Recovery.”
John and Mary cover the emotional, mental and physical circumstances commonly associated with relapse as well as useful strategies for identifying these pitfalls before tumbling into them. We also look at the biggest risks to sobriety (lack of self-care is at the top of the list) and some of the most toxic reactions to relapse (pride, which breeds silence and self-loathing).
It’s a free exchange of ideas, including candid and thought-provoking comments from viewers on a range of topics. You’ll come away with a deeper perspective on what it means to relapse and the tools available to manage through even the most challenging of times. The most important takeaway: Remember that the quickest way to recover from a relapse is to confront the reality. No denial, no hiding — and no fear of judgment, at least not among those who understand that it’s all part of your recovery.
If you would like to watch the video of this conversation on YouTube, click here. And you can read in its entirety the  2015 Yale Journal of Biology and Medicine article about the stages of relapse discussed on this episode here.
If you’d like to support this podcast, please consider clicking here to become a patron. Your contribution of just $1, $3 or $5 a month goes a long way towards building this community!
Key Takeaways

* Mary C. Shares the story of her relapse 11 years ago, when she lit up a joint that led to a brief break from what is now 27 years of sobriety. Lessons learned.
* Sobriety dates can be a strong incentive to remaining sober — until they aren’t. Mary shares her perspective on the counterproductive pride associated with wanting to keep her sobriety date. She was out of integrity and justifying lies.
* John recognizes that recovery is a process of change and that a relapse doesn’t have to hammer us or negate all our time in recovery.
* You can’t really go back to where you were before a relapse, but you can move forward with meaning and deeper understanding.
* Secrets Are a Sickness: Shame does not serve us, even in the wake of relapse.
* Is relapse part of recovery? There are varying philosophies about whether it’s an inevitable part of the process.
* John shares some of the ideas offered up by Steven M. Melemis in his Yale Journal of Biology and Medicine article, “Relapse Prevention and the Five Rules of Recovery,” according to which there are four main ideas:

* Relapse is a gradual process with distinct stages (and the earlier the stage we disrupt, the better our odds of success).
* Recovery is a process of personal growth with developmental milestones, each of which has its own risks for relapse.
* The main tools for relapse prevention are cognitive therapy and body relaxation,

Highjacked by trauma and a profound desire for validation, Martin Lockett attached himself early on to gangs, drugs and violence – all in the name of fitting in. It was a path that took him into a world of trouble, including a DUI accident that resulted in the death of two people. Sentenced by the state of Oregon to 17.5 years in prison at the age of 24, his life might have been ruined by addiction and despair. Instead, Martin chose hope and believed in the possibility of redemption. More importantly still, he was willing to do the work. “I determined that the only way that this tragedy would not be in vain was if I carried on (my victims’) legacies by doing the work in the recovery community,” says Martin, who methodically went about earning a master’s degree in psychology and acquiring tools and credentials to lift others out of the pain and self-loathing he once knew.
Martin found in substances an easy way to get comfortable with peers, and himself. He didn’t recognize the role that hypervigilance, low self-esteem and a fractured ego could play in feeding his addicted mind. That understanding came only through time, and intention. You’ll be inspired not only by Martin’s honesty but also by his mission to enfranchise young people impacted by trauma and social pressures of which they’re not aware.
Released from prison in 2021 after serving his full sentence, Martin is today a 43-year-old man committed equally to recovery and advocacy. He works full-time for Lines for Life, supporting individuals at risk for suicide and substance abuse. He is also the author of two books, including most recently his compelling memoir, “Prison to Purpose Pipeline: How One Sentence Led to a Life of Service.” There is power in accountability – to ourselves and to others. Martin epitomizes the ideals of service that fuel recovery and our best hopes for becoming our most fully realized selves. His resonant life story, rigorous self-reflection and commitment to change have something to say to all of us, wherever we are in our journeys.
Click here if you’d like to buy Martin’s book: “Prison to Purpose Pipeline: How One Sentence Led to a Life of Service.” You might also enjoy listening to Rock the Bottom, the podcast he co-hosts about rebounding from low points through our shared humanity.
If you’d like to support The Beyond Belief Sobriety Podcast, please consider clicking here to become a patron. Your contribution of just $1, $3 or $5 a month goes a long way towards building this community! 
Key Takeaways

* Out of prison for a little over a year, Martin is living his best sober life and doing the work he set out to do after he committed a fatal DUI that sent him to prison for the better part of two decades.
* Martin’s parents worked hard to keep him away from the “wrong crowd,” but for a shy kid who wanted to embolden himself the crime, gangs and drugs proved impossible to resist. Everything else was secondary.
* An afterschool job at an ice cream parlor exposed Martin to white, middle class kids. He quickly adapted – code switching between Black street gang clothes and preppy designer labels to fit into what he perceived as a more upwardly mobile world.  
* Coming out of a stint in juvenile detention, Martin was separated from his peer group and placed in a school where he was given personal attention. He blossomed, achieving straight A’s – until his 45 days were up and life returned to busine...

Today, July 20, 2022 marks thirty-four years since my last drink, so in the spirit of sobriety anniversaries, I thought I’d take the opportunity to share my recovery story. It’s a story I’ve told many times over the years, but each telling is a little different as I continually gain additional insight and learn from my past. In this talk, I didn’t spend a lot of time on my drinking years, but instead I focused more on my experience with recovery.
Introduction
I used to put more weight on recovery stories and my own personal story than I do now, but I still think there’s some value to be had from these stories. It’s good for me to think about where I’ve been, what I’ve learned, and where I’m going. Hopefully, someone will hear something in what I say that will be useful. I hope that’s the case. Thirty-four years is a lot of time to cover, so I won’t go into a lot of detail about my drinking years, nor will I give a blow-by-blow description of each of the past 34 years since I’ve been sober. What I will do is briefly describe my background, so you can have an idea of how I grew up, and I’ll break my time in recovery down into three phases, each lasting roughly a decade.
My family of origin
I grew up in a military family, and I think that’s important because there are certain issues with Army, Navy, and Air Force brats that are unique. One of those things is that I don’t have a strong connection with a place in my past. We moved around a lot, which was always a great experience, but I don’t have a strong connection with the past. I can’t tell you who I went to kindergarten with, or who I went to first grade with, or who I went to fourth grade with, I don’t have those kinds of memories like a lot of people. There were advantages to growing up this way as well. One thing that I appreciate is having been exposed to different cultures and experiences early in my life.
I am fortunate that my father learned to appreciate diversity from the Army, and he instilled that in me, my brothers, and my sister. Our family was very adventurous. When we moved to a new place, we always wanted to go out and explore the area. I spent four years of my childhood in the Netherlands, and while we lived there, we went camping all over Europe. Like I suppose anyone, there were certainly problems in my family. Most of those stemmed from my mother who suffered from serious depression. Mental illness ran through her family, and still effects the present generation. When she was in high school, her father committed suicide by jumping off a bridge. That trauma undoubtedly had a significant impact on her life and was passed on to her children.
Like her father, my mother suffered from depression. When I was growing up, I was exposed to her mood swings, and dagger-like attacks on my self-esteem. Yet, she could also be loving and fun, so there was a lot of uncertainty surrounding my relationship with her. Much of the time, she was under the influence of drugs that kept her sedated, and she spent hours sleeping.
My father was an officer in the Army. He was a veteran of the war in Vietnam, and he was a tough person. He could be a lot of fun and he took a real interest in his kids. I enjoyed talking with him about current events as he had coffee in the morning. On the other hand, this engaged and fun father, was also a very strict disciplinarian. Any punishment was severe and physical. This caused me to fear him. I still remember the stress and fear that I felt simply from hearing the car door close when he came home from work.
My Drinking Years
My childhood was a mixed bag and if there was any trauma, it would have been the unpredictability in my household. I never knew what to expect and I didn’t always feel safe. My mother’s many mood swings and my father’s anger would often erupt into loud arguments in the house that would cause me to hide,

Anyone who has any experience with AA has heard the saying, “fake it ’til you make it.” Often, the statement is made to someone who isn’t buying the concept of needing a higher power to stay sober. They are told to just pretend and sooner or later, they will come along. But is there another way to think about this saying? In this livestream, Angela and John attempt to answer that question with help from comments in the live chat and calls from listeners.
This was recorded live in March of 2021. If you are interested in joining one of our livestreams, we stream every Saturday at 11:00 am Central and you can always find the stream on our YouTube Channel.
What we talked about

* Importance of establishing a habit of calling people and attending meetings.
* Value of writing a gratitude list.
* ‘”Acting As If” used as behavior modification.
* Confident people often achieve more than those with less confidence.
* Scheduling dopamine hits rather than allowing them to be hijacked.
* Call from Bob K. who talked about the theory of cognitive dissonance.
* The power of the placebo effect.
* How body language impacts you emotionally.
* Developing good habits.
* Hesitancy about ending social distancing.
* We need to be agitated by making slight changes.
* Call from Steve K. who talked about William James thoughts on this topic.
* Call from Al from Vero Beach who talked about the importance of language. The word “fake” is negative and should be avoided.
* Call from Tyler who agreed with Al about why he developed a resentment toward this saying due to its negative language.

Resources
Jack Cornfield’s Forgiveness Meditation
Huberman Podcast
Atomic Habits, by James Clear 
Chase Hughes
Sick Souls Healthy Minds

Our sponsor
Many thanks to Soberlink for sponsoring this episode of Beyond Belief Sobriety. Visit https://soberlink.com/bbs for more information.

Every Tuesday at 7:00 PM Central, we have a meeting for listeners of the podcast, that you are free to join anytime. Typically, we’ll have a guest from a previous episode speak or we’ll play a clip from one of our episodes to use as a basis of conversation. This week, I needed to get an episode published and I was having a hard time.  So, I asked the group if they would mind if I used the meeting to record an episode. They agreed and the result is what you are about to hear.
Sober with Purpose
A few weeks ago, I posted episode 270 “What is Recovery”, based on a pamphlet published by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), called “SAMHSA’s Working Definition of Recovery.” In that pamphlet SAMHSA defined recovery as “a process of change through which individuals improve their health and wellness, live a self-directed life, and strive to reach their full potential.” The pamphlet went on to list four major dimensions that support recovery: Health, home, purpose, and community; as well as ten principles of recovery. I liked the pamphlet so much, that I thought I would record episodes to cover each of the four dimensions and ten principles. So, for this episode, I will be talking about the dimension of purpose. We’ll look at what purpose is, how to go about finding it, and why it supports recovery.
What is purpose?
Purpose is my reason for being, why I get up in the morning, what motivates me to learn and grow, and the passion that makes life worth living. There isn’t any one thing that gives me purpose, either. There are many things that bring meaning to my life and motivate me to live to my fullest potential. This is true with my life overall as well as with my sobriety.
I find meaning by doing what’s important to me based on my values. This gives me a sense of purpose and it’s a freedom I didn’t enjoy while drinking. During that time, I lived from one crisis to the next. I was alive but not really living. There was no purpose, no intention to how I lived. There was no direction in my life.
Sober, if I had any purpose at all, it was this vague idea that life could be better, and self-improvement seemed to be my purpose in recovery. It was important to me to participate in recovery meetings, and to get some stability and joy in my life. This was pretty much the extent of my purpose during the first ten years of my sobriety.
But when I stop to think about it now. I didn’t have any specific goals and I wasn’t trying to reclaim any of my dreams that I lost to drinking. Before my drinking completely took over, I had this vision of how my life would play out. Education was important to me, so I assumed that I would go to college and get a degree. I wanted to have children, so I thought after college, I would get a job, marry, buy a house. I guess it was the white picket fence American dream that I gave up on when my life got crazy.
I carried a lot of guilt and shame because of my alcoholism. When I stopped drinking, I had no idea who I was. I have this memory of sitting in a jail cell waiting for my day before the judge. As I sat there, I had a thought of what I wanted out of life. All, I wanted was to be free. I saw myself getting a job cleaning offices, living in a studio apartment, and going to AA meetings. That was honestly the best that I could do.
I think that because of all the failures I experienced during my drinking years, I figured that I too was a failure. I was ready to settle for something less. I have a friend who reminds me from time to time about a conversation he had with me when he first started out in AA. I was there for a year, and he asked me how I was doing. I said something like “I’m miserable, but I’m staying out of jail and that’s all I care about.” We laugh about that now, but that was my mindset.
Then, in my tenth year of sobriety, my father died unexpectedly and that was the shock I needed to begin to take a seriou...

Is it possible that the “higher power” concept that animates Bill W.’s framework for Alcoholics Anonymous is based on an overly narrow reading of William James, a preeminent psychologist and intellectual giant of the early 20th century? On this episode of The Beyond Belief Sobriety Podcast, author Peg O’Connor unpacks a compelling theory as well as insights from her new book, “Higher and Friendly Powers: Transforming Addiction and Suffering.”
Many people don’t naturally resonate with the Christian-centric God at the heart of AA and enshrined in the 12 steps. Although William James used “higher power” language, his writings actually reflect a broader, more inclusive and nuanced view of spirituality. He may have deployed the term “reborn” in the context of addiction, but Peg believes it was meant to describe joyful, transformational recovery – not a specific or confining religious experience.
A professor of philosophy at Gustavus Adolphus College, Peg offers an alternative view for those who have struggled with the concept of powerlessness as a first step towards recovery. If you yearn for healing and community but feel uncomfortable with – or even alienated by – mandates to surrender, this is a thought-provoking invitation to reframe every step towards sobriety as an expansive process of engagement and self-discovery. 
Key Takeaways

* How the “higher power” concept, with its echoes of her Catholic upbringing, kept Peg from participating in AA when she initially sought help as a 19-year-old college student. 
* Twenty years into her sobriety, Peg decided to try AA again in the interest of staying engaged with her recovery and enjoyed opening up new conversations, even though she still found the concept of powerlessness unsettling.
* John shares his own experience with AA’s more spiritual elements and the ways in which he has processed it through the years.
* Peg shares context for her forthcoming book about William James (“Higher and Friendly Powers: Transforming Addiction and Suffering”) and the formative role James played in Bill W.’s conversion experience, and conception of AA.
* Key facts about William James:

* William was the brother of the eminent 19th century author Henry James as well as Alice James, a well-known feminist thinker.
* All the James siblings suffered from a nervous temperament.
* William was a trained psychologist, physician and philosopher who felt helpless in the face of a younger brother’s severe alcoholism.
* William grew up with an expansive sense of religion and looked upon faith as intrinsic to life and not attributable to an external force. Actions mattered.


* Peg reflects on a potential AA paradigm shift away from religious practice to a broader faith-based centering that embraces strengths as well as moral defects.
* There can be a certain element of passivity in active alcoholism that Peg feels is mirrored in some of the AA tenets that focus definitively on a surrender to God.
* For women in particular the notion of surrender can be freighted with disempowering social and historical forces against which the fight is ongoing.
* Peg offers an alternative framework to surrender and powerlessness, substituting instead a self-proclaimed renouncement that offers more agency.
* Faith in free will opens up space for individuals to flourish, moving from merely surviving to shifting the terms on which we live life.
* William James used the term “reborn” but within the context of joyful, transformational recovery, not religious experience.
* Peg teases out human nature’s impulse towards spirituality, a sense of something universal beyond ourselves that for many transcends Christianity.
* Why Bill Wilson’s story very likely reflected some “over-belief...