Today's episode is about rage. You know when we look like a snapping turtle out of water ready to attack anyone who comes near us or gets in our way. Using the LIFEMORTS mnemonic by R. Douglas Fields, an American senior researcher at the National Institutes of Health, we look at the nine triggers to rage which may have people always telling us "you need to take an anger management course bro!" Listen and see how your stressors in life may be the hair trigger of your snapping turtle!

This episode is another group meeting with our guys in recovery from the US, South Africa and Australia. Today's topic is about how we have changed in recovery. We are not the same man we were in addiction. The guys look at three quotes about change. One deals with people thinking it's easy to be in recovery. The second talks about finding strength in the depth of a winter season in life. And the third talks about going back to the old places that are still the same to see how much you have changed. Listen, enjoy and share with your friends.

This episode is about making amends to our spouse, partner, grown children and possibly our parents. You may want to listen to episode #41 which deals with making amends to a variety of people that we have harmed in our addiction. Here we are dealing with accepting the reality that in some cases "That Ship Has Sailed" and we are never going to fully reconcile with certain loved ones. In this tough reality we discuss turning our focus on our own transformation, character development and new life.

In this episode we look at the link between the character development stage of recovery and the development of our identity. Too often addicts stay stuck in a lifeless form of recovery because they feel their addiction and behavior in addiction defines their identity. We look at questions like: who are you? Who do you want to be? What are the doubts stuck in your head? How do rewrite your story? And we review the four statuses of Identity Development as outlined by American psychologist James Marcia.

In this episode or group of guys in recovery share there reactions to the lyrics of the Jim Croce song "One Less Set of Footsteps." Specifically, the line "But tomorrow's a dream away and today had turned to dust" is our focus for discussion. How can we reach the point where we're ready to dip down into that pile of dust and paint the shining star of our future in the sky?

In this group episode our six guys in recovery from the US, South Africa and Australia share their hearts about the things from their past that they have or still need to overcome. We all have that same stuff that keeps popping up unexpectedly. They show up out of nowhere or they can haunt us like ghosts or broken records. The key is we need to focus on processing them and finding life. Using the lyrics of the song Operator by Jim Croce we see that we can't get stuck in the trap of trying to convince others that we've overcome the blow when we know inside that it isn't real.

This episode looks at our decision making process. Salad Days refers to the times of our youth when we were carefree and innocent. We dug into how make decisions now that bring negative consequences and how we can make good decisions going forward.

Today's episode is another group meeting where our guys in recovery answer these three questions: 1) When the music stops that's when they pain begins? 2) When the music stops and your game is gone who will remember you? 3) What happens to the party when the music stops? They share great insight as to how they have handled recovery as the music of their addiction and addictive lifestyle stopped.

In today's group session our guys in recovery from South Africa, Australia and the US respond to these two quotes: 1) The beauty was once I lied to myself and believed the lie, I could lie to anyone with whatever unique emotion they needed to believe me and to do whatever I wanted. 2) My lies were the perfect escape! They allowed me to escape punishment, escape consequences, escape shame, escape guilt, escape remorse. I know you'll be moved to hear their words and as they share about the days when the truth was revealed.

Do you find yourself holding on to fear and pain? Are you stuck feeling like a victim of injustice? What do you do to find pleasure when you can't find joy in your daily life? Have you turned to isolation as your only way to feel safe in self preservation? Well the answer lies in friendship!! Join us on this journey with Thomas Aquinas to leave fear, pain and loneliness in your rear view mirror.