In this episode we are celebrating our founder, Chris’s 14 years in recovery! The conversation shines a light on what recovery looks like now in 2022 and how much it has developed throughout the decades.

hey everybody and welcome to another
amazing episode of finding peaks yours
truly president and founder chris burns
i got my grateful recovering co-host
jason friesma chief clinical officer
welcome to the show jay good to be here
welcome grateful to have you we got a
bunch of chiefs and directors in the
house today um we have aaron grenny our
admissions director um phenomenal
professional but even better human let’s
go
man behind the mystery this is joseph
villanueva he is our chief growth
officer here at peaks recovery and he
and his wife and a couple other people
coover um are responsible for putting
out all of this material all of the
multimedia all the business and growth
and development joseph and his team are
responsible for and we just couldn’t be
more honored to have him on the show he
supports peaks
just as much or more than anybody else
big heart for this work
and another person person in active
recovery so um today is my birthday
episode um i am celebrating 14 years of
recovery um what i like to say about
that should
and really what it’s been for me um
is it’s been an opportunity to not cope
with substances for a tremendous amount
of time
and i’m really really grateful for that
but i wanted to bring up in this show
and talk about just the recovery process
in 2022 differently than even when i got
here 14 years ago in 2008
and i’ve talked about this a lot on the
show and i think it’s really important
to bring up is you know in 2008 when
treatment programs were providing young
people aftercare plans
it really was kind of a sticky note
opportunity it was a 90 90 find a
therapist good luck but you’re better
off getting into a 12-step group to help
build a community
and so that’s what i did i had a really
awesome process in the early stages of
alcoholics anonymous but i was met with
a tremendous amount of hard edges early
on
and the hard edges didn’t matter as much
to me because what the 12-step group did
for me was it was a family of choice
that i had never had and so i really
wanted to be a part of this family
and they wanted me to be a part of it
and that felt really good because i
hadn’t felt like i had been a part of
anything for a long time so i was
willing to do whatever these men
suggested
you know one of the sayings in a a is
if somebody has what you want you’ll do
what they do
right if you’re willing if you want what
they have you’re willing to do what they
do and my first sponsor sat down with me
at 90 days sober and i was using an
anti-craving medication
called suboxone and i sat down with my
first sponsor and he said
my second sponsor excuse me my first
sponsor and he said if you’re on
suboxone you’re not sober
and that is one of the um most widely
used drugs today for opiate use and
early stages of recovery and we’re
finding a tremendous amount of efficacy
for that drug up and into two three four
five years of recovery
but yet i was fed kind of a different
message and my fear is that
our young people and our mature people
are still getting fed a message that’s
incongruent
to where we are at today in 2022 with
all of the resources that we have
and so i wanted to bring you all on the
show because each and every one of you
has an individualized approach to your
authentic process and i just want to
touch base on kind of your early
experience we talked about it a little
bit before the show how it kind of feels
very small to start but if we’re going
to have really long standing and
sustainable recovery we have to open
that up and create some broadness about
it and so
i want to check in with you first aaron
because we both
found recovery in a small town in
northern arizona where there’s more
treatment centers per capita than
anywhere else in the world more aaa
meetings per capita than anywhere else
in the united states last i checked and
so the 12-step culture there if you
didn’t want to get into 12-step
you probably didn’t have a lot of
friends and so i just want to talk about
your experience in the early stages what
the 12-step meant to you and maybe where
you’re at today with respect to
your longer-term recovery
and how that matters as a professional
yeah
so definitely when i when i first went
into this this small town in northern
arizona it was essentially the the
foundation of getting sober there was
some clinical approach but i say this
often
i was um not really i didn’t do much
therapy really at all there were some
groups that were helpful but really at
its at its core the 12 steps was um was
clearly the basis of how you got sober
um and there was this large community of
people who all knew each other everyone
was friends everyone helped each other
and i certainly had that same um thought
going into it like i really want to be
included in this i want to be the cool
cool person and get my chips like
everybody else and it honestly um it was
really great it helped me so much
because there was this
built-in group of people who
knew what i had experienced and who
um you know didn’t judge my my past
mistakes and and that was huge for me to
feel
so immediately accepted by such a large
group of people who kind of shared this
this commonality um
and so really for the first probably
at least 12 months you know two years
three years but certainly while i was in
this town um it was really it was
ingrained in everything in my life and
the sayings and the steps and all of
these things were um
absolutely at its core what kind of ran
my life
and i i actually remember thinking
at a certain point
i was like i feel like i’m running i
feel like i am
trying to sprint as fast and as far away
as i can from this
this past experience and this person
that i was and i was probably a couple
years in i was like i’m a little bit
tired i’m kind of tired of
trying to cover all these things all the
time like oh don’t forget you had to go
to meetings and don’t forget to
turn yourself over and like all these
things and i was like what i really want
and i know that this is a part of the
program is just a collective like peace
and i want to feel
like i’m okay um
and so at that point i kind of shifted a
little bit from the foundation of what
got me sober into what felt right to me
and that was having a community um
continuing to go to therapy and
maintaining medications honestly and
those are the things in my life today i
have six years sober seven next month
yeah yeah and you know
thank you
um
and so at this point that’s what i’m
doing like i i have the exact same
friendships a lot of the same
friendships that i had at that time and
they will be in my life forever i truly
believe that and that’s the gift i think
of the 12-step community is this group
of people that you really connect with
but i also go to therapy and i also take
medication so um it’s been it’s been
such a journey to watch it evolve and
i’m really grateful for everything i
experienced throughout my process but
yeah and i love that you said that too
that was really progressive like when i
get my seven years next month
you would you would have been up you
wouldn’t say that
because you’re not guaranteed next month
no but i actually believe you know in
your heart of hearts that you’re going
to be sober next yeah i do wow yeah that
is interesting i love that and that’s
kind of what i get through having this
holistic view of recovery and and having
a full recovery one day at a time i most
certainly believe in the one day at a
time
absolutely but i can tell you next week
that i’m going to be sober yes and i
don’t have to sell myself short on that
and so i think in a way that early onset
experience and alcoholics anonymous it
has a tremendous amount of efficacy to
keeping you a little bit small
and i think it’s in an effort to create
humility but it also detracts from
opportunity
but i love how you said that because you
wouldn’t have said that in a 12-step
group they’d be like no no no very true
yeah nothing 14 years doesn’t matter if
unless you get 14 years in a day
and there are those stories of people
who get a long period of time and they
relapse and that’s kind of what propels
this internal fear but at this point in
my life i feel resolved and peaceful and
calm and confident in who i am in my
recovery so that feels
great yeah that’s absolutely a beautiful
thing i kind of had that experience
in 12 step of what as well as like i’m
going to a meeting every day
but oftentimes the dialogue is is often
about substances
and war stories and things like that and
so i found myself even though i would
let the meeting know that i was happy
joyous and free i found myself
ruminating a lot on thoughts about
substances and glorifying it’s because i
really hadn’t attended to the root right
you know and when i’m able to repair
that route a little bit to your point it
i can have that longevity and i can have
that peace and i can have that
comfortability
that you talk about so
thank you for that yeah of course um i
want to check in with joseph too because
we were sitting down just a few weeks
ago
and this is somebody who’s
been working with peaks for a number of
years probably about five or six five
somewhere around there yeah f5 yeah and
he’s just developed a tremendous passion
i think it’s always been there but it’s
certainly been exacerbated since he
started working with peaks and for
somebody who doesn’t work
client facing i don’t know if you’ll
find a more passionate
and big-hearted individual for the
people that we serve
other than joseph and now i’ve had the
the opportunity to sit with him and meet
with you on a weekly basis or every
couple weeks for a number of weeks now
and i was sitting with him the other day
and what brings this up for me is i’m
i’ve been married for 10 years
and my wife has
she’s been to survivor she’s been to
grief week she’s been in a lot of
therapy she’s done the 12 steps for
adult child
she’s done all this stuff she’s in
bi-weekly therapy but for whatever
reason throughout my recovery i’ve
always felt like she’s been on the
sideline because she wasn’t a
substance abuser and i was sitting with
joseph a few weeks ago and i was just
watching kind of this growth happen in
front of me and i was like man
you’re in recovery um because if you
take a coping mechanism a substance use
disorder and they cope and then you take
i um perfectionism or tuning my world
out or isolation it isolation
isolationism isolation this one’s right
that works yeah
um if if the substance user lives to 90
they’re in the same spot at the end of
their life anxious all alone depressed
and disconnected and so i think we don’t
give enough praise to folks that are
working on the sidelines to better
themselves one day at a time and i i
really believe this is all about mental
health it has nothing to do with
substances so i want everybody in the
world to come join this recovery party
um and joseph’s one of them and so i
just want to check in with you joseph is
like
what was that like to hear
that you’re actually a part of this
thing this really magical and beautiful
thing that you love so much that you’re
actually on the same team it was almost
like you like went poof it was like able
to settle because it allowed you to be a
part of something that i i know that you
love and value so much
yeah so the conversation for me was was
pretty um meaningful to say the least
and it was a revelation that i think
i’ll carry with me
really close to my heart for everything
that we do and continue to do together
as a
you know
as an organization and all the projects
that i’m involved in um because i think
i felt what you were
talking about that your wife feels
kind of on the sidelines really good
supporters um
but it didn’t quite feel right to uh
place yourself on the sideline because
part of you feels connected
doesn’t know how to truly associate it
and for me in that conversation you
brought me to the
to the revelation that unified us all of
us
and that was really powerful for me
because i i saw how
myself and everybody else that i come
across and in the staff and
the the people that are in the program
clients
we’re all eye to eye we’re on the same
level and we’re all in recovery and it
meant it brought me so much closer to
the entire situation
and that was really powerful i think we
were talking about i was sharing with
you
for me the recovery is recovering
from perfectionism
and the way that i observe myself and
one thing that it seems like is a caring
thread or a thread that goes through all
these
prior conversations that i’ve had aaron
shared you shared some of your story
with me and then uh listening to sylvan
on a few episodes back
there’s this moment of
you arrive to the point where i think
aaron you said i’m just tired
of chris’s terminology white-knuckling
the situation and i felt the same way i
was so critical and hard on myself and
i was never enough and always reaching
and then tired and that’s that was my
moment of like
all right let me look for a book that
can probably help me and then that led
me to conversations with people like
chris
and to therapy and and you transition
from that
rigidity
something that can keep you on a path
but very rigid i think silvan was using
that word and i really liked that he was
like aa can be really good
for that rigidity
that a lot of people need and he
admitted to it i think
i needed that
but then you get to that point where
you transition
and you need something more
enter in treatment
and i was like man such a cool balance
how they how they can
be hand in hand i think
i started learning the values
of um something like aa
and how that can get you to a certain
checkpoint
and then you inevitably need to
walk into a program that has the
capabilities of really wrapping
themselves around you like peaks and
what what people like jason do and and
like
the organization as a whole really can
provide is is uh something much beyond
that rigidity so
um
full stop yeah no that’s beautiful man
and really well explained and um
i want to be able today
for anybody
to see themselves in my story
so i don’t want to talk about for me
chris burns last year i’m talking about
sobriety time this is it
because i want jason to see himself in
my story he can’t see himself in my
sobriety story
right you can see himself in my mental
health story my trauma survivor story my
adult child you know all of the stuff
and i want to make sure that each and
every person that is thinking about
picking up the phone to call peeks that
i can sit down with them and like they
can find themselves in my story and i
think for so many years you know 1935
and on and 12 steps has been such a
great thing for this world
but i think it’s detracted a little bit
from the opportunity we have to bring
more people into
this space
and i really want to just continue to um
broaden our horizons broaden the
conversation um and ask others like
jason like how do you feel hearing this
type of stuff because you’re someone who
quite frankly man was in recovery before
me
you know
chris one of my favorite stories you
tell is uh you and i met at a restaurant
like two blocks from here
uh with with bobby and then somebody
else
and like
you told me i think just last year that
like
you guys were like how much time does he
have yeah how much time does he have and
i think you’re like
that
mommy’s like nah 20 alcohol for sure i’m
like oh like this guy is on the yeah
this is like 15 years ago yeah to be
clear i’ve never
read it i just want to be clear about
that but
um
but i
you know i think um
as you guys were talking i just um
i think about
uh the amount of work we do and actually
a long time ago when i was working with
um
adolescents and even young adults when
we were a young adult program i actually
used to tell parents this when we just
worked with with young adults
and we worked with them for like four to
six months i’m like you’re going to
bring in an immature
our program and do all the examining of
their life they’re going to be more
mature than their cohort
because it is a gift to do that
examining of one’s life and you know for
me personally um
i certainly started as a counselor
before i started any sort of counseling
uh i was that guy uh this was a long
time ago don’t get me wrong
um
back when i was working under freud but
no i’m kidding uh but but in all
seriousness like
i had some life events occur some around
the health of my son
that just actually had a nice effect a
really horrible effect of like bringing
up um things from my childhood that i
hadn’t thought about in a long time and
i didn’t realize how they were affecting
me to the to the day
and started to do somatic experience
work and i did i actually got with a
group of guys every week
um and did that examining of my own life
and and
um
kind of breaking the the link from
how the past was affecting my presence
and i think
um it was with that work that i think i
finally was able to get
you know to where i am today and be able
to sit
uh and be present with people and and uh
hold that space and
and not be run by anger or other
emotions and that sort of thing um
in in i think to aaron’s point too like
it did take community it wasn’t an a
community um
i’ve been a counselor since 1999 and
i used to get asked a lot it doesn’t
happen at all really anymore but like
why do you work so much with addictions
because i i always just found that
that’s where i was most comfortable
um and
you know because similar like people
would think like oh you’re in recovery
from something i’m like bro like i’m as
normy as it comes pretty much but like
um
but i but i can relate to the pain and
the depravity of it and i think what
always drew me to it is like
people who are kind of at their bottom
with uh
with addiction man they know uh that
they could die at any moment
and um it takes a long time for people
depression or other mental health issues
like you can endure a lot of suffering
for a long time
um in any with substances or or just
with mental health or with both um
there’s something about that that just
feels really uh pretty appealing to me
yeah
i love that man and it’s as you were
talking i’m i’m actually leaning towards
you know before i got to colorado i was
six years in a.a then i came here and i
met you yeah and you showed me the
mountains
and then after a few years of doing the
mountains you were like here’s a phone
number call this person i think it’s
going to be kind of crazy therapy but i
think you’re ready for it yeah he threw
me that and so you know that the back
side of my recovery which i would assume
for me um is the most vulnerable and the
most authentic came as a suggestion from
somebody who’s never been substance
driven yeah
that’s recovery
right
and that’s that’s what i want the
viewers to see today is like it comes in
all different shapes and sizes and i
remember being a young person and being
like i’m not sitting in that group for
the rest of my life i can’t do it
this just in it what you will grow up
and out of whatever wherever you start
you’ll have an authentic opportunity to
be in the top one percent relationally
spiritually mentally and emotionally and
that creates such fulfillment especially
for young people and it’s interesting
what you said too is they’re going to
come in here really immature but then
they’re probably going to be much more
mature than their cohort or other people
that are in the similar age range it’s
so true
and it’s scary too yeah you know to grow
up and out of that my friends are in
college but
there’s just a tremendous amount of hope
in 2022 that i really didn’t want to
miss
in my birthday celebration and i want to
turn it back over to you erin just to
say
what would you like to say to the person
that’s like
pre-contemplated or contemplated or has
that phone in their hand and it’s just
like
i don’t want to do this because i’m
scared to death that i’m going to have
this hard edge or not be a part of or be
left out i mean what can you say to that
person who’s got the phone in their hand
right now that could just give them just
a little bit of hope
well as we’ve been talking about this
i’ve been thinking that
um and i’m sure you’ve experienced i’m
sure we’ve all experienced this where
it’s so easy to identify how you’re
different and how you don’t fit within
xyz i think even within aaa and within
recovery situations you’re kind of
looking for differences and that’s the
thing about
what i love about peaks is it truly is
individualized and like it truly is like
based on um what this person needs and
what commonalities do we have
collectively as humans collectively as
people within peaks and the organization
so i think what what i would say is just
um
despite whatever you’re telling yourself
you’re not
you’re not so different that that we
can’t find commonality and that like
there are people there who here who will
not judge you and who will support you
despite whatever you think about
yourself um we don’t have that
and
um and there’s definitely hope and it
can it can get better yeah um
yeah i love that thank you so much for
that aaron i appreciate it
joseph what do you what would you like
to leave you know kind of the
our cul the culture of the show is
really the opportunity for recovery
community-based resources in 2022 and
the hope that is
um recovery today i mean what what would
you like to say to those people um who
are pre-contemplative or contemplative
and have the phone in their hand or just
you know filled with a tremendous amount
of fear and anxiety and shame
because i know we’ve all been in that
position so what would you
say to that individual
man
i guess that trying matters
you know it’s not about
if i if
every attempt that i’ve made in anything
in my life
um this is gonna be full effort try um
and a lot of them don’t work out but you
know you learn a lot from that and you
grow
so you know growth is a is a word that
i’ve been embodying i’m trying to you
know place in every almost
day of my life and i think that the
growth that you get from trying is
something and that trying means a lot so
take the try for sure and that’s huge
you know when i used to say this bull
crap phrase um that i got from a a that
says trying is dying and you actually
reminded me right there that i’m done
saying that
because it’s actually so important
and
for us to show up right and we do one
thing perfect we just don’t do this
substance thing but if you’re anything
like me in your first year you’re
struggling with dishonesty
um you’re struggling with integrity
you’re struggling with um relationships
you’re struggling with treating people
poorly but i got this one thing you know
but i’m not trying in a lot of other
areas
so you actually bring up a really good
point for me and i’m gonna quit saying
that because trying matters a lot
and i used to say you’re either doing it
or you don’t what a hard edge huh
well especially if you’ve tried over and
over and over and then you feel like
what is the point i keep trying and it’s
not working no it does matter yeah
i love that no that’s great man thank
you for that for sure
jason last but not least
what are we going to send the viewers
off with what is the message we want to
get across for the vulnerable person
who’s suffering with a mental health
disorder substance or not
um
man i love that you just said the word
suffering because that’s what i was
thinking about and um
uh
we were just talking about this in the
meeting earlier today too that uh
suffering
um
can be so difficult it is where we like
we we all have these stories of
suffering um
but overcoming suffering can be such a
great uh opportunity but i was i was
talking about in our meetings this
morning too that like sometimes our
suffering can create cause us to get
bitter and wall ourselves off and
i guess what i would have to say is uh
you don’t have to live this way
like it can be different and there can
be a path
um and you’re not alone those would be
the things i would say i love that
well thank you all for coming on um my
birthday episode we’ll do it each year
we’re not going to talk about sobriety
time we’ll just do mental health
awareness
i am grateful for the men and women in
the 12-step group a crazy birds group
alcoholics anonymous in prescott arizona
those were one of the first 5 am 5 a.m
watch out for the holiness yeah watch
out for the javelinas um shout out to
them those men and women showed me a
tremendous amount of love when i
couldn’t show it for myself so really
grateful for them grateful for all of
you and what you guys have meant to my
recovery um so thank you all so much
until next year um well before before
like we leave i just wanna like commend
you on that 14 years not that the
numbers mean a lot but every day that i
get to observe and just know you you
make it look so easy and it’s definitely
a role model for
several people and i know a lot of
people look up to you and the way that
you navigate through life chris so i
mean 14 years i hope you really feel the
congratulations on my behalf and the
people that i know we talk about man
chris got 14 years that’s awesome and
he’s out here looking living his best
life and doing so many leadership based
things that i don’t know if you get the
the recognition all the time but i
certainly appreciate the example you you
set for so thank you for 14 years thank
you man that means a lot and the vast
vast amount of people who you have made
a difference in their life because of
your recovery i mean it’s we can’t even
count it it goes on forever means a lot
it’s really incredible
thank you guys i really appreciate it um
recovery is amazing man i was at lake
and yesterday and i got to come down and
do iop and i am just like
the life that i get to live today with
you all a part of it is very very
special and i’m very lucky um so thank
you guys very much for coming on i
appreciate it um
you know where to find us this sunday at
spotify apple music who knows check us
out man i’ve been pointing a lot of
people to the show we’re getting a lot
of viewers we would love to have you on
this sunday at 6pm until next time
peace
[Music]