November 23, 2023 • 42 mins
Join us on the Comeback Stories Podcast for an episode filled with gratitude, self-discovery, and purpose. Darren Waller and Donnie Starkins offer their perspectives on adopting gratitude as a guiding force when confronted with criticism and challenges. Learn how gratitude can redefine any moment and become a constant presence in your daily life.
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DARREN WALLER
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DONNY STARKINS
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Come Back Stories is a production I've Inflection Network and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Welcome back, everyone to another episode of come Back Stories.
I'm one of your co hosts, Darren Waller. I'm excited
to be here with you guys for another episode along
with my brother, my friend, mister Donnie Starkins. Donnie, how
you doing, man.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
I'm doing great, man. I look forward to these days
that we get to connect and drop in and today
it's just going to be me and you, which I
really value and appreciate these episodes where we actually don't
have a guest on.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
No doubt, man, the flow is incredible. And I don't
know about you, but I find myself at this time wondering,
like where all the time has gone from this year.
We're already approaching Thanksgiving, which is coming up this week,
and it's like a great time, I know, for me
to especially kind of slow down and start to reflect,
(00:55):
start to look back on all the things I label
as good things I label as bad things that are
indifferent really just be like man like. It feels like
every year time is going by faster and faster just
accelerates the more that I get older, and that brings
us to the topic that we want to discuss with
(01:15):
you guys today, which is gratitude, which is a word
you hear come out of our mouths a lot, mainly
because it's a practice that we're still continuing to unfold
in our own personal lives and knowing just how important
it is. Like the day of Thanksgiving, the idea of
Thanksgiving is a beautiful thing, you know, people coming together,
(01:37):
spending that time with your family, your friends that you
may not get to see as much, and cherishing that time,
cherishing that connection. But at the same time, I feel
like what I feel like we want to unpack today
is how do we carry that vibe and that energy
of Thanksgiving that we love and we appreciate. How do
we bring that into our daily lives. How do we
bring that into the moment to moment flow of our existence.
(02:01):
And that's what we want to unpack with you guys
here today.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
And I can't believe you started with that about time flying,
and I still I feel so connected to you, even
even though you're on opposite side of the country, and
probably there's been more time elapsed where I haven't seen you,
but just you saying that I've been trying to explain
that to people like, like, does anybody else notice? I
(02:25):
know time flies and people say it, but something right now,
like this year of all years, and it's not like
anything really crazy happened, but there's something very interesting happening.
So I've been saying that to people and for you
to start it off like that is, yeah, we have
to if time is going that quick, which it is
(02:46):
going quick, and technology makes things go quicker, that we
have to take time to stop and pause. And yes,
Thanksgiving is many things, but I think it's a beautiful
opportunity to take a step back and really gain some
perspective for the things that we are grateful for today.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
No doubt, man, Because for me especially, I know that
there's times where I can fall into a little bit
of like an autopilot mode and I'm just grinding and
I'm just hustling, and I'm just trying to get things done,
keeping a schedule full. And it's like, at what point
do we hustle ourselves to death? You know what I'm saying,
(03:24):
grind ourselves to this space to where our spiritual life
gets boxed out, or just our emotional intelligence and the
feel that we have for what's going on in our
daily lives can start to fade and it's like, a man,
i don't even know what's really going on. I'm just
being swept with the current. And I felt like that
(03:45):
a lot. I felt like that a little bit recently,
definitely in spurts over the course of the year, over
the course of my whole life. Man. And I know
that that's not what I want to do. But how
quickly I can forget when I'm doing things and get
lost into that performance mode a little bit that hey, man,
like the things that I should be most grateful for,
(04:09):
don't I should myself to death, but the things that
I should be taking into account, my health, my support system,
you know what I'm saying. Even the discomfort and the
uncomfortable moments of my life, I can't. I don't view
them through the lens that is most proper and most
beneficial for me a lot of times. And but that's
(04:31):
just me being human.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
You know.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
I need to be reeled back in, brought back into
my center because there's there's no way I'm gonna be
perfect at this. And I hope anybody listening knows that
I ain't gonna hold you to be in perfect Donnie
isn't either. We're just we're just trying to figure this
thing out.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Yeah, And I think that's why we've been inspired to
maybe at least during the holiday season, hit it with
you guys, with maybe just us two, especially because we
understand in the in the world of addiction, alcoholism and
mental health that by the time that you listen to
this podcast episode from Thanksgiving till after New Year's is
(05:08):
when we see the world sees the spike, the big
spike in addiction and mental health and alcoholism. So I
remember these days, these using days, and how scary and
how having to deal with family and the triggers and
all of that stuff. So we want you to know
that we're here with you. And again, this is just
(05:30):
us continuing to fulfill a mission of reaching many as
many people as possible to remind them that you're not alone.
And I know a lot of people are going to
feel alone during the holidays, but we're here to tell
you that you're not alone. And I know that saying
can sound cliche, but it's a story that you're telling yourself.
And when we weave in practices like gratitude, because there's
(05:53):
going to be times in life where you're feeling stuck,
like you really don't feel like you're moving forward, like
everything isn't working out the way that you expected. And
it's at these times where we actually lose person effective
And it's at these times during Thanksgiving in the holidays,
and we're seeing everybody else's Instagram post about how how
good of a time they're having, which I mean, let's
(06:15):
let's be real, like family time during the holidays can
be very challenging for many and it always isn't what
you think it is, and for a lot of people,
a lot of people struggle. It's there's a lot of
pain during this time. So you can tell that I'm
super fired up about this because I remember how it was.
And we want you to know that you know you're
(06:38):
not alone and you can't do this alone.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
Amen, we are. We are with you, guys. We've been
with you guys from the jump. We start this this show,
this platform to tell you guys, or to educate you guys,
or to you know, let you know what's what. We
started the show because we are one of you. We
have our struggles. I got struggles like I'm not immune,
(07:02):
nor will I ever be. And we just want to.
I know we wit you guys, and you know, I
know that maybe some people listening thinking about a gratitude
practice kind of like me, like I was intimidated by it.
You know, I've and I can't tell you I've done
a lot of gratitude lists in the last six years,
since since my life has kind of taken a little
bit of a different course. But even still in the
(07:23):
midst of that, I can find myself kind of in
the midst of my day maybe like grumbling, like maybe
not vocally and out loud, but silently kind of complaining
about things, or using sarcasm to kind of cut down people,
or or the situation that I'm in because I don't
(07:45):
like it, and basically saying I lose track of the
gratitude practice that I've been cultivating. So it starts with
one like not expecting perfection from yourself and knowing that
this is a practice is going to continue to unfold
over time. But I feel like it's proper for us
right now to break down, like okay, like I want
a gratitude practice, Like what does that look like? Like
(08:06):
what are the thoughts? Like what can I ask myself?
How can I check in and I feel like one
Like one way to start is like even if you
haven't had an amazing life or your comeback story feels
like it hasn't happened yet, we can start with like, hey, like,
what's one good thing that's happened to me this week?
What's one good thing that's happened for you? Like, because
(08:28):
there's there's no way you can sit here and tell
me that there's not one good thing that's happened this
week if you don't sit down and analyze your life,
reflect on one thing, Like if it's you only all,
but you just woke up today, then that may be
all it is. But there's at least one good thing,
and that we can start there, Like, if that's all
(08:51):
our gratitude practice is, is hey, I check it at
the end of the week and find one thing. Let's
go like we're doing this thing. We're getting started and
we're rolling. So don't feel like it's got to be
this magnificent journaling episode or you know, every single part
of your day you're just smelling every single rose and
you know, feeling like you've got to have it all together. No, like,
(09:14):
let's just find a place to start and roll from there.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Yeah, I love that, and I think it's just good
for anybody listening that says well, because gratitude is kind
of like this. It's another one of those kind of
cliche things, maybe often a term that's overused sometimes maybe
rarely or not as often embodied, Like we're talking about
it and people are sharing it. But the reason why,
I mean, the big reason the science behind it is
(09:38):
because it helps us overcome all these hardwired the hardwired
negativity bias, which back in the day, it was in
the caveman days when you know, we had to look
for the saber to tiger, so we had to be
on the lookout for something to go wrong or else
we would dye. I mean, that's just how it was.
And so this negativity bias is hardwired. And it's funny
(09:59):
because remember we had Michael Gervais on the show and
he was talking about today's modern tooth saberduth tigers carrying
what other people think, and I was like, wow, that's
so powerful. But going back to understanding why we do this,
we are conditioned to just look for the things that
are going wrong. It's just how it is. So when
we accept that and we understand that there's not something
(10:21):
wrong with us. It's just like deep, deep, many many
years and generations of conditioning. That's why we practice. And Darren,
you know, when we would do our coaching sessions, it
was we would always start with, like, what's going well?
And the reason we talk about what's going well is
because we're so used to talking about what's not going well,
(10:41):
and when we talk about what's not going well well,
it has us feeling demotivated and uninspired. But when we
talk about what's going well first, that's kind of what
has us feeling feeling good. It's like, you know, the
reason we practice gratitude is because we're our tension goes,
energy flows, and if we focus on the good, like
guess what happens, more good happens in our lives. If
(11:03):
you wake up in the morning and you turn on
the news, and that's the beginning of your practice and
the foundation of your day, I mean, that's a fear written, shaky,
shaky foundation. You wake up in the morning and take
a few deep breaths, right, or at least maybe just
think of a few things you're grateful for. As you
advance to practice, you can actually cultivate the feeling of gratitude,
(11:25):
like feeling it in your bones, feeling it in your body.
That's how you really start to gain a practice that
doesn't feel monotonous because I mean, Darren, we've done this,
You've written plenty of times, and it's like, oh, I'm
riting the same shit every day, and that's like our mind,
the chatter, you know, the little self sabotage voice that's
chirping up. But it's more about just practicing and doing
(11:47):
it again, because especially if you said you're gonna do it,
because we talk about this all the time about keeping
the promises you make to yourself. So it's it's big
in many ways, and it's just a beautiful practice. And
that's why we're talking about it.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
Man so well said my wife and I we had
about an hour plus car ride last night and she
put on this audiobook that somebody sent her. It's called
Peaks and Valleys. If you haven't checked that out, comeback Stories, Family,
go check that out. But essentially, like in the first
couple of chapters, you know, it's a fictional story, and
(12:26):
it says, man that's up on this peak, an old
man's up on this peak, and a young man kind
of gets to this peak.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
And.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
As opposed to his perspective being like, yes, I made
it up here to this peak, he says like, like,
damn it, I missed it, like he missed the sunset
because it was later in the day. And you know,
old Man's like, you know, you made it to a
place that you've always wanted to come, yet the only
thing that you could focus on was what you're missing
out on. And he basically says, the peaks and the
(12:58):
valleys of your life aren't destinations, but the peaks are
when you're most grounded and in tune with gratitude, and
the valleys are when you're caught up in the longing
for what's not there. And that just I'm right in
the car. I'm just like like ad libbing to it
as the story as the story is kind of unfolding
(13:19):
and only a couple chapters in, but I feel like
that's such a great way to put it. Like where
a lot of us think that we're going to be
grateful when we get to a certain place or a
certain thing happens in our life where we get a
certain achievement, as opposed to just being grateful for what's
around us currently and how we're just setting ourselves up
(13:41):
for loneliness, you know, depression when we're longing for things
that we don't have. And it's just like what a
powerful perspective, right, Like nobody teaches us these things, you know,
Like it's I'm thirty one and I'm still trying to
get a grip on that. Like I know it's the truth,
but it's still like I still want to go the
(14:02):
other direction, you know.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
Yeah, man, I'm just like, as you're walking through telling
that story and giving us the vision of you driving
with Kelsey, I just I'm so grateful for the podcast
because the podcast is where you guys connected and who
knew that you know, less than a couple of years
later that you'd be talking about what you're talking about.
(14:24):
And it makes me so happy that the things you're
listening to and the content that you're taking in and
the conversations that you're having with your partner is like everything,
like a what a gift that you found a partner? Dude,
She's the best. I was listening to her. I was
watching her Instagram today, her stories, and she started to
get serious about like having negative beliefs about something and
(14:46):
I was like, whoa, she's going to go like political
on this or something, and I didn't think she would
do that. And then she turned to your cat, dude,
and I think she's falling in love with your cat.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
Yeah. No, man, there's a match made in heaven. Man.
They're definitely drawn to each other. It's pretty pretty cool
to see. But but yeah, but yeah, bro, it's like,
you know, it is a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful
thing to be in the place that we are. You know,
you talk about reflecting on this year. The transition is
is challenging, you know, and we're too, you know, pretty
(15:20):
strong will, strong minded people, and we want to focus on, like,
you know, not necessarily what the situation is, but how
we can make the most of a situation with as
far as like the transition and moving out here and
being away from each other. But you know, there's like
a study out there that the top three most stressful
things are you know, changing your environment, moving, changing your job,
(15:47):
and like relational change. And it's the top three things
on the on the list that would stress you out
the most. We got, you know, combined a sandwich you know,
of of all three and dealing with all of the
emotions that come with that. You know, there's been you know,
plenty of moments I look back on that a victory
(16:07):
and moments where it's just like, man, we just gotta
find a way through this. But I'm grateful that we
have and that we still are. Man, It's just it's crazy.
And I hope people can take away from that that,
you know, it's not necessarily what's happening to you or
happening around you that has to be the defining factor
(16:31):
in your perspective or your gratitude or where you may
feel like your life is heading, if anything, Like, I'm
grateful for the adversity because like, I have no evidence
to not be grateful for it, even though in my
daily life. You can catch me if you had the
audio to my mind, I'd be like man like, but
I have no evidence to not feel like my life
(16:53):
is going to continue to get better, because that's all
it's ever done. Like even from the place of overdose,
even from you know, places of loneliness and feel like
there was no purpose in my life. Like, there's clear
evidence that my life it continues to get better. But
you can lose still lose tat you know, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:13):
I mean, yeah, you hit. I would call that the trifecta.
That's like the ultimate trifecta of what you've got thrown
at you as far as adversity, right, And I've told
you this before, and you know this truth of God
will never give you more than you can handle. And
when it comes to the NFL and everything that you've
faced and continue to face as far as adversity, like
(17:34):
I will remind you and this is I believe to
be a fact that you have more tools than one
ninety nine point nine percent of the league. So you
can you can deal with this. You can deal with
the adversity and the shit that's going on this year
that I mean, it's not what we envision and it's
it's but it's I have evidence that I feel like
(17:56):
your gratitude practice from four or five years ago is
the reason why you can have the perspective that you
have today. So it's like, you know, you kind of
plant seeds and then when shit hits the fan that
you can dig deep for that perspective. I don't think
you can just you know, start a gratitude practice the
day before and something bad happened and you're going to
(18:16):
be able to just see the good in it. It's
a practice and I think that's what sets us up
for all the curve balls in the adversity that life
throws us, and we can always choose to see the good.
Speaker 2 (18:30):
Facts. And you know, for those of you that you
know are maybe struggling with okay, like, what's something good
that's happened this week for my gratitude practice? Okay, Like
I feel you on that. There's been weeks where I'm like,
you know, I feel like I can't get out my
own way. You know, things are just not bouncing my way.
But you know, we could also shift to you know,
(18:52):
who am I grateful for? Like people wise, like who's
helped me become the person I am today? You know
what's Who's somebody that even though I've made a lot
of mistakes, even though I may have fallen on my face,
they're always there to help pick me up. They're always
there to comfort me and speak encouragement into my life,
like find something or someone, because there's no way that
(19:16):
we're doing life without the people around us. Like I'm
grateful for the people in my life, like my wife,
like you Donnie, like my friends. That especially because you guys,
challenge me when I'm isolating or you know, I'm not
staying connected or I'm trying to withdraw in fear or
(19:40):
anxiety or something about the future stressing me out, Like
you guys challenge me to stay connected and make sure
I'm talking about things and make sure that you know
I'm being myself and I'm smiling and I'm laughing, and
I'm just like getting all these things off my chest
instead of holding them in. So like I said, like,
(20:02):
there's no way that every there's not one good thing
that's happening in your week or in your day. And
at the same time, there's no way that you can't
scan your life, your existence at any point and not
find somebody that you could be grateful for for whatever
it was they did for you, or them just being
there their overall presence, Like there's somebody there, and we
(20:26):
just challenge you to sit with it. However long it
takes for you to arrive to that point where you
start to feel that gratitude for those people flow in.
We're here with you, and however long it takes is
however long it takes. But telling you there's somebody out there.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Yeah, and if there's not somebody, And I think Darren
and I will go toe to toe with anybody that
would argue that that they have nothing to be grateful for,
because if you don't have anybody and you're isolated, then
you have something there that's keeping you isolated, so you
can be grateful for that something that's keeping you isolated.
So it's just like it's proof that it's perspective in
(21:01):
a mindset, just like everything. And you know, Darren and
I talk a lot about controlling the controllables, and one
of the things we do have control over is our
It's our it's our attitude and our perspective. And so
you know, if you don't like what you're seeing, sometimes
you have to you have to change the way, you
have to change where you stand, or you have to shift,
or you have to maybe do some work so that
(21:24):
the lens that you're looking through. I've looked through people
through lenses of resentment and judgment, and you know, had
different exercises that I've gone through where that's been lifted
and then I can like see that person for who
they are today and not something they did or something
they said a year ago. So yeah, man, this is
(21:44):
so powerful. I had a good question I wanted to
ask you. That kind of weaves back into the podcast
as far as like childhood stuff, like on a lighter note,
what what for you? Like what aspects of your childhood
or like your neighborhood were you most grateful for or
are you most grateful for?
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Oh? Man, I go back to playing in the cul
de sac. There was this, Uh, there was a culder
sack in my neighborhood, like two houses down at the
bottom of this hill. And man, we played every sport
knowing the man like you know, parents would kick you
out the door and locked the door, say go play outside,
(22:25):
and uh, I don't know. My boy Wave, Marcy, his
brother Red, my boy Dalton kindle like we were the
main for in that colder sack. I don't know if
they watching it, but shout out of y'all. Yeah, I
mean every sporting on the man, we were out there
just ripping and running, just trying things like we don't
know what we're doing. We're doing wrestling moves. We were uh,
(22:45):
diehard wrestling fans. But I look back to my childhood
and I was free in those moments, Like there was
a lot of times in my childhood. Like even at
that age, like when I would go to school, I'd
be like anxious, trying to figure out where I fit in.
Like I talk about from the very first episode of
the show, like how my it was very confusing, like
(23:05):
I and just alienating. I didn't know where I fit in.
But in that caul desact, man, I felt like I
could do anything I wanted to do, be anybody I
wanted to be, and just hang out with these with
these guys man. And you know, that's a feeling I
look back on in my life and I'm just like,
sometimes I'm like, where has that gone? In the midst
of all my doing, in the midst of all my accomplishing.
(23:29):
How often am I connecting and feeling about what I'm
doing right now? How do I how often do I
feel the way I felt like when I was in
that cul Des act. You know what I'm saying. So
that's something that pops out in my head immediately. What
about you, though?
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Man? It's and mine's mine's the same answer, But just
hearing yours, it sounds like that coul A Sack, you
felt safe, You felt safe and free, right, and that's
when you were able to just be you and be
that authentic version of you. That was enough no matter
what your skin tone was, but mine was mine was
the same. I grew up and I lived in a
(24:04):
coul a sac and in our backyard the complex, like
the housing complex we lived in, there was all these
like green belts, so the backyards there was there was
a backyard, but then there was green belts. And my
backyard was like this perfect almost like a baseball field
to the other people's backyards. There was this green belt
and big trees, and the big tree was called the
green Monster. So like we were out there every single day,
(24:28):
baseball or football, you know, before school, after school. It
was NonStop. And to me that was like everything to
be able to play outside every single day. I mean,
I don't know, I you know, I was living in
Arizona most of my life. I live in California. Now.
I see so many more kids outside here, but I
think it's mainly because of the ocean and they're on
their e bikes and they're surfing. But in a lot
(24:50):
of places, like kids aren't doing that anymore, and it's
it's it's very scary to know what what that long
term effect could be because we're talking about the most
the most powerful moments of our lives that happened when
we were out there, And so I don't know what
they're doing now, but I have I have to guess
it has to do with a screen and playing some
(25:10):
games or being on technology. And that's scary.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
Shoot, man, I was just having a conversation about that
with somebody the other day. But but yeah, man, it's
just like, yeah, like we were talking about, like to
like instead of us being outside in the park playing
like like dudes and kids will be on like two
K playing my part like with an avatar, or like
(25:37):
on Fortnite, like they'll get on the hang out on
the game, as opposed to like going outside and hanging out,
you know. And it's just like what hanging out when
we were a kid out there in those cul de
sacs and those environments like and we would do anything,
try anything, Like I feel like that was just like hope,
you know what I'm saying, Like what couldn't we do?
Who couldn't we be? And I feel like, you know,
(26:00):
the engine for hope is gratitude, because it's like why
I hope for something better in the in the future
down the road if I can't find that feeling exactly
where I'm at, like, because this is this is the
only place I could be, This is the only moment
I've been promised. If I'm not cultivating the habit of
(26:21):
you know, that joy and that that feeling, that contentment
of just running with the pack of just wild kids
man like feeling that like in that moment and embracing
for what it is. How could I possibly do that
at a further moment if I haven't created the groundedness
and the rootedness to be able to practice that right here,
(26:42):
right now. And I feel like such a such a
lost art man because I'm guilty of it too at times.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
Yeah, but but it's so deep what you're saying, because
the gratitude is the train, right, It's what keeps it going.
But I think hope. We have that hope when we're young,
because we are free and like maybe some shit has
happened to us, but we're not really aware of it yet,
like the subconscious stuff, but like we haven't been hurt,
our hearts haven't been broken, like none of that has happened.
(27:10):
So we start to lose hope as the world throws
us curveballs, and people you know, do hurtful things to us,
and things happen, and I think that's where we start
to lose hope and lose perspective. So the only way
to find that hope is to direct your thinking and
your energy towards something positive. So it's always going to
(27:31):
come back to gratitude. And you know, if you resist it,
you would have to look at like what what's the resistance,
Like where's that resistance coming from? And just get super
clear on it. I mean, the science shows why this works,
and this is why we're talking about it. And I think, gosh,
I can think of so many opportunities, just like little
stuff like I last week, you know, had issues had
(27:56):
issues with my car. Right car battery dies, But it's like,
what are you going to do? I have a car? Like,
at least I have a car, and I know that like,
oh hey, it's at least I have a car to
have a battery that died in right, And I know
that sounds nice and all, but that's really what I thought.
And so it proves to me that this shit works.
You know, what's like, what's a really hard lesson that
(28:21):
you're in your whole life that happened like a hard
lesson that you're grateful that you learned.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
That's such a great question. I mean, I gotta go
back to, you know, just my story and with my
addiction and how everything culminated as far as that's concerned,
and the lesson in that, the lesson in overdosing, the
lesson in crashing and burning in the way that I
thought was the route to peace or to fulfillment in
(28:50):
my life. I had to learn that there is no
world that exists where numbing out the negative emotions, the
negative experiences, and trying to only experience it's positive ones
is going to give me the balance that I need
to live a wholesome life, a life that I can
(29:12):
look at, look in the mirror and be like this
is it, Like right here, in this moment, this is it.
And my story had to unfold the way that it
did in order for me to be able to see
a different path, which is oh, I have to feel everything.
I have to feel the doubt, I have to feel
the fear. I have to feel the disappointment, I have
(29:37):
to feel the anger. Like there's no way I can
just stuff these things aside and think like, oh, Okay,
the only thing that's left is happy. The only thing
that's left is you know, just bunnies and rainbows, you
know what I'm saying, like positive things. That's not the
(29:57):
case because the balance of everything, the dichotomy of everything,
is thrown off, because if oh, this is good, how
do I know this is good? How do I know
this is what I'm seeking after? How do I know
that this is something that is what my heart and
my soul are truly longing for. If I don't know
what's not what I'm not really longing for, that I'm
(30:19):
trying to mask behind, or that I'm trying to pursue
just to get relief as opposed to getting freedom. So
I would say, you know, we talk about our stories
a bunch on here, We harpen on it because there's
still so much meaning that we can take from those experiences,
like I can now, like just you asking that question
sparked that in me, and I'm like wow, Like I
(30:40):
haven't even thought of it until the words started coming
out of my mouth, Like that's a hard lesson that
I had to learn. That is really a serving me
more than anything else, maybe serving me in my life today.
Speaker 3 (30:54):
Yeah, you're explaining like the duality of things. And I
think for me that that answer goes my answer to
the question of the hard lesson that I'm great that
I learned was the lesson of selfishness and self centeredness
and doing my fourth step and I remember just like
looking at this four step in this inventory and it
(31:15):
just screamed selfishness. It's if for those of you that
don't know, it's just doing an inventory and basically looking
at your character defects, and it screamed selfishness and self centeredness.
So the lesson that I've been given for for my
life because of the gift of recovery and the gift
of desperation and being so selfish all of these decisions
(31:38):
that I made that led to a self destruction, a
self destruction that was also an overdose, but I still
wasn't done right and it was it was all about me.
And so the gift is we've been given the antidote
to that and that service.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
And so.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
You know, selfishly, it's the greatest gift ever because it
just it keeps us out of our own way. I mean,
Darren and I talking to you right now, Yes we
are being a certain but you have to understand how
much we are benefiting off this also, so it like
it fills both parties and that's that's like, it's the
gift that keeps on giving, And that's that's our work
(32:15):
here is just to figure out, like, you know, what
our natural gifts and talents are, what are the passions
and the things that we believe in and stand for
and the causes, and then how can we share those gifts?
Be it our time, our finances, our love, our creative
it doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Facts. Man, It's like, I feel like what you just
said is a great angle towards gratitude and it's a
simple one. It's like, you know, if I'm not feeling
that gratitude, I'm struggling from place for places to find it.
Is it maybe because all I'm focused on is me?
Is it? Maybe because all I'm focused on is the
(32:56):
thoughts that are spinning in my head why things aren't
going my way, why I'm not where I should be
at this very moment, Like why I'm my? What about me?
What about this? You know? And I asked that because
I can be there and I need to be reminded
even still to this day that go out and go
(33:17):
out and help somebody, Go out and meet meet a
need for somebody. Go out and do something for somebody
and expect nothing in return, and see how and see
how you feel after that. That's that's gratitude. I'm telling you, Like,
as a human being, the way that we're wired, no
matter how much pain, hate, any emotion, maybe in your heart,
(33:40):
you go out there and do something for somebody and
expect nothing in return, and watch watch them light up,
watch them be grateful. And tell me that's not going
to stir something up on the inside of you. I
refuse to believe anything other than that.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
Yeah, And you know it ties back to when we
started to be of service. In my first service commitment
was setting up the chairs and making coffee for a
seven am meeting, a man's meeting on Saturday mornings. And
once my sponsor asked me to say yes to that
service commitment that next Saturday for the first time, and
(34:15):
I don't know since the last time I played a
day of baseball, I felt a sense of purpose and
all I was doing was setting up chairs and making coffee.
But I did that for a year, and I did
it with my sponsor, and my sponsor has thirty plus
years sober, and he had kind of straight away he
was good. But it even brought him back in to
connect to the program and to connect to us. So
(34:38):
I'll never forget those lessons early on and the feeling
of contribution that I had when I you know, because
it didn't feel like I was really doing anything but
taking and causing big messes, you know, anywhere I would
step foot man.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
Yeah, And it's like I feel like that right there.
Somebody can take a bit of hope from that right there.
Like people think that in order for them to co
tribute to a situation, to an environment, to a workplace,
they have to do something miraculous, like they got to
do something that nobody's ever seen before in order in
order to feel grateful, in order to feel like they're appreciated,
(35:18):
When all you really got to do is meet the
situation at hand. If it's a small thing, if it's
picking up somebody's plate, if it's offering to throw something
away from somebody, to grab something for somebody. Hey, I
see your swamp with what you got going. Is there
any way I can help take some off your plate,
help your experience better, Like it doesn't have to be
(35:40):
a major thing, like you can provide value. You are
valuable by doing the small everyday things that you do,
like take that, chew on that, take that everywhere that
you go. Because it's the truth. We don't have to
have a certain number of followers, we don't have to
have our resume, we don't have to be popping like
(36:02):
you know, a list, like those things don't matter in
the grand scheme of things, Like at the end of
the day on your life, you'll be able to look
back on what mattered the most and what it was. Man,
was I available to people? Did I leave this world
a better place than where I found it? And that
doesn't take miraculous things or miraculous works. It just takes
(36:23):
the little thing, the next right thing, the next thing
that you feel in your heart that you should be
doing and be connected to.
Speaker 3 (36:32):
So good man, Yeah, it's I think we're gonna not
provide a lot of these questions to you on the
audio and the video if you're listening, but we will
make sure that we get you in the in the
show notes a link to these questions. I think this
is a great time during Thanksgiving or during during that
weekend or you know, as it leads up to the
(36:54):
holidays to spend time reflecting on these questions and you know,
just a sneak preview of some of the questions. I mean,
like Darren said early on, if you just start off
and you just reflect on, like what's one good thing
that happened to you this week, it's so easy to
lose sight of what's gone good in a really busy
week or when things maybe aren't going well, and so
(37:16):
we want to like really again celebrate the wins. I
would highly recommend, and I did this early on in recovery,
is find two close friends or three close friends or
one close friend and start a gratitude text chain. So
every day you're just texting three things you're grateful for.
It sets up another layer of accountability, which makes you
more likely to follow through on it. And it's a
(37:38):
great way to connect with anybody you're looking to connect to.
So you can look at that, you can look at
the winds of like what's improved in your in your
life from like this time last year, like celebrating those
little wins, what progress or maybe what's good about today,
like what's better about today than yesterday? But we Darren
(37:59):
and I put together some questions that I think if
you spend some intentional time reflecting on and feel free
to share them, that you'll really use this time to
stop and pause and take a step back and understand
that gratitude really does change the way we see the
world and it turns what we have into enough, what
we have today into enough. So yeah, no matter what
(38:22):
you're going through, there's always something you can be grateful for,
and if anything, for the breath that you're taking right now,
because we take our breath for granted, but you know,
the breath is the access point to the present moment
and the mind body connection. It's our way back home
into our hearts, right, and so like just taking one
(38:42):
breath sometimes can be enough. So yeah, we could talk
about this all all day long, but I'm gonna let
Darren wrap us up, and yeah, stay in the practice practice.
I promise you, this practice of gratitude will change the
way you see the world.
Speaker 2 (38:57):
Mm hmm, well said Donnie. And I feel like with
the key with this gratitude process is self compassion man
Like for me, a real life example for me, sometimes
when I do gratitude lists, I'll write down like that
I woke up this morning, or that the sun the
sunshine coming through my window, and there's a voice in
my head that's like, man, this is cheesy, dog, this
(39:18):
is this is corny, Like what are we doing here?
Like you really think this is gonna turn your life
around or be something huge, And you have to be
gentle with that voice. You gotta be welcoming up that
voice and be like okay, like but recognize, hey, this
is new, Like I'm gonna face resistance in anything new
that I'm trying to do that is going to turn
(39:38):
into something powerful. So I just challenge you to offer
yourself compassion in that resistance. When you hear that voice,
come in greet it and say, hey, this isn't this
isn't the place, Like I allow myself to grow and
take baby steps in the beginning of new things I'm
trying to implement in my life. So I hope you
guys are able to find some compassion in that and
(39:58):
definitely check those questions out that Donnie was saying. There's
some powerful stuff in there. There's some stuff that could
really shift your perspective, really have you to sit in
silence and figure out the things that could ultimately change
your life, So share those questions with people in your life. Friends,
whoever send us what you wrote, like, we're here with
(40:21):
you and we just want to help see you grow.
So check those questions out because Done does a great
job of always providing questions and documents that are game changers, man,
So check those out, and you know, hope you guys
have a wonderful holiday however you celebrate, whoever you celebrate with.
You know, it's a time to where, you know, if
you want to start practicing your gratitude practice, start right then,
(40:43):
because there's a lot to be thankful for in that
moment and every other moment that is to follow in
our lives. So we appreciate you, guys. We're grateful for
y'all for coming and rocking with us, still out here
two years later doing this show on this mission, and yeah,
we appreciate you. Donnie. I love you, man, love you brother.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
Yeah, Man, I wanted to I forgot to mention. I'm
actually doing a meditation challenge, Gratitude meditation challenge that's going
to start the Monday after Thanksgiving. So I'm not about
doing it during Thanksgiving because that's easy. So it's like, Okay,
are you still as grateful as you were on Thursday
as you are on Monday. So starting that Monday, I'll
(41:25):
be sending out a this is all through text for
my texting platform, and I'll share that number in a
sec I don't even know it by heart, but I'll
be giving out sending out a gratitude meditation, some type
of meditation every single day. It'll be a video meditation,
but you can also listen audio, and so this will
be a great way to kick start your your gratitude practice.
(41:46):
You know, Darren and I are believers, but it's like
it's a practice and what we practice grows stronger. So
all you'll text stay Grateful to the phone number four
eights and we'll try to put that on the show
notes too, but hopefully that'll kick you off to a
good gratitude practice. But happy Thanksgiving everybody, and thanks for listening.
And if this episode inspired you, please share it, share
(42:08):
the love tag us, post it on Instagram. We'll repost it.
We just want to reach as many people as possible
and share the love, especially this time of the year.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
So we're out, no doubt, We out of here. Lay
Off Peace.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
Comeback Stories is a production of Inflection Network and iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
Come Back Stories is a production I've Inflection Network and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Welcome back, everyone to another episode of come Back Stories.
I'm one of your co hosts, Darren Waller. I'm excited
to be here with you guys for another episode along
with my brother, my friend, mister Donnie Starkins. Donnie, how
you doing, man.
Speaker 3 (00:20):
I'm doing great, man. I look forward to these days
that we get to connect and drop in and today
it's just going to be me and you, which I
really value and appreciate these episodes where we actually don't
have a guest on.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
No doubt, man, the flow is incredible. And I don't
know about you, but I find myself at this time wondering,
like where all the time has gone from this year.
We're already approaching Thanksgiving, which is coming up this week,
and it's like a great time, I know, for me
to especially kind of slow down and start to reflect,
(00:55):
start to look back on all the things I label
as good things I label as bad things that are
indifferent really just be like man like. It feels like
every year time is going by faster and faster just
accelerates the more that I get older, and that brings
us to the topic that we want to discuss with
(01:15):
you guys today, which is gratitude, which is a word
you hear come out of our mouths a lot, mainly
because it's a practice that we're still continuing to unfold
in our own personal lives and knowing just how important
it is. Like the day of Thanksgiving, the idea of
Thanksgiving is a beautiful thing, you know, people coming together,
(01:37):
spending that time with your family, your friends that you
may not get to see as much, and cherishing that time,
cherishing that connection. But at the same time, I feel
like what I feel like we want to unpack today
is how do we carry that vibe and that energy
of Thanksgiving that we love and we appreciate. How do
we bring that into our daily lives. How do we
bring that into the moment to moment flow of our existence.
(02:01):
And that's what we want to unpack with you guys
here today.
Speaker 3 (02:05):
And I can't believe you started with that about time flying,
and I still I feel so connected to you, even
even though you're on opposite side of the country, and
probably there's been more time elapsed where I haven't seen you,
but just you saying that I've been trying to explain
that to people like, like, does anybody else notice? I
(02:25):
know time flies and people say it, but something right now,
like this year of all years, and it's not like
anything really crazy happened, but there's something very interesting happening.
So I've been saying that to people and for you
to start it off like that is, yeah, we have
to if time is going that quick, which it is
(02:46):
going quick, and technology makes things go quicker, that we
have to take time to stop and pause. And yes,
Thanksgiving is many things, but I think it's a beautiful
opportunity to take a step back and really gain some
perspective for the things that we are grateful for today.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
No doubt, man, Because for me especially, I know that
there's times where I can fall into a little bit
of like an autopilot mode and I'm just grinding and
I'm just hustling, and I'm just trying to get things done,
keeping a schedule full. And it's like, at what point
do we hustle ourselves to death? You know what I'm saying,
(03:24):
grind ourselves to this space to where our spiritual life
gets boxed out, or just our emotional intelligence and the
feel that we have for what's going on in our
daily lives can start to fade and it's like, a man,
i don't even know what's really going on. I'm just
being swept with the current. And I felt like that
(03:45):
a lot. I felt like that a little bit recently,
definitely in spurts over the course of the year, over
the course of my whole life. Man. And I know
that that's not what I want to do. But how
quickly I can forget when I'm doing things and get
lost into that performance mode a little bit that hey, man,
like the things that I should be most grateful for,
(04:09):
don't I should myself to death, but the things that
I should be taking into account, my health, my support system,
you know what I'm saying. Even the discomfort and the
uncomfortable moments of my life, I can't. I don't view
them through the lens that is most proper and most
beneficial for me a lot of times. And but that's
(04:31):
just me being human.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
You know.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
I need to be reeled back in, brought back into
my center because there's there's no way I'm gonna be
perfect at this. And I hope anybody listening knows that
I ain't gonna hold you to be in perfect Donnie
isn't either. We're just we're just trying to figure this
thing out.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
Yeah, And I think that's why we've been inspired to
maybe at least during the holiday season, hit it with
you guys, with maybe just us two, especially because we
understand in the in the world of addiction, alcoholism and
mental health that by the time that you listen to
this podcast episode from Thanksgiving till after New Year's is
(05:08):
when we see the world sees the spike, the big
spike in addiction and mental health and alcoholism. So I
remember these days, these using days, and how scary and
how having to deal with family and the triggers and
all of that stuff. So we want you to know
that we're here with you. And again, this is just
(05:30):
us continuing to fulfill a mission of reaching many as
many people as possible to remind them that you're not alone.
And I know a lot of people are going to
feel alone during the holidays, but we're here to tell
you that you're not alone. And I know that saying
can sound cliche, but it's a story that you're telling yourself.
And when we weave in practices like gratitude, because there's
(05:53):
going to be times in life where you're feeling stuck,
like you really don't feel like you're moving forward, like
everything isn't working out the way that you expected. And
it's at these times where we actually lose person effective
And it's at these times during Thanksgiving in the holidays,
and we're seeing everybody else's Instagram post about how how
good of a time they're having, which I mean, let's
(06:15):
let's be real, like family time during the holidays can
be very challenging for many and it always isn't what
you think it is, and for a lot of people,
a lot of people struggle. It's there's a lot of
pain during this time. So you can tell that I'm
super fired up about this because I remember how it was.
And we want you to know that you know you're
(06:38):
not alone and you can't do this alone.
Speaker 2 (06:40):
Amen, we are. We are with you, guys. We've been
with you guys from the jump. We start this this show,
this platform to tell you guys, or to educate you guys,
or to you know, let you know what's what. We
started the show because we are one of you. We
have our struggles. I got struggles like I'm not immune,
(07:02):
nor will I ever be. And we just want to.
I know we wit you guys, and you know, I
know that maybe some people listening thinking about a gratitude
practice kind of like me, like I was intimidated by it.
You know, I've and I can't tell you I've done
a lot of gratitude lists in the last six years,
since since my life has kind of taken a little
bit of a different course. But even still in the
(07:23):
midst of that, I can find myself kind of in
the midst of my day maybe like grumbling, like maybe
not vocally and out loud, but silently kind of complaining
about things, or using sarcasm to kind of cut down people,
or or the situation that I'm in because I don't
(07:45):
like it, and basically saying I lose track of the
gratitude practice that I've been cultivating. So it starts with
one like not expecting perfection from yourself and knowing that
this is a practice is going to continue to unfold
over time. But I feel like it's proper for us
right now to break down, like okay, like I want
a gratitude practice, Like what does that look like? Like
(08:06):
what are the thoughts? Like what can I ask myself?
How can I check in and I feel like one
Like one way to start is like even if you
haven't had an amazing life or your comeback story feels
like it hasn't happened yet, we can start with like, hey, like,
what's one good thing that's happened to me this week?
What's one good thing that's happened for you? Like, because
(08:28):
there's there's no way you can sit here and tell
me that there's not one good thing that's happened this
week if you don't sit down and analyze your life,
reflect on one thing, Like if it's you only all,
but you just woke up today, then that may be
all it is. But there's at least one good thing,
and that we can start there, Like, if that's all
(08:51):
our gratitude practice is, is hey, I check it at
the end of the week and find one thing. Let's
go like we're doing this thing. We're getting started and
we're rolling. So don't feel like it's got to be
this magnificent journaling episode or you know, every single part
of your day you're just smelling every single rose and
you know, feeling like you've got to have it all together. No, like,
(09:14):
let's just find a place to start and roll from there.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
Yeah, I love that, and I think it's just good
for anybody listening that says well, because gratitude is kind
of like this. It's another one of those kind of
cliche things, maybe often a term that's overused sometimes maybe
rarely or not as often embodied, Like we're talking about
it and people are sharing it. But the reason why,
I mean, the big reason the science behind it is
(09:38):
because it helps us overcome all these hardwired the hardwired
negativity bias, which back in the day, it was in
the caveman days when you know, we had to look
for the saber to tiger, so we had to be
on the lookout for something to go wrong or else
we would dye. I mean, that's just how it was.
And so this negativity bias is hardwired. And it's funny
(09:59):
because remember we had Michael Gervais on the show and
he was talking about today's modern tooth saberduth tigers carrying
what other people think, and I was like, wow, that's
so powerful. But going back to understanding why we do this,
we are conditioned to just look for the things that
are going wrong. It's just how it is. So when
we accept that and we understand that there's not something
(10:21):
wrong with us. It's just like deep, deep, many many
years and generations of conditioning. That's why we practice. And Darren,
you know, when we would do our coaching sessions, it
was we would always start with, like, what's going well?
And the reason we talk about what's going well is
because we're so used to talking about what's not going well,
(10:41):
and when we talk about what's not going well well,
it has us feeling demotivated and uninspired. But when we
talk about what's going well first, that's kind of what
has us feeling feeling good. It's like, you know, the
reason we practice gratitude is because we're our tension goes,
energy flows, and if we focus on the good, like
guess what happens, more good happens in our lives. If
(11:03):
you wake up in the morning and you turn on
the news, and that's the beginning of your practice and
the foundation of your day, I mean, that's a fear written, shaky,
shaky foundation. You wake up in the morning and take
a few deep breaths, right, or at least maybe just
think of a few things you're grateful for. As you
advance to practice, you can actually cultivate the feeling of gratitude,
(11:25):
like feeling it in your bones, feeling it in your body.
That's how you really start to gain a practice that
doesn't feel monotonous because I mean, Darren, we've done this,
You've written plenty of times, and it's like, oh, I'm
riting the same shit every day, and that's like our mind,
the chatter, you know, the little self sabotage voice that's
chirping up. But it's more about just practicing and doing
(11:47):
it again, because especially if you said you're gonna do it,
because we talk about this all the time about keeping
the promises you make to yourself. So it's it's big
in many ways, and it's just a beautiful practice. And
that's why we're talking about it.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
Man so well said my wife and I we had
about an hour plus car ride last night and she
put on this audiobook that somebody sent her. It's called
Peaks and Valleys. If you haven't checked that out, comeback Stories, Family,
go check that out. But essentially, like in the first
couple of chapters, you know, it's a fictional story, and
(12:26):
it says, man that's up on this peak, an old
man's up on this peak, and a young man kind
of gets to this peak.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
And.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
As opposed to his perspective being like, yes, I made
it up here to this peak, he says like, like,
damn it, I missed it, like he missed the sunset
because it was later in the day. And you know,
old Man's like, you know, you made it to a
place that you've always wanted to come, yet the only
thing that you could focus on was what you're missing
out on. And he basically says, the peaks and the
(12:58):
valleys of your life aren't destinations, but the peaks are
when you're most grounded and in tune with gratitude, and
the valleys are when you're caught up in the longing
for what's not there. And that just I'm right in
the car. I'm just like like ad libbing to it
as the story as the story is kind of unfolding
(13:19):
and only a couple chapters in, but I feel like
that's such a great way to put it. Like where
a lot of us think that we're going to be
grateful when we get to a certain place or a
certain thing happens in our life where we get a
certain achievement, as opposed to just being grateful for what's
around us currently and how we're just setting ourselves up
(13:41):
for loneliness, you know, depression when we're longing for things
that we don't have. And it's just like what a
powerful perspective, right, Like nobody teaches us these things, you know,
Like it's I'm thirty one and I'm still trying to
get a grip on that. Like I know it's the truth,
but it's still like I still want to go the
(14:02):
other direction, you know.
Speaker 3 (14:03):
Yeah, man, I'm just like, as you're walking through telling
that story and giving us the vision of you driving
with Kelsey, I just I'm so grateful for the podcast
because the podcast is where you guys connected and who
knew that you know, less than a couple of years
later that you'd be talking about what you're talking about.
(14:24):
And it makes me so happy that the things you're
listening to and the content that you're taking in and
the conversations that you're having with your partner is like everything,
like a what a gift that you found a partner? Dude,
She's the best. I was listening to her. I was
watching her Instagram today, her stories, and she started to
get serious about like having negative beliefs about something and
(14:46):
I was like, whoa, she's going to go like political
on this or something, and I didn't think she would
do that. And then she turned to your cat, dude,
and I think she's falling in love with your cat.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
Yeah. No, man, there's a match made in heaven. Man.
They're definitely drawn to each other. It's pretty pretty cool
to see. But but yeah, but yeah, bro, it's like,
you know, it is a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful
thing to be in the place that we are. You know,
you talk about reflecting on this year. The transition is
is challenging, you know, and we're too, you know, pretty
(15:20):
strong will, strong minded people, and we want to focus on, like,
you know, not necessarily what the situation is, but how
we can make the most of a situation with as
far as like the transition and moving out here and
being away from each other. But you know, there's like
a study out there that the top three most stressful
things are you know, changing your environment, moving, changing your job,
(15:47):
and like relational change. And it's the top three things
on the on the list that would stress you out
the most. We got, you know, combined a sandwich you know,
of of all three and dealing with all of the
emotions that come with that. You know, there's been you know,
plenty of moments I look back on that a victory
(16:07):
and moments where it's just like, man, we just gotta
find a way through this. But I'm grateful that we
have and that we still are. Man, It's just it's crazy.
And I hope people can take away from that that,
you know, it's not necessarily what's happening to you or
happening around you that has to be the defining factor
(16:31):
in your perspective or your gratitude or where you may
feel like your life is heading, if anything, Like, I'm
grateful for the adversity because like, I have no evidence
to not be grateful for it, even though in my
daily life. You can catch me if you had the
audio to my mind, I'd be like man like, but
I have no evidence to not feel like my life
(16:53):
is going to continue to get better, because that's all
it's ever done. Like even from the place of overdose,
even from you know, places of loneliness and feel like
there was no purpose in my life. Like, there's clear
evidence that my life it continues to get better. But
you can lose still lose tat you know, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:13):
I mean, yeah, you hit. I would call that the trifecta.
That's like the ultimate trifecta of what you've got thrown
at you as far as adversity, right, And I've told
you this before, and you know this truth of God
will never give you more than you can handle. And
when it comes to the NFL and everything that you've
faced and continue to face as far as adversity, like
(17:34):
I will remind you and this is I believe to
be a fact that you have more tools than one
ninety nine point nine percent of the league. So you
can you can deal with this. You can deal with
the adversity and the shit that's going on this year
that I mean, it's not what we envision and it's
it's but it's I have evidence that I feel like
(17:56):
your gratitude practice from four or five years ago is
the reason why you can have the perspective that you
have today. So it's like, you know, you kind of
plant seeds and then when shit hits the fan that
you can dig deep for that perspective. I don't think
you can just you know, start a gratitude practice the
day before and something bad happened and you're going to
(18:16):
be able to just see the good in it. It's
a practice and I think that's what sets us up
for all the curve balls in the adversity that life
throws us, and we can always choose to see the good.
Speaker 2 (18:30):
Facts. And you know, for those of you that you
know are maybe struggling with okay, like, what's something good
that's happened this week for my gratitude practice? Okay, Like
I feel you on that. There's been weeks where I'm like,
you know, I feel like I can't get out my
own way. You know, things are just not bouncing my way.
But you know, we could also shift to you know,
(18:52):
who am I grateful for? Like people wise, like who's
helped me become the person I am today? You know
what's Who's somebody that even though I've made a lot
of mistakes, even though I may have fallen on my face,
they're always there to help pick me up. They're always
there to comfort me and speak encouragement into my life,
like find something or someone, because there's no way that
(19:16):
we're doing life without the people around us. Like I'm
grateful for the people in my life, like my wife,
like you Donnie, like my friends. That especially because you guys,
challenge me when I'm isolating or you know, I'm not
staying connected or I'm trying to withdraw in fear or
(19:40):
anxiety or something about the future stressing me out, Like
you guys challenge me to stay connected and make sure
I'm talking about things and make sure that you know
I'm being myself and I'm smiling and I'm laughing, and
I'm just like getting all these things off my chest
instead of holding them in. So like I said, like,
(20:02):
there's no way that every there's not one good thing
that's happening in your week or in your day. And
at the same time, there's no way that you can't
scan your life, your existence at any point and not
find somebody that you could be grateful for for whatever
it was they did for you, or them just being
there their overall presence, Like there's somebody there, and we
(20:26):
just challenge you to sit with it. However long it
takes for you to arrive to that point where you
start to feel that gratitude for those people flow in.
We're here with you, and however long it takes is
however long it takes. But telling you there's somebody out there.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Yeah, and if there's not somebody, And I think Darren
and I will go toe to toe with anybody that
would argue that that they have nothing to be grateful for,
because if you don't have anybody and you're isolated, then
you have something there that's keeping you isolated, so you
can be grateful for that something that's keeping you isolated.
So it's just like it's proof that it's perspective in
(21:01):
a mindset, just like everything. And you know, Darren and
I talk a lot about controlling the controllables, and one
of the things we do have control over is our
It's our it's our attitude and our perspective. And so
you know, if you don't like what you're seeing, sometimes
you have to you have to change the way, you
have to change where you stand, or you have to shift,
or you have to maybe do some work so that
(21:24):
the lens that you're looking through. I've looked through people
through lenses of resentment and judgment, and you know, had
different exercises that I've gone through where that's been lifted
and then I can like see that person for who
they are today and not something they did or something
they said a year ago. So yeah, man, this is
(21:44):
so powerful. I had a good question I wanted to
ask you. That kind of weaves back into the podcast
as far as like childhood stuff, like on a lighter note,
what what for you? Like what aspects of your childhood
or like your neighborhood were you most grateful for or
are you most grateful for?
Speaker 2 (22:03):
Oh? Man, I go back to playing in the cul
de sac. There was this, Uh, there was a culder
sack in my neighborhood, like two houses down at the
bottom of this hill. And man, we played every sport
knowing the man like you know, parents would kick you
out the door and locked the door, say go play outside,
(22:25):
and uh, I don't know. My boy Wave, Marcy, his
brother Red, my boy Dalton kindle like we were the
main for in that colder sack. I don't know if
they watching it, but shout out of y'all. Yeah, I
mean every sporting on the man, we were out there
just ripping and running, just trying things like we don't
know what we're doing. We're doing wrestling moves. We were uh,
(22:45):
diehard wrestling fans. But I look back to my childhood
and I was free in those moments, Like there was
a lot of times in my childhood. Like even at
that age, like when I would go to school, I'd
be like anxious, trying to figure out where I fit in.
Like I talk about from the very first episode of
the show, like how my it was very confusing, like
(23:05):
I and just alienating. I didn't know where I fit in.
But in that caul desact, man, I felt like I
could do anything I wanted to do, be anybody I
wanted to be, and just hang out with these with
these guys man. And you know, that's a feeling I
look back on in my life and I'm just like,
sometimes I'm like, where has that gone? In the midst
of all my doing, in the midst of all my accomplishing.
(23:29):
How often am I connecting and feeling about what I'm
doing right now? How do I how often do I
feel the way I felt like when I was in
that cul Des act. You know what I'm saying. So
that's something that pops out in my head immediately. What
about you, though?
Speaker 3 (23:43):
Man? It's and mine's mine's the same answer, But just
hearing yours, it sounds like that coul A Sack, you
felt safe, You felt safe and free, right, and that's
when you were able to just be you and be
that authentic version of you. That was enough no matter
what your skin tone was, but mine was mine was
the same. I grew up and I lived in a
(24:04):
coul a sac and in our backyard the complex, like
the housing complex we lived in, there was all these
like green belts, so the backyards there was there was
a backyard, but then there was green belts. And my
backyard was like this perfect almost like a baseball field
to the other people's backyards. There was this green belt
and big trees, and the big tree was called the
green Monster. So like we were out there every single day,
(24:28):
baseball or football, you know, before school, after school. It
was NonStop. And to me that was like everything to
be able to play outside every single day. I mean,
I don't know, I you know, I was living in
Arizona most of my life. I live in California. Now.
I see so many more kids outside here, but I
think it's mainly because of the ocean and they're on
their e bikes and they're surfing. But in a lot
(24:50):
of places, like kids aren't doing that anymore, and it's
it's it's very scary to know what what that long
term effect could be because we're talking about the most
the most powerful moments of our lives that happened when
we were out there, And so I don't know what
they're doing now, but I have I have to guess
it has to do with a screen and playing some
(25:10):
games or being on technology. And that's scary.
Speaker 2 (25:13):
Shoot, man, I was just having a conversation about that
with somebody the other day. But but yeah, man, it's
just like, yeah, like we were talking about, like to
like instead of us being outside in the park playing
like like dudes and kids will be on like two
K playing my part like with an avatar, or like
(25:37):
on Fortnite, like they'll get on the hang out on
the game, as opposed to like going outside and hanging out,
you know. And it's just like what hanging out when
we were a kid out there in those cul de
sacs and those environments like and we would do anything,
try anything, Like I feel like that was just like hope,
you know what I'm saying, Like what couldn't we do?
Who couldn't we be? And I feel like, you know,
(26:00):
the engine for hope is gratitude, because it's like why
I hope for something better in the in the future
down the road if I can't find that feeling exactly
where I'm at, like, because this is this is the
only place I could be, This is the only moment
I've been promised. If I'm not cultivating the habit of
(26:21):
you know, that joy and that that feeling, that contentment
of just running with the pack of just wild kids
man like feeling that like in that moment and embracing
for what it is. How could I possibly do that
at a further moment if I haven't created the groundedness
and the rootedness to be able to practice that right here,
(26:42):
right now. And I feel like such a such a
lost art man because I'm guilty of it too at times.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
Yeah, but but it's so deep what you're saying, because
the gratitude is the train, right, It's what keeps it going.
But I think hope. We have that hope when we're young,
because we are free and like maybe some shit has
happened to us, but we're not really aware of it yet,
like the subconscious stuff, but like we haven't been hurt,
our hearts haven't been broken, like none of that has happened.
(27:10):
So we start to lose hope as the world throws
us curveballs, and people you know, do hurtful things to us,
and things happen, and I think that's where we start
to lose hope and lose perspective. So the only way
to find that hope is to direct your thinking and
your energy towards something positive. So it's always going to
(27:31):
come back to gratitude. And you know, if you resist it,
you would have to look at like what what's the resistance,
Like where's that resistance coming from? And just get super
clear on it. I mean, the science shows why this works,
and this is why we're talking about it. And I think, gosh,
I can think of so many opportunities, just like little
stuff like I last week, you know, had issues had
(27:56):
issues with my car. Right car battery dies, But it's like,
what are you going to do? I have a car? Like,
at least I have a car, and I know that like,
oh hey, it's at least I have a car to
have a battery that died in right, And I know
that sounds nice and all, but that's really what I thought.
And so it proves to me that this shit works.
You know, what's like, what's a really hard lesson that
(28:21):
you're in your whole life that happened like a hard
lesson that you're grateful that you learned.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
That's such a great question. I mean, I gotta go
back to, you know, just my story and with my
addiction and how everything culminated as far as that's concerned,
and the lesson in that, the lesson in overdosing, the
lesson in crashing and burning in the way that I
thought was the route to peace or to fulfillment in
(28:50):
my life. I had to learn that there is no
world that exists where numbing out the negative emotions, the
negative experiences, and trying to only experience it's positive ones
is going to give me the balance that I need
to live a wholesome life, a life that I can
(29:12):
look at, look in the mirror and be like this
is it, Like right here, in this moment, this is it.
And my story had to unfold the way that it
did in order for me to be able to see
a different path, which is oh, I have to feel everything.
I have to feel the doubt, I have to feel
the fear. I have to feel the disappointment, I have
(29:37):
to feel the anger. Like there's no way I can
just stuff these things aside and think like, oh, Okay,
the only thing that's left is happy. The only thing
that's left is you know, just bunnies and rainbows, you
know what I'm saying, like positive things. That's not the
(29:57):
case because the balance of everything, the dichotomy of everything,
is thrown off, because if oh, this is good, how
do I know this is good? How do I know
this is what I'm seeking after? How do I know
that this is something that is what my heart and
my soul are truly longing for. If I don't know
what's not what I'm not really longing for, that I'm
(30:19):
trying to mask behind, or that I'm trying to pursue
just to get relief as opposed to getting freedom. So
I would say, you know, we talk about our stories
a bunch on here, We harpen on it because there's
still so much meaning that we can take from those experiences,
like I can now, like just you asking that question
sparked that in me, and I'm like wow, Like I
(30:40):
haven't even thought of it until the words started coming
out of my mouth, Like that's a hard lesson that
I had to learn. That is really a serving me
more than anything else, maybe serving me in my life today.
Speaker 3 (30:54):
Yeah, you're explaining like the duality of things. And I
think for me that that answer goes my answer to
the question of the hard lesson that I'm great that
I learned was the lesson of selfishness and self centeredness
and doing my fourth step and I remember just like
looking at this four step in this inventory and it
(31:15):
just screamed selfishness. It's if for those of you that
don't know, it's just doing an inventory and basically looking
at your character defects, and it screamed selfishness and self centeredness.
So the lesson that I've been given for for my
life because of the gift of recovery and the gift
of desperation and being so selfish all of these decisions
(31:38):
that I made that led to a self destruction, a
self destruction that was also an overdose, but I still
wasn't done right and it was it was all about me.
And so the gift is we've been given the antidote
to that and that service.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
And so.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
You know, selfishly, it's the greatest gift ever because it
just it keeps us out of our own way. I mean,
Darren and I talking to you right now, Yes we
are being a certain but you have to understand how
much we are benefiting off this also, so it like
it fills both parties and that's that's like, it's the
gift that keeps on giving, And that's that's our work
(32:15):
here is just to figure out, like, you know, what
our natural gifts and talents are, what are the passions
and the things that we believe in and stand for
and the causes, and then how can we share those gifts?
Be it our time, our finances, our love, our creative
it doesn't matter.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Facts. Man, It's like, I feel like what you just
said is a great angle towards gratitude and it's a
simple one. It's like, you know, if I'm not feeling
that gratitude, I'm struggling from place for places to find it.
Is it maybe because all I'm focused on is me?
Is it? Maybe because all I'm focused on is the
(32:56):
thoughts that are spinning in my head why things aren't
going my way, why I'm not where I should be
at this very moment, Like why I'm my? What about me?
What about this? You know? And I asked that because
I can be there and I need to be reminded
even still to this day that go out and go
(33:17):
out and help somebody, Go out and meet meet a
need for somebody. Go out and do something for somebody
and expect nothing in return, and see how and see
how you feel after that. That's that's gratitude. I'm telling you, Like,
as a human being, the way that we're wired, no
matter how much pain, hate, any emotion, maybe in your heart,
(33:40):
you go out there and do something for somebody and
expect nothing in return, and watch watch them light up,
watch them be grateful. And tell me that's not going
to stir something up on the inside of you. I
refuse to believe anything other than that.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
Yeah, And you know it ties back to when we
started to be of service. In my first service commitment
was setting up the chairs and making coffee for a
seven am meeting, a man's meeting on Saturday mornings. And
once my sponsor asked me to say yes to that
service commitment that next Saturday for the first time, and
(34:15):
I don't know since the last time I played a
day of baseball, I felt a sense of purpose and
all I was doing was setting up chairs and making coffee.
But I did that for a year, and I did
it with my sponsor, and my sponsor has thirty plus
years sober, and he had kind of straight away he
was good. But it even brought him back in to
connect to the program and to connect to us. So
(34:38):
I'll never forget those lessons early on and the feeling
of contribution that I had when I you know, because
it didn't feel like I was really doing anything but
taking and causing big messes, you know, anywhere I would
step foot man.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
Yeah, And it's like I feel like that right there.
Somebody can take a bit of hope from that right there.
Like people think that in order for them to co
tribute to a situation, to an environment, to a workplace,
they have to do something miraculous, like they got to
do something that nobody's ever seen before in order in
order to feel grateful, in order to feel like they're appreciated,
(35:18):
When all you really got to do is meet the
situation at hand. If it's a small thing, if it's
picking up somebody's plate, if it's offering to throw something
away from somebody, to grab something for somebody. Hey, I
see your swamp with what you got going. Is there
any way I can help take some off your plate,
help your experience better, Like it doesn't have to be
(35:40):
a major thing, like you can provide value. You are
valuable by doing the small everyday things that you do,
like take that, chew on that, take that everywhere that
you go. Because it's the truth. We don't have to
have a certain number of followers, we don't have to
have our resume, we don't have to be popping like
(36:02):
you know, a list, like those things don't matter in
the grand scheme of things, Like at the end of
the day on your life, you'll be able to look
back on what mattered the most and what it was. Man,
was I available to people? Did I leave this world
a better place than where I found it? And that
doesn't take miraculous things or miraculous works. It just takes
(36:23):
the little thing, the next right thing, the next thing
that you feel in your heart that you should be
doing and be connected to.
Speaker 3 (36:32):
So good man, Yeah, it's I think we're gonna not
provide a lot of these questions to you on the
audio and the video if you're listening, but we will
make sure that we get you in the in the
show notes a link to these questions. I think this
is a great time during Thanksgiving or during during that
weekend or you know, as it leads up to the
(36:54):
holidays to spend time reflecting on these questions and you know,
just a sneak preview of some of the questions. I mean,
like Darren said early on, if you just start off
and you just reflect on, like what's one good thing
that happened to you this week, it's so easy to
lose sight of what's gone good in a really busy
week or when things maybe aren't going well, and so
(37:16):
we want to like really again celebrate the wins. I
would highly recommend, and I did this early on in recovery,
is find two close friends or three close friends or
one close friend and start a gratitude text chain. So
every day you're just texting three things you're grateful for.
It sets up another layer of accountability, which makes you
more likely to follow through on it. And it's a
(37:38):
great way to connect with anybody you're looking to connect to.
So you can look at that, you can look at
the winds of like what's improved in your in your
life from like this time last year, like celebrating those
little wins, what progress or maybe what's good about today,
like what's better about today than yesterday? But we Darren
(37:59):
and I put together some questions that I think if
you spend some intentional time reflecting on and feel free
to share them, that you'll really use this time to
stop and pause and take a step back and understand
that gratitude really does change the way we see the
world and it turns what we have into enough, what
we have today into enough. So yeah, no matter what
(38:22):
you're going through, there's always something you can be grateful for,
and if anything, for the breath that you're taking right now,
because we take our breath for granted, but you know,
the breath is the access point to the present moment
and the mind body connection. It's our way back home
into our hearts, right, and so like just taking one
(38:42):
breath sometimes can be enough. So yeah, we could talk
about this all all day long, but I'm gonna let
Darren wrap us up, and yeah, stay in the practice practice.
I promise you, this practice of gratitude will change the
way you see the world.
Speaker 2 (38:57):
Mm hmm, well said Donnie. And I feel like with
the key with this gratitude process is self compassion man
Like for me, a real life example for me, sometimes
when I do gratitude lists, I'll write down like that
I woke up this morning, or that the sun the
sunshine coming through my window, and there's a voice in
my head that's like, man, this is cheesy, dog, this
(39:18):
is this is corny, Like what are we doing here?
Like you really think this is gonna turn your life
around or be something huge, And you have to be
gentle with that voice. You gotta be welcoming up that
voice and be like okay, like but recognize, hey, this
is new, Like I'm gonna face resistance in anything new
that I'm trying to do that is going to turn
(39:38):
into something powerful. So I just challenge you to offer
yourself compassion in that resistance. When you hear that voice,
come in greet it and say, hey, this isn't this
isn't the place, Like I allow myself to grow and
take baby steps in the beginning of new things I'm
trying to implement in my life. So I hope you
guys are able to find some compassion in that and
(39:58):
definitely check those questions out that Donnie was saying. There's
some powerful stuff in there. There's some stuff that could
really shift your perspective, really have you to sit in
silence and figure out the things that could ultimately change
your life, So share those questions with people in your life. Friends,
whoever send us what you wrote, like, we're here with
(40:21):
you and we just want to help see you grow.
So check those questions out because Done does a great
job of always providing questions and documents that are game changers, man,
So check those out, and you know, hope you guys
have a wonderful holiday however you celebrate, whoever you celebrate with.
You know, it's a time to where, you know, if
you want to start practicing your gratitude practice, start right then,
(40:43):
because there's a lot to be thankful for in that
moment and every other moment that is to follow in
our lives. So we appreciate you, guys. We're grateful for
y'all for coming and rocking with us, still out here
two years later doing this show on this mission, and yeah,
we appreciate you. Donnie. I love you, man, love you brother.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
Yeah, Man, I wanted to I forgot to mention. I'm
actually doing a meditation challenge, Gratitude meditation challenge that's going
to start the Monday after Thanksgiving. So I'm not about
doing it during Thanksgiving because that's easy. So it's like, Okay,
are you still as grateful as you were on Thursday
as you are on Monday. So starting that Monday, I'll
(41:25):
be sending out a this is all through text for
my texting platform, and I'll share that number in a
sec I don't even know it by heart, but I'll
be giving out sending out a gratitude meditation, some type
of meditation every single day. It'll be a video meditation,
but you can also listen audio, and so this will
be a great way to kick start your your gratitude practice.
(41:46):
You know, Darren and I are believers, but it's like
it's a practice and what we practice grows stronger. So
all you'll text stay Grateful to the phone number four
eights and we'll try to put that on the show
notes too, but hopefully that'll kick you off to a
good gratitude practice. But happy Thanksgiving everybody, and thanks for listening.
And if this episode inspired you, please share it, share
(42:08):
the love tag us, post it on Instagram. We'll repost it.
We just want to reach as many people as possible
and share the love, especially this time of the year.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
So we're out, no doubt, We out of here. Lay
Off Peace.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
Comeback Stories is a production of Inflection Network and iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hosts And Creators
Eric Balchunas
Donny Starkins
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