September 30, 2025 • 53 mins
I say down with Chef Devan...
Driven by his desire and ambition to be the best in the business, Guyanese, Canadian Chef Devan Rajkumar (aka Chef Dev) has no boundaries when it comes to culinary exploration.
Chef Devan Rajkumar is on a mission to create food worth sharing that modernizes the craft, traditions and tastes of East and West Indian cuisines.
Whether that means owning the role of food expert on Cityline, traveling abroad to gain more experience and share his craft, appearing as a judge on Food Network Canada’s Fire Masters, developing signature soups with Mema Foods International or hosting pop-ups with chef peers both local and internationally on any given day.
This episode dives deep into the raw truths of addiction, relapse, and the ongoing journey of recovery. From finding podcasting as a lifeline in rehab, to rediscovering humility, service, and purpose, we explore how sobriety isn’t just about abstaining—it’s about learning how to live again.
You’ll hear powerful stories about:
Relapsing after 8 years and starting over
Wearing the “mask” and hiding behind ego
Functional alcoholism and the danger of high performance in addiction
How addiction stripped away passion—and how recovery brought it back
Why humility, service, and honesty are the keys to lasting change
If you’re looking for hope, tools, and real conversations about recovery, addiction, and mental health, this episode will resonate.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
It's like getting sober is one thing, but then learning how to
manage feelings and emotions andlive a healthy life is another
thing. And I'll share something big
with you right now, man. It's like I'm I'm, I'm about 4
1/2 years clean and I just started doing therapy again
earlier this year and it's uncovered so much shit for the
past few years. Like I thought because I wasn't
(00:21):
picking up drugs and alcohol that I pretty much had my shit
together. There's not much you could tell
me, but yo, there was some like heavy buried shit down there,
like resentment towards certain people, some things that
definitely needed to be uncovered.
So like abstaining from alteringmy state of consciousness is one
thing, but learning how to live a good life clean and sober,
that's a whole other. That's a whole other thing bro.
(00:42):
But it's way better than living in that shit.
Hi there, welcome back or welcome to Recovering Out Loud
Podcast, the show where we get real about mental health and
addiction. I'm so glad you're here.
If you or someone you love is struggling with drugs or
alcohol, please reach out for help.
Send me a message on all social media platforms at Recovering
(01:04):
Out Loud Pod or by e-mail at recoveringoutloudpod@gmail.com.
You are no longer alone. How'd you get filming this and.
(01:30):
What do you mean? How'd you get it like?
Into this. Yeah, it's fascinating.
Yeah. Caught my attention.
I found it organically. Yeah, it's funny how that that
happens. Hey, the God, the universe,
higher power kind of puts peoplein your life and you can choose
to pick it up or you can choose to just it's just a coincidence,
right? I was in rehab this third time
and there was a counsellor in there that was talking about his
(01:52):
podcast. And I've always loved
podcasting. It's helped me through some of
my darkest times and I've, I learn a lot from podcasting.
And I was like, hmm, that guy can do it.
Why not me, right? Like I like talking, I like
listening, I like interviewing people like conversations.
And I was like, what can I talk about?
(02:12):
Well, recovery, I can, you know,I've been doing this for 10
years. I'm passionate about it and let
me tell you bro, like it's everything I thought it would be
and more. I've had some of the most
amazing people come in here thatI never would run into.
Ever. Like yourself, right?
Oh God bless you. And I just fucking like, I
learned so much, right? And so the reason I started it
(02:34):
essentially was to stay sober myself.
I have to keep, I had to remind myself of that this morning
because I'm doing a lot today. And it starts to become like,
you know, this is a lot of work and I'm not getting the fucking
results that I think I want, right?
I'm not getting this and that it's like, dude, why did you
start this? You started it to not fucking
relapse again. Because remember how horrible
(02:56):
that was? I relapsed after eight years
and, you know, started doing things that I never thought I
would do, hanging out with people and never thought I would
hang out with. And, you know, hopefully it
helps one person, right? Those are the two kind of things
I try to lift. The goal, I always tell myself,
we don't grow in comfort zones, so when things get very
uncomfortable and I can't handleit, I just kind of close my
eyes. I try to reset and I'm like,
(03:16):
it's going to make me stronger, It's going to make me tougher.
But it's hard, man. It's easier said than done.
I have a crazy workload with work.
I have a problem. And if taking on too much, maybe
it's the attic, attic brain where I just thrive in chaos and
I need to keep it as stacked as possible.
But also part of me, it could beego.
A part of me too is just like, if I'm not super busy, I'm not
being productive and I'm wastingtoo much time and time's our
(03:40):
most valuable asset and blah, blah, blah, you know, and my
girlfriend is now helping me take a lot more time and I'm,
I'm like, I'm scratching things off the calendar.
Like I had a double production day this week.
Thursday, Friday, I cancelled Friday, you know, because the
week is just so crazy. There's so much happening.
And then Sunday I leave town again.
I'm always on the road so I'm learning to take more time for
(04:00):
myself, which is important, but easier said than done.
Absolutely. Can you describe to people what
what you do and what what how you got into it not?
Really, cause 'cause I don't know what I, what I do, but I
get asked all the time, like what's your day-to-day like?
Monday to Sunday is completely different.
In some ways it's by design, in some ways it's not.
And what I mean by that is essentially have a very dynamic
(04:22):
workflow. So on Monday I could be, you
know, shooting breakfast television.
On Tuesday I'm sitting here withyou, you know, And then on
Wednesday I'm consulting, you know, and then on Thursday I'm
popping up in Melbourne like, you know, it's, it's really,
really random. Like for example, this week, I'm
here with you. We have a, a big production day
where I'll shoot organic contentcontent this week and some brand
(04:44):
partnership work. We have some brand partnership
stuff for PC President's choice,McCain, McCain fries.
They brought up some like Indiantype fries.
So I'm doing like this loaded. Anyways, you got to see the
video. And then Sunday I'm, I'm, I'm on
a work trip in Turkey, Istanbul,doing some fun stuff out there
with some local chefs from Toronto.
So every day is different. I love it dynamic.
(05:04):
I don't want to be in a bricks and mortar seven days out of the
week. Everyone keeps asking me to work
a restaurant, but I would preferthey open it and they're there
140 hours a week, you know, not me.
So I love being on the road. We, you were talking about this
earlier, about how much you're learning.
I just want to learn. I just want to travel and keep
learning. And I was talking about this a
few days ago. Like I was in the kitchen in
(05:25):
Jamaica not too long ago when wewere supposed to do this.
I got stuck there, but the greenest, youngest, most
inexperienced person in the kitchen anywhere I go has
something to offer. Me, I got goosebumps when you
were saying that. Yeah, they have something to
offer me. And I used to walk around the
kitchen like 10 years ago, not asking any questions 'cause I
didn't want anyone to think I had any gaps in my game.
(05:45):
And now I ask questions. Nonsense.
I don't care where I am, who's there.
I could be talking in front of agroup of kids and if someone
does something I don't recognizeor I'd like to know more about
it, I will ask them the question.
And and yeah, so very dynamic workflow.
I just want to have lots of fun,inspire people to cook, serve my
neighbor and and enjoy this lifeto the fullest.
(06:06):
Yeah, I love that man. Humility, right?
I can learn something in every single situation, every time,
every single situation. And the minute I'm not open to
it, first of all, like how many I can think about how many
relationships I could have had with people that I wrote off
because I'm better than you or Iknow more than you or you don't
know shit. Like think about all those
(06:28):
little micro interactions that you could have where you're just
like. Or left the wrong impression
with that being a Dick. You, you mentioned humility.
My favorite quote in life is about humility.
It's true. Humility is not thinking less of
yourself, but it's thinking of yourself less.
And it's my favorite thing. Prior to going to Renaissance in
(06:48):
2015, I didn't know about humility.
I didn't know about ego or ego deflation.
And I learned all those principles when I was there.
And although I didn't stay sobercoming out of Renaissance in
2015, those things were instilled in me.
And we were talking a little bitbefore about when I was at art
and all that stuff, and I was able to take some of those
principles into my last treatment session fourish years
(07:09):
ago. Now.
Humility is a big one. Congrats man.
God bless. What a miracle.
Hey, for guys that I don't know about you, but couldn't put 4
minutes together at some, some days of sobriety and then we'd
come in and we'd put four years together.
And I was a mess. I was a mess.
And all my daily mission was to convince everybody that
everything was good. Like I just it was constantly.
(07:33):
A mask. So exhausting, right?
It was it, it, you know, I was talking to this therapist about
this and he's like, what happenswhen you wore the mask?
I was like, I could be this different person on the outside,
right? So like I would appear to you
the way I would appear to you, the way that I want you to see
me. And then he's like, what else
does it do? And I was like, he's like, it's
(07:53):
a two way thing, right? So like, I, I, I project this
image of what I think I want on the outside, but he's like,
nobody can see the real me because you can't see in.
So it's a two way thing wearing the mask.
And I never looked at it that way before.
And it was like kind of a doublewhammy for me, you know?
And I do my best to try to be like as genuine and authentic as
possible now. And that leads me into being
(08:15):
vulnerable. It leads me into being more
direct and blunt. And it leads me into awkward
situations, places that I was very afraid of before, but now
not so much. Yeah, You can kind of just sit
in it and be like you were mentioning before, it's like
this is going to benefit me, I'mgoing to grow from this, right,
Whatever this one. Passes like this, too.
Shall pass. Like, it's not.
It's like my mom's has his best.She's like, in five years, no
one's going to care. Yeah.
(08:36):
These little things that we worry about in in 50 years, does
it matter? I mean, I mean, it's a little
bit morbid. No, it's, it's true.
It's a small thing. I saw a reel one time of a girl
saying and this applied to me atthe time because I saw I
struggle with this body image thing.
I've, you know, same. One of the reasons I got into
steroids and relapsed the last time I talk about it a lot.
But she said at your funeral, isanyone gonna remember how nice
(08:57):
your, your butt was, right? Or how big your boobs were?
And I was like, yes, like, I needed to hear that today,
right? No one's gonna be talking about
how fucking jacked you were at your funeral.
Nobody, no, it's true. It's very, very true.
Like and all the material stuff I saw this thing on on Instagram
too. It's like all these things that
you amass with, they don't get buried with you.
You don't take them with you. You come into this world with
(09:19):
nothing and you leave with nothing.
So it's all, it's all growth, right?
We're learning and we're gettingolder.
So you train regularly? Yeah, I mean, not as much
anymore. I've been walking every day with
my wife. I find that that's liberating
for me. Here's my problem with well, was
my problem with working out. I had a very toxic relationship
with it. So what that means, and I think
(09:40):
a lot of guys can relate to thisthat I've talked to, if I didn't
go to the gym five days a week and I missed that one day, I was
a piece of shit, right? I was going to get fat.
I was, I would beat myself up the entire day.
And so I thought that that was productive because it fuelled me
to go to the gym everyday. And I was like, you know, I got
really big, right? Totally, really.
So today when I don't go to the gym, I'm like, I should really
(10:02):
start. It's a lot healthier of a
relationship. And that's what matters to me
today. Like am I?
I got to go to bed with myself at the end of the night, right?
Nobody else sees what's going onor not even my wife, right?
I got to deal with that shit, that guy in my head that tells
me you're going to get fat, you're not enough, you're not
enough. It's it's usually not enough,
right? That's usually what it is.
So now I'm happy if I go for a walk everyday, I can enjoy it
more. I'm with my wife and I'm not,
(10:23):
you know, alone in my head judging guys at the gym, right?
Like this guy's fucking staring at me.
You know those conversations, ifhe came up to I would say this
and I would say that I don't know, A lot of crazy shit goes
on in my mind. You know, after, excuse me,
after getting sober, I had to learn to relive life.
And I'm listening to you and I'mrelating to what you're saying
because like when I got clean a few years ago, I was training
(10:46):
seven days a week, like completely overtraining.
Because if I missed that 7th day, the voice in my head was
like, you know, you're not doingwhat you need to be doing.
This is your escape. This is what you're, you're
replacing drugs and alcohol with, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah, blah. And then now I'm at a point
where I like, I took the last two days off.
You know, I was up at the cottage, but I'm going to go ham
later today. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Big push date today. But it's like getting sober is
(11:08):
one thing, but then learning howto manage feelings and emotions
and live a healthy life is another thing.
And I'll share something big with you right now, man.
It's like I'm, I'm, I'm about 4 1/2 years clean and I just
started doing therapy again earlier this year and it's
uncovered so much shit for the past few years.
Like I thought because I wasn't picking up drugs and alcohol
(11:30):
that I pretty much had my shit together.
There's not much you could tell me.
But yo, there was some like heavy buried shit down there
like resentment towards certain people, just like still not
treating women properly, you know, like I don't want to get
into too much detail, but there was some some things that
definitely needed to be uncovered.
So like abstaining from alteringmy state of consciousness is one
(11:53):
thing, but learning how to live a good life clean and sober,
that's a whole other. That's a whole other thing bro.
But it's way better than living in that shit.
Yeah, yeah. And like this sort of unlearning
of old behaviors, too. Oh, God.
Discovered. What are these?
I heard it once. Someone said, I think it was
Chuck C, who's a member of a certain fellowship.
And he always used to say recovery gives you the ability
(12:16):
to uncover, discover and discard.
Yeah, like you come in here and you're like, wow, I do this
thing a lot. And for me, I can relate to, you
know, this uncovering for me, it's the emotional abuse of
other people. When you.
So let's say I'm in a situation and you make me feel
uncomfortable. Well, I'm going to be passive
(12:37):
aggressive towards you. And I'm going to make sure that
every single person hears it because I want to feel better
about myself. So I'm going to put you down.
I'm going to make a sarcastic remark and I've done I'm I feel
good. People are laughing at my jokes.
You feel like shit and I feel better about myself.
It's really mean. That's that's when I really had
to had to dig deep with this last time.
I didn't realize I did it. I thought it was like, I'm just
(12:58):
joking guys. I'm just.
Joking, man, I've done the same thing.
You know, getting laughs at other people's expense with my
sarcastic BS. I did it a lot.
That was, that was my classic behavior when I was under the
influence class, very class clownish, you know, like jokes
at the expense of other people. I, it doesn't make me feel good
when I go back to those times and I gotta, I gotta, I gotta be
(13:19):
better. Yeah, yeah.
It never like fighting or or confrontation never ends up with
me going home at the end of the day.
Me like, that was great. You know, I feel good.
I, I, I won. I never feel better, right?
So you've you've come a long way.
Yeah, I think so. There's still a lot of growing
to do, right? But yeah, like I, I had a lot
(13:41):
of, you know, I was, I was sharing actually yesterday at a
meeting and I was talking about the principles of recovery, like
the sort of honesty, hope, faith, perseverance, service,
brotherly love that, you know, all these things that were
taught to practice in our, our daily lives.
And when I went into rehab, those were all the, you know, at
(14:04):
a high level, those were the things that they were trying to
install home so I could take that tool belt and get it out
into the world. Every time I relapsed, I wasn't,
I was not practicing one of those principles.
And usually it was honesty. It was usually honesty.
To your point, like, I'm OK, I'mgood.
I'm not going to tell you about what's going on back here that
I'm, you know, taking steroids or I'm thinking about getting on
(14:24):
ADHD medication because I need to focus.
I got it. I'm good, right?
And that's every, like, I've relapsed every time because of
that, right? I had three major ones where
they took me down for a long time.
And so now it's like I got to bebrutally honest about
everything, right? Everything, every little thought
that comes in my head that is like these sort of plans and
(14:45):
ideas. It all starts with a seemingly
insignificant thing like gettingon TRT at the time is totally
insignificant, right? I didn't think anything of it.
And I'm not saying that everybody that gets on TRT is
going to relapse, but for me, itled me to that.
Fuck it, you know, I'm doing this.
Might as well take a little bit more.
Might as well buy Anavar and andall these other steroids, right,
(15:07):
That I'm looking into. And then I'm not telling
anybody. I'm not telling anybody.
Next thing I know, I have Adderall in my hand and I
started using that and I'm smoking meth, you know, in a
trap house somewhere. Four months later.
It was a bit of a. Gateway situation, I feel like
not knowing you very well. I mean, I think I reached out to
you because I saw, I saw we talked about Eric and stuff like
that, but I saw the content and I really, it really resonated
(15:32):
with me because obviously I follow a lot of accounts that
discuss sobriety and mental health and addiction, et cetera,
et cetera. But there was one there.
There was just something that seemed very raw.
I mean, one part of it is you've, you've worked with guys
and people that I know intimately, you know, throughout
the program, you know, not intimately, but very well, I
guess. But there was something very raw
and real about it. And you're also like citing very
(15:54):
specific things from your past in terms of character defects,
which like indicates to me that you've done a lot of work, man.
And like you know exactly what it is that you, you need to work
on. And you're also seem like me.
It's easy to lose it. Yeah, that's.
Just so true, you know. Just like that, yeah.
All I have is. Today, right?
You know, I this recovery doesn't keep well, you know,
(16:16):
yesterday's recovery isn't gonnakeep me sober today to remember
that. And you were, it's funny, when
you came in here, you're like, you know, I've took my foot off
the gas on the recovery thing for a bit and then it pops into
my life. And now I have a choice to
fucking go head on with it or just ignore it and say I'm fine
when it rains. It pours.
I was sponsoring a gentleman. He's a gentleman now.
I was sponsoring this kid a few years ago.
(16:37):
It's funny, he reached out to meonline 'cause he saw me
celebrating Caravan in Toronto. I was at one of the Fets, one of
the parties, and people are justlosing their mind.
All around me we're jumping up and down, there's flags in the
air, there's whistles, there's loud music, there's booze
everywhere. And he follows me.
I didn't know him and he's like,how are you remaining sober
through all this? It doesn't make sense to me.
(16:57):
And I mean, I was working a program really strongly at that
time. Those parties, which I still go
to every now and then, I'm not doing them very often.
I love the saying, you know, if you sit in a barber's chair long
enough, you will eventually get a haircut.
So I live by that, right? So I pop into these things here
and there. And I'm also not there from like
11:00 AM to midnight. I'll go for a few hours.
(17:18):
You know, as much as I think is enough because I love the
culture, I love the music. I'm Guyanese.
I'm Caribbean at the end of the day, so he saw me doing this and
and he's like, how is this possible?
Long story short, we started working together.
He lived about half an hour away.
I took him through the entire book.
I spent a lot of time with him, but he kept relapsing.
He kept relapsing, he kept relapsing and stuff like that.
He eventually found another Homegroup in the East End of the
(17:41):
city. He found another sponsor and I
think he had had enough And his,his, you know, his, I don't need
to get into details, but some personal stuff had had evolved
on his end with his marriage andstuff like that.
And, and guess what, a few months ago, he's like, Dev, I'm,
I'm approaching a year. Can you come speak at my one
year? And I was like, bro, this is so
fire. And, and like, like what we
talked about earlier. I hadn't done too much prior to
(18:02):
this, but I went and spoke as the guest speaker on Friday at
the a, a meeting and then I'm here with you.
And then tomorrow my buddy and Iwill do the life after alcohol.
We're starting a series to talk 'cause he's in Melbourne, other
end of the world, especially from a, from a time standpoint.
So yeah, we're, we're, we're doing that, that live stream
tomorrow. That's what's that Instagram.
(18:24):
It's on IG live at at 9:00 PM Eastern Standard Time.
But it's just interesting. I also feel like this is where I
needed to be, like this is this is a little bit of divine
intervention, higher power spirituality coming in here.
Maybe character defects were starting to creep back in.
Like it seems a little bit overwhelming at times.
(18:45):
Like I was talking to my girlfriend about some serious
stuff yesterday and I'm feeling a little bit beat down.
I'm feeling a little bit vulnerable.
I'm feeling like a little bit like slightly teary eyed and
like 10 year old boy bald fist. You know, I'm going through a
lot of stuff with with a very close family member right now
too, and it all seems like a lot.
But I also feel at the same timethat we don't go in comfort
(19:07):
zones to my favorite saying one of the one of them.
And this is where I need to be and I need to feel my way
through all of this instead of suppressing you of it.
So, so yeah, to, to have all this like recovery, recovery,
recovery. Because man, it's exhausting
sharing your story. It is like to show your your
full story a few times, like over like in a week.
That takes a lot out of you. And, you know, I'm not, I'm not
(19:27):
superhuman by any means, but this is the whole story of my
life, trying to find balance. You know, it's tough.
So I'm just, I'm just grateful that this is what it is now
instead of me going AWOL for four days in a row.
Right. So I'll take this side.
Yeah, I agree. Can you get into a little bit
about like how maybe you know, backtrack a bit how you found
(19:49):
substances, what they did for you, and then how you found
recovery? I grew.
Up in Richmond Hill I grew up into a home yeah yeah baby and
Waldrick OK OK yeah so where about I was young in.
Elgin Mills, Bernard. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, let's go. Yeah.
So I Tim Horton's right? There I was fishing for darts.
(20:10):
There my entire my childhood. So I grew up in Richmond Hill.
My parents were together. I I had an elder brother who was
amazing. His name was Jai five years my
senior. Any room Jai walked into
immediately he went to Saint Rob's and stuff.
I went to Saint Rob's like, you know, Beverly Acres.
We spoke French and stuff like that.
And anywhere Jai walked into, hewould be able to connect with
(20:31):
anybody and played guitar and and and you know, chief Boy
Scout, star hockey player, like just ears pierced, dyed hair in
a rock band, like just doing everything that, you know,
typical brown kid would not do at that time.
And I'm talking 80s nineties, right, So quite some years ago.
So I grew up in this type of environment.
My mom was the best, but I was definitely very disconnected to
(20:52):
my father and he was very much played the role of an enforcer
in the years that I can rememberand just yelled a lot.
And my brother and I and, and, and very, what I see now is like
verbally abusive, but I don't want to paint my dad out to be a
bad person. You know, I want to be clear
that he provided us with, with everything that we needed.
(21:13):
And, and, and over the years. It's like practicing compassion
and empathy for like him coming from Guyana, him having to face
the challenges that he did. I'm a lot more compassionate to
him now. You know, his dad died when he
was young. These are all things that I
didn't know growing up or prior to treatment and, and, and, and
therapy. It was always just like you
didn't take me fishing, you know, you yelled at me for
(21:33):
leaving a drawer open kind of thing.
Instead of me being like he was just doing what was best for us.
So like man, most of like when Iwent to treatment bro, this last
time, my goal in treatment a fewyears ago was to go get clean,
but still find a way to resent my dad, which is sick to think
about now, but that's what I thought I could do.
Obviously that doesn't work. So anyways, I got introduced to
(21:56):
substance at like, I think it was 12 or 13 years old,
marijuana. And from that first puff, I felt
weightless. And it was almost like you
placed a warm scarf around my neck or a blanket and it gave me
a hug. And it just gave me like a
community of guys to be with, the people to be with.
(22:17):
And it made me feel something other than the way that I felt
without it. And I found solace in that
place. So as the years went on, any
substance that I could ingest toalter my state of consciousness
became a happy place. And I found a lot of comfort in
that place. It made me less awkward in
social situations. It made me feel more than
(22:40):
because I felt less than before.And over the years in, in, in
therapy, I've learned that I waslacking love as a kid.
I was not getting it from where I thought I should have been
getting it. So I was just changing the way
that I felt to, to feel the love, missing love.
I do believe that we are biologically hardwired to
(23:01):
receive love from not one, but both of our parents, you know,
and, and yeah, so, so I just, I just used and used and used Fast
forward into the future, like maybe several years.
I'm 21 years old and I get a phone call from my mom.
She's like, you have to come home right away.
To give you some context, this is 2006, OK, 19 years ago.
(23:22):
She's like, you gotta and I'm 21years old.
She's like, you gotta come home right away.
I get home, I find out that my brother died, you know, so my
brother died. Pretty gruesome man.
Suicide. We never got to the bottom of it
and I never got to say goodbye. And like I was already an
addict. I was already an extreme user of
(23:43):
whatever was in front of me prior to this happening.
Excuse me but this just gave me like free range to just go off
the deep end. My brother died.
You can't tell me shit. So my, my drug use and, and the
escaping and numbing just went absolutely crazy.
And that was my, I don't know ifI want to call it get out of
jail free card, but that was just what I waved in people's
(24:05):
faces, right? Like, yo, my bro died.
Like don't tell me shit kind of thing.
And, and, and, and the drug use and the numbing and all that, it
just, it just, it just, it increased and increased.
And while this is happening, I'm, I'm becoming a chef, you
know, I'm, I'm AT, I'm on TV, I'm travelling, I'm doing all
these things throughout my 20s. But we were talking about this
before. My whole goal is to convince you
(24:25):
that everything's OK. So I just become a master
manipulator. This is something that since I
was a teenager, I'm just full ofdeceit.
I'm cunning, you know, and I'm just trying to convince you.
I make, I'm trying to convince you to to, to think what I want
you to think, you know, and I'm just an actor and I don't even
know who Devin is at the core ofit.
I don't even know who that person is.
(24:46):
What are their morals, the theirethics, their principles?
You know, I don't even know whatthat what those words mean or
anything like that. In 2015, I end up going to
Renaissance where I learned about the program, I learned
about, I met Eric, you know, I learned, I saw people recover as
a result of doing the work of 12Steps and that planted a seed in
(25:09):
my head. I came out, I was clean for 10
months, I relapsed and I was back out again for a bunch of
years. And then in 2021, I had just got
back from travelling for about acouple months during COVID and I
called Eric and I'm, I was just like, man, at this point I'd
already driven myself to the hospital a couple times, you
know, with chest pain and like, I was just, I was dying.
(25:30):
I was actually dying. I couldn't stand up straight, I
couldn't clench my fists. I was putting on a lot of weight
from the binge eating, binge drinking, like I was just
unhealthy. My knees were swollen, you know,
I wouldn't eat for three days, you know, then just eat junk
food and stuff like that. And I was dying.
I was dying. I remember driving myself to the
(25:51):
hospital once, bro, where it's like the, the chest pains were
so bad that I thought I was going to like heal over and
crash into something. And I'm walking in like crunched
cause any sharp movement or any quick movement I felt would just
slice through my heart. That was the pain that I was
getting. And I was just like, bro, like
you have so much potential. You have, you're so talented at
certain things when you apply yourself like this can't be your
(26:13):
legacy, man. This can't be your life.
And I called Eric and he's like,let's get you tapped in.
And I got a good sponsor and I just like, I gave it 105%, bro.
And that was, I've been clean since May 2021.
So that's like a kind of a quickrun through of, of what it was
like. Yeah, man.
(26:33):
I'm sure you can relate to some of that stuff 100% man.
I'm just I'm so curious like what was it like?
You know this term Functional alcohol like gets thrown around
a lot bro. Like what was it?
Like and potential. I love that word.
That word used to fucking kill me because I talk to so many
people now with, with my job andtrying to get them into
treatment. And you know, you know, my
(26:54):
husband's a functional alcoholicand it's not that bad yet or I'm
a functional alcoholic and I'm, but I'm going to work and I'm
showing up and I'm doing all these things.
And what was it like, you know, trying to be live to your
potential and not being able to?My output was mental my and I
was just telling someone this inthe car the other day because we
(27:14):
were talking something about like, why didn't anybody talk to
you Or like, why didn't like, why weren't people more like if
they were your friend? So, oh, someone asked me, your
friends from back in the day that you used to use a lot with,
are you still close with them now?
And I'm like, you know, this, this my friend Donovan said it
once. He's like, I love them from a
distance and that's what I do. I love them from a distance,
right? But I couldn't blame any of
(27:36):
them, bro, because it's like I was on billboards, you know, in
those years in Toronto, like I was the, we, we would be after
party. You turn on the TV, I'm cooking
on TV, and it's like, what were they supposed to tell me because
my output was so high? But that was all part of the
charade, bro. It was all part of the charade
that it's like I worked so hard to build this image of someone
(27:57):
who had their shit together thatlike you would question me less
about how effed up everything was right?
And that you would look past allthis like guilt and shame and
like self seeking behavior and egotistical behavior that was in
me. But to your question, like, what
was it like knowing I had the potential, not living up to it?
Man, it was really like it was really unfulfilling.
(28:21):
At the same time, I was like, you know, I lost my brother and,
and, and, and I should have beenvaluing my life and like pulling
it to my parents to live my bestlife possible.
And I was just kind of throwing the dice every day with my life.
And man, it was just like a verylonely, dark place.
I don't ever want to go there, man.
It was a really, it was a reallylonely place for sure.
(28:41):
That's interesting that yeah, because, you know, my wife and I
were actually talking about thisthe other day.
An alcoholic or an addict with like sort of, I don't want to
say no limits on finances, but when you have the finances
coming in and your work is good,it is so hard to get sober
because why would you like things are OK, You know what I
(29:02):
mean? Even though I'm dying inside so.
That's part of my story in, in 20 in 2019 I'm cooking in India,
2020 I'm cooking in Turks and Caicos for a month.
Pakistan, I'm travelling for four months cooking all over the
world. And I fly back March 15th, 2020
(29:26):
because my mom, I flew from Borough Market in London.
I'm doing I'm cooking there in in UK.
I was like, get your ass home. They're closing the borders.
So I came home because I was going to be gone for another
month or two. I come back with probably what
was COVID and food poisoning andI came out five days later at my
parents house, March March 20th,2020.
And I put out the first what wasthe Chef Dev at home series.
All my posts started going viral.
(29:46):
I started to build a massive following utilizing pantry
staples at home. Whether I'm grading $50.00 worth
of black truffle on KD or I'm remixing the Shin Ramya noodles
downstairs with all kinds of vegand cracking eggs on top, that's
what I'm doing. I'm in the papers, I'm here, I'm
everywhere. Brands start knocking at my
door. So bro, I come from a place of
like working 3-4 days to make a certain amount of money, you
(30:07):
know? Whereas now I'm doing a one hour
live stream and getting paid double for 45 minutes to like 2
hours work. So just as you're talking, bro,
I was making more money than I'dever made at the beginning of
COVID because of all the brand partnership deals that started
coming through. And what happens?
I'm moving to a place downtown. I'm living in this place at
(30:28):
Queen and Gladstone. I'm paying an ridiculous amount
of money for the first floor of an entire home by myself.
So dumb, bro, you know? And what am I doing?
I'm just hosting parties every day, every day, every day.
And then what happens? And further to your point, I
have budget for whatever I want.I've never had money like this
before. And what happens the, the youth
(30:48):
starts to become more and more, I start isolating more and I
start going further and further deep down into that hole.
And it was actually, that's whatled me to my bottom.
You know, it was, it was less than a year later that I called
Eric and I got got into art. So, yeah, I can fully relate to
the, to the money part of it because before you're scrounging
for money, like I was stealing money, I was trying to, to, to
(31:09):
support my addiction. But then it just started rolling
in and and yeah, I would have died.
I would have died, man. I had no limit.
Yeah, it's, it's, you know, 'cause my, one of my, my last
bottom, I went into rehab and I gave my wife probably, I would
say probably a week or two worthof drugs, right?
(31:30):
I had the drugs and I had never done that before, right?
I usually, I ran out of drugs and then ran out of money at the
same time and I had nowhere to go.
And I hit an emotional bottom with all three of those things
kind of lined up. But this last time, and I talk
about it a lot on your but I ranout of money.
I had nowhere to stay because mywife had kicked me out at the
results as at the advice of a very smart, educated therapist.
(31:52):
That was like, you're enabling him just by allowing him to
sleep in the bed, right? And I went on a four month
Bender and I can relate so much to.
Well, I got to stay at the Ritz because I can.
And I'm going to have people over that.
You know, I don't know any of these people in my house.
You know, my drug dealers, the only one that'll hang out with
me at that point, right. Because no one, when you, when
(32:14):
you stay sober for a long time, you build a a network of people
that know you as the sober guy. So when you invite them to come
party, they come once or twice and then they realize that
you're back. You know that it hasn't gotten
better. You haven't gotten a hold on
this addiction thing and you're still an addict.
And they and then I don't yeah, I'm enabling him just by hanging
out with him. I don't want to.
(32:34):
And plus, I'm not a fun guy to be around when I'm.
I wouldn't even. I wouldn't even invite those
people. Yeah.
Oh. Really.
No, not even. Anybody that would that would
question, question it like it's interesting, like when I would
get clean, like I had my cousinsand I had a crew that I was
with, but I did not. I did not prioritize those
people when because they would call me on my bullshit.
(32:55):
Yeah, yeah. No, you're not coming.
I know who I can invite over. I know who won't judge me.
That's why I won over. The yes man, Yeah.
No negative, no negativity over here, you know.
I want enablers. Yeah, yeah.
And. It's true though, right?
Enable Bee, Yeah. It's.
True. And one of the hardest things I
try to get family members to to and I, I never tell anybody to
(33:17):
kick out their loved ones out oftheir house.
But it is such a hard, you know what if he dies?
Yeah, that is always a possibility.
You kick out your husband, you kick out your son and he dies.
What if they die in your house, right?
I had a a lady in here that was a a therapist for teenagers,
right? And family.
And she said that to me. And I was like, yeah, that's
(33:37):
that's a great point. You know, what if they die in
your house? But these are these are things
enabling to me is, and this is, I didn't make this up, but
whenever. So it's shielding somebody from
the natural consequences of their addiction, right?
So if I'm running out of money and someone gives me money for a
haircut, you just supported my haircut.
Now I have money to buy drugs. You know what I mean?
(33:59):
Like it doesn't seem like it. It's often LED with good
intentions, but it it always you're you're allowing me to be
comfortable in my in my using right?
And you're not allowing me to hit my bottom that I would have
hit without it right. So I had to, I had to go the
hard way and I had to rack up a bunch of debt and go and surf
hotels and the Bisha and all these guys.
I've never been. So I got to try them all out,
(34:20):
right? They suck, man.
There's nothing. You know what I mean?
Like, there are hotel rooms at the end of the day.
There are four walls with fancy furniture.
And I thought I was living. But at the end of the day, it's
your point. It's like, I want everyone to
see how good I'm doing and how how successful I am.
Yeah, All ego, right? I have to check that shit every
single day. My biggest problem was.
Ego, bro Yeah. Just just my whole life was the
(34:41):
Devon show, yeah. It's.
Hard to think about bro. That's hard to think about it
man. So you get.
Sober and you continue on. Let me ask you this.
What does what does success looklike to you today?
It's a really good question. I think success to me today is
(35:03):
being able to sit in a room for like an hour with no
distractions. I think, I think if you asked me
that five years ago, I would have given you like a, a salary
figure or something like that. I think for me, success is to be
comfortable in my own skin and, and just be able to build and
support a family. You know, it's things that I
(35:27):
never thought before. It has it always had to do with
money before or being financially secure.
It has nothing to do with that. It's just to be able to live a
good life without the goosebumps, man.
Like just be comfortable in my own skin and like, not let me
handshake. I think like, this is success to
me, bro. Yeah, 'cause I used to be like
all over you just. Reminded me about that actually.
(35:47):
I remember there was a specific time.
And This is why I love doing this because, you know, it
brings up remember ones and yeah, because it was bad.
But you know, I, I'm a good forgetter at just how bad it was
sometimes, right? And I can remember, you know, my
dad loves watching F1 and I usedto go there Sunday mornings in
addiction. And, you know, benzodiazepines
(36:08):
became a big part of my story because I would get way too
high. And again, to, to the point of
it always gets worse. Like I, I never touched that
shit in my life. And then now I'm like, anyways,
it's a progressive illness. That's my point, of course.
So I'm doing benzos and that's adangerous thing because you mix
that with stimulants. The stimulants come down at the
end of the night and all the benzos you took that were kind
(36:30):
of levelling you out, they smackyou right in the face, right
when the, when those stimulants wear off.
So I'd be driving and I would black out.
Yeah. I wouldn't remember, right.
And it would come out of nowhere.
And so I remember going to my, my parents' house and sitting
down watching my dad has ATV outside.
And I remember, you know, we were smoking cigars or
cigarettes at the time. And I just remember this, like,
(36:51):
shaking. And he, I remember him looking
at my hand and knowing that I wasn't OK, right?
Did he know before that that youweren't?
Yeah, they had some. Inclination because I would
subconsciously I would go there in a blackout.
I did once. Actually I went there in a
blackout one time. Now I see it as a cry for help.
At the time I was just like, I'mgoing to go to my parents house
(37:14):
and I'm in a good mood and you know what I mean?
But that was that was the point where I was like, help me.
You know what I mean with help, because I, I don't know about
you, but I fucking suck at asking for help.
I suck at it. I, I'm very, I want to know the
way to do it. I know the way to do it.
I'm OK, right? I'm better now.
I'm better now. Because I've dropped the ego.
But going back to what I was saying before about not wanting
(37:36):
to ask any questions in the kitchen, I don't want to show
any chinks in my armor or any gaps in my game.
I want it to be the know it all.So now I ask for help.
I think it's tied directly to humility and ego deflation for
sure. I ask all the questions now and
if I need help or admitting whenyou're wrong.
Like that's one thing that I'm really proud of is like,
especially with my girlfriend orsomeone else, it's like I was
(37:57):
wrong, you know, that was my mistake.
I think that's really, really important, that accountability.
But yo, when you're talking about your parents, it gives me
the chills too, man. Because bro, my whole life all I
wanted to do was hide this shit from my parents.
And my mom always knew. She would know three days after
she could see it in my eyes or my behaviour or my short
(38:19):
temperedness or like, yo, there my car, bro, was like, there was
so many Kleenexes in the door ofmy truck that like, you couldn't
get another one in there, bro. You know, I should have been
sponsored by Kleenex back then because I was plowing through
them. So she would borrow my car or
get in my car and she would see them like just bursting out of
(38:40):
there. And I felt like I was emptying
it three times a day, bro. But my mom, I was not stupid,
she knew and she's the person that I feel like I robbed the
most sleep of over the years. So that's I was showing this on
Friday actually. Like that's why she's my best
friend. That's why we travel so much
together. That's why we shoot content
together. That's why we spend so much time
together. It's because that I can't make
(39:01):
up for the time that I robbed, but you know, I can make the
most of the time that I have going forward with her, right?
So I really prioritize her. And I was just on the phone with
her this morning, you know, justchatting with her about some
stuff. So yeah, parents and my dad, my
dad's relationship, my relationship with my dad rather,
is also really in a good place. It's it's it's in my opinion,
it's in the best place it's everbeen in 41 years.
(39:23):
And I'm 41 years old. So super grateful for that.
Yeah, I love it, man. I always get reminded of what I
need to hear. And yeah, that's one of them.
My, my, my mother and I used to go for walks a lot.
And there was a time when the only text messages I would get
from her in those four months were, hey, are you alive?
Like that Was that was, you knowwhat I mean bro?
(39:45):
You know, the amount of calls I ignored, like I'm ignoring them
at 8:00 AM, at noon, at four, at8, at 12, at 3:00.
And it's just like, it makes me feel sick.
And the whole time I'm seeing itring, bro.
And I never answered, you know. That makes me sad, I think.
I think just to pivot a little bit, passion is an important
(40:06):
thing in recovery, right? To find some kind of passion,
something to stay close to, to, to.
How did you get into cooking andwhat is cooking?
What does it do for you? What?
What do you like about it? Yo, so like I'm so passionate
about cooking and food, man, Like and I hear it all the time
from people. I feel like they we were at the
(40:26):
cottage and, and the guys were talking about it there.
And I think it's because like I can't fake it and and I can't
hide it and anybody who looks atmy command, I just love, I love
everything about food. I love the way that it makes me
feel. I love how it, it, it opens me
up to other cultures. I love how it's, it's something
that we have to do. You have to eat right, So you
(40:47):
might as well make it super exciting.
It's allowed me to travel the world and meet so many people
and learn so much about myself and others.
So I got into cooking as a kid. I just loved flavors.
I was always attracted to the sights and sounds and aromatics,
the scents coming from the kitchen pots clanging, you know,
like the flame clicking on smelling basil hit a tomato
(41:10):
sauce. I know you can relate to that.
You know, like all of that. And, and, and funny enough, I, I
grew up very close to my Uncle Joe and Auntie Maria and
Concord. They worked with my dad.
Uncle Joe worked with my dad. So we grew up with like
sopressata and like torone and like, you know, melons and
parmigiana. These are all things that I grew
up with, right? Carbonaras, etcetera, etcetera.
So I was very close to that culture growing up and in my
(41:31):
cookbook, in my, in my cookbook and in other content I do I, I
cite all these experiences I hadas a kid cause sitting at Uncle
Joe and Auntie Maria's table influenced me a lot.
And in the opening intro of my cookbook, I talk about them.
So I was shaped by those types of experiences, shaped by trips
going to Guyana, shaped by sitting on the floor of my
grandmother's apartment grating coconuts for, for condiment
(41:53):
dishes and stuff like that. Really, really, really exciting
experiences and I was just always obsessed with food.
Still to this day, I'm going to go for lunch and I'm going to be
eating this bowl of pho on Ossington with my buddy and I'm
going to be thinking about what am I making for dinner and so on
and so forth. You know, I've always been that
way as I got into cooking because my dad was always
(42:15):
pushing me to go into business, law, engineering, medicine.
I used to think it was a brown thing, but the more I talk about
it, it's a world thing. You know, it's a world thing.
So I ended up going to culinary school at 24 and as I got into
culinary school, I never looked back when I went to culinary and
I started studying butchery and mother sauces and internal
temperatures of meats and, and then the, the, the why and the
(42:37):
culture of food as opposed to studying standard deviation and,
and accounting and economics andall the things that didn't
interest me. It was just like I had found my
passion and I never knew I couldgo to school and study something
that just was something that I would naturally go home and
study at night or throughout theday.
That never made sense to me. I never once felt the feeling of
being excited to wake up and go to school, you know, ever until
(42:59):
I went to culinary school. But a very important thing
happened earlier on in my life. I recognized the feeling food
had on people, the community, like bringing family together
around the table, like at Uncle Joe and Auntie Maria's where
they fed us until we had to be rolled out of their place.
When I was a kid, you know, it'sjust like courses kept coming,
(43:22):
salad, then there's bread, then there's just cheese, then the
pasta, then there's fruits. And it just, they just never
stopped. There was always way more food
on the table. And like those experiences,
there was a sense of togetherness and there was no
real drama. You know, like I've sat at
tables around the world with people who I didn't speak their
language and we have a whole conversation through body
language and smiling, right? And it's a really, really
(43:43):
beautiful thing. But there's a nurturing aspect,
an unconditional love and like cooking with intention, like all
these beautiful principles, Likewhen I'm cooking for you, I get
to look after you, I get to takecare of you.
And I have like seva on my arm. It's like in Sanskrit, but it
translates to selfless service. And I'm a big fan of that for a
(44:04):
lot of my life, bro, I would do things for public recognition.
And the more anonymously I do itnow, or I try to do it that way,
it's the more fulfilling it is, man.
It's like, it's like give with your right hand so anonymously,
anonymously that your left hand doesn't even know it like that
selfless. It'll take away that praise and
recognition component. And then, you know, practice the
(44:25):
humility and the ego deflation. So yeah, I love being in this
industry because food is poppingoff these days, but it's so
dynamic. If I study food 24 hours a day
for the rest of my life, I'll probably scratch way less than
1% of it. It's amazing to think about and
I get to take care of people man.
Like my girlfriend is the greatest thing, one of the
greatest things that's ever happened to me.
(44:46):
We started getting very close earlier this year and, and we're
going ring shopping and we're doing a lot of fun stuff like
big things are happening and we spent so much time together.
But what I love most about her is like how family oriented she
is, how she calls me out on all my bullshit which I hate but she
calls me out of my shit bro and it makes me feel like a kid.
(45:07):
But I'm getting better at being less avoiding with her in those
situations. So she's teaching me a lot about
myself and how to effectively communicate and how to build
something and nurture something with a partner.
But the reason why I'm telling you all this is because like, I
just love cooking for her. I'm good at it, right?
I'm decent at it. And I love being able to cook
(45:28):
for people. So at a very young age, I
learned that, you know, I could nurture and look after people by
cooking because my mom did it for me and and Auntie Maria did
it for me. And you know, Uncle Joe would
Take Me Out back and I remember when you'd pull down the salami,
he'd be slicing the salami with a shaking hand.
You know, I remember all these things and.
And yeah, like, I found a reallybeautiful career in food and I'm
(45:49):
just so passionate about it. And I would have lost it, man,
if I didn't get my shit together.
And the crazy thing, too. What do drugs make you do?
Not eat. Yeah.
Yeah. So it's like.
The thing that was dominating inof my life and the thing that I
I just prized so much, like the drugs they took away, the thing
that mattered to me most, that gave me the most passion, that
(46:11):
gave me the most fulfillment. It's so sick, man, to think
about the irony of. It right.
It's so ironic and I can think about so many nights where,
yeah, just like that plate of you could have made me anything,
bro. And I would just I'd I'd.
Well, I kind of want candy instead because that dopamine is
so low because of all the the drug use that nothing looks
(46:31):
compelling. I couldn't even stomach candy.
I couldn't stomach anything. We would we would force down
protein shakes. Just to survive, right?
Yeah, just. Gagging on protein shakes just
to push through another day. Yeah, I love I.
Love the idea too of what did you said the the left hand
serves. Oh yeah, give it the.
Right, like the left hand doesn't know no that anonymously
(46:52):
Yeah, it's like. Not with no expectations of
anything in return. No praise, no recognition, no
expectation. Yeah, exactly.
And that is? Service of it's in of itself,
right? Selfless service that definitely
contributes to your recovery program.
And it's like I'm gonna show up no matter what and I'm not gonna
respect any praise or results. And when I'm doing those things,
I'm not thinking about my problems, right?
(47:15):
I'm not thinking about my shit from yesterday or tomorrow or
I'm kind of there's like a of, of, of mindfulness involved in
coping. Yeah.
As you're talking, I'm thinking about myself and it's like a lot
of my a lot of my like characterdefects bro, and a lot of my
past behaviours. It's all like self seeking
selfish behaviour, bro. It's like just so it's like
(47:36):
always like me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me.
It's always like me, me, me, me,me, me.
Which is why these things like the being of service to others
and selflessly, it just constantly keeps taking me out
of myself, bro, you know, and that's why I show up here and
that's why I'm showing up tomorrow.
And that's why I was there on Friday.
It's like I keep putting myself out there.
I was thinking about it driving to that meeting on Friday.
(47:57):
I posted to Instagram. I'm like, imagine Friday night,
8:30. I'm guest speaker and I'm
sharing my, my, my story of hope, strength and courage at a
meeting. This is not what my Friday
nights look like. I checked in on Instagram as
well because I'm just in this zone right now where I need to
be, where I'm sitting on the dock at 7:45 AM in Muskoka
showing the background. This is not what Sunday mornings
(48:17):
used to be like. Like we know what we were doing
on Sunday mornings and that wasn't it.
Jumping into a therapy session, you know, sipping some coffee at
7:45 AM. So I'm just super grateful to to
to be in the place that I am today.
And I just need to keep getting out of myself and putting myself
in situations that are uncomfortable because the old
way of thinking is not doesn't want me to be in those places.
(48:38):
I'm thinking about the the the blinds that I'm picking out of
on Sunday mornings. Eric, always.
Talks about that with the people.
I'm looking through in the hotelroom that that was my Sunday
morning bro like. At my old condo I would think I
would see the flicker of someonewalk by and I'm just fixated on
that for hours. I remember when I.
First came in and people startedto talk about that stuff and I
(48:58):
was like, Oh my God, thank God. I'm not, I'm not crazy.
Like this is a normal thing, right?
I'm not terminally unique. I thought I had.
Super hearing bro. You know, I could hear someone
coming from a mile away and no one was ever there.
Never. And you get to a point to where
you know that no one's there, but you're like, I just I, I
just, there's this little bit oflike, maybe they are.
(49:19):
I didn't get to that point. I never.
They're just always there, always there every time.
Yeah. Oh man, I appreciate you so
much. Thank you.
Thank you for coming down, bro. I appreciate it.
Let's end with this. If you if you could say someone
something to someone that's struggling right now, either
getting their passion started ormaybe getting sober, what would
(49:41):
you say to that person? I.
I get asked this every now and then and like, I really wish I
could, part of me wants to have like a more like prepared
response for this, but I'll justlike kind of speak from the
heart, I guess things, things that kind of work for me.
And, and I think I might have been a little bit all over the
(50:02):
place, but like I just kind of go on tangents and I talk.
But I think the best thing that I could say to that is like, if
I could just talk to my younger self, 'cause I can only speak
from my experience and my journey, right?
But if I could go back and talk to my younger self, I would tell
myself how worth it I am. I would tell myself to stop
caring so much what people thought about me.
(50:23):
I put so much power. I took so much power from myself
and gave it to other people. And and, and your opinion of me
dominated my behaviours and my actions, right?
This too shall pass is also another one because when I'm
when someone when I was in earlyrecovery, I saw no hope for
myself. I'm like, I can't continue this
(50:44):
and, and, and, and I can't keep showing up this way at meeting.
Like I don't want to be, do I don't want to be here.
I don't, I don't want to go. I don't want to feel everything.
And like it just seems so daunting, which is why we say
one day at a time. So practice one day at a time
and practice This too shall pass.
Because if you asked me a day or30 days into recovery or 60 days
or 90s as a recovery, if I'll besitting in this chair right now,
(51:05):
I would have told you no, absolutely not.
So don't get too far ahead of yourself.
You know, this too shall pass. And don't be afraid to reach
out. Love it.
Yeah. You got to put a hand down and
say I need help. Yeah, I still need help.
Yeah. Yeah.
Help. Yeah.
Amazing bro. What's next for you and where
can we find you? Yeah, so.
I appreciate it and again, thankyou for having me.
(51:27):
There was something that that caught my attention about what
you were doing. It's very real and very raw.
There was no frills about it. And I and, and I love that.
Yeah. At Chef Devin DEVAN.
I'm on Instagram, Tiktok, Chef Devin Rajkumar on Facebook, at
Chef Devin official on YouTube. I'm really easy to find.
I like to stay super addict. I like to say to say I like to
(51:51):
stay super active. Actually, we didn't talk too
much about the functioning atticthing, which we're going to save
for next time because that's a big part of my story.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's more things I want to
say there, but yeah, I'm, I'm all over the place.
I'm really easy to find super active.
What's next? I have a really cool show, 2
shows coming out on Gusto TV. It's a food focused streaming
(52:11):
platform and it's my first ever show.
It's called Global St. Eats with Chef Dev.
It's coming out in October, freeapp, Gusto TV and the holiday
special. And yeah, I'm popping up at
Queen West in a month. I'm always doing pop ups in the
city. You know John Luca Ruggieri,
He's a very popular local Italian chef.
We've done a bunch of stuff. Together.
(52:31):
So there's lots of cool things happening.
Just follow me on social media to see what's happening and and
yeah, like I I think that's that's really about it.
I'm looking forward. We got to do this again.
Amazing. Girl, thank you.
Thanks for. Listening Please help us grow
the channel and like, share and subscribe for more content.
The discussions and stories shared on this podcast are for
informational and motivational purposes only.
(52:54):
This content is not a substitutefor professional medical advice,
addiction treatment, or therapy.If you or someone you know is
struggling with addiction, please consult A licensed
physician, addiction specialist,or mental health professional.
You are no longer alone.
It's like getting sober is one thing, but then learning how to
manage feelings and emotions andlive a healthy life is another
thing. And I'll share something big
with you right now, man. It's like I'm I'm, I'm about 4
1/2 years clean and I just started doing therapy again
earlier this year and it's uncovered so much shit for the
past few years. Like I thought because I wasn't
(00:21):
picking up drugs and alcohol that I pretty much had my shit
together. There's not much you could tell
me, but yo, there was some like heavy buried shit down there,
like resentment towards certain people, some things that
definitely needed to be uncovered.
So like abstaining from alteringmy state of consciousness is one
thing, but learning how to live a good life clean and sober,
that's a whole other. That's a whole other thing bro.
(00:42):
But it's way better than living in that shit.
Hi there, welcome back or welcome to Recovering Out Loud
Podcast, the show where we get real about mental health and
addiction. I'm so glad you're here.
If you or someone you love is struggling with drugs or
alcohol, please reach out for help.
Send me a message on all social media platforms at Recovering
(01:04):
Out Loud Pod or by e-mail at recoveringoutloudpod@gmail.com.
You are no longer alone. How'd you get filming this and.
(01:30):
What do you mean? How'd you get it like?
Into this. Yeah, it's fascinating.
Yeah. Caught my attention.
I found it organically. Yeah, it's funny how that that
happens. Hey, the God, the universe,
higher power kind of puts peoplein your life and you can choose
to pick it up or you can choose to just it's just a coincidence,
right? I was in rehab this third time
and there was a counsellor in there that was talking about his
(01:52):
podcast. And I've always loved
podcasting. It's helped me through some of
my darkest times and I've, I learn a lot from podcasting.
And I was like, hmm, that guy can do it.
Why not me, right? Like I like talking, I like
listening, I like interviewing people like conversations.
And I was like, what can I talk about?
(02:12):
Well, recovery, I can, you know,I've been doing this for 10
years. I'm passionate about it and let
me tell you bro, like it's everything I thought it would be
and more. I've had some of the most
amazing people come in here thatI never would run into.
Ever. Like yourself, right?
Oh God bless you. And I just fucking like, I
learned so much, right? And so the reason I started it
(02:34):
essentially was to stay sober myself.
I have to keep, I had to remind myself of that this morning
because I'm doing a lot today. And it starts to become like,
you know, this is a lot of work and I'm not getting the fucking
results that I think I want, right?
I'm not getting this and that it's like, dude, why did you
start this? You started it to not fucking
relapse again. Because remember how horrible
(02:56):
that was? I relapsed after eight years
and, you know, started doing things that I never thought I
would do, hanging out with people and never thought I would
hang out with. And, you know, hopefully it
helps one person, right? Those are the two kind of things
I try to lift. The goal, I always tell myself,
we don't grow in comfort zones, so when things get very
uncomfortable and I can't handleit, I just kind of close my
eyes. I try to reset and I'm like,
(03:16):
it's going to make me stronger, It's going to make me tougher.
But it's hard, man. It's easier said than done.
I have a crazy workload with work.
I have a problem. And if taking on too much, maybe
it's the attic, attic brain where I just thrive in chaos and
I need to keep it as stacked as possible.
But also part of me, it could beego.
A part of me too is just like, if I'm not super busy, I'm not
being productive and I'm wastingtoo much time and time's our
(03:40):
most valuable asset and blah, blah, blah, you know, and my
girlfriend is now helping me take a lot more time and I'm,
I'm like, I'm scratching things off the calendar.
Like I had a double production day this week.
Thursday, Friday, I cancelled Friday, you know, because the
week is just so crazy. There's so much happening.
And then Sunday I leave town again.
I'm always on the road so I'm learning to take more time for
(04:00):
myself, which is important, but easier said than done.
Absolutely. Can you describe to people what
what you do and what what how you got into it not?
Really, cause 'cause I don't know what I, what I do, but I
get asked all the time, like what's your day-to-day like?
Monday to Sunday is completely different.
In some ways it's by design, in some ways it's not.
And what I mean by that is essentially have a very dynamic
(04:22):
workflow. So on Monday I could be, you
know, shooting breakfast television.
On Tuesday I'm sitting here withyou, you know, And then on
Wednesday I'm consulting, you know, and then on Thursday I'm
popping up in Melbourne like, you know, it's, it's really,
really random. Like for example, this week, I'm
here with you. We have a, a big production day
where I'll shoot organic contentcontent this week and some brand
(04:44):
partnership work. We have some brand partnership
stuff for PC President's choice,McCain, McCain fries.
They brought up some like Indiantype fries.
So I'm doing like this loaded. Anyways, you got to see the
video. And then Sunday I'm, I'm, I'm on
a work trip in Turkey, Istanbul,doing some fun stuff out there
with some local chefs from Toronto.
So every day is different. I love it dynamic.
(05:04):
I don't want to be in a bricks and mortar seven days out of the
week. Everyone keeps asking me to work
a restaurant, but I would preferthey open it and they're there
140 hours a week, you know, not me.
So I love being on the road. We, you were talking about this
earlier, about how much you're learning.
I just want to learn. I just want to travel and keep
learning. And I was talking about this a
few days ago. Like I was in the kitchen in
(05:25):
Jamaica not too long ago when wewere supposed to do this.
I got stuck there, but the greenest, youngest, most
inexperienced person in the kitchen anywhere I go has
something to offer. Me, I got goosebumps when you
were saying that. Yeah, they have something to
offer me. And I used to walk around the
kitchen like 10 years ago, not asking any questions 'cause I
didn't want anyone to think I had any gaps in my game.
(05:45):
And now I ask questions. Nonsense.
I don't care where I am, who's there.
I could be talking in front of agroup of kids and if someone
does something I don't recognizeor I'd like to know more about
it, I will ask them the question.
And and yeah, so very dynamic workflow.
I just want to have lots of fun,inspire people to cook, serve my
neighbor and and enjoy this lifeto the fullest.
(06:06):
Yeah, I love that man. Humility, right?
I can learn something in every single situation, every time,
every single situation. And the minute I'm not open to
it, first of all, like how many I can think about how many
relationships I could have had with people that I wrote off
because I'm better than you or Iknow more than you or you don't
know shit. Like think about all those
(06:28):
little micro interactions that you could have where you're just
like. Or left the wrong impression
with that being a Dick. You, you mentioned humility.
My favorite quote in life is about humility.
It's true. Humility is not thinking less of
yourself, but it's thinking of yourself less.
And it's my favorite thing. Prior to going to Renaissance in
(06:48):
2015, I didn't know about humility.
I didn't know about ego or ego deflation.
And I learned all those principles when I was there.
And although I didn't stay sobercoming out of Renaissance in
2015, those things were instilled in me.
And we were talking a little bitbefore about when I was at art
and all that stuff, and I was able to take some of those
principles into my last treatment session fourish years
(07:09):
ago. Now.
Humility is a big one. Congrats man.
God bless. What a miracle.
Hey, for guys that I don't know about you, but couldn't put 4
minutes together at some, some days of sobriety and then we'd
come in and we'd put four years together.
And I was a mess. I was a mess.
And all my daily mission was to convince everybody that
everything was good. Like I just it was constantly.
(07:33):
A mask. So exhausting, right?
It was it, it, you know, I was talking to this therapist about
this and he's like, what happenswhen you wore the mask?
I was like, I could be this different person on the outside,
right? So like I would appear to you
the way I would appear to you, the way that I want you to see
me. And then he's like, what else
does it do? And I was like, he's like, it's
(07:53):
a two way thing, right? So like, I, I, I project this
image of what I think I want on the outside, but he's like,
nobody can see the real me because you can't see in.
So it's a two way thing wearing the mask.
And I never looked at it that way before.
And it was like kind of a doublewhammy for me, you know?
And I do my best to try to be like as genuine and authentic as
possible now. And that leads me into being
(08:15):
vulnerable. It leads me into being more
direct and blunt. And it leads me into awkward
situations, places that I was very afraid of before, but now
not so much. Yeah, You can kind of just sit
in it and be like you were mentioning before, it's like
this is going to benefit me, I'mgoing to grow from this, right,
Whatever this one. Passes like this, too.
Shall pass. Like, it's not.
It's like my mom's has his best.She's like, in five years, no
one's going to care. Yeah.
(08:36):
These little things that we worry about in in 50 years, does
it matter? I mean, I mean, it's a little
bit morbid. No, it's, it's true.
It's a small thing. I saw a reel one time of a girl
saying and this applied to me atthe time because I saw I
struggle with this body image thing.
I've, you know, same. One of the reasons I got into
steroids and relapsed the last time I talk about it a lot.
But she said at your funeral, isanyone gonna remember how nice
(08:57):
your, your butt was, right? Or how big your boobs were?
And I was like, yes, like, I needed to hear that today,
right? No one's gonna be talking about
how fucking jacked you were at your funeral.
Nobody, no, it's true. It's very, very true.
Like and all the material stuff I saw this thing on on Instagram
too. It's like all these things that
you amass with, they don't get buried with you.
You don't take them with you. You come into this world with
(09:19):
nothing and you leave with nothing.
So it's all, it's all growth, right?
We're learning and we're gettingolder.
So you train regularly? Yeah, I mean, not as much
anymore. I've been walking every day with
my wife. I find that that's liberating
for me. Here's my problem with well, was
my problem with working out. I had a very toxic relationship
with it. So what that means, and I think
(09:40):
a lot of guys can relate to thisthat I've talked to, if I didn't
go to the gym five days a week and I missed that one day, I was
a piece of shit, right? I was going to get fat.
I was, I would beat myself up the entire day.
And so I thought that that was productive because it fuelled me
to go to the gym everyday. And I was like, you know, I got
really big, right? Totally, really.
So today when I don't go to the gym, I'm like, I should really
(10:02):
start. It's a lot healthier of a
relationship. And that's what matters to me
today. Like am I?
I got to go to bed with myself at the end of the night, right?
Nobody else sees what's going onor not even my wife, right?
I got to deal with that shit, that guy in my head that tells
me you're going to get fat, you're not enough, you're not
enough. It's it's usually not enough,
right? That's usually what it is.
So now I'm happy if I go for a walk everyday, I can enjoy it
more. I'm with my wife and I'm not,
(10:23):
you know, alone in my head judging guys at the gym, right?
Like this guy's fucking staring at me.
You know those conversations, ifhe came up to I would say this
and I would say that I don't know, A lot of crazy shit goes
on in my mind. You know, after, excuse me,
after getting sober, I had to learn to relive life.
And I'm listening to you and I'mrelating to what you're saying
because like when I got clean a few years ago, I was training
(10:46):
seven days a week, like completely overtraining.
Because if I missed that 7th day, the voice in my head was
like, you know, you're not doingwhat you need to be doing.
This is your escape. This is what you're, you're
replacing drugs and alcohol with, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah, blah. And then now I'm at a point
where I like, I took the last two days off.
You know, I was up at the cottage, but I'm going to go ham
later today. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Big push date today. But it's like getting sober is
(11:08):
one thing, but then learning howto manage feelings and emotions
and live a healthy life is another thing.
And I'll share something big with you right now, man.
It's like I'm, I'm, I'm about 4 1/2 years clean and I just
started doing therapy again earlier this year and it's
uncovered so much shit for the past few years.
Like I thought because I wasn't picking up drugs and alcohol
(11:30):
that I pretty much had my shit together.
There's not much you could tell me.
But yo, there was some like heavy buried shit down there
like resentment towards certain people, just like still not
treating women properly, you know, like I don't want to get
into too much detail, but there was some some things that
definitely needed to be uncovered.
So like abstaining from alteringmy state of consciousness is one
(11:53):
thing, but learning how to live a good life clean and sober,
that's a whole other. That's a whole other thing bro.
But it's way better than living in that shit.
Yeah, yeah. And like this sort of unlearning
of old behaviors, too. Oh, God.
Discovered. What are these?
I heard it once. Someone said, I think it was
Chuck C, who's a member of a certain fellowship.
And he always used to say recovery gives you the ability
(12:16):
to uncover, discover and discard.
Yeah, like you come in here and you're like, wow, I do this
thing a lot. And for me, I can relate to, you
know, this uncovering for me, it's the emotional abuse of
other people. When you.
So let's say I'm in a situation and you make me feel
uncomfortable. Well, I'm going to be passive
(12:37):
aggressive towards you. And I'm going to make sure that
every single person hears it because I want to feel better
about myself. So I'm going to put you down.
I'm going to make a sarcastic remark and I've done I'm I feel
good. People are laughing at my jokes.
You feel like shit and I feel better about myself.
It's really mean. That's that's when I really had
to had to dig deep with this last time.
I didn't realize I did it. I thought it was like, I'm just
(12:58):
joking guys. I'm just.
Joking, man, I've done the same thing.
You know, getting laughs at other people's expense with my
sarcastic BS. I did it a lot.
That was, that was my classic behavior when I was under the
influence class, very class clownish, you know, like jokes
at the expense of other people. I, it doesn't make me feel good
when I go back to those times and I gotta, I gotta, I gotta be
(13:19):
better. Yeah, yeah.
It never like fighting or or confrontation never ends up with
me going home at the end of the day.
Me like, that was great. You know, I feel good.
I, I, I won. I never feel better, right?
So you've you've come a long way.
Yeah, I think so. There's still a lot of growing
to do, right? But yeah, like I, I had a lot
(13:41):
of, you know, I was, I was sharing actually yesterday at a
meeting and I was talking about the principles of recovery, like
the sort of honesty, hope, faith, perseverance, service,
brotherly love that, you know, all these things that were
taught to practice in our, our daily lives.
And when I went into rehab, those were all the, you know, at
(14:04):
a high level, those were the things that they were trying to
install home so I could take that tool belt and get it out
into the world. Every time I relapsed, I wasn't,
I was not practicing one of those principles.
And usually it was honesty. It was usually honesty.
To your point, like, I'm OK, I'mgood.
I'm not going to tell you about what's going on back here that
I'm, you know, taking steroids or I'm thinking about getting on
(14:24):
ADHD medication because I need to focus.
I got it. I'm good, right?
And that's every, like, I've relapsed every time because of
that, right? I had three major ones where
they took me down for a long time.
And so now it's like I got to bebrutally honest about
everything, right? Everything, every little thought
that comes in my head that is like these sort of plans and
(14:45):
ideas. It all starts with a seemingly
insignificant thing like gettingon TRT at the time is totally
insignificant, right? I didn't think anything of it.
And I'm not saying that everybody that gets on TRT is
going to relapse, but for me, itled me to that.
Fuck it, you know, I'm doing this.
Might as well take a little bit more.
Might as well buy Anavar and andall these other steroids, right,
(15:07):
That I'm looking into. And then I'm not telling
anybody. I'm not telling anybody.
Next thing I know, I have Adderall in my hand and I
started using that and I'm smoking meth, you know, in a
trap house somewhere. Four months later.
It was a bit of a. Gateway situation, I feel like
not knowing you very well. I mean, I think I reached out to
you because I saw, I saw we talked about Eric and stuff like
that, but I saw the content and I really, it really resonated
(15:32):
with me because obviously I follow a lot of accounts that
discuss sobriety and mental health and addiction, et cetera,
et cetera. But there was one there.
There was just something that seemed very raw.
I mean, one part of it is you've, you've worked with guys
and people that I know intimately, you know, throughout
the program, you know, not intimately, but very well, I
guess. But there was something very raw
and real about it. And you're also like citing very
(15:54):
specific things from your past in terms of character defects,
which like indicates to me that you've done a lot of work, man.
And like you know exactly what it is that you, you need to work
on. And you're also seem like me.
It's easy to lose it. Yeah, that's.
Just so true, you know. Just like that, yeah.
All I have is. Today, right?
You know, I this recovery doesn't keep well, you know,
(16:16):
yesterday's recovery isn't gonnakeep me sober today to remember
that. And you were, it's funny, when
you came in here, you're like, you know, I've took my foot off
the gas on the recovery thing for a bit and then it pops into
my life. And now I have a choice to
fucking go head on with it or just ignore it and say I'm fine
when it rains. It pours.
I was sponsoring a gentleman. He's a gentleman now.
I was sponsoring this kid a few years ago.
(16:37):
It's funny, he reached out to meonline 'cause he saw me
celebrating Caravan in Toronto. I was at one of the Fets, one of
the parties, and people are justlosing their mind.
All around me we're jumping up and down, there's flags in the
air, there's whistles, there's loud music, there's booze
everywhere. And he follows me.
I didn't know him and he's like,how are you remaining sober
through all this? It doesn't make sense to me.
(16:57):
And I mean, I was working a program really strongly at that
time. Those parties, which I still go
to every now and then, I'm not doing them very often.
I love the saying, you know, if you sit in a barber's chair long
enough, you will eventually get a haircut.
So I live by that, right? So I pop into these things here
and there. And I'm also not there from like
11:00 AM to midnight. I'll go for a few hours.
(17:18):
You know, as much as I think is enough because I love the
culture, I love the music. I'm Guyanese.
I'm Caribbean at the end of the day, so he saw me doing this and
and he's like, how is this possible?
Long story short, we started working together.
He lived about half an hour away.
I took him through the entire book.
I spent a lot of time with him, but he kept relapsing.
He kept relapsing, he kept relapsing and stuff like that.
He eventually found another Homegroup in the East End of the
(17:41):
city. He found another sponsor and I
think he had had enough And his,his, you know, his, I don't need
to get into details, but some personal stuff had had evolved
on his end with his marriage andstuff like that.
And, and guess what, a few months ago, he's like, Dev, I'm,
I'm approaching a year. Can you come speak at my one
year? And I was like, bro, this is so
fire. And, and like, like what we
talked about earlier. I hadn't done too much prior to
(18:02):
this, but I went and spoke as the guest speaker on Friday at
the a, a meeting and then I'm here with you.
And then tomorrow my buddy and Iwill do the life after alcohol.
We're starting a series to talk 'cause he's in Melbourne, other
end of the world, especially from a, from a time standpoint.
So yeah, we're, we're, we're doing that, that live stream
tomorrow. That's what's that Instagram.
(18:24):
It's on IG live at at 9:00 PM Eastern Standard Time.
But it's just interesting. I also feel like this is where I
needed to be, like this is this is a little bit of divine
intervention, higher power spirituality coming in here.
Maybe character defects were starting to creep back in.
Like it seems a little bit overwhelming at times.
(18:45):
Like I was talking to my girlfriend about some serious
stuff yesterday and I'm feeling a little bit beat down.
I'm feeling a little bit vulnerable.
I'm feeling like a little bit like slightly teary eyed and
like 10 year old boy bald fist. You know, I'm going through a
lot of stuff with with a very close family member right now
too, and it all seems like a lot.
But I also feel at the same timethat we don't go in comfort
(19:07):
zones to my favorite saying one of the one of them.
And this is where I need to be and I need to feel my way
through all of this instead of suppressing you of it.
So, so yeah, to, to have all this like recovery, recovery,
recovery. Because man, it's exhausting
sharing your story. It is like to show your your
full story a few times, like over like in a week.
That takes a lot out of you. And, you know, I'm not, I'm not
(19:27):
superhuman by any means, but this is the whole story of my
life, trying to find balance. You know, it's tough.
So I'm just, I'm just grateful that this is what it is now
instead of me going AWOL for four days in a row.
Right. So I'll take this side.
Yeah, I agree. Can you get into a little bit
about like how maybe you know, backtrack a bit how you found
(19:49):
substances, what they did for you, and then how you found
recovery? I grew.
Up in Richmond Hill I grew up into a home yeah yeah baby and
Waldrick OK OK yeah so where about I was young in.
Elgin Mills, Bernard. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, let's go. Yeah.
So I Tim Horton's right? There I was fishing for darts.
(20:10):
There my entire my childhood. So I grew up in Richmond Hill.
My parents were together. I I had an elder brother who was
amazing. His name was Jai five years my
senior. Any room Jai walked into
immediately he went to Saint Rob's and stuff.
I went to Saint Rob's like, you know, Beverly Acres.
We spoke French and stuff like that.
And anywhere Jai walked into, hewould be able to connect with
(20:31):
anybody and played guitar and and and you know, chief Boy
Scout, star hockey player, like just ears pierced, dyed hair in
a rock band, like just doing everything that, you know,
typical brown kid would not do at that time.
And I'm talking 80s nineties, right, So quite some years ago.
So I grew up in this type of environment.
My mom was the best, but I was definitely very disconnected to
(20:52):
my father and he was very much played the role of an enforcer
in the years that I can rememberand just yelled a lot.
And my brother and I and, and, and very, what I see now is like
verbally abusive, but I don't want to paint my dad out to be a
bad person. You know, I want to be clear
that he provided us with, with everything that we needed.
(21:13):
And, and, and over the years. It's like practicing compassion
and empathy for like him coming from Guyana, him having to face
the challenges that he did. I'm a lot more compassionate to
him now. You know, his dad died when he
was young. These are all things that I
didn't know growing up or prior to treatment and, and, and, and
therapy. It was always just like you
didn't take me fishing, you know, you yelled at me for
(21:33):
leaving a drawer open kind of thing.
Instead of me being like he was just doing what was best for us.
So like man, most of like when Iwent to treatment bro, this last
time, my goal in treatment a fewyears ago was to go get clean,
but still find a way to resent my dad, which is sick to think
about now, but that's what I thought I could do.
Obviously that doesn't work. So anyways, I got introduced to
(21:56):
substance at like, I think it was 12 or 13 years old,
marijuana. And from that first puff, I felt
weightless. And it was almost like you
placed a warm scarf around my neck or a blanket and it gave me
a hug. And it just gave me like a
community of guys to be with, the people to be with.
(22:17):
And it made me feel something other than the way that I felt
without it. And I found solace in that
place. So as the years went on, any
substance that I could ingest toalter my state of consciousness
became a happy place. And I found a lot of comfort in
that place. It made me less awkward in
social situations. It made me feel more than
(22:40):
because I felt less than before.And over the years in, in, in
therapy, I've learned that I waslacking love as a kid.
I was not getting it from where I thought I should have been
getting it. So I was just changing the way
that I felt to, to feel the love, missing love.
I do believe that we are biologically hardwired to
(23:01):
receive love from not one, but both of our parents, you know,
and, and yeah, so, so I just, I just used and used and used Fast
forward into the future, like maybe several years.
I'm 21 years old and I get a phone call from my mom.
She's like, you have to come home right away.
To give you some context, this is 2006, OK, 19 years ago.
(23:22):
She's like, you gotta and I'm 21years old.
She's like, you gotta come home right away.
I get home, I find out that my brother died, you know, so my
brother died. Pretty gruesome man.
Suicide. We never got to the bottom of it
and I never got to say goodbye. And like I was already an
addict. I was already an extreme user of
(23:43):
whatever was in front of me prior to this happening.
Excuse me but this just gave me like free range to just go off
the deep end. My brother died.
You can't tell me shit. So my, my drug use and, and the
escaping and numbing just went absolutely crazy.
And that was my, I don't know ifI want to call it get out of
jail free card, but that was just what I waved in people's
(24:05):
faces, right? Like, yo, my bro died.
Like don't tell me shit kind of thing.
And, and, and, and the drug use and the numbing and all that, it
just, it just, it just, it increased and increased.
And while this is happening, I'm, I'm becoming a chef, you
know, I'm, I'm AT, I'm on TV, I'm travelling, I'm doing all
these things throughout my 20s. But we were talking about this
before. My whole goal is to convince you
(24:25):
that everything's OK. So I just become a master
manipulator. This is something that since I
was a teenager, I'm just full ofdeceit.
I'm cunning, you know, and I'm just trying to convince you.
I make, I'm trying to convince you to to, to think what I want
you to think, you know, and I'm just an actor and I don't even
know who Devin is at the core ofit.
I don't even know who that person is.
(24:46):
What are their morals, the theirethics, their principles?
You know, I don't even know whatthat what those words mean or
anything like that. In 2015, I end up going to
Renaissance where I learned about the program, I learned
about, I met Eric, you know, I learned, I saw people recover as
a result of doing the work of 12Steps and that planted a seed in
(25:09):
my head. I came out, I was clean for 10
months, I relapsed and I was back out again for a bunch of
years. And then in 2021, I had just got
back from travelling for about acouple months during COVID and I
called Eric and I'm, I was just like, man, at this point I'd
already driven myself to the hospital a couple times, you
know, with chest pain and like, I was just, I was dying.
(25:30):
I was actually dying. I couldn't stand up straight, I
couldn't clench my fists. I was putting on a lot of weight
from the binge eating, binge drinking, like I was just
unhealthy. My knees were swollen, you know,
I wouldn't eat for three days, you know, then just eat junk
food and stuff like that. And I was dying.
I was dying. I remember driving myself to the
(25:51):
hospital once, bro, where it's like the, the chest pains were
so bad that I thought I was going to like heal over and
crash into something. And I'm walking in like crunched
cause any sharp movement or any quick movement I felt would just
slice through my heart. That was the pain that I was
getting. And I was just like, bro, like
you have so much potential. You have, you're so talented at
certain things when you apply yourself like this can't be your
(26:13):
legacy, man. This can't be your life.
And I called Eric and he's like,let's get you tapped in.
And I got a good sponsor and I just like, I gave it 105%, bro.
And that was, I've been clean since May 2021.
So that's like a kind of a quickrun through of, of what it was
like. Yeah, man.
(26:33):
I'm sure you can relate to some of that stuff 100% man.
I'm just I'm so curious like what was it like?
You know this term Functional alcohol like gets thrown around
a lot bro. Like what was it?
Like and potential. I love that word.
That word used to fucking kill me because I talk to so many
people now with, with my job andtrying to get them into
treatment. And you know, you know, my
(26:54):
husband's a functional alcoholicand it's not that bad yet or I'm
a functional alcoholic and I'm, but I'm going to work and I'm
showing up and I'm doing all these things.
And what was it like, you know, trying to be live to your
potential and not being able to?My output was mental my and I
was just telling someone this inthe car the other day because we
(27:14):
were talking something about like, why didn't anybody talk to
you Or like, why didn't like, why weren't people more like if
they were your friend? So, oh, someone asked me, your
friends from back in the day that you used to use a lot with,
are you still close with them now?
And I'm like, you know, this, this my friend Donovan said it
once. He's like, I love them from a
distance and that's what I do. I love them from a distance,
right? But I couldn't blame any of
(27:36):
them, bro, because it's like I was on billboards, you know, in
those years in Toronto, like I was the, we, we would be after
party. You turn on the TV, I'm cooking
on TV, and it's like, what were they supposed to tell me because
my output was so high? But that was all part of the
charade, bro. It was all part of the charade
that it's like I worked so hard to build this image of someone
(27:57):
who had their shit together thatlike you would question me less
about how effed up everything was right?
And that you would look past allthis like guilt and shame and
like self seeking behavior and egotistical behavior that was in
me. But to your question, like, what
was it like knowing I had the potential, not living up to it?
Man, it was really like it was really unfulfilling.
(28:21):
At the same time, I was like, you know, I lost my brother and,
and, and, and I should have beenvaluing my life and like pulling
it to my parents to live my bestlife possible.
And I was just kind of throwing the dice every day with my life.
And man, it was just like a verylonely, dark place.
I don't ever want to go there, man.
It was a really, it was a reallylonely place for sure.
(28:41):
That's interesting that yeah, because, you know, my wife and I
were actually talking about thisthe other day.
An alcoholic or an addict with like sort of, I don't want to
say no limits on finances, but when you have the finances
coming in and your work is good,it is so hard to get sober
because why would you like things are OK, You know what I
(29:02):
mean? Even though I'm dying inside so.
That's part of my story in, in 20 in 2019 I'm cooking in India,
2020 I'm cooking in Turks and Caicos for a month.
Pakistan, I'm travelling for four months cooking all over the
world. And I fly back March 15th, 2020
(29:26):
because my mom, I flew from Borough Market in London.
I'm doing I'm cooking there in in UK.
I was like, get your ass home. They're closing the borders.
So I came home because I was going to be gone for another
month or two. I come back with probably what
was COVID and food poisoning andI came out five days later at my
parents house, March March 20th,2020.
And I put out the first what wasthe Chef Dev at home series.
All my posts started going viral.
(29:46):
I started to build a massive following utilizing pantry
staples at home. Whether I'm grading $50.00 worth
of black truffle on KD or I'm remixing the Shin Ramya noodles
downstairs with all kinds of vegand cracking eggs on top, that's
what I'm doing. I'm in the papers, I'm here, I'm
everywhere. Brands start knocking at my
door. So bro, I come from a place of
like working 3-4 days to make a certain amount of money, you
(30:07):
know? Whereas now I'm doing a one hour
live stream and getting paid double for 45 minutes to like 2
hours work. So just as you're talking, bro,
I was making more money than I'dever made at the beginning of
COVID because of all the brand partnership deals that started
coming through. And what happens?
I'm moving to a place downtown. I'm living in this place at
(30:28):
Queen and Gladstone. I'm paying an ridiculous amount
of money for the first floor of an entire home by myself.
So dumb, bro, you know? And what am I doing?
I'm just hosting parties every day, every day, every day.
And then what happens? And further to your point, I
have budget for whatever I want.I've never had money like this
before. And what happens the, the youth
(30:48):
starts to become more and more, I start isolating more and I
start going further and further deep down into that hole.
And it was actually, that's whatled me to my bottom.
You know, it was, it was less than a year later that I called
Eric and I got got into art. So, yeah, I can fully relate to
the, to the money part of it because before you're scrounging
for money, like I was stealing money, I was trying to, to, to
(31:09):
support my addiction. But then it just started rolling
in and and yeah, I would have died.
I would have died, man. I had no limit.
Yeah, it's, it's, you know, 'cause my, one of my, my last
bottom, I went into rehab and I gave my wife probably, I would
say probably a week or two worthof drugs, right?
(31:30):
I had the drugs and I had never done that before, right?
I usually, I ran out of drugs and then ran out of money at the
same time and I had nowhere to go.
And I hit an emotional bottom with all three of those things
kind of lined up. But this last time, and I talk
about it a lot on your but I ranout of money.
I had nowhere to stay because mywife had kicked me out at the
results as at the advice of a very smart, educated therapist.
(31:52):
That was like, you're enabling him just by allowing him to
sleep in the bed, right? And I went on a four month
Bender and I can relate so much to.
Well, I got to stay at the Ritz because I can.
And I'm going to have people over that.
You know, I don't know any of these people in my house.
You know, my drug dealers, the only one that'll hang out with
me at that point, right. Because no one, when you, when
(32:14):
you stay sober for a long time, you build a a network of people
that know you as the sober guy. So when you invite them to come
party, they come once or twice and then they realize that
you're back. You know that it hasn't gotten
better. You haven't gotten a hold on
this addiction thing and you're still an addict.
And they and then I don't yeah, I'm enabling him just by hanging
out with him. I don't want to.
(32:34):
And plus, I'm not a fun guy to be around when I'm.
I wouldn't even. I wouldn't even invite those
people. Yeah.
Oh. Really.
No, not even. Anybody that would that would
question, question it like it's interesting, like when I would
get clean, like I had my cousinsand I had a crew that I was
with, but I did not. I did not prioritize those
people when because they would call me on my bullshit.
(32:55):
Yeah, yeah. No, you're not coming.
I know who I can invite over. I know who won't judge me.
That's why I won over. The yes man, Yeah.
No negative, no negativity over here, you know.
I want enablers. Yeah, yeah.
And. It's true though, right?
Enable Bee, Yeah. It's.
True. And one of the hardest things I
try to get family members to to and I, I never tell anybody to
(33:17):
kick out their loved ones out oftheir house.
But it is such a hard, you know what if he dies?
Yeah, that is always a possibility.
You kick out your husband, you kick out your son and he dies.
What if they die in your house, right?
I had a a lady in here that was a a therapist for teenagers,
right? And family.
And she said that to me. And I was like, yeah, that's
(33:37):
that's a great point. You know, what if they die in
your house? But these are these are things
enabling to me is, and this is, I didn't make this up, but
whenever. So it's shielding somebody from
the natural consequences of their addiction, right?
So if I'm running out of money and someone gives me money for a
haircut, you just supported my haircut.
Now I have money to buy drugs. You know what I mean?
(33:59):
Like it doesn't seem like it. It's often LED with good
intentions, but it it always you're you're allowing me to be
comfortable in my in my using right?
And you're not allowing me to hit my bottom that I would have
hit without it right. So I had to, I had to go the
hard way and I had to rack up a bunch of debt and go and surf
hotels and the Bisha and all these guys.
I've never been. So I got to try them all out,
(34:20):
right? They suck, man.
There's nothing. You know what I mean?
Like, there are hotel rooms at the end of the day.
There are four walls with fancy furniture.
And I thought I was living. But at the end of the day, it's
your point. It's like, I want everyone to
see how good I'm doing and how how successful I am.
Yeah, All ego, right? I have to check that shit every
single day. My biggest problem was.
Ego, bro Yeah. Just just my whole life was the
(34:41):
Devon show, yeah. It's.
Hard to think about bro. That's hard to think about it
man. So you get.
Sober and you continue on. Let me ask you this.
What does what does success looklike to you today?
It's a really good question. I think success to me today is
(35:03):
being able to sit in a room for like an hour with no
distractions. I think, I think if you asked me
that five years ago, I would have given you like a, a salary
figure or something like that. I think for me, success is to be
comfortable in my own skin and, and just be able to build and
support a family. You know, it's things that I
(35:27):
never thought before. It has it always had to do with
money before or being financially secure.
It has nothing to do with that. It's just to be able to live a
good life without the goosebumps, man.
Like just be comfortable in my own skin and like, not let me
handshake. I think like, this is success to
me, bro. Yeah, 'cause I used to be like
all over you just. Reminded me about that actually.
(35:47):
I remember there was a specific time.
And This is why I love doing this because, you know, it
brings up remember ones and yeah, because it was bad.
But you know, I, I'm a good forgetter at just how bad it was
sometimes, right? And I can remember, you know, my
dad loves watching F1 and I usedto go there Sunday mornings in
addiction. And, you know, benzodiazepines
(36:08):
became a big part of my story because I would get way too
high. And again, to, to the point of
it always gets worse. Like I, I never touched that
shit in my life. And then now I'm like, anyways,
it's a progressive illness. That's my point, of course.
So I'm doing benzos and that's adangerous thing because you mix
that with stimulants. The stimulants come down at the
end of the night and all the benzos you took that were kind
(36:30):
of levelling you out, they smackyou right in the face, right
when the, when those stimulants wear off.
So I'd be driving and I would black out.
Yeah. I wouldn't remember, right.
And it would come out of nowhere.
And so I remember going to my, my parents' house and sitting
down watching my dad has ATV outside.
And I remember, you know, we were smoking cigars or
cigarettes at the time. And I just remember this, like,
(36:51):
shaking. And he, I remember him looking
at my hand and knowing that I wasn't OK, right?
Did he know before that that youweren't?
Yeah, they had some. Inclination because I would
subconsciously I would go there in a blackout.
I did once. Actually I went there in a
blackout one time. Now I see it as a cry for help.
At the time I was just like, I'mgoing to go to my parents house
(37:14):
and I'm in a good mood and you know what I mean?
But that was that was the point where I was like, help me.
You know what I mean with help, because I, I don't know about
you, but I fucking suck at asking for help.
I suck at it. I, I'm very, I want to know the
way to do it. I know the way to do it.
I'm OK, right? I'm better now.
I'm better now. Because I've dropped the ego.
But going back to what I was saying before about not wanting
(37:36):
to ask any questions in the kitchen, I don't want to show
any chinks in my armor or any gaps in my game.
I want it to be the know it all.So now I ask for help.
I think it's tied directly to humility and ego deflation for
sure. I ask all the questions now and
if I need help or admitting whenyou're wrong.
Like that's one thing that I'm really proud of is like,
especially with my girlfriend orsomeone else, it's like I was
(37:57):
wrong, you know, that was my mistake.
I think that's really, really important, that accountability.
But yo, when you're talking about your parents, it gives me
the chills too, man. Because bro, my whole life all I
wanted to do was hide this shit from my parents.
And my mom always knew. She would know three days after
she could see it in my eyes or my behaviour or my short
(38:19):
temperedness or like, yo, there my car, bro, was like, there was
so many Kleenexes in the door ofmy truck that like, you couldn't
get another one in there, bro. You know, I should have been
sponsored by Kleenex back then because I was plowing through
them. So she would borrow my car or
get in my car and she would see them like just bursting out of
(38:40):
there. And I felt like I was emptying
it three times a day, bro. But my mom, I was not stupid,
she knew and she's the person that I feel like I robbed the
most sleep of over the years. So that's I was showing this on
Friday actually. Like that's why she's my best
friend. That's why we travel so much
together. That's why we shoot content
together. That's why we spend so much time
together. It's because that I can't make
(39:01):
up for the time that I robbed, but you know, I can make the
most of the time that I have going forward with her, right?
So I really prioritize her. And I was just on the phone with
her this morning, you know, justchatting with her about some
stuff. So yeah, parents and my dad, my
dad's relationship, my relationship with my dad rather,
is also really in a good place. It's it's it's in my opinion,
it's in the best place it's everbeen in 41 years.
(39:23):
And I'm 41 years old. So super grateful for that.
Yeah, I love it, man. I always get reminded of what I
need to hear. And yeah, that's one of them.
My, my, my mother and I used to go for walks a lot.
And there was a time when the only text messages I would get
from her in those four months were, hey, are you alive?
Like that Was that was, you knowwhat I mean bro?
(39:45):
You know, the amount of calls I ignored, like I'm ignoring them
at 8:00 AM, at noon, at four, at8, at 12, at 3:00.
And it's just like, it makes me feel sick.
And the whole time I'm seeing itring, bro.
And I never answered, you know. That makes me sad, I think.
I think just to pivot a little bit, passion is an important
(40:06):
thing in recovery, right? To find some kind of passion,
something to stay close to, to, to.
How did you get into cooking andwhat is cooking?
What does it do for you? What?
What do you like about it? Yo, so like I'm so passionate
about cooking and food, man, Like and I hear it all the time
from people. I feel like they we were at the
(40:26):
cottage and, and the guys were talking about it there.
And I think it's because like I can't fake it and and I can't
hide it and anybody who looks atmy command, I just love, I love
everything about food. I love the way that it makes me
feel. I love how it, it, it opens me
up to other cultures. I love how it's, it's something
that we have to do. You have to eat right, So you
(40:47):
might as well make it super exciting.
It's allowed me to travel the world and meet so many people
and learn so much about myself and others.
So I got into cooking as a kid. I just loved flavors.
I was always attracted to the sights and sounds and aromatics,
the scents coming from the kitchen pots clanging, you know,
like the flame clicking on smelling basil hit a tomato
(41:10):
sauce. I know you can relate to that.
You know, like all of that. And, and, and funny enough, I, I
grew up very close to my Uncle Joe and Auntie Maria and
Concord. They worked with my dad.
Uncle Joe worked with my dad. So we grew up with like
sopressata and like torone and like, you know, melons and
parmigiana. These are all things that I grew
up with, right? Carbonaras, etcetera, etcetera.
So I was very close to that culture growing up and in my
(41:31):
cookbook, in my, in my cookbook and in other content I do I, I
cite all these experiences I hadas a kid cause sitting at Uncle
Joe and Auntie Maria's table influenced me a lot.
And in the opening intro of my cookbook, I talk about them.
So I was shaped by those types of experiences, shaped by trips
going to Guyana, shaped by sitting on the floor of my
grandmother's apartment grating coconuts for, for condiment
(41:53):
dishes and stuff like that. Really, really, really exciting
experiences and I was just always obsessed with food.
Still to this day, I'm going to go for lunch and I'm going to be
eating this bowl of pho on Ossington with my buddy and I'm
going to be thinking about what am I making for dinner and so on
and so forth. You know, I've always been that
way as I got into cooking because my dad was always
(42:15):
pushing me to go into business, law, engineering, medicine.
I used to think it was a brown thing, but the more I talk about
it, it's a world thing. You know, it's a world thing.
So I ended up going to culinary school at 24 and as I got into
culinary school, I never looked back when I went to culinary and
I started studying butchery and mother sauces and internal
temperatures of meats and, and then the, the, the why and the
(42:37):
culture of food as opposed to studying standard deviation and,
and accounting and economics andall the things that didn't
interest me. It was just like I had found my
passion and I never knew I couldgo to school and study something
that just was something that I would naturally go home and
study at night or throughout theday.
That never made sense to me. I never once felt the feeling of
being excited to wake up and go to school, you know, ever until
(42:59):
I went to culinary school. But a very important thing
happened earlier on in my life. I recognized the feeling food
had on people, the community, like bringing family together
around the table, like at Uncle Joe and Auntie Maria's where
they fed us until we had to be rolled out of their place.
When I was a kid, you know, it'sjust like courses kept coming,
(43:22):
salad, then there's bread, then there's just cheese, then the
pasta, then there's fruits. And it just, they just never
stopped. There was always way more food
on the table. And like those experiences,
there was a sense of togetherness and there was no
real drama. You know, like I've sat at
tables around the world with people who I didn't speak their
language and we have a whole conversation through body
language and smiling, right? And it's a really, really
(43:43):
beautiful thing. But there's a nurturing aspect,
an unconditional love and like cooking with intention, like all
these beautiful principles, Likewhen I'm cooking for you, I get
to look after you, I get to takecare of you.
And I have like seva on my arm. It's like in Sanskrit, but it
translates to selfless service. And I'm a big fan of that for a
(44:04):
lot of my life, bro, I would do things for public recognition.
And the more anonymously I do itnow, or I try to do it that way,
it's the more fulfilling it is, man.
It's like, it's like give with your right hand so anonymously,
anonymously that your left hand doesn't even know it like that
selfless. It'll take away that praise and
recognition component. And then, you know, practice the
(44:25):
humility and the ego deflation. So yeah, I love being in this
industry because food is poppingoff these days, but it's so
dynamic. If I study food 24 hours a day
for the rest of my life, I'll probably scratch way less than
1% of it. It's amazing to think about and
I get to take care of people man.
Like my girlfriend is the greatest thing, one of the
greatest things that's ever happened to me.
(44:46):
We started getting very close earlier this year and, and we're
going ring shopping and we're doing a lot of fun stuff like
big things are happening and we spent so much time together.
But what I love most about her is like how family oriented she
is, how she calls me out on all my bullshit which I hate but she
calls me out of my shit bro and it makes me feel like a kid.
(45:07):
But I'm getting better at being less avoiding with her in those
situations. So she's teaching me a lot about
myself and how to effectively communicate and how to build
something and nurture something with a partner.
But the reason why I'm telling you all this is because like, I
just love cooking for her. I'm good at it, right?
I'm decent at it. And I love being able to cook
(45:28):
for people. So at a very young age, I
learned that, you know, I could nurture and look after people by
cooking because my mom did it for me and and Auntie Maria did
it for me. And you know, Uncle Joe would
Take Me Out back and I remember when you'd pull down the salami,
he'd be slicing the salami with a shaking hand.
You know, I remember all these things and.
And yeah, like, I found a reallybeautiful career in food and I'm
(45:49):
just so passionate about it. And I would have lost it, man,
if I didn't get my shit together.
And the crazy thing, too. What do drugs make you do?
Not eat. Yeah.
Yeah. So it's like.
The thing that was dominating inof my life and the thing that I
I just prized so much, like the drugs they took away, the thing
that mattered to me most, that gave me the most passion, that
(46:11):
gave me the most fulfillment. It's so sick, man, to think
about the irony of. It right.
It's so ironic and I can think about so many nights where,
yeah, just like that plate of you could have made me anything,
bro. And I would just I'd I'd.
Well, I kind of want candy instead because that dopamine is
so low because of all the the drug use that nothing looks
(46:31):
compelling. I couldn't even stomach candy.
I couldn't stomach anything. We would we would force down
protein shakes. Just to survive, right?
Yeah, just. Gagging on protein shakes just
to push through another day. Yeah, I love I.
Love the idea too of what did you said the the left hand
serves. Oh yeah, give it the.
Right, like the left hand doesn't know no that anonymously
(46:52):
Yeah, it's like. Not with no expectations of
anything in return. No praise, no recognition, no
expectation. Yeah, exactly.
And that is? Service of it's in of itself,
right? Selfless service that definitely
contributes to your recovery program.
And it's like I'm gonna show up no matter what and I'm not gonna
respect any praise or results. And when I'm doing those things,
I'm not thinking about my problems, right?
(47:15):
I'm not thinking about my shit from yesterday or tomorrow or
I'm kind of there's like a of, of, of mindfulness involved in
coping. Yeah.
As you're talking, I'm thinking about myself and it's like a lot
of my a lot of my like characterdefects bro, and a lot of my
past behaviours. It's all like self seeking
selfish behaviour, bro. It's like just so it's like
(47:36):
always like me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me.
It's always like me, me, me, me,me, me.
Which is why these things like the being of service to others
and selflessly, it just constantly keeps taking me out
of myself, bro, you know, and that's why I show up here and
that's why I'm showing up tomorrow.
And that's why I was there on Friday.
It's like I keep putting myself out there.
I was thinking about it driving to that meeting on Friday.
(47:57):
I posted to Instagram. I'm like, imagine Friday night,
8:30. I'm guest speaker and I'm
sharing my, my, my story of hope, strength and courage at a
meeting. This is not what my Friday
nights look like. I checked in on Instagram as
well because I'm just in this zone right now where I need to
be, where I'm sitting on the dock at 7:45 AM in Muskoka
showing the background. This is not what Sunday mornings
(48:17):
used to be like. Like we know what we were doing
on Sunday mornings and that wasn't it.
Jumping into a therapy session, you know, sipping some coffee at
7:45 AM. So I'm just super grateful to to
to be in the place that I am today.
And I just need to keep getting out of myself and putting myself
in situations that are uncomfortable because the old
way of thinking is not doesn't want me to be in those places.
(48:38):
I'm thinking about the the the blinds that I'm picking out of
on Sunday mornings. Eric, always.
Talks about that with the people.
I'm looking through in the hotelroom that that was my Sunday
morning bro like. At my old condo I would think I
would see the flicker of someonewalk by and I'm just fixated on
that for hours. I remember when I.
First came in and people startedto talk about that stuff and I
(48:58):
was like, Oh my God, thank God. I'm not, I'm not crazy.
Like this is a normal thing, right?
I'm not terminally unique. I thought I had.
Super hearing bro. You know, I could hear someone
coming from a mile away and no one was ever there.
Never. And you get to a point to where
you know that no one's there, but you're like, I just I, I
just, there's this little bit oflike, maybe they are.
(49:19):
I didn't get to that point. I never.
They're just always there, always there every time.
Yeah. Oh man, I appreciate you so
much. Thank you.
Thank you for coming down, bro. I appreciate it.
Let's end with this. If you if you could say someone
something to someone that's struggling right now, either
getting their passion started ormaybe getting sober, what would
(49:41):
you say to that person? I.
I get asked this every now and then and like, I really wish I
could, part of me wants to have like a more like prepared
response for this, but I'll justlike kind of speak from the
heart, I guess things, things that kind of work for me.
And, and I think I might have been a little bit all over the
(50:02):
place, but like I just kind of go on tangents and I talk.
But I think the best thing that I could say to that is like, if
I could just talk to my younger self, 'cause I can only speak
from my experience and my journey, right?
But if I could go back and talk to my younger self, I would tell
myself how worth it I am. I would tell myself to stop
caring so much what people thought about me.
(50:23):
I put so much power. I took so much power from myself
and gave it to other people. And and, and your opinion of me
dominated my behaviours and my actions, right?
This too shall pass is also another one because when I'm
when someone when I was in earlyrecovery, I saw no hope for
myself. I'm like, I can't continue this
(50:44):
and, and, and, and I can't keep showing up this way at meeting.
Like I don't want to be, do I don't want to be here.
I don't, I don't want to go. I don't want to feel everything.
And like it just seems so daunting, which is why we say
one day at a time. So practice one day at a time
and practice This too shall pass.
Because if you asked me a day or30 days into recovery or 60 days
or 90s as a recovery, if I'll besitting in this chair right now,
(51:05):
I would have told you no, absolutely not.
So don't get too far ahead of yourself.
You know, this too shall pass. And don't be afraid to reach
out. Love it.
Yeah. You got to put a hand down and
say I need help. Yeah, I still need help.
Yeah. Yeah.
Help. Yeah.
Amazing bro. What's next for you and where
can we find you? Yeah, so.
I appreciate it and again, thankyou for having me.
(51:27):
There was something that that caught my attention about what
you were doing. It's very real and very raw.
There was no frills about it. And I and, and I love that.
Yeah. At Chef Devin DEVAN.
I'm on Instagram, Tiktok, Chef Devin Rajkumar on Facebook, at
Chef Devin official on YouTube. I'm really easy to find.
I like to stay super addict. I like to say to say I like to
(51:51):
stay super active. Actually, we didn't talk too
much about the functioning atticthing, which we're going to save
for next time because that's a big part of my story.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's more things I want to
say there, but yeah, I'm, I'm all over the place.
I'm really easy to find super active.
What's next? I have a really cool show, 2
shows coming out on Gusto TV. It's a food focused streaming
(52:11):
platform and it's my first ever show.
It's called Global St. Eats with Chef Dev.
It's coming out in October, freeapp, Gusto TV and the holiday
special. And yeah, I'm popping up at
Queen West in a month. I'm always doing pop ups in the
city. You know John Luca Ruggieri,
He's a very popular local Italian chef.
We've done a bunch of stuff. Together.
(52:31):
So there's lots of cool things happening.
Just follow me on social media to see what's happening and and
yeah, like I I think that's that's really about it.
I'm looking forward. We got to do this again.
Amazing. Girl, thank you.
Thanks for. Listening Please help us grow
the channel and like, share and subscribe for more content.
The discussions and stories shared on this podcast are for
informational and motivational purposes only.
(52:54):
This content is not a substitutefor professional medical advice,
addiction treatment, or therapy.If you or someone you know is
struggling with addiction, please consult A licensed
physician, addiction specialist,or mental health professional.
You are no longer alone.
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