March 25, 2025 • 45 mins
In this powerful episode of the Confident Sober Women Podcast, Shelby welcomes Gail Taylor, a recovery advocate, keynote speaker, and musician who shares her inspiring journey from childhood addiction to successful reinvention.
Episode Highlights:
- Gail's early struggles: How losing her father at age 12 led to substance abuse and dropping out of school at 16
- The path to recovery: Gail's "high bottom" recovery journey and how she recognized her addiction through her son's similar struggles
- From finance to music: How Gail reinvented herself at age 61 by learning piano and pursuing music full-time
- The power of internal dialogue: Why changing your thoughts is the first step to reinventing yourself
- Recovery as reinvention: How sobriety is our first opportunity to transform our lives
- Creating community: The importance of building relationships both in and outside of recovery circles
- Message for loved ones: Tools for maintaining your own happiness while supporting someone with addiction
Key Takeaways:
- Control your internal dialogue: Challenge negative thinking patterns with the mantra "garbage in, garbage out" and practice reframing negative thoughts
- Reinvention is possible at any age: Gail went from addiction to managing $130 million in finance to becoming a musician and speaker
- Your past doesn't define your future: "The fact that we missed a beat in life doesn't matter. It's about today and the future."
- Recovery is just the beginning: Continue to layer on new interests, communities, and growth opportunities
- Self-care isn't selfish: Maintaining your own wellbeing is essential, especially if you're supporting someone with addiction
Memorable Quotes:
"I come from a place of healed scars and not open wounds." - Gail Taylor
"Every person going into recovery has to reinvent themselves, because that's the whole nature of what recovery is - the starting point of you reinventing yourself." - Gail Taylor
"Self-care is not selfish, it's important." - Gail Taylor
Connect with Gail Taylor:
- Website: gailtaylormusic.com
- Book: "Curveballs: Unlocking Your Potential Through Personal Growth and Inspirational Music" (Available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble)
Recovery Resources:
- For support with addiction recovery
- Tools for managing negative thinking patterns
- Resources for building community in recovery
Have you experienced reinvention in your recovery journey? Share
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Oh, and by the way, if you didn’t know, my remote Neurofeedback Therapy program is up and running. Learn more here!
If you aren't part of the Confident Sober Women Facebook group, it's a great place to be. There are over a thousand other sober women there building lives they don't want to escape from. Come on over and join us.
And if you haven't read my memoir, grab a copy today and maybe a second one for a friend. There is so much hope in recovery, and I shared my story so raw and vulnerable so that others would know they aren't alone and that there is a way to live well, manage relationships, parent your kids, and have a healthy body, all while staying sober. Grab a copy of Recovering in Recovery: The Life-Changing Joy of Sobriety wherever books are sold.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Shelby (00:00):
Well, hey there, sober ladies, Thank you so much for
joining me today for theConfident Sober Women podcast,
and today I get to share withyou my conversation with Gail
Taylor.
She is an incredible woman inlong-term recovery with a
wonderful story that is fraughtwith trauma and recovery and
also this incredible careershift and really reinventing
(00:24):
herself.
That's her message for all ofus today is that no matter kind
of where we are in life, whatage and stage we are, we always
have the opportunity to changethings, to discover new
priorities, to transform ourlives, and that's what she did.
She went from a self-mademillionaire in the financial
(00:46):
industry to becoming a keynotespeaker in discovering music,
empowering other people to meettheir goals, to prioritize
mental health and wellbeing, andshe just really is excited
about personal growth anddevelopment, and that's one of
the reasons why I wanted to talkto her.
(01:08):
She also has a new book that'scoming out.
I'll link to that in the shownotes below.
But I want you guys to reallylisten up and enjoy this
conversation and if you'resomeone who kind of feels maybe
stuck in your in your spaceright now or you're confused
about where to go, this might bejust the conversation to help
you kind of shake some of thatloose.
So grab that big glass of wateror your favorite mocktail and
(01:31):
listen in to this conversationwith Gail Taylor.
Hey, it's me, Shelby.
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Take the first step towardstraining your brain for lasting
change.
Hello and welcome to theConfident Sober Women podcast.
I'm your guide, Shelby John.
I'm the mother of three, wifeto one and sober since July 1st
(03:20):
2002.
As sober women, we havesomething huge in common, and
when we share our lives and ourstories with each other, we feel
that sense of belonging andconnection.
So we know we are no longeralone.
In this podcast, you will hearreal life talk about building
confidence and transforming yourlife beyond recovery.
(03:42):
So come on, let's talk yourlife beyond recovery.
So come on, let's talk.
Well, hey there, Gail.
Thank you so much for joiningme today for the Confident Sober
Women podcast.
I am so excited that you'rehere today to share your story
and your book and your work withour audience, so I'm going to
turn the mic over to you now andlet you share a little bit more
(04:03):
about your story, and thenwe're going to chat okay, thanks
, thanks, shelby, thanks forhaving me.
Gail (04:10):
Um, I'm actually going to start at the end of my yeah, I'm
going to start my story kind ofat the end of it and and share
with you, um, why I'm actuallyhere and how I ended up getting
here.
Because I went from being a.
My addiction started when I was12 years old, and so I went
(04:33):
from being a child in activeaddiction I dropped out of
school when I was 16 to being avery successful business person
in finance, and I worked in thatfield for 25 years.
And then, when I was 58 yearsold, I started taking piano
lessons and I had no musicalbackground at all and I just I
(04:56):
fell in love with it, like I'mlearning the scales right, and
all of a sudden, music startedto flood back in my life, and we
know how healing music is.
I didn't even know I hadstopped listening to it because
instead I was listening to bookson economics, and so after a
couple of years, I thought I'mgoing to retire earlier than I
(05:19):
had planned and study music fulltime and study music full-time.
And so I did that at age 61,and I studied music full-time
private teachers, berkeley,berkeley School of Music in
California because you don'thave to audition.
If you're doing it online, youcould just pay.
And so then I did that and aftera couple of years I thought I'm
(05:41):
going to reinvent myself as amusician.
And when I shared that storywith folks, I kept getting the
same reaction Gail, that's soinspiring.
I'm going to go do somethingthey had put on the back burner.
And I heard that so oftenShelby that I thought whoa the
heck with becoming a musician.
(06:02):
I'm going to come out ofretirement, start my business,
gail Taylor Music, become akeynote speaker and share my
stories and my music with folksto help them become their best
selves.
And so I decided I hired anentertainment lawyer and he said
(06:23):
well, if that's the journeyyou're going to take, write a
book.
So that's what I did and that'show Curveballs started.
And now a lot of my speaking isat recovery conferences.
And, yeah, I'm just so, sofortunate to be able to share my
story with people that havegone down a similar journey.
Shelby (06:48):
That is so cool.
I love the, the idea ofreinventing yourself at any
stage.
And you know, if you live longenough we'll have a lot of
stages.
You know, and they aredefinitely all they're all
different.
You know it's kind of like ifyou have children and you raise
them like you know.
You know that all the littlestages are.
(07:09):
They're different.
You know they have some of themhave their pros and cons to all
of them and you maybe you likesome better than others, but you
know they're all just a littledifferent and it doesn't really
change, you know, for us asadults.
So I love this idea.
So how did your addiction sortof play into that?
Like?
Can you say a little bit moreabout your recovery process?
How did you get sober?
Gail (07:30):
Yeah.
So what happened when I was 12is my dad died, and so when he
died I mean talk about trauma Iwasn't ready to lose this parent
, and I actually pretended thathe was still alive.
For two years I kept him alivein my mind.
I said he was a spy for thegovernment and that they had to
pretend that he died so he couldgo save the world.
(07:53):
And so my mom, who's in her midthirties and has six kids,
moved us from a small town to acity, and that's what happened.
We moved into the city, and shetold me later later, many years
later, that the reason she didthat was to get work in the city
(08:15):
, so that her, her mainobjective at the point was to
keep us off of welfare and alltogether.
And so so, yeah, the citypretty much chewed me up and
spit me out.
I was trying to figure out howto handle this situation, and
she'd come home from work at theend of the day putting one foot
(08:35):
in front of the other and havedinner with us and then go to
bed and cry herself to sleep.
She just lost her soul mate,and so I would, at 12 years old,
I would sneak out of the housewhen she went to bed, hitchhike
to a seedier part of the city,meet up with older kids, get
stoned, hitchhike home at twoo'clock in the morning and and
(08:58):
in addition to this, you knowthe females listening to your
call I was also engaged inreckless behavior, so you know
what that means.
And this was all before my 13thbirthday.
I was using mind-alteringsubstances every single day and
I I carried on this lifestyle.
I lived at home until I was 18.
(09:20):
When I was 16, I dropped out ofschool.
When I was 18, I got marriedfor five weeks no dysfunction,
what can I say?
And so so in my I hit my firstbottom, kind of in my mid-20s.
And when that happened, like Ijust I kind of woke up one
(09:41):
morning and looked around at themess I made, and not just in
the room but in my soul, anddecided there's gotta be more to
life than this.
There's got to be a way I canpull myself out of this rut.
And that one little bit of hopestarted me on a new journey, a
brand new journey of you knowhow to well, I have a type A
(10:05):
personality.
So I was like, okay, I got toget out of this.
What am I going to do?
I started with Napoleon Hill'sbook Think and Grow Rich.
I'm sure some of your listenershave read it and some of them
have definitely heard of it andthat was, yeah, that was the
first part.
Yeah, that was the first part.
(10:25):
That was the first part in myjourney where I started to
change things, and I stilldidn't even know I was an addict
.
I was still in denial.
I just knew I wanted to get outof my rut, but I still didn't
know that I was an addict.
And so now I'm saying, okay,I'm gonna learn how to.
I'm going to go back to school,get my high.
Now I'm saying, okay, I'm goingto learn how to.
I'm going to go back to school,get my high school.
(10:46):
I'm going to learn how to besuccessful.
I'm reading about how peoplebecome financially independent.
I mean, in that book.
Anyone that read that book theyknow that riches wasn't money.
But for me it was, because Iwas a dysfunctional
20-something-year-old and so,you know, I started to learn
(11:06):
that real estate was a way to go.
So I started to study realestate and uh, and that was my
first sort of segue out of theaddiction.
Shelby (11:21):
Wow, thank you so much for sharing your story and so
vulnerable.
Wow, thank you so much forsharing your story and so
vulnerable.
I'm so sorry to hear about theloss of your dad and at such a
young age and really just Idon't know that there's ever a
good time, but really formativetime when you're 12, you know
like that's such a you knowtough, like middle school age
time anyway, and it sounds likethere was a super lot going on
(11:42):
with in your family and thenyour brain just kind of
internalize that trauma and sentyou into that you know kind of
addiction path, which I thinkit's a story for a lot of us.
We know so much more now aboutfrom science, about where
addiction comes from, and it'smostly from trauma, so thank you
for sharing that.
So when you were kind of comingaround and you got sober and
(12:08):
you were starting to deal with,you know, recovery and work and
build your life through that,did music play a part in that
for you then?
Gail (12:15):
No, well, other than I went to concerts and I don't
even know, I can't even say thisis part of the recovery because
, you know, I, I, I, this.
This was the 70s, and so it waslike 60s, 70s, everybody was
going to concerts, getting high,and it was.
That was.
That was the era.
(12:36):
So, uh, classic rock and rockand roll as a listening person
was a big part of this, the mylife at that point.
But I was always hired in akite when I went to these
concerts.
But what happened next was, as Istarted to become, you know, a
little bit more successful inbusiness.
(12:57):
I was again I'm still in denialhere in this story right, so I
was working 10 or 12 hours a dayand then hitting the bars at
night with my colleagues and thepeople I work with.
But unfortunately, I had a son.
I had a three-year-old son, andso what happened was, I thought
(13:21):
, you know, as long as he's withgood caregivers and they love
him and and take care of himit's more about quality than
quantity, so as long as he seesme for like a few hours on the
weekend, for some, somehow I'm agood parent.
Yeah, not, I mean, I didn'tknow any better at the time.
But that's where I was at right.
(13:44):
And then when my son turned 12years old, I moved across the
country.
I brought a new man into hislife.
I put him in a new school.
He had to make new friends.
Guess what happened?
You know, he went through thesame.
He went through down the exactsame path I did.
He became an addict at 12 andthat was the first time in my
(14:05):
life I I stopped using mindaltering substances on a daily
basis.
And that's when I figured out Iwas an addict, even though I
had shifted it a lot to alcohol.
I mean, I moved across thecountry so I had to shift it a
lot to alcohol because I didn'thave any dealers and but the
thought didn't cross my mindbecause again, I was.
(14:26):
I was still in denial.
So at that point I sort of gotinto just alcohol and smoking
and weed and and and.
So when my son started goingdown this journey, I thought, oh
my god, I gotta be there forhim, I gotta help him through
this.
And I started reading all thesebooks on on addiction and what
(14:48):
he was going through and it waslike hey, that sounds like me.
Oh my God, how stupid was I?
But I was a functioning.
I was a functioning addict, soI didn't really get it and so I
even bought this book on are youan alcoholic?
And Shelby?
This was really interestingbecause the questionnaire in it,
(15:11):
the questions, had nothing todo with how much you drink.
It was questions like would yougo to a social event that
there's no alcohol?
And I'm there, yeah, no, whywould you do that, right?
(15:48):
So I mean, the brain's juststarting to click in here.
And then my son got intoopioids big time, really big
time, and so I have hispermission to share our story
and he's also in recovery,recovery and he's one of my best
friends.
So you know, things turned outgood for both of us.
And actually, um, you know,when we talk about it, we both
say if he was still in addiction, he wouldn't be alive.
Like, there's no way that withthe fentanyl, the way that it is
.
And and where are you, shelby?
Where are you located?
Shelby (16:07):
I'm in Maryland.
Gail (16:09):
Okay, so I'm in Alberta, canada, and so you know, between
our two countries, we both havea big and no, we're not
supplying you with your fentanylbut we both have a big problem
with opioid addiction, and soyou know, for him to come out of
it, oh my god, it was just, itwas just so.
(16:31):
So, thank, thank god.
And then I, with all thesebooks I was reading, and when he
went into rehab, one time Iasked the counselor how come I
got through my addiction andinto recovery without going to
rehab, how come I I could just,you know, read books and I was
able to work my way through it.
And this counselor said to mebecause you did what we call
(16:54):
hitting a high bottom.
And that was interesting,because there's a lot of people
out there that are like me, thatare functional addicts or
functional there, that are likeme, that are functional addicts
or functional alcoholics.
And you know, we sort of think,well, I didn't lose my job, and
so you know, I can still go towork every day.
So you know, maybe I don't havea problem.
Shelby (17:21):
But, believe me, the word I use the word functional
loosely.
Well, what we know is is thateven even um, people who would
maybe consider themselves likebinge drinkers, like they
weren't like every day orthey're just more binge like
even I learned anyway earlier onwhen I was in treatment, that
it wasn't really about like howmuch we drank, it was really
about what happened.
So, even if you weren't evendrinking or using like that much
(17:42):
, whatever, that is like, it'sreally about what happens to us.
How, how's our thinking pattern?
How are we coping with lifeLike are we like if we're using
substances?
Everybody uses substances for areason, you know, and it's
mostly to, you know, to escapesomething, even even the normies
or whatever.
If you're just having fun,right, you're, you know, you're
kind of escaping the work weekor you're getting de-stressed or
(18:05):
something.
So we're using them as a toolfor, for anxiety or stress
relief or whatever we want totell ourselves.
But I mean, so that's, that'sthe thing, you know, like
everybody is in a differentspace and sure, like the guy
that's living under the bridgewith his little brown paper bag
might look like, you know, theworst one of all of us, but
(18:27):
maybe he gets it really quicklybecause he's like, oh, I'm going
to take what they're telling meto do and I just internalize
that and I do what.
I do what I'm told.
You know, I'm going to sort ofdo what I'm told because I want
to change my life and somebodyelse is a chronic relapser, you
(18:49):
know, cause they just like can'tget it or they don't want to do
what's necessary, you know, andI think that's why there's just
all kinds of us, you know, butit really is about what happens
to us when we are in activeaddiction.
You know, what is that?
What is that stinking thinking,what?
What are?
What are our?
How are our reactions orresponses?
What are our relationships,like you know?
What are our relationships,like you know?
Gail (19:05):
And one of the things that book had explained was that it
actually broke addiction intofour stages, right, and
alcoholism particularly, thatthere's four stages.
And yeah, that first the laststage, you're living underneath
the bridge and you're homeless.
But when I first did the test,it said that I was in.
(19:29):
I don't know.
I think it was somewhere aroundthe second stage, maybe midway
in the second stage.
And then, two years later, Ithought I think I'll do that
test again because I haven't hada drink in two years, so I
think I'm not an alcoholicanymore.
I might as well start drinkingagain.
And I did the test again and Iscored higher.
(19:52):
So instead of being mid secondstage, I was in early third
stage and what happened was thecloud had lifted.
So I wasn't minimalizinganymore, right.
And they say that what the endthis is like?
Just adding to what you justsaid, if you go six months
(20:14):
without a mind alteringsubstance, then the cloud starts
to lift out of your brain andyou start to think a lot more
clear and understand yourreality and and so you know
whether you're self medicatingor whether you're, you know,
whatever reason.
The longer that you go withoutit, the more you get to get
(20:36):
control and and learn how to getthose natural highs.
I mean, that's what it was allabout learning how to put the
bounce in my step.
I say I come from a place.
I heard this on another podcastand I stole it because it's me
to a T I come from a place ofhealed scars and not open wounds
.
Shelby (20:57):
Wow, yeah, I love that.
Gail (21:00):
I know and that's me like that I have got to that point in
my journey and that's why Ilove to share my story, because
the fact that we missed a beatin life doesn't matter.
It really doesn't.
It doesn't matter at all.
We're here where we are todayand that's it right.
It's about today and it's aboutthe future.
And yeah, I'm not sayingpretend the past never happened.
(21:24):
You know you, you use it.
Use it to give you the strengthto go forward and not to keep
you in the spot.
I mean, I literally went fromthat place.
I told you where I was a highschool dropout and an addict to
being managing $130 million andearning in the top 5% of North
(21:48):
Americans.
So there's no limit.
You don't.
You set your limit, you decideyour limit and you know I
reinvented myself.
I wanted to start the call withthe fact that I reinvented
myself even though I had nobackground in music, but I
reinvented myself because Iwanted to.
A lot of folks reinventedthemselves because they had to
(22:12):
right Companies shut down withCOVID.
All different things havehappened and every person not
every person, but the majorityof the people going into
recovery have to reinventthemselves, because that's the
whole nature of what recovery isthe starting point of you
reinventing yourself and, wow,what a positive place to be in.
Shelby (22:35):
You're right, and so that's a great jumping off place
for us to kind of step intosome of the work.
And I mean, I think, if we lookat that exactly the way you
just said, that our kind ofsobriety journey whatever that
looks like for each of us is isour first reinvention, right,
like when I wrote my memoir, Istarted it off by saying you
know, everybody has a point intheir life where there's like a
(22:57):
before and an after, and if youlive long enough, you might have
multiple ones right.
And so for me, when I got soberin 2002, like that, that but I
have like the before that date,july 1st and I have the after
that date, and so I had thiswhole life before and then I
have this whole new life and, um, that's how I look at it,
because I'm not the same person,thank god, I don't want.
(23:20):
I don't want to be the sameperson.
I mean, I'm still me, but it'sa completely different.
It's a complete transformation,like when we work it.
And we work whether it's likethrough 12 step or smart
recovery or whatever tools,therapy, whatever we use when we
work it and we commit to sayinglike I don't actually want to
be that bad anymore and,honestly, that's not always at
(23:42):
the conscious level.
You know, we don't always sitand be like I don't want to be
myself and it's like it'ssomething that happens and like,
in the background, with a lotof guidance, you're committed to
saying like I want to becomesomething else.
And so then we did that rightand so, like you said, yeah,
once you stay sober for a longenough time you said six months,
I always say one year likeafter that first year of
(24:03):
sobriety, like a, you're assober as you're ever going to
get, first of all.
Second of all, that fog islifted, you start to get a lot
of clarity and you kind of wakeup.
I've had this conversation withevery woman I've ever
interviewed pretty much, and weall have the same experience.
There's an awakening thatstarts to happen after that
first year.
Well, in that one to five yearrange where you're like you know
(24:27):
you want, you start to crave,like more.
You're like oh, wow, like I'mfeeling like really good, like
now I'm really wanting to getinto you know, who am I now?
Or what do I even like now?
Or you know, do I want to startdating?
Do I need to leave my husband,like whatever's going on, you
start to think about thesethings, like that reinvention to
creep in right and we'restarting to say, oh, oh, what is
that going to look like for me?
(24:48):
And so I guess, when thatstarts to happen, when you start
to get those sort of inflectionpoints, you know, like you said
, sometimes it's given to us,like COVID or maybe you, you
know your husband leaves you oryou have, you know you lose your
job, whatever, like sometimesit's given to you and sometimes
we get to decide.
(25:08):
So what would you say is likesome of the first steps in like
managing, like how would, wherewould you even start?
Gail (25:16):
Yeah, so.
So the very first step and thisone worked for me beautifully
was take control of yourinternal dialogue, because once
when you're in addiction, yourinternal dialogues out of your
control, the the addiction hascontrol over it.
Because once when you're inaddiction, your internal
dialogue's out of your control,the addiction has control over
it.
It's, like you said, thestinking thinking, right?
So that's the first spot istake care of, take control of
(25:37):
your internal dialogue, andwhatever that looks like for you
, I don't, you know, we can callit the power of positive
thinking, we can call itwhatever we want, but it's
taking control of your internaldialogue.
And so you know, an examplethat I would give you is if I
didn't have control of myinternal dialogue and I see a
(25:59):
proposal to do I'm a keynotespeaker, so I see a proposal to
speak at a big conference, so Isay say, oh well, there's no use
me filling that proposal out,because look at how
sophisticated the audience is.
They probably already heardeverything that I have to say.
Or imagine how many otherspeakers are going to apply for
(26:20):
that.
Why would they want to pay myfee?
Garbage in, garbage out, that'smy mantra.
Garbage in, garbage out.
I scream it, I yell it, garbagein, garbage out, and then I
reframe it.
Oh my God, I'm so excited thatI found this proposal.
I'm a perfect fit for them.
Yeah, they might have heard someof the messages that I'm having
before, but you got to hearthings over and over again
(26:44):
before you jump into them andyou take action.
So you know, and my fee iscompletely reasonable, that's
the reframing right and thatdoesn't happen overnight.
You can't reframe over Ifyou've been in the victim mode
or the woezy woezy mode, then toteach your internal dialogue,
(27:07):
to stand up for you, believe inyou, go after your dreams, takes
work.
It's like training for amarathon, and so that's what I
see.
The starting point is thisisn't a sprint, it's not a New
Year's resolution.
It's you training your internaldialogue.
You can read books, you canwatch, you know, listen to
(27:27):
podcasts, watch YouTube trainingvideos.
There's a lot you can learn onhow to do this, but to me,
that's the key.
That's the key get control ofyour internal dialogue.
Shelby (27:40):
You're so right and I agree with you.
That's actually the firstmodule of my program as well,
like eliminating negativethinking patterns, because it
all starts there.
You know, it all starts with.
What is that dialogue that'srunning in the background
constantly?
What are the negative beliefsthat you have about yourself?
What are you telling yourself?
You know, I mean, what are thelabels?
Even that we've like take, thatwe've heard people say and so,
(28:02):
like we've, we've layered ontoourselves, even unconsciously,
you know, um, all of that stuffneeds to be taken a look at and
um, and you're right, it takesweeks, months, years, like this
isn't a practice that takes avery, very long time.
Um, you know, and, and thefirst, like how I teach it too,
is like the first thing isreally just to start to take an
(28:23):
inventory of your thoughts.
Just take an inventory, like,start to notice, to start to
take an inventory of yourthoughts.
Just take an inventory likestart to notice, become aware,
start to write that down All daylong when you have that
negative thought, well, oh mygosh, like I can't do that, like
I'm not good enough, or man, Ialways make mistakes, you know,
or she's going to be so mad atme because I did this Like you
start to write those down, youreally take an inventory of what
(28:45):
are the negative thoughts youhave about yourself that are
running in the background allthe time.
And when you write things down,it becomes a little bit more
real, right, so you canliterally see it and start to
work with that and you can startto think like is this thought
irrational or is it rational?
Like, is there any truth behindthis?
Do I have any evidence tosupport this thought about
myself?
Maybe you do Most likely, thisthought about myself.
(29:08):
Maybe you do most likely, youprobably don't, but like, really
tap into that.
Gail (29:10):
You know, is this rational or irrational?
Yeah, yeah and all.
And it comes with limitedbeliefs too.
Well, you know, I tried thatbefore and it didn't work.
Well, that doesn't.
That's not a fact.
The fact you tried it beforeand it didn't work isn't doesn't
mean it's not going to workthis time.
That's just something thathappened.
That's a fact.
And so you can say because Itried it before and it didn't
work, it's not going to workthis time.
(29:32):
And you know you mentioned yourbook.
Like when I wrote my book, I'vebeen studying personal growth
and peak performance for 40years, right?
So I read a gazillion books.
And here's what I could tellyou.
If you're just at the startingpoint on this journey, don't get
overwhelmed by the amount oftools that are out there and
(29:53):
what's.
I didn't.
I didn't reinvent anything.
And and here's what I'll sharewith you and it doesn't even
matter if the topic is, you know, personal growth or if it's
computers.
I don't care what the topic is.
If you read a book and youhighlight the 10 ideas that
they're giving you, the 10 toolsthat you're giving you, then
(30:14):
you read another one and youhighlight their 10.
So you read 10 books and youhighlight all the guess what
seven out of the 10 are going tobe identical in every single
book.
They're not.
They're all going to be thesame.
They're just going to be peopleapproaching it from a different
angle and saying it in adifferent way.
And you know, they say you haveto hear something three times
(30:36):
or, in my case, seven timesbefore you hear it right, we're
all a little bit different, butbut that's the point.
You start with one thing and youwork on it, and then you'll end
up building and building um.
In.
In my book, I tell you apersonal story, a curveball that
(30:58):
life threw at me, and then whatI do is I share with you the
tools that I use to be able towork through that.
And then this is the fun partthere's a QR code so you can go
and listen to a song that Iwrote on YouTube and see the
lyric video that was inspired bythe story that I just shared
(31:20):
with you.
So I literally put a soundtrackin my book.
Shelby (31:28):
I love that and you're so right.
Thank you so much for sayingthe fact that basically most
people, most of the informationthat we're consuming, is the
same.
You know, I mean I love thatyou.
Thank you for that, cause I yes, there are a lot of really good
books.
I've read a lot.
I mostly read nonfiction anyway.
There are a lot of really goodbooks.
I've read a lot.
I mostly read nonfiction anyway.
(31:49):
I've read a lot of really goodbooks.
I've read a lot of goodinformation.
Some I resonate with a lot.
Some I'm like, eh, I didn'trelate to that as much, but a
lot of that is a little bit moreof like I feel like an
energetic experience, meaninglike a connection to the author,
right, or their story.
So if I don't have like areally deep connection to like
(32:10):
you or like your story orwhatever, then I may resonate
with the book, but I might alsojust be like that's that was
just like okay for me, but itdoesn't mean that the material
in there isn't any any lessvaluable, and so that's all that
is.
It's kind of like deciding likewho your therapist is going to
be or your coach or whatever.
Like there's a million of them,right, and then some of them
are good, some of them are notso good.
(32:31):
That's fine, but you're going to, you're like, even if you had
10 and they were all like justas qualified and they were just
as vetted, like some of them,you're just not going to like,
you know, even though they havethe same clinical degree, the
same clinical degree, the sameskills, the same training,
you're just not going to beenergetically in line with them.
And that's the same thing with,like, our personal development
(32:54):
work.
And so that's why it's I likedhow you said that, because, you
know, sometimes I feel like thatwhole that concept around.
I already tried that.
It didn't work for me.
It's so.
It is so powerful and you'reright, it's a limiting belief
and it can really keep us stuckin a rut or in a mindset or in a
(33:15):
way of life for way longer thanwe need to.
Gail (33:21):
I know, I know, and even the book, your 12-Step Program,
that in itself that's a book.
I mean, that can give you someamazing strength.
But if you can't resonate withthe material, for whatever
reason, you're not connectingwith the author of it.
It's their way of writing.
I agree with you 100%.
(33:43):
You're going to have to hear itanother way and just keep going
.
And you know therapists andcounselors.
I always say to people you go toa doctor when you break your
leg or you get diabetes, whywouldn't you go to a counselor
or a psychologist when you'redealing with your emotional
(34:03):
turmoil?
It's the same thing and it'sequally important.
Well, I tried that.
I went to a counselor and itwas no good.
Well, you had the wrongcounselor.
Maybe try a different one.
You know, I'm sure lots ofpeople went to doctors that they
couldn't resonate with either.
Right, it's about finding theright team.
They say that you're the resultof the five people you spend
(34:26):
your most time with, and so Iuse my imagination sometimes and
turn.
I'm just coming out of recovery.
I don't have the right network.
Create it, imagine it.
Shelby (34:52):
You know you can point like another, another really
really like kind of next step ina lot of that is is creating
your own community, and and sowe can't do this life alone.
We weren't designed Our, ourliteral human nature was not
designed to live in solidarity.
We were designed to be incommunity, and that can look so
(35:12):
many different ways depending onour personalities, our
lifestyle, our interests, andrecovery is no different from
that, right.
So if you are somebody who'sthat's why things like 12-step
works, right For a lot ofreasons.
Right, because it builds youautomatically have this
fellowship around you that likeis are people doing sober things
?
Right, which is not really likethe world.
(35:34):
It's hard to find that outthere.
Or if you like really want toget interested in music or art
or cooking or whatever, youstart to join like facebook
groups or whatever with otherpeople in that community and you
build it around you becausegroups or whatever with other
people in that community and youbuild it around you because we
can't expect that we are gonnaour our thing if we're just
stuck with our own thoughts allthe time and we're working on
our thinking patterns like howare we ever gonna be able to
(35:56):
check ourselves like, how are weever gonna have any like
accountability really foranybody to be like, hey, like,
maybe, like I know you said this, I heard you this, but like,
maybe you could think of it likethis Like, if we don't have
other people in our life thatwe're sharing things with, then
how will we ever know when we'reoff track?
Gail (36:16):
Yeah, and I think it's important too, too, and you
brought this forward like thefellowship program is amazing,
and it's a great group of peoplethat have gone through the same
challenges that you have.
But it is really important toget out and do the, whether it's
your cooking group or whetherit's your like me.
(36:38):
You know, bring yourself intothe community, the, the
non-recovery community that youknow.
Don't let that be your onlycommunity, and that's the
message that I try to give iswe're here today, we missed a
beat, and and, and that's it,that's all, but it's it doesn't
matter.
We can go wherever it is thatwe want, and it's really
(37:01):
important that we getcomfortable with people that
didn't miss the beats that wemissed, and, and I mean that's
just part of life and it's a andand it's a powerful like you
know this, you can get yourmusic, your exercise, you can
get your dopamine in a lot ofdifferent ways out in the world,
(37:22):
and and I just yeah, I have a.
Shelby (37:32):
I believe in you.
Yeah, I agree, I totally agree,like I think in the beginning,
for most people in the beginningof their recovery journey, you
really do need to have like asober community, because it's
such a at least around in our,our area like it's, you know, we
live in a world that's likeobsessed with alcohol, so, like
the regular world is notthinking that, like that, like
most people.
So you do need to find peoplewho are doing sober things,
(37:52):
because you need to have peoplethat can help you along the way
in early recovery.
But you're right, like, as yougo on, like that's why I always
say, like, if you just startlayering on other things and
you're like, oh well, now I wantto, I want to do the therapy,
oh well, now I want to, um, Iwant to get into relationships.
Or, oh wow, I want to work onmy health Okay, so I'm going to
start doing that so we justlayer on the other parts and
(38:15):
that thinking pattern is goingto help us do that too, cause,
as we build more confidence inourselves and, uh, we can trust
that we know how to make gooddecisions, then we can be like
you know what?
Like I do want to.
I do really want to take pianolessons.
You know, I've always wanted todo that and I'm just going to
try it and like maybe you grab afriend and like you're like,
hey, let's take piano lessons oryou just do it by yourself, but
(38:38):
that is always available to us.
You know, we really do limitourselves when we, when we kind
of put on those limiting beliefsof like, well, I can't do that
because you know, my mom alwayssaid you'll never be good at
music, or I can't do thatbecause my husband doesn't like
it when I'm out at night orwhatever the thing is.
(39:00):
You know, like right yeah, limitourselves by those thinking
patterns that are reallydesigned to kind of protect.
We think that they'reprotection right To protect us
from failure or getting hurt,but they're really limiting.
Gail (39:14):
Yeah, and if you're in the rooms and you're listening to
the messages, you're hearing thestories of you know I've been
five years clean, or 10 yearsclean or 15 years clean and and
this is what's going on in mylife right now and you're
hearing all those.
You know, listen to the story.
You're hearing all thoselayered on things that you're
talking about and how that youknow we didn't yeah, we didn't
(39:41):
have to stay in recovery and wedidn't have to stop at the day
we went into recovery.
Shelby (39:48):
Exactly.
And then, like you said, like weliterally can reinvent
ourselves at any time, you know,I mean, ages and stages are a
real thing, like I had said toyou before we started them
facing kind of empty nest herecoming up and it's, it's slowly
but surely starting to happen,and like I am constantly
thinking about that, like, whatdoes this look like for me?
Like, and and also I think weneed to be careful, when we are
(40:09):
in that sort of in that process,to be cautious about the
stories that we're tellingourselves or the stories we
choose to believe, which is likeoh, emptiness, um is very sad,
or I'm going to be really lonely, or I don't have any friends,
like, if those are the storiesthat I'm constantly kind of
telling myself or believing, Ireally need to check that, you
(40:30):
know know, because are they true?
Like, are those things reallytrue?
And kind of be careful aboutlike, like who we're hanging out
with.
If I'm hanging out with a bunchof people who are super sad
that they don't have any kids athome anymore, it's probably not
going to be very like feel verygood, right.
Gail (40:47):
Right, yeah, I mean, that just brings you back to that
whole thing.
If that's what you think, ifyou think that's going to be
your situation, you're right.
If you don't think that's goingto be your situation, you're
right.
Shelby (41:01):
And it does take a like.
Just to reiterate, it takes atremendous amount of practice to
do this and sometimes you kindof have to fake it till you make
it a little bit Like.
Sometimes you have to say like,ooh, even though I'm feeling
really anxious about this, um,this new thing, like I'm going
to, I'm still going to do itanyway, or like we have to, we
have to do it, we have to havethe feeling about it or the
(41:24):
thing, and then still do itanyway.
Right, so that's a big part, Ithink, of that transformation.
Gail (41:29):
I know, and I talk about that fake it till you make it in
the book, because you have toget yourself out of your comfort
zone.
There's no question, you haveto be able to get yourself.
But if you're doing that, ifyou're faking it till you make
it and you're giving yoursubconscious a new message,
you're telling your subconsciousthat you got this, and so, when
(41:53):
it's time for it to happen,your subconscious is going to
default.
Oh, we know how to do this,even though it's the first time
you've ever done it.
You've been telling yourselfthat you have it, so you
automatically have it.
And so I mean there are so manytools that you can use to get
yourself to your next level.
(42:14):
And there's even there's achapter.
I have a soft spot in my heartfor the loved ones of addicts
big time, because so many peopleare dying.
There's so much, there's somuch of a challenge right now
for the parents.
It's what could I have donedifferently?
Um, you know, even the siblings.
Is there anything?
(42:34):
Could I have been a bettersister or better, or better
brother?
And so there's a chapter where Isort of talk about whether
you're talking about, uh,codependency, or enabling or
boundaries, orcompartmentalizing all these
tools to give yourselfpermission to be happy, even
(42:55):
though you've got a loved onethat's struggling.
You're allowed to be happy.
You're allowed to enjoy yourlife, to excel, to enjoy time
with your other children, andthen, when your loved one's
ready to get help, you can bethe advocate.
You're strong, you can helpthem find a rehab.
You can.
You know you didn't let the,because your anxiety and
(43:19):
depression and and andoverwhelmness can can overtake
your own strength and your ownmental and physical health.
And now a lot of people thatare addicts, that have been in
recovery for years, they're theloved ones of the addicts,
because you're losing people inthe rooms and so you find
(43:43):
yourself in that situation.
And so, yeah, I think it's so,so important for us to do our
self-care.
You know, self-care is notselfish, it's important.
Shelby (44:04):
You're so right.
This has been such a goodconversation, and I think that
your book is obviously going tobe even more in-depth around
this concept of reinventingyourself at any stage, and I
think that your book isobviously going to be even more
in depth around this concept ofreinventing yourself at any
stage, and I love that for you.
So, gail, where do you likepeople to reach out and get a
hold of you if they want to.
Gail (44:19):
Yeah, so the easiest place to get a hold of me is my
website, which isgailtaylormusiccom.
If you want my book in theStates Amazon, barnes, noble
online you can have access to itin either of those places.
Look, I'm going to show you thecover of my book.
(44:40):
Look at the butterfly.
I put a treble clap and a bassclap in it.
So the book's called Curballs,unlocking your potential through
personal growth andinspirational music, and the
reason I repeated it with thesubtotal is because there are a
lot of books out there calledcurveballs.
Shelby (45:00):
This is the one that's not about baseball well, I'll
make sure I link to those thingsin the show notes below.
And again, I appreciate yourtime.
I know everyone's really goingto enjoy this and I hope our
paths cross again soon, becausethis was really great.
Gail (45:13):
Oh, thanks, and thank you for having me.
I really appreciated this.
Yeah, happy Valentine's Day ByeShelby.
Shelby (45:26):
Thank you for joining me for this week's episode of
Confident Sober Women.
If you enjoyed thisconversation, hit the subscribe
button above so you won't missany upcoming episodes.
And, hey, if you really lovedit, leave me a review.
You can learn more about theSober Freedom Inner Circle
membership atwwwshelbyjohncoachingcom.
(45:46):
Forward slash inner circle.
See you next time.
Well, hey there, sober ladies, Thank you so much for
joining me today for theConfident Sober Women podcast,
and today I get to share withyou my conversation with Gail
Taylor.
She is an incredible woman inlong-term recovery with a
wonderful story that is fraughtwith trauma and recovery and
also this incredible careershift and really reinventing
(00:24):
herself.
That's her message for all ofus today is that no matter kind
of where we are in life, whatage and stage we are, we always
have the opportunity to changethings, to discover new
priorities, to transform ourlives, and that's what she did.
She went from a self-mademillionaire in the financial
(00:46):
industry to becoming a keynotespeaker in discovering music,
empowering other people to meettheir goals, to prioritize
mental health and wellbeing, andshe just really is excited
about personal growth anddevelopment, and that's one of
the reasons why I wanted to talkto her.
(01:08):
She also has a new book that'scoming out.
I'll link to that in the shownotes below.
But I want you guys to reallylisten up and enjoy this
conversation and if you'resomeone who kind of feels maybe
stuck in your in your spaceright now or you're confused
about where to go, this might bejust the conversation to help
you kind of shake some of thatloose.
So grab that big glass of wateror your favorite mocktail and
(01:31):
listen in to this conversationwith Gail Taylor.
Hey, it's me, Shelby.
Have you ever wondered what'sreally happening in your brain
during recovery?
Are you ready to take controlof your anxiety, sleep better
and finally feel focused andconfident?
I want to introduce you to agame changer that's transforming
women's recovery remoteneurofeedback therapy.
(01:53):
I want you to think of this asa personal trainer for your
brain.
It's helping you build newneuropathways right from the
comfort of your own home.
So if you're dealing withanxiety that just won't quit, if
you have ADHD that's makinglife chaotic, or sleep issues
that leave you exhausted,neurofeedback could be your
(02:15):
missing piece.
It's science-backed braintraining that works with your
natural healing process, helpingyou regulate emotions and build
lasting confidence.
The best part is, you don'tneed to add another appointment
to your busy schedule.
My remote neurofeedback programbrings professional guidance
and support right to your livingroom.
(02:35):
Do you want to learn more aboutneurofeedback therapy?
You can go to my website,wwwshelbyjohncom, to download my
free guide.
Is Neurofeedback Right For you?
Together, we'll create the calm, confident future you that you
deserve.
That's wwwshelbyjohncom.
(02:57):
Take the first step towardstraining your brain for lasting
change.
Hello and welcome to theConfident Sober Women podcast.
I'm your guide, Shelby John.
I'm the mother of three, wifeto one and sober since July 1st
(03:20):
2002.
As sober women, we havesomething huge in common, and
when we share our lives and ourstories with each other, we feel
that sense of belonging andconnection.
So we know we are no longeralone.
In this podcast, you will hearreal life talk about building
confidence and transforming yourlife beyond recovery.
(03:42):
So come on, let's talk yourlife beyond recovery.
So come on, let's talk.
Well, hey there, Gail.
Thank you so much for joiningme today for the Confident Sober
Women podcast.
I am so excited that you'rehere today to share your story
and your book and your work withour audience, so I'm going to
turn the mic over to you now andlet you share a little bit more
(04:03):
about your story, and thenwe're going to chat okay, thanks
, thanks, shelby, thanks forhaving me.
Gail (04:10):
Um, I'm actually going to start at the end of my yeah, I'm
going to start my story kind ofat the end of it and and share
with you, um, why I'm actuallyhere and how I ended up getting
here.
Because I went from being a.
My addiction started when I was12 years old, and so I went
(04:33):
from being a child in activeaddiction I dropped out of
school when I was 16 to being avery successful business person
in finance, and I worked in thatfield for 25 years.
And then, when I was 58 yearsold, I started taking piano
lessons and I had no musicalbackground at all and I just I
(04:56):
fell in love with it, like I'mlearning the scales right, and
all of a sudden, music startedto flood back in my life, and we
know how healing music is.
I didn't even know I hadstopped listening to it because
instead I was listening to bookson economics, and so after a
couple of years, I thought I'mgoing to retire earlier than I
(05:19):
had planned and study music fulltime and study music full-time.
And so I did that at age 61,and I studied music full-time
private teachers, berkeley,berkeley School of Music in
California because you don'thave to audition.
If you're doing it online, youcould just pay.
And so then I did that and aftera couple of years I thought I'm
(05:41):
going to reinvent myself as amusician.
And when I shared that storywith folks, I kept getting the
same reaction Gail, that's soinspiring.
I'm going to go do somethingthey had put on the back burner.
And I heard that so oftenShelby that I thought whoa the
heck with becoming a musician.
(06:02):
I'm going to come out ofretirement, start my business,
gail Taylor Music, become akeynote speaker and share my
stories and my music with folksto help them become their best
selves.
And so I decided I hired anentertainment lawyer and he said
(06:23):
well, if that's the journeyyou're going to take, write a
book.
So that's what I did and that'show Curveballs started.
And now a lot of my speaking isat recovery conferences.
And, yeah, I'm just so, sofortunate to be able to share my
story with people that havegone down a similar journey.
Shelby (06:48):
That is so cool.
I love the, the idea ofreinventing yourself at any
stage.
And you know, if you live longenough we'll have a lot of
stages.
You know, and they aredefinitely all they're all
different.
You know it's kind of like ifyou have children and you raise
them like you know.
You know that all the littlestages are.
(07:09):
They're different.
You know they have some of themhave their pros and cons to all
of them and you maybe you likesome better than others, but you
know they're all just a littledifferent and it doesn't really
change, you know, for us asadults.
So I love this idea.
So how did your addiction sortof play into that?
Like?
Can you say a little bit moreabout your recovery process?
How did you get sober?
Gail (07:30):
Yeah.
So what happened when I was 12is my dad died, and so when he
died I mean talk about trauma Iwasn't ready to lose this parent
, and I actually pretended thathe was still alive.
For two years I kept him alivein my mind.
I said he was a spy for thegovernment and that they had to
pretend that he died so he couldgo save the world.
(07:53):
And so my mom, who's in her midthirties and has six kids,
moved us from a small town to acity, and that's what happened.
We moved into the city, and shetold me later later, many years
later, that the reason she didthat was to get work in the city
(08:15):
, so that her, her mainobjective at the point was to
keep us off of welfare and alltogether.
And so so, yeah, the citypretty much chewed me up and
spit me out.
I was trying to figure out howto handle this situation, and
she'd come home from work at theend of the day putting one foot
(08:35):
in front of the other and havedinner with us and then go to
bed and cry herself to sleep.
She just lost her soul mate,and so I would, at 12 years old,
I would sneak out of the housewhen she went to bed, hitchhike
to a seedier part of the city,meet up with older kids, get
stoned, hitchhike home at twoo'clock in the morning and and
(08:58):
in addition to this, you knowthe females listening to your
call I was also engaged inreckless behavior, so you know
what that means.
And this was all before my 13thbirthday.
I was using mind-alteringsubstances every single day and
I I carried on this lifestyle.
I lived at home until I was 18.
(09:20):
When I was 16, I dropped out ofschool.
When I was 18, I got marriedfor five weeks no dysfunction,
what can I say?
And so so in my I hit my firstbottom, kind of in my mid-20s.
And when that happened, like Ijust I kind of woke up one
(09:41):
morning and looked around at themess I made, and not just in
the room but in my soul, anddecided there's gotta be more to
life than this.
There's got to be a way I canpull myself out of this rut.
And that one little bit of hopestarted me on a new journey, a
brand new journey of you knowhow to well, I have a type A
(10:05):
personality.
So I was like, okay, I got toget out of this.
What am I going to do?
I started with Napoleon Hill'sbook Think and Grow Rich.
I'm sure some of your listenershave read it and some of them
have definitely heard of it andthat was, yeah, that was the
first part.
Yeah, that was the first part.
(10:25):
That was the first part in myjourney where I started to
change things, and I stilldidn't even know I was an addict
.
I was still in denial.
I just knew I wanted to get outof my rut, but I still didn't
know that I was an addict.
And so now I'm saying, okay,I'm gonna learn how to.
I'm going to go back to school,get my high.
Now I'm saying, okay, I'm goingto learn how to.
I'm going to go back to school,get my high school.
(10:46):
I'm going to learn how to besuccessful.
I'm reading about how peoplebecome financially independent.
I mean, in that book.
Anyone that read that book theyknow that riches wasn't money.
But for me it was, because Iwas a dysfunctional
20-something-year-old and so,you know, I started to learn
(11:06):
that real estate was a way to go.
So I started to study realestate and uh, and that was my
first sort of segue out of theaddiction.
Shelby (11:21):
Wow, thank you so much for sharing your story and so
vulnerable.
Wow, thank you so much forsharing your story and so
vulnerable.
I'm so sorry to hear about theloss of your dad and at such a
young age and really just Idon't know that there's ever a
good time, but really formativetime when you're 12, you know
like that's such a you knowtough, like middle school age
time anyway, and it sounds likethere was a super lot going on
(11:42):
with in your family and thenyour brain just kind of
internalize that trauma and sentyou into that you know kind of
addiction path, which I thinkit's a story for a lot of us.
We know so much more now aboutfrom science, about where
addiction comes from, and it'smostly from trauma, so thank you
for sharing that.
So when you were kind of comingaround and you got sober and
(12:08):
you were starting to deal with,you know, recovery and work and
build your life through that,did music play a part in that
for you then?
Gail (12:15):
No, well, other than I went to concerts and I don't
even know, I can't even say thisis part of the recovery because
, you know, I, I, I, this.
This was the 70s, and so it waslike 60s, 70s, everybody was
going to concerts, getting high,and it was.
That was.
That was the era.
(12:36):
So, uh, classic rock and rockand roll as a listening person
was a big part of this, the mylife at that point.
But I was always hired in akite when I went to these
concerts.
But what happened next was, as Istarted to become, you know, a
little bit more successful inbusiness.
(12:57):
I was again I'm still in denialhere in this story right, so I
was working 10 or 12 hours a dayand then hitting the bars at
night with my colleagues and thepeople I work with.
But unfortunately, I had a son.
I had a three-year-old son, andso what happened was, I thought
(13:21):
, you know, as long as he's withgood caregivers and they love
him and and take care of himit's more about quality than
quantity, so as long as he seesme for like a few hours on the
weekend, for some, somehow I'm agood parent.
Yeah, not, I mean, I didn'tknow any better at the time.
But that's where I was at right.
(13:44):
And then when my son turned 12years old, I moved across the
country.
I brought a new man into hislife.
I put him in a new school.
He had to make new friends.
Guess what happened?
You know, he went through thesame.
He went through down the exactsame path I did.
He became an addict at 12 andthat was the first time in my
(14:05):
life I I stopped using mindaltering substances on a daily
basis.
And that's when I figured out Iwas an addict, even though I
had shifted it a lot to alcohol.
I mean, I moved across thecountry so I had to shift it a
lot to alcohol because I didn'thave any dealers and but the
thought didn't cross my mindbecause again, I was.
(14:26):
I was still in denial.
So at that point I sort of gotinto just alcohol and smoking
and weed and and and.
So when my son started goingdown this journey, I thought, oh
my god, I gotta be there forhim, I gotta help him through
this.
And I started reading all thesebooks on on addiction and what
(14:48):
he was going through and it waslike hey, that sounds like me.
Oh my God, how stupid was I?
But I was a functioning.
I was a functioning addict, soI didn't really get it and so I
even bought this book on are youan alcoholic?
And Shelby?
This was really interestingbecause the questionnaire in it,
(15:11):
the questions, had nothing todo with how much you drink.
It was questions like would yougo to a social event that
there's no alcohol?
And I'm there, yeah, no, whywould you do that, right?
(15:48):
So I mean, the brain's juststarting to click in here.
And then my son got intoopioids big time, really big
time, and so I have hispermission to share our story
and he's also in recovery,recovery and he's one of my best
friends.
So you know, things turned outgood for both of us.
And actually, um, you know,when we talk about it, we both
say if he was still in addiction, he wouldn't be alive.
Like, there's no way that withthe fentanyl, the way that it is
.
And and where are you, shelby?
Where are you located?
Shelby (16:07):
I'm in Maryland.
Gail (16:09):
Okay, so I'm in Alberta, canada, and so you know, between
our two countries, we both havea big and no, we're not
supplying you with your fentanylbut we both have a big problem
with opioid addiction, and soyou know, for him to come out of
it, oh my god, it was just, itwas just so.
(16:31):
So, thank, thank god.
And then I, with all thesebooks I was reading, and when he
went into rehab, one time Iasked the counselor how come I
got through my addiction andinto recovery without going to
rehab, how come I I could just,you know, read books and I was
able to work my way through it.
And this counselor said to mebecause you did what we call
(16:54):
hitting a high bottom.
And that was interesting,because there's a lot of people
out there that are like me, thatare functional addicts or
functional there, that are likeme, that are functional addicts
or functional alcoholics.
And you know, we sort of think,well, I didn't lose my job, and
so you know, I can still go towork every day.
So you know, maybe I don't havea problem.
Shelby (17:21):
But, believe me, the word I use the word functional
loosely.
Well, what we know is is thateven even um, people who would
maybe consider themselves likebinge drinkers, like they
weren't like every day orthey're just more binge like
even I learned anyway earlier onwhen I was in treatment, that
it wasn't really about like howmuch we drank, it was really
about what happened.
So, even if you weren't evendrinking or using like that much
(17:42):
, whatever, that is like, it'sreally about what happens to us.
How, how's our thinking pattern?
How are we coping with lifeLike are we like if we're using
substances?
Everybody uses substances for areason, you know, and it's
mostly to, you know, to escapesomething, even even the normies
or whatever.
If you're just having fun,right, you're, you know, you're
kind of escaping the work weekor you're getting de-stressed or
(18:05):
something.
So we're using them as a toolfor, for anxiety or stress
relief or whatever we want totell ourselves.
But I mean, so that's, that'sthe thing, you know, like
everybody is in a differentspace and sure, like the guy
that's living under the bridgewith his little brown paper bag
might look like, you know, theworst one of all of us, but
(18:27):
maybe he gets it really quicklybecause he's like, oh, I'm going
to take what they're telling meto do and I just internalize
that and I do what.
I do what I'm told.
You know, I'm going to sort ofdo what I'm told because I want
to change my life and somebodyelse is a chronic relapser, you
(18:49):
know, cause they just like can'tget it or they don't want to do
what's necessary, you know, andI think that's why there's just
all kinds of us, you know, butit really is about what happens
to us when we are in activeaddiction.
You know, what is that?
What is that stinking thinking,what?
What are?
What are our?
How are our reactions orresponses?
What are our relationships,like you know?
What are our relationships,like you know?
Gail (19:05):
And one of the things that book had explained was that it
actually broke addiction intofour stages, right, and
alcoholism particularly, thatthere's four stages.
And yeah, that first the laststage, you're living underneath
the bridge and you're homeless.
But when I first did the test,it said that I was in.
(19:29):
I don't know.
I think it was somewhere aroundthe second stage, maybe midway
in the second stage.
And then, two years later, Ithought I think I'll do that
test again because I haven't hada drink in two years, so I
think I'm not an alcoholicanymore.
I might as well start drinkingagain.
And I did the test again and Iscored higher.
(19:52):
So instead of being mid secondstage, I was in early third
stage and what happened was thecloud had lifted.
So I wasn't minimalizinganymore, right.
And they say that what the endthis is like?
Just adding to what you justsaid, if you go six months
(20:14):
without a mind alteringsubstance, then the cloud starts
to lift out of your brain andyou start to think a lot more
clear and understand yourreality and and so you know
whether you're self medicatingor whether you're, you know,
whatever reason.
The longer that you go withoutit, the more you get to get
(20:36):
control and and learn how to getthose natural highs.
I mean, that's what it was allabout learning how to put the
bounce in my step.
I say I come from a place.
I heard this on another podcastand I stole it because it's me
to a T I come from a place ofhealed scars and not open wounds
.
Shelby (20:57):
Wow, yeah, I love that.
Gail (21:00):
I know and that's me like that I have got to that point in
my journey and that's why Ilove to share my story, because
the fact that we missed a beatin life doesn't matter.
It really doesn't.
It doesn't matter at all.
We're here where we are todayand that's it right.
It's about today and it's aboutthe future.
And yeah, I'm not sayingpretend the past never happened.
(21:24):
You know you, you use it.
Use it to give you the strengthto go forward and not to keep
you in the spot.
I mean, I literally went fromthat place.
I told you where I was a highschool dropout and an addict to
being managing $130 million andearning in the top 5% of North
(21:48):
Americans.
So there's no limit.
You don't.
You set your limit, you decideyour limit and you know I
reinvented myself.
I wanted to start the call withthe fact that I reinvented
myself even though I had nobackground in music, but I
reinvented myself because Iwanted to.
A lot of folks reinventedthemselves because they had to
(22:12):
right Companies shut down withCOVID.
All different things havehappened and every person not
every person, but the majorityof the people going into
recovery have to reinventthemselves, because that's the
whole nature of what recovery isthe starting point of you
reinventing yourself and, wow,what a positive place to be in.
Shelby (22:35):
You're right, and so that's a great jumping off place
for us to kind of step intosome of the work.
And I mean, I think, if we lookat that exactly the way you
just said, that our kind ofsobriety journey whatever that
looks like for each of us is isour first reinvention, right,
like when I wrote my memoir, Istarted it off by saying you
know, everybody has a point intheir life where there's like a
(22:57):
before and an after, and if youlive long enough, you might have
multiple ones right.
And so for me, when I got soberin 2002, like that, that but I
have like the before that date,july 1st and I have the after
that date, and so I had thiswhole life before and then I
have this whole new life and, um, that's how I look at it,
because I'm not the same person,thank god, I don't want.
(23:20):
I don't want to be the sameperson.
I mean, I'm still me, but it'sa completely different.
It's a complete transformation,like when we work it.
And we work whether it's likethrough 12 step or smart
recovery or whatever tools,therapy, whatever we use when we
work it and we commit to sayinglike I don't actually want to
be that bad anymore and,honestly, that's not always at
(23:42):
the conscious level.
You know, we don't always sitand be like I don't want to be
myself and it's like it'ssomething that happens and like,
in the background, with a lotof guidance, you're committed to
saying like I want to becomesomething else.
And so then we did that rightand so, like you said, yeah,
once you stay sober for a longenough time you said six months,
I always say one year likeafter that first year of
(24:03):
sobriety, like a, you're assober as you're ever going to
get, first of all.
Second of all, that fog islifted, you start to get a lot
of clarity and you kind of wakeup.
I've had this conversation withevery woman I've ever
interviewed pretty much, and weall have the same experience.
There's an awakening thatstarts to happen after that
first year.
Well, in that one to five yearrange where you're like you know
(24:27):
you want, you start to crave,like more.
You're like oh, wow, like I'mfeeling like really good, like
now I'm really wanting to getinto you know, who am I now?
Or what do I even like now?
Or you know, do I want to startdating?
Do I need to leave my husband,like whatever's going on, you
start to think about thesethings, like that reinvention to
creep in right and we'restarting to say, oh, oh, what is
that going to look like for me?
(24:48):
And so I guess, when thatstarts to happen, when you start
to get those sort of inflectionpoints, you know, like you said
, sometimes it's given to us,like COVID or maybe you, you
know your husband leaves you oryou have, you know you lose your
job, whatever, like sometimesit's given to you and sometimes
we get to decide.
(25:08):
So what would you say is likesome of the first steps in like
managing, like how would, wherewould you even start?
Gail (25:16):
Yeah, so.
So the very first step and thisone worked for me beautifully
was take control of yourinternal dialogue, because once
when you're in addiction, yourinternal dialogues out of your
control, the the addiction hascontrol over it.
Because once when you're inaddiction, your internal
dialogue's out of your control,the addiction has control over
it.
It's, like you said, thestinking thinking, right?
So that's the first spot istake care of, take control of
(25:37):
your internal dialogue, andwhatever that looks like for you
, I don't, you know, we can callit the power of positive
thinking, we can call itwhatever we want, but it's
taking control of your internaldialogue.
And so you know, an examplethat I would give you is if I
didn't have control of myinternal dialogue and I see a
(25:59):
proposal to do I'm a keynotespeaker, so I see a proposal to
speak at a big conference, so Isay say, oh well, there's no use
me filling that proposal out,because look at how
sophisticated the audience is.
They probably already heardeverything that I have to say.
Or imagine how many otherspeakers are going to apply for
(26:20):
that.
Why would they want to pay myfee?
Garbage in, garbage out, that'smy mantra.
Garbage in, garbage out.
I scream it, I yell it, garbagein, garbage out, and then I
reframe it.
Oh my God, I'm so excited thatI found this proposal.
I'm a perfect fit for them.
Yeah, they might have heard someof the messages that I'm having
before, but you got to hearthings over and over again
(26:44):
before you jump into them andyou take action.
So you know, and my fee iscompletely reasonable, that's
the reframing right and thatdoesn't happen overnight.
You can't reframe over Ifyou've been in the victim mode
or the woezy woezy mode, then toteach your internal dialogue,
(27:07):
to stand up for you, believe inyou, go after your dreams, takes
work.
It's like training for amarathon, and so that's what I
see.
The starting point is thisisn't a sprint, it's not a New
Year's resolution.
It's you training your internaldialogue.
You can read books, you canwatch, you know, listen to
(27:27):
podcasts, watch YouTube trainingvideos.
There's a lot you can learn onhow to do this, but to me,
that's the key.
That's the key get control ofyour internal dialogue.
Shelby (27:40):
You're so right and I agree with you.
That's actually the firstmodule of my program as well,
like eliminating negativethinking patterns, because it
all starts there.
You know, it all starts with.
What is that dialogue that'srunning in the background
constantly?
What are the negative beliefsthat you have about yourself?
What are you telling yourself?
You know, I mean, what are thelabels?
Even that we've like take, thatwe've heard people say and so,
(28:02):
like we've, we've layered ontoourselves, even unconsciously,
you know, um, all of that stuffneeds to be taken a look at and
um, and you're right, it takesweeks, months, years, like this
isn't a practice that takes avery, very long time.
Um, you know, and, and thefirst, like how I teach it too,
is like the first thing isreally just to start to take an
(28:23):
inventory of your thoughts.
Just take an inventory, like,start to notice, to start to
take an inventory of yourthoughts.
Just take an inventory likestart to notice, become aware,
start to write that down All daylong when you have that
negative thought, well, oh mygosh, like I can't do that, like
I'm not good enough, or man, Ialways make mistakes, you know,
or she's going to be so mad atme because I did this Like you
start to write those down, youreally take an inventory of what
(28:45):
are the negative thoughts youhave about yourself that are
running in the background allthe time.
And when you write things down,it becomes a little bit more
real, right, so you canliterally see it and start to
work with that and you can startto think like is this thought
irrational or is it rational?
Like, is there any truth behindthis?
Do I have any evidence tosupport this thought about
myself?
Maybe you do Most likely, thisthought about myself.
(29:08):
Maybe you do most likely, youprobably don't, but like, really
tap into that.
Gail (29:10):
You know, is this rational or irrational?
Yeah, yeah and all.
And it comes with limitedbeliefs too.
Well, you know, I tried thatbefore and it didn't work.
Well, that doesn't.
That's not a fact.
The fact you tried it beforeand it didn't work isn't doesn't
mean it's not going to workthis time.
That's just something thathappened.
That's a fact.
And so you can say because Itried it before and it didn't
work, it's not going to workthis time.
(29:32):
And you know you mentioned yourbook.
Like when I wrote my book, I'vebeen studying personal growth
and peak performance for 40years, right?
So I read a gazillion books.
And here's what I could tellyou.
If you're just at the startingpoint on this journey, don't get
overwhelmed by the amount oftools that are out there and
(29:53):
what's.
I didn't.
I didn't reinvent anything.
And and here's what I'll sharewith you and it doesn't even
matter if the topic is, you know, personal growth or if it's
computers.
I don't care what the topic is.
If you read a book and youhighlight the 10 ideas that
they're giving you, the 10 toolsthat you're giving you, then
(30:14):
you read another one and youhighlight their 10.
So you read 10 books and youhighlight all the guess what
seven out of the 10 are going tobe identical in every single
book.
They're not.
They're all going to be thesame.
They're just going to be peopleapproaching it from a different
angle and saying it in adifferent way.
And you know, they say you haveto hear something three times
(30:36):
or, in my case, seven timesbefore you hear it right, we're
all a little bit different, butbut that's the point.
You start with one thing and youwork on it, and then you'll end
up building and building um.
In.
In my book, I tell you apersonal story, a curveball that
(30:58):
life threw at me, and then whatI do is I share with you the
tools that I use to be able towork through that.
And then this is the fun partthere's a QR code so you can go
and listen to a song that Iwrote on YouTube and see the
lyric video that was inspired bythe story that I just shared
(31:20):
with you.
So I literally put a soundtrackin my book.
Shelby (31:28):
I love that and you're so right.
Thank you so much for sayingthe fact that basically most
people, most of the informationthat we're consuming, is the
same.
You know, I mean I love thatyou.
Thank you for that, cause I yes, there are a lot of really good
books.
I've read a lot.
I mostly read nonfiction anyway.
There are a lot of really goodbooks.
I've read a lot.
I mostly read nonfiction anyway.
(31:49):
I've read a lot of really goodbooks.
I've read a lot of goodinformation.
Some I resonate with a lot.
Some I'm like, eh, I didn'trelate to that as much, but a
lot of that is a little bit moreof like I feel like an
energetic experience, meaninglike a connection to the author,
right, or their story.
So if I don't have like areally deep connection to like
(32:10):
you or like your story orwhatever, then I may resonate
with the book, but I might alsojust be like that's that was
just like okay for me, but itdoesn't mean that the material
in there isn't any any lessvaluable, and so that's all that
is.
It's kind of like deciding likewho your therapist is going to
be or your coach or whatever.
Like there's a million of them,right, and then some of them
are good, some of them are notso good.
(32:31):
That's fine, but you're going to, you're like, even if you had
10 and they were all like justas qualified and they were just
as vetted, like some of them,you're just not going to like,
you know, even though they havethe same clinical degree, the
same clinical degree, the sameskills, the same training,
you're just not going to beenergetically in line with them.
And that's the same thing with,like, our personal development
(32:54):
work.
And so that's why it's I likedhow you said that, because, you
know, sometimes I feel like thatwhole that concept around.
I already tried that.
It didn't work for me.
It's so.
It is so powerful and you'reright, it's a limiting belief
and it can really keep us stuckin a rut or in a mindset or in a
(33:15):
way of life for way longer thanwe need to.
Gail (33:21):
I know, I know, and even the book, your 12-Step Program,
that in itself that's a book.
I mean, that can give you someamazing strength.
But if you can't resonate withthe material, for whatever
reason, you're not connectingwith the author of it.
It's their way of writing.
I agree with you 100%.
(33:43):
You're going to have to hear itanother way and just keep going
.
And you know therapists andcounselors.
I always say to people you go toa doctor when you break your
leg or you get diabetes, whywouldn't you go to a counselor
or a psychologist when you'redealing with your emotional
(34:03):
turmoil?
It's the same thing and it'sequally important.
Well, I tried that.
I went to a counselor and itwas no good.
Well, you had the wrongcounselor.
Maybe try a different one.
You know, I'm sure lots ofpeople went to doctors that they
couldn't resonate with either.
Right, it's about finding theright team.
They say that you're the resultof the five people you spend
(34:26):
your most time with, and so Iuse my imagination sometimes and
turn.
I'm just coming out of recovery.
I don't have the right network.
Create it, imagine it.
Shelby (34:52):
You know you can point like another, another really
really like kind of next step ina lot of that is is creating
your own community, and and sowe can't do this life alone.
We weren't designed Our, ourliteral human nature was not
designed to live in solidarity.
We were designed to be incommunity, and that can look so
(35:12):
many different ways depending onour personalities, our
lifestyle, our interests, andrecovery is no different from
that, right.
So if you are somebody who'sthat's why things like 12-step
works, right For a lot ofreasons.
Right, because it builds youautomatically have this
fellowship around you that likeis are people doing sober things
?
Right, which is not really likethe world.
(35:34):
It's hard to find that outthere.
Or if you like really want toget interested in music or art
or cooking or whatever, youstart to join like facebook
groups or whatever with otherpeople in that community and you
build it around you becausegroups or whatever with other
people in that community and youbuild it around you because we
can't expect that we are gonnaour our thing if we're just
stuck with our own thoughts allthe time and we're working on
our thinking patterns like howare we ever gonna be able to
(35:56):
check ourselves like, how are weever gonna have any like
accountability really foranybody to be like, hey, like,
maybe, like I know you said this, I heard you this, but like,
maybe you could think of it likethis Like, if we don't have
other people in our life thatwe're sharing things with, then
how will we ever know when we'reoff track?
Gail (36:16):
Yeah, and I think it's important too, too, and you
brought this forward like thefellowship program is amazing,
and it's a great group of peoplethat have gone through the same
challenges that you have.
But it is really important toget out and do the, whether it's
your cooking group or whetherit's your like me.
(36:38):
You know, bring yourself intothe community, the, the
non-recovery community that youknow.
Don't let that be your onlycommunity, and that's the
message that I try to give iswe're here today, we missed a
beat, and and, and that's it,that's all, but it's it doesn't
matter.
We can go wherever it is thatwe want, and it's really
(37:01):
important that we getcomfortable with people that
didn't miss the beats that wemissed, and, and I mean that's
just part of life and it's a andand it's a powerful like you
know this, you can get yourmusic, your exercise, you can
get your dopamine in a lot ofdifferent ways out in the world,
(37:22):
and and I just yeah, I have a.
Shelby (37:32):
I believe in you.
Yeah, I agree, I totally agree,like I think in the beginning,
for most people in the beginningof their recovery journey, you
really do need to have like asober community, because it's
such a at least around in our,our area like it's, you know, we
live in a world that's likeobsessed with alcohol, so, like
the regular world is notthinking that, like that, like
most people.
So you do need to find peoplewho are doing sober things,
(37:52):
because you need to have peoplethat can help you along the way
in early recovery.
But you're right, like, as yougo on, like that's why I always
say, like, if you just startlayering on other things and
you're like, oh well, now I wantto, I want to do the therapy,
oh well, now I want to, um, Iwant to get into relationships.
Or, oh wow, I want to work onmy health Okay, so I'm going to
start doing that so we justlayer on the other parts and
(38:15):
that thinking pattern is goingto help us do that too, cause,
as we build more confidence inourselves and, uh, we can trust
that we know how to make gooddecisions, then we can be like
you know what?
Like I do want to.
I do really want to take pianolessons.
You know, I've always wanted todo that and I'm just going to
try it and like maybe you grab afriend and like you're like,
hey, let's take piano lessons oryou just do it by yourself, but
(38:38):
that is always available to us.
You know, we really do limitourselves when we, when we kind
of put on those limiting beliefsof like, well, I can't do that
because you know, my mom alwayssaid you'll never be good at
music, or I can't do thatbecause my husband doesn't like
it when I'm out at night orwhatever the thing is.
(39:00):
You know, like right yeah, limitourselves by those thinking
patterns that are reallydesigned to kind of protect.
We think that they'reprotection right To protect us
from failure or getting hurt,but they're really limiting.
Gail (39:14):
Yeah, and if you're in the rooms and you're listening to
the messages, you're hearing thestories of you know I've been
five years clean, or 10 yearsclean or 15 years clean and and
this is what's going on in mylife right now and you're
hearing all those.
You know, listen to the story.
You're hearing all thoselayered on things that you're
talking about and how that youknow we didn't yeah, we didn't
(39:41):
have to stay in recovery and wedidn't have to stop at the day
we went into recovery.
Shelby (39:48):
Exactly.
And then, like you said, like weliterally can reinvent
ourselves at any time, you know,I mean, ages and stages are a
real thing, like I had said toyou before we started them
facing kind of empty nest herecoming up and it's, it's slowly
but surely starting to happen,and like I am constantly
thinking about that, like, whatdoes this look like for me?
Like, and and also I think weneed to be careful, when we are
(40:09):
in that sort of in that process,to be cautious about the
stories that we're tellingourselves or the stories we
choose to believe, which is likeoh, emptiness, um is very sad,
or I'm going to be really lonely, or I don't have any friends,
like, if those are the storiesthat I'm constantly kind of
telling myself or believing, Ireally need to check that, you
(40:30):
know know, because are they true?
Like, are those things reallytrue?
And kind of be careful aboutlike, like who we're hanging out
with.
If I'm hanging out with a bunchof people who are super sad
that they don't have any kids athome anymore, it's probably not
going to be very like feel verygood, right.
Gail (40:47):
Right, yeah, I mean, that just brings you back to that
whole thing.
If that's what you think, ifyou think that's going to be
your situation, you're right.
If you don't think that's goingto be your situation, you're
right.
Shelby (41:01):
And it does take a like.
Just to reiterate, it takes atremendous amount of practice to
do this and sometimes you kindof have to fake it till you make
it a little bit Like.
Sometimes you have to say like,ooh, even though I'm feeling
really anxious about this, um,this new thing, like I'm going
to, I'm still going to do itanyway, or like we have to, we
have to do it, we have to havethe feeling about it or the
(41:24):
thing, and then still do itanyway.
Right, so that's a big part, Ithink, of that transformation.
Gail (41:29):
I know, and I talk about that fake it till you make it in
the book, because you have toget yourself out of your comfort
zone.
There's no question, you haveto be able to get yourself.
But if you're doing that, ifyou're faking it till you make
it and you're giving yoursubconscious a new message,
you're telling your subconsciousthat you got this, and so, when
(41:53):
it's time for it to happen,your subconscious is going to
default.
Oh, we know how to do this,even though it's the first time
you've ever done it.
You've been telling yourselfthat you have it, so you
automatically have it.
And so I mean there are so manytools that you can use to get
yourself to your next level.
(42:14):
And there's even there's achapter.
I have a soft spot in my heartfor the loved ones of addicts
big time, because so many peopleare dying.
There's so much, there's somuch of a challenge right now
for the parents.
It's what could I have donedifferently?
Um, you know, even the siblings.
Is there anything?
(42:34):
Could I have been a bettersister or better, or better
brother?
And so there's a chapter where Isort of talk about whether
you're talking about, uh,codependency, or enabling or
boundaries, orcompartmentalizing all these
tools to give yourselfpermission to be happy, even
(42:55):
though you've got a loved onethat's struggling.
You're allowed to be happy.
You're allowed to enjoy yourlife, to excel, to enjoy time
with your other children, andthen, when your loved one's
ready to get help, you can bethe advocate.
You're strong, you can helpthem find a rehab.
You can.
You know you didn't let the,because your anxiety and
(43:19):
depression and and andoverwhelmness can can overtake
your own strength and your ownmental and physical health.
And now a lot of people thatare addicts, that have been in
recovery for years, they're theloved ones of the addicts,
because you're losing people inthe rooms and so you find
(43:43):
yourself in that situation.
And so, yeah, I think it's so,so important for us to do our
self-care.
You know, self-care is notselfish, it's important.
Shelby (44:04):
You're so right.
This has been such a goodconversation, and I think that
your book is obviously going tobe even more in-depth around
this concept of reinventingyourself at any stage, and I
think that your book isobviously going to be even more
in depth around this concept ofreinventing yourself at any
stage, and I love that for you.
So, gail, where do you likepeople to reach out and get a
hold of you if they want to.
Gail (44:19):
Yeah, so the easiest place to get a hold of me is my
website, which isgailtaylormusiccom.
If you want my book in theStates Amazon, barnes, noble
online you can have access to itin either of those places.
Look, I'm going to show you thecover of my book.
(44:40):
Look at the butterfly.
I put a treble clap and a bassclap in it.
So the book's called Curballs,unlocking your potential through
personal growth andinspirational music, and the
reason I repeated it with thesubtotal is because there are a
lot of books out there calledcurveballs.
Shelby (45:00):
This is the one that's not about baseball well, I'll
make sure I link to those thingsin the show notes below.
And again, I appreciate yourtime.
I know everyone's really goingto enjoy this and I hope our
paths cross again soon, becausethis was really great.
Gail (45:13):
Oh, thanks, and thank you for having me.
I really appreciated this.
Yeah, happy Valentine's Day ByeShelby.
Shelby (45:26):
Thank you for joining me for this week's episode of
Confident Sober Women.
If you enjoyed thisconversation, hit the subscribe
button above so you won't missany upcoming episodes.
And, hey, if you really lovedit, leave me a review.
You can learn more about theSober Freedom Inner Circle
membership atwwwshelbyjohncoachingcom.
(45:46):
Forward slash inner circle.
See you next time.
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