Speaker 1: Can I enjoy things fully and give my heart over
Speaker 1: to these things and be in it and be present
Speaker 1: knowing that like, yeah, there's a chance it won't work out,
Speaker 1: And even if I experience this holy, I'll still be
Speaker 1: able to keep moving forward if it doesn't work out.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the one you feed throughout time. Great thinkers
Speaker 1: have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have, quotes
Speaker 1: like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you
Speaker 1: think ring true. And yet for many of us, our
Speaker 1: thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity,
Speaker 1: self pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don't
Speaker 1: have instead of what we do. We think things that
Speaker 1: hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not
Speaker 1: just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent,
Speaker 1: and creative effort to make a life worth living. This
Speaker 1: podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in
Speaker 1: the right direction, how they feed their good wolf. Thanks
Speaker 1: for joining us. Our guest on this episode is Josh Peck,
Speaker 1: an actor, comedian, podcast host, and author who began his
Speaker 1: career as an actor in the late nineties, originally rising
Speaker 1: to prominence for his role in the sitcom Drake and
Speaker 1: Josh and has had a successful acting career ever since.
Speaker 1: He is in fact in a movie I saw not
Speaker 1: long ago called The Wackness and was very well cast
Speaker 1: in that movie, acting with Ben Kingsley. He's also the
Speaker 1: voice of Eddie in the Ice Age franchise and tons
Speaker 1: of other movies. His book is called Happy People Are Annoying. Hi, Josh,
Speaker 1: welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. I'm
Speaker 1: really happy to have you on. We're going to be
Speaker 1: discussing your book, which has a title that I love,
Speaker 1: which is happy People Are Annoying. But before we get
Speaker 1: into that, we'll start like we always do, with the Parable.
Speaker 1: And in the Parable, there's a grandparent who's talking with
Speaker 1: their grandchild and they say, in life, there are two
Speaker 1: wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One
Speaker 1: is a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and
Speaker 1: bravery and love, and the other is a bad wolf,
Speaker 1: which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And
Speaker 1: the grandchild stops and thinks about it for a second,
Speaker 1: looks up at their grandparents as well. Which one wins,
Speaker 1: and the grandparents says, the one you feed, So I'd
Speaker 1: like to start off by asking you what that parable
Speaker 1: means to you in your life and in the work
Speaker 1: that you do. Well. I would first say it's good
Speaker 1: that they want with like a wolf and not like
Speaker 1: a hamster. Right, I just don't I don't know if
Speaker 1: it would have the same impact. You know, I have
Speaker 1: heard that parable before and it's very sort of didactic,
Speaker 1: and I feel like I'm just sort of repurposing what
Speaker 1: was already said best in that parable. Right, it's this
Speaker 1: idea of nurturing the things that allow you to be
Speaker 1: great and be the person that you want to be
Speaker 1: in what we sort of devote our time too. And
Speaker 1: I remember before I got in recovery, I didn't think
Speaker 1: I was self centered, because you know, I thought that
Speaker 1: was reserved for people who thought highly of themselves, you know,
Speaker 1: like people with big egos and people who were the
Speaker 1: quarterbacks and naturally popular. And then of course I was
Speaker 1: quickly corrected by you know, people smarter than me where
Speaker 1: when they said, well, if you spend all day thinking
Speaker 1: about how good or how bad you are, you're self centered.
Speaker 1: So sorry, you qualify. So again, it's like where you
Speaker 1: direct your time is the thing that's going to grow
Speaker 1: and it can either be something good for us or
Speaker 1: less good. Yeah, I love that what you just said
Speaker 1: about self centeredness. I had the exact same thing sort
Speaker 1: of happened to me. And I remember this clearly in
Speaker 1: Early Recovery the first time, and I read that part
Speaker 1: in the Big book that said selfishness, self centeredness, that
Speaker 1: was the of our problem. And when I really got that,
Speaker 1: it was like this big light went on for me because,
Speaker 1: similar to you, I didn't think I was self centered
Speaker 1: because I didn't think so highly of myself. But I
Speaker 1: thought of myself all the time. I was the only
Speaker 1: thing I largely thought about how am I feeling? And
Speaker 1: that was such a big revelation for me. It sounds
Speaker 1: like it was for you also. Yeah, it's interesting, right,
Speaker 1: because what we learned is is that if the problem
Speaker 1: doesn't lie with us, then there can be no solution
Speaker 1: because we only can control ourselves. So it's almost as
Speaker 1: though we were onto something thinking about us, because it
Speaker 1: really does only have to do with us at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, as far as what we can
Speaker 1: control and how we can adjust our perception and our
Speaker 1: actions and our reactions or lack thereof. But inevitably, you know,
Speaker 1: I have found. My biggest reprieves, My biggest moments of
Speaker 1: like oh, taking a deep breath and not feeling completely
Speaker 1: weighed down by the world is when I'm indeed thinking
Speaker 1: of other people unfortunately. Yeah, yeah, totally. It's funny you
Speaker 1: just said, They're like, we sort of had it right
Speaker 1: in thinking about ourselves because we were looking for a
Speaker 1: solution sort of inside ourselves. It makes me think of
Speaker 1: another area I think about with my time and addiction,
Speaker 1: something I sort of had right and also had completely
Speaker 1: wrong at the same time, which was this idea that
Speaker 1: we should live for the moment, right like that now
Speaker 1: is what matters, you know, And there's a deep spiritual
Speaker 1: and philosophical truth in that. And I lived that way
Speaker 1: to a certain extent in my drug using days. But
Speaker 1: I had it sort of all completely wrong, even though
Speaker 1: the kernel of the idea was sort of there. That's right. No,
Speaker 1: I think you're right. And just like how any asset
Speaker 1: in excess can become a defect, right, it's just the
Speaker 1: nature of these things that, to your point, at their root,
Speaker 1: a lot of these, you know, and it talks about
Speaker 1: this in sort of a literature. It's like it's these
Speaker 1: base primal desire run riot. You know, we all need shelter,
Speaker 1: we all want to approcreate, we all need food, we
Speaker 1: all need a certain level of security. But I needed
Speaker 1: in such excess that it presents an issue. Yep, yep.
Speaker 1: So I want to for listeners who don't know much
Speaker 1: about who you are, paint a quick picture of you
Speaker 1: and who you are and what your life is, just
Speaker 1: so that it informs the rest of this conversation. So
Speaker 1: I'm going to do a very crude summary, and then
Speaker 1: you can correct anything that I say that you don't love.
Speaker 1: But in essence, you were a star on a Nickelodeon show,
Speaker 1: Drake and Josh, which my kids watched, by the way,
Speaker 1: as you and I talked about, and so you were
Speaker 1: a child actor, child star, and then you've gone on
Speaker 1: to act in some other ways, and then you've also
Speaker 1: become pretty big on social media, YouTube and Instagram and
Speaker 1: different things, and so that's generally been the arc of
Speaker 1: your professional life. And what you've done. Was that safe
Speaker 1: to say? I know it was a vast summary it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm just an actor. I did a show called Drake
Speaker 1: and Josh when I was a kid. You know, I
Speaker 1: don't know like terms of child star and things like this.
Speaker 1: I think that's like weirdly, like it has like a
Speaker 1: negative tone to it. So I just kind of say, like,
Speaker 1: I was an actor and then I've been acting for
Speaker 1: the last twenty years, and I'm on a show called
Speaker 1: How I Met Your Father now, and have this small
Speaker 1: part of the new Christopher Nolan movie called Oppenheimer coming out,
Speaker 1: and oh this movie thirteen actually the musical for Netflix
Speaker 1: coming out August twelve, which so I imagine that might
Speaker 1: be around when this comes out. Ish so happy to
Speaker 1: plug that. But yeah, I'm just an actor and I've
Speaker 1: been doing it since I was ten, and so I
Speaker 1: guess I got into it a little earlier than other people.
Speaker 1: And I also do social media and digital content, and
Speaker 1: I have a podcast, Male Models, and I guess a book. Now. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what you just said about acting now, I want to
Speaker 1: dive in there for a second, because late in the book,
Speaker 1: you were sort of going through a phase where the
Speaker 1: work you were doing in social media was going very
Speaker 1: very well, but your acting career you weren't finding much work,
Speaker 1: and at one point you made the decision to sort of,
Speaker 1: instead of being frustrated by that, let that go and
Speaker 1: now it sounds like you are acting more again. Did
Speaker 1: the letting go of it to some extent actually, you
Speaker 1: think help you become a better actor and then get
Speaker 1: re engaged in newer roles. Well, I think the letting
Speaker 1: go as a result of a lot of work that
Speaker 1: I had to do to be able to let go
Speaker 1: in that respect, right, because like letting go and I
Speaker 1: talked about in the book was kind of like a
Speaker 1: bumper sticker, right, Like we've we've heard that before in
Speaker 1: all facets of life. Once you stop carrying is when
Speaker 1: it all comes to you and you know, let go
Speaker 1: and let God And it sounds good, But how do
Speaker 1: you get there? You know? I had to let go
Speaker 1: of it from an ego point of view because I
Speaker 1: had worked for you know, the greater part of twenty years.
Speaker 1: The time which you're referencing was like a two plus
Speaker 1: year sort of dry spurt where my ego was so
Speaker 1: damaged by this idea of like, oh God, like a
Speaker 1: reckoning needed to happen because the data suggested that I
Speaker 1: would have kept working, but I had to be okay
Speaker 1: with if I didn't. It was sort of like the
Speaker 1: universe conspiring to be like whether you work or not.
Speaker 1: From this moment on, you gotta be okay just being you.
Speaker 1: And so the only way you're going to be forced
Speaker 1: to do this work, because for me, pain is a
Speaker 1: great motivator, is if we remove this thing that feature ego.
Speaker 1: You know, we're gonna have to remove this thing that
Speaker 1: allows you to kind of circumvent the work and put
Speaker 1: a pause on really looking at yourself. So during those
Speaker 1: two plus years where to your point, like I was
Speaker 1: really lucky to be doing well in social media, but
Speaker 1: you know, in my traditional career, I wasn't working as much.
Speaker 1: I was forced to be like, is this my identity
Speaker 1: or is my identity that I'm a good man, I'm
Speaker 1: trying to be a good father. I'm a so a
Speaker 1: guy trying to be a good friend and a good son.
Speaker 1: And that will remain true whether I'm the biggest star
Speaker 1: in the world or just continue on to be like
Speaker 1: this journeyman actor who goes from part to part. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I love what you're saying. They're about letting go. It's
Speaker 1: such a cliche. It's ultimately very true, like learning to
Speaker 1: let go is an enormously helpful skill, but it is
Speaker 1: not as easy as it used to be. I remember
Speaker 1: early on in in sobriety people saying like, well, you
Speaker 1: just gotta let go, And I was like, if I
Speaker 1: knew how, I would like, I recognize the wisdom in that,
Speaker 1: But try as I might, like, I'm doing what I
Speaker 1: think is letting go, but this thing isn't going. It's
Speaker 1: still right here. And there's an author her name is
Speaker 1: Sue monk Kid, and she's a fiction author, but she
Speaker 1: has a line somewhere that says, you know, letting go
Speaker 1: is this spiraling, winding process, you know. And I love
Speaker 1: that description of it, that letting go is something that
Speaker 1: happens over time. It's not we just set our will
Speaker 1: and let something go if it's important to us. It's
Speaker 1: not that easy. Yeah. I think it's addition through subtraction.
Speaker 1: And for most of my life I thought I had
Speaker 1: to add all these like really pretty ornaments to my
Speaker 1: soul to make me more attractive to people. But in
Speaker 1: a weird way, it was like stripping away, getting back
Speaker 1: to the real meme and removing the sub trifuge that
Speaker 1: I had picked up along the way to sort of
Speaker 1: either as a defense mechanism to protect me or just
Speaker 1: to look like more attractive to my employer or the
Speaker 1: opposite sex or whomever. So let's start kind of back
Speaker 1: in the beginning. Early in the book, you say that
Speaker 1: food was a menacing force to the pecks. So food
Speaker 1: was a problem in your family. Talk to me about
Speaker 1: you know, we might say food being your first addiction.
Speaker 1: You want to share a little bit about the early
Speaker 1: days with that. Well, I have a son and he's three,
Speaker 1: and so I already see the way in what societal
Speaker 1: sort of norms are that you know, I've already fallen
Speaker 1: victim to making food a celebration him. For my son,
Speaker 1: it makes him feel better. It's the thing that we
Speaker 1: do when you know, you go to a birthday party,
Speaker 1: or if he behaves correctly, then he'll earn a treat.
Speaker 1: And I'm like, oh, God, Like here I am falling
Speaker 1: victim to all the things that I think had a
Speaker 1: hand in the reason why I was what I was
Speaker 1: at that age. But of course we know most kids
Speaker 1: are like my son, and that they get birthday cake
Speaker 1: at birthdays, and that eating a treat is an exciting
Speaker 1: thing or popcorn at the movies. But for a good
Speaker 1: portion of people, they just sort of go out of
Speaker 1: it and they develop a healthy relationship with food. I
Speaker 1: was not that way. I had a pretty unhealthy relationship
Speaker 1: with food from the beginning. And I overdid it. And
Speaker 1: I would sneak in your snack closet if I came
Speaker 1: over for a plate, and I was rummaging through your drawers,
Speaker 1: and I was kind of having my own little private
Speaker 1: party overdoing it. You know. I didn't eat chocolate like
Speaker 1: my fellows. And I could see with my mom that
Speaker 1: she was too having a similar experience with food, but
Speaker 1: she was older and it was wayne on her, so
Speaker 1: I kind of knew. Yeah, everybody talked about food growing up,
Speaker 1: everybody talked about food. I don't know whether it was
Speaker 1: being Jewish or from the East Coast or what, but
Speaker 1: everything was like around what are we eating now? What
Speaker 1: are we going to eat later? And what are we
Speaker 1: eating tomorrow? And growing up like my uncle I remember,
Speaker 1: who was in like always been in like fairly good shape.
Speaker 1: Like the obsession became like, well how do I eat
Speaker 1: and stay in good shape? You know, and like and
Speaker 1: then that was the part of it. Whereas like my
Speaker 1: mom and I were on the heavier side, you know,
Speaker 1: then like there were people in my family who were
Speaker 1: in great shape. But that was the obsession, right, So
Speaker 1: it was just kind of different sides of the coin.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure how you would say this. Would you
Speaker 1: say that you were overweight in those years? Society is
Speaker 1: changing and how we talk about these things. So I
Speaker 1: want to be sensitive. I appreciate it. No, it's very fat, okay, okay.
Speaker 1: And you were really sort of obsessed with that at
Speaker 1: the same time, right you You talk in the book
Speaker 1: about you know this idea, you know, once I lose weight,
Speaker 1: once I lose weight, once I lose weight at being
Speaker 1: sort of this great obsession. Yeah, I hated being overweight.
Speaker 1: And to your point, I don't mean to be insensitive,
Speaker 1: because there were people at my age even then in
Speaker 1: the nineties kind of pre body positivity, of people who
Speaker 1: were totally comfortable and happy being overweight and unencumbered by it,
Speaker 1: and guys who would like whip their shirts off and
Speaker 1: jump in the pool and have a belly like I
Speaker 1: did but didn't think twice, whereas I was like busy
Speaker 1: putting on my second like turtleneck before I got in
Speaker 1: the pool, and I think it totally existed. I just
Speaker 1: happened to be very affected by it, and in a
Speaker 1: weight can be a manifest station of many things. In
Speaker 1: its best form, it can be a manifestation of someone
Speaker 1: who lives well and enjoys eating and dining and experiencing things,
Speaker 1: and for them that's all it is. But for me,
Speaker 1: it was a manifestation of a desire in which to
Speaker 1: overdo things, to kind of numb out, to not feel,
Speaker 1: to not think, and so it was a source of
Speaker 1: pain for me. It's funny, it's not still this way
Speaker 1: for me. But when I was a kid, my problem
Speaker 1: was I was so skinny I could not put on weight.
Speaker 1: But I was the same way and that I would
Speaker 1: not want to take my shirt off at the pool
Speaker 1: because I thought I was too skinny. So I guess,
Speaker 1: you know, we're so concerned with how someone else is
Speaker 1: going to view us. And by the way, like my
Speaker 1: wife comes from this family of athletes, of people who
Speaker 1: in theory have like a very you know, picture perfect
Speaker 1: type genetic makeup, and like I see insecurities with them
Speaker 1: all the time, and you know, there's a part of
Speaker 1: me that wants to make light like I'm sure people
Speaker 1: did when you were young and being thin, like make
Speaker 1: light of their struggle and say like, oh, give me
Speaker 1: a break like, oh, you don't like your elbows like,
Speaker 1: you know, try being a hundred pounds overweight, you know.
Speaker 1: But it's like to your point, I think most people
Speaker 1: have something that it makes them thoroughly uncomfortable about the
Speaker 1: way they look. Yeah, And so you went from food
Speaker 1: being sort of your primary way that you coped with
Speaker 1: life to drugs and alcohol being the way you did.
Speaker 1: And I wanted to just read a little bit that
Speaker 1: you wrote about that, because there's some some great lines
Speaker 1: in here that I loved. You basically say, someone once
Speaker 1: asked me what it felt like to be addicted to drugs,
Speaker 1: and this is how I described it. Imagine you've spent
Speaker 1: your entire life trying to listen to a radio station,
Speaker 1: but every time you tuned in there with static, you
Speaker 1: were certain you were on the right frequency, but the
Speaker 1: signal was never very strong. And then one day you
Speaker 1: accidentally bumped the knob and suddenly all the auditory goodness
Speaker 1: you've been waiting for to hear your entire life fills
Speaker 1: your ears in surround sound. You've been on the wrong wavelength,
Speaker 1: but not anymore. That's what drugs felt like me. I
Speaker 1: wasn't tuning out. I was tuning in. I just I
Speaker 1: love that description of it. It's one of the better
Speaker 1: descriptions I've heard, and it mirrors my experience completely. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thank you, And you know, I naturally, once I got older,
Speaker 1: I lost Swede and I was the same head in
Speaker 1: a new body. I found, you know, drugs and alcohol,
Speaker 1: and it was very efficacious without the same calorie content.
Speaker 1: So it seemed like like a clear winner. But inevitably, Yeah,
Speaker 1: to your point. I mean, look, I say in the book,
Speaker 1: like if when you do drugs and alcohol, the effect
Speaker 1: it has on you is that you begin to confuse
Speaker 1: being high with being alive, because throughout most of your
Speaker 1: life you're walking around so in your head, so self centered,
Speaker 1: so worried about what other people think, so sensitive and
Speaker 1: analytical to the world around you, and kind of that
Speaker 1: snort or that smoke or that whatever gives you a
Speaker 1: moment of quiet. I think it's no wonder why you know,
Speaker 1: someone like me, or not to speak for you, someone
Speaker 1: like you or whoever, why anyone would be like, oh,
Speaker 1: why would ever want to feel any other way? Yep? Yeah,
Speaker 1: that idea of I wasn't tuning out, I was tuning
Speaker 1: in really speaks to me. So much because I just
Speaker 1: felt like that's what it was at first. You know,
Speaker 1: it was drinking for me. It made me feel like
Speaker 1: connected to the world in a way I never normally did.
Speaker 1: In a way it was an escape from the way
Speaker 1: I felt, but it wasn't an attempt to escape from
Speaker 1: the world. That actually allowed me to engage with the
Speaker 1: world in a more meaningful way than I'd ever been
Speaker 1: able to up to that point. Yeah, it just has
Speaker 1: diminishing returns. It works so well and then it just doesn't,
Speaker 1: and then the wreckage that it leaves in its path
Speaker 1: becomes not worth it, yep. And so you lose a
Speaker 1: bunch of weight and you're still not happy. So you
Speaker 1: go through food, but it has diminishing returns, becomes a problem.
Speaker 1: You know. I was twenty one years old and had
Speaker 1: lost all this weight, and I remember I was starting
Speaker 1: in this movie that I was extremely proud of, called
Speaker 1: The Wackness with Sir Ben Kingsley, who's my favorite apt
Speaker 1: during I remember at sixteen doing Drake and Josh and
Speaker 1: being overweight and just feeling like I just want to
Speaker 1: be an actor. I don't even want to be remarkable.
Speaker 1: I just don't want to only be the funny fact guy.
Speaker 1: I don't mind it, but I would love to be
Speaker 1: considered just like a proper actor who can like transform
Speaker 1: into different roles and not just be like one thing only.
Speaker 1: And so you know, I finished the show at nineteen,
Speaker 1: and I'm well into my addiction. But I booked this
Speaker 1: movie because I've been working on my acting, which I've
Speaker 1: done to the last, you know, fifteen years in class
Speaker 1: and studying, because I'm just a theater nerd at heart.
Speaker 1: And night I love it and I wind up wreaking
Speaker 1: this great part and I dreamt of going to Sundance
Speaker 1: because I've been there at sixteen because I had this
Speaker 1: other small part in the movie and just dreamed of
Speaker 1: like one day I'll be here and I'll be in
Speaker 1: a movie that I'm proud of and it will be
Speaker 1: so great. So I'm twenty one, I'm there the movie
Speaker 1: screens for fift people in Quentin Tarantino is in the crowd,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, oh my God, like this is happening,
Speaker 1: like I will this, I will this in the being
Speaker 1: and then I remember the credits role. My manager whispers
Speaker 1: to me and goes there standing and I turned around
Speaker 1: in this it was like people were telling me, I
Speaker 1: was okay, Like you're okay, Josh, You're You're gonna be okay,
Speaker 1: You're worth while. And I go home that night, and
Speaker 1: I woke up the next morning and I think what
Speaker 1: I believed in my head that I was going to
Speaker 1: go to bed and wake up and I was going
Speaker 1: to be a new man, that the old Josh would
Speaker 1: be gone. I had lost the weight, I had gotten
Speaker 1: that career moment, and I just felt like, if there
Speaker 1: was ever a finish line, this must be it, right
Speaker 1: and it wasn't. And I woke up the next morning
Speaker 1: with that same shitty committee in my head that woke
Speaker 1: up a few minutes before I did that would tell
Speaker 1: me all the reasons why I wasn't enough. And I
Speaker 1: got sober two weeks after that because it confirmed my
Speaker 1: worst suspicion that I had had throughout most of my life,
Speaker 1: which was that I was bottomless and that nothing outside
Speaker 1: of me be at a six pack, which I didn't have,
Speaker 1: but I was working on or you know, being in
Speaker 1: this movie, this career prestige or what have you. It
Speaker 1: didn't matter, and there was nothing of the outside world
Speaker 1: that was going to fix the inner meet and of
Speaker 1: course I tried drugs, alcohol, and food and that didn't
Speaker 1: help either. So, you know, I walked into a twelve
Speaker 1: Step meeting because I had been going to them my
Speaker 1: whole life because my mom was in twelve Step and
Speaker 1: I would just sit there on my game boy until
Speaker 1: I was old enough to stay home alone, like kind
Speaker 1: of hearing what was going on, but really tuned out.
Speaker 1: But eventually the seed that was planted was when I
Speaker 1: was twenty one and I was like, finally convinced that
Speaker 1: my way wasn't working anymore. I was like, well, I
Speaker 1: do know of this one place and it seems to
Speaker 1: have an effect on people, and that's where I went,
Speaker 1: and I, you know, knock would have been sober ever
Speaker 1: since you described when you said that your mom used
Speaker 1: to go. You said that you knew the serenity prayer
Speaker 1: before you knew algebra, which I think is funny. In
Speaker 1: speaking of your mom, You've got another analogy in here
Speaker 1: which I love. And you're talking about how hard it
Speaker 1: is to be around an addict, you know, and you
Speaker 1: say that person has to sit there and except being
Speaker 1: radiated while the addict becomes nuclear And what a great,
Speaker 1: great analogy for what that's like, you know, even though
Speaker 1: it's the addict who's ultimately suffering the most destruction, boy,
Speaker 1: everybody around him get sick. Oh yeah, I mean that's
Speaker 1: a great lie that any alcoholic who tell themselves, and
Speaker 1: you just have to watch intervention to know that it's
Speaker 1: true that we rationalize and believe that we're the only
Speaker 1: ones being hurt. You know, that we're only hurting ourselves.
Speaker 1: And you know, this is why other programs exist for
Speaker 1: the family and friends of alcoholics, because it can affect
Speaker 1: people in a really deep way, and it really takes
Speaker 1: a lot of guts and a lot of work to
Speaker 1: walk away from, you know, people that are as close
Speaker 1: as it gets, you know, children, parents, siblings, to you know,
Speaker 1: a spouse, to be able to walk away and say
Speaker 1: like I can't do anything for you, and me sticking
Speaker 1: around is actually enabling you. And I'll be here if
Speaker 1: you want to get help and do the work, but
Speaker 1: until then, like I can't be around you. Like that
Speaker 1: is a huge order for most people. And so yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's you know, that's so true, and I
Speaker 1: see it now even in my daily life as far
Speaker 1: as just like you know, especially in the family unit,
Speaker 1: like if one person is suffering. We're all suffering to
Speaker 1: a certain extent. Tell me about what it was like
Speaker 1: for you arriving into twelve Step meetings and recovery. What
Speaker 1: was that initial experience like for you? You know, if
Speaker 1: you think about the way we started with this sort
Speaker 1: of like didactic parable, right, and that it's you know,
Speaker 1: you know you need this wildly successful podcast after it,
Speaker 1: so obviously it resonated with you. And what it is
Speaker 1: is it's putting into words what we know is sort
Speaker 1: of like some ancient truth and to me, religion or
Speaker 1: spirituality or self help, like it's just repurposing ancient truths,
Speaker 1: like things that we have always known over time to
Speaker 1: be true and really good. And for me, twelve Step
Speaker 1: the brilliance of it was the packaging, the way that
Speaker 1: it packaged ancient truths to a guy like me, you know,
Speaker 1: a knuckle had like me, where I could hear it
Speaker 1: and hear other people talking about their experience and go, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm not alone anymore. I'm part of Because I think
Speaker 1: that's something that you know, our brain in its worst place,
Speaker 1: wants us alone. It wants us to feel unique, it
Speaker 1: wants us to feel like the world doesn't get it
Speaker 1: that if you had my head on your shoulders, you
Speaker 1: do the same thing. But you don't, so you'll never
Speaker 1: get it. And the reality is when I walked into
Speaker 1: those meetings, like I heard people telling my story and
Speaker 1: people who drank and used and you know, treated people
Speaker 1: and felt the way that I did. But they weren't
Speaker 1: a glum lot. They weren't walking around shattered. They were
Speaker 1: like these wonderful members of society. And they were like
Speaker 1: cracking up and laughing at these things that most of
Speaker 1: society would have like, you know, cast their eyes downward
Speaker 1: at and felt uncomfortable as you were sharing them. So
Speaker 1: suddenly I wasn't alone in this thing, and it seemed
Speaker 1: possible to have a full life while feeling all these
Speaker 1: things like that there was a solution. Yeah, you have
Speaker 1: a line that you said was a quote from a
Speaker 1: sober friend who said that the people in recovery didn't
Speaker 1: tell me what was wrong with me. You told me
Speaker 1: what was wrong with you, and I identified And I
Speaker 1: love that because as an addict or an alcoholic, you've
Speaker 1: been told plenty of times what's wrong with you. You
Speaker 1: kind of know on some extent, but when you get
Speaker 1: to recovery. You know, people are sharing what it's like
Speaker 1: for them and we're able to identify. Yeah, it's the
Speaker 1: magic and need to knowing that someone else has walked
Speaker 1: through what you're going through and that they've been able
Speaker 1: to do it with grace and you know, in a
Speaker 1: respectable way, talk to me about fifteen years in. You know,
Speaker 1: in what ways is your recovery program similar to what
Speaker 1: it was fifteen years ago? In what ways is it different?
Speaker 1: And also maybe what having a child has done also
Speaker 1: for your recovery one way or the other. I think,
Speaker 1: you know, what it reaffirms is I get a little
Speaker 1: bit more time under my belt or two things. One
Speaker 1: it's only more of the basics. It's only doubling down
Speaker 1: on the foundation of things. And then two it's it's
Speaker 1: peeling the onion. You know, more will be revealed. And
Speaker 1: there are things now that I deal with that you know,
Speaker 1: with a little bit of time sober at fourteen years
Speaker 1: and in no way could I have ever looked at
Speaker 1: in six months or one year or eighteen months. And
Speaker 1: you know, I don't like playing the time game because
Speaker 1: there are certainly guys who have thirty plus years of
Speaker 1: sobriety that are fats smoked two packs a day and divorced,
Speaker 1: and I don't want what they have, and they're always right,
Speaker 1: and I just straight up don't want what they have.
Speaker 1: And there are people who like come in with six
Speaker 1: months that are on fire and like literal spiritual beings
Speaker 1: walking around and you know, are like in it and
Speaker 1: doing for people and have commitments and are putting their
Speaker 1: hand out and helping. You know, a bunch of people
Speaker 1: in can feel like so inspired by them. But what
Speaker 1: I will say the benefit of having time and not
Speaker 1: going in and out is that you do to me
Speaker 1: this deep work that comes with continuing to peel the
Speaker 1: onion and continuing to you know, face things head on
Speaker 1: as they reveal themselves to you of the human condition
Speaker 1: and of past traumas and things you've walked through. And
Speaker 1: I'm dealing with it. Recently, if I was on the
Speaker 1: show with John SteamOS called Grandfathered and it was great
Speaker 1: and we did a season on Fox and it and
Speaker 1: it got canceled. Or recently I was on the show
Speaker 1: Turner and Hooch and on Disney Plus and we were
Speaker 1: so proud of it and it was this fabulous experience
Speaker 1: and it only went one season, and you know, I've
Speaker 1: recently been dealing with this idea of like, is it
Speaker 1: possible to enjoy these things fully without being the cynic
Speaker 1: without protection? Right? And it doesn't mean that you go
Speaker 1: spend all the money or you act irrationally, but like,
Speaker 1: I find that I'm still guarded after all this time.
Speaker 1: I'm a little kid in certain ways, and I don't
Speaker 1: want to totally enjoy it because I know that the
Speaker 1: data suggests there's a good chance it won't work out.
Speaker 1: And what I want to see, hopefully, or what I'm
Speaker 1: going to work on, is like can I enjoy things
Speaker 1: fully and give my little heart over to these things
Speaker 1: and be in it and be present knowing that, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a chance it won't work out, and even if
Speaker 1: I experience this holy I'll still be able to keep
Speaker 1: moving forward if it doesn't work out. And I don't
Speaker 1: think I had those thoughts when I was two years sober.
Speaker 1: I think I was more worried about like letting go
Speaker 1: of the road rage and making sure, you know, women
Speaker 1: weren't mad at me because you know, I just wanted
Speaker 1: a casually date and they wanted a boyfriend. I definitely
Speaker 1: think that there's a lot to what you're saying, at
Speaker 1: least for me, that the sort of things that bother
Speaker 1: me about the way I act in the way I
Speaker 1: behave would have seemed completely insignificant to me at two
Speaker 1: years sober, you know. I mean I would have been like,
Speaker 1: what so, what so you do that? Who cared? Like?
Speaker 1: I mean, everybody doesn't, you know. I've heard some people say,
Speaker 1: you know, the road gets narrower, and I don't like
Speaker 1: that analogy in a lot of ways, But in this way,
Speaker 1: I think, at least for me, is the road has
Speaker 1: gotten narrower as I've cleaned up some of the more
Speaker 1: gross misbehaviors and gross ways of thinking. Um, I don't
Speaker 1: mean gross and disgusting, I mean like net and gross.
Speaker 1: As I've gotten rid of some of those, I've been
Speaker 1: able to get to your point clearer and clearer on
Speaker 1: really sort of what you're talking about here and what
Speaker 1: ways is my ego and my fear continuing to get
Speaker 1: in my way? And I love what you're just saying
Speaker 1: about being able to give ourselves to things wholeheartedly and
Speaker 1: then be able to let go of the outcome to
Speaker 1: some degree, you know, And for me it's been a
Speaker 1: lot more clarity on Okay, how do I focus my
Speaker 1: energy and my effort on what I do? And it's
Speaker 1: kind of back to what you learned before algebra, the
Speaker 1: serenity prayer, right, Like, Okay, I can control how much
Speaker 1: effort and how much work I put into this show
Speaker 1: and how much I care and all that, I can't
Speaker 1: control what happens after my part's done. Yeah, what a
Speaker 1: journey that is. It's I think it's something that we
Speaker 1: can ideally work on every day. And it sounds good.
Speaker 1: That sounds like the goal. Yeah, to your point, I'm
Speaker 1: working on that because the little kid in me, the
Speaker 1: disappointed little boy, you know, wants to insulate myself from
Speaker 1: pain and I want to protect myself. I want to
Speaker 1: fortify myself. I will never feel this way again. I'll
Speaker 1: never allow myself to feel this way again. I never
Speaker 1: want to be duped. I never want to be discouraged.
Speaker 1: And you know, I was listening to Malcolm Gladwell talk
Speaker 1: earlier about how like, you know, the reason why we
Speaker 1: have so much success is a society and as human
Speaker 1: beings is is because we're so trusting. Like if you
Speaker 1: look at animals in the animal kingdom, right, like they
Speaker 1: pretty much like they get any whiff of trouble, they're
Speaker 1: out gone. And like that wouldn't actually lend itself to
Speaker 1: good business dealings, and like because the moment anything felt
Speaker 1: remotely uncomfortable, everyone would head for the hills. But we're
Speaker 1: naturally a trusting people because we are hoping for the best.
Speaker 1: It's part of us. And so yeah, to me, it's like,
Speaker 1: I'm thirty five now and I've you know, been lucky
Speaker 1: enough to like have these great sort of moments every
Speaker 1: couple of years of work and doing these new shows.
Speaker 1: And if that's going to continue, it's like, well, can
Speaker 1: I just enjoy it for what it is, you know,
Speaker 1: with a contingency on only if it goes five seasons
Speaker 1: or only if it's this, or only if it hits
Speaker 1: this marker, then I'll enjoy it. Yeah, it was struck
Speaker 1: by that in the book, this idea, and I think
Speaker 1: this is a human condition thing. I don't think there's
Speaker 1: an alcoholic thing. I think this is a human condition thing,
Speaker 1: which is I'll be happy when I'll be happy when
Speaker 1: I lose the weight, I'll be happy when the fame comes,
Speaker 1: I'll be happy when I have X amount of money,
Speaker 1: I'll be happy when and that game just continues to
Speaker 1: play out until we start to look at it. And
Speaker 1: in the book you talk about having to be willing
Speaker 1: to let go of the positive things in life, you know,
Speaker 1: being willing to say, okay, it's okay if that goes. Also,
Speaker 1: I heard a woman say at a meeting once that
Speaker 1: you are the fish you're trying to catch. You're the
Speaker 1: love of your life. You're everything you've been searching for.
Speaker 1: And that's the good and the bad news. She said,
Speaker 1: If you're really trying to become happy, what are you
Speaker 1: willing to let go of that stands between you and happiness?
Speaker 1: Because the glaring sort of defects are clear, right, we
Speaker 1: all want to let go of our anger, Like I
Speaker 1: don't know, there's a lot of people who are like
Speaker 1: I really want to hold onto my rage. Most people
Speaker 1: don't want to be getting out of their car on
Speaker 1: the four oh five with a bat, you know. Most
Speaker 1: people don't want to be stealing or incredibly slothful and lazy.
Speaker 1: Like those are very clear things that it's like, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: if I could work on that, I'd love to lose that.
Speaker 1: But then there are these like surreptitious things. They're these
Speaker 1: like underlying things that are really hard to pick up on,
Speaker 1: and some of them are deeply rooted in like my identity.
Speaker 1: So in that respect, it's like, can you let go
Speaker 1: of that relationship that you think to find you? Can
Speaker 1: you let go of that you know, job that you
Speaker 1: think you can't live without? And it doesn't mean like
Speaker 1: that you go and clean house of all the things
Speaker 1: that are good in your life too, but like for
Speaker 1: someone like me, it means you might have to go
Speaker 1: through a period where you're not getting that ego fulfillment
Speaker 1: and that validation to know that you can be okay
Speaker 1: without it. Yeah, it's amazing sort of how we do
Speaker 1: put conditions on happiness. You know, I'll be happy if
Speaker 1: I get X, if I get why, and that just
Speaker 1: doesn't turn out to be true. I think what's so
Speaker 1: hard about that is that, sort of like drugs and alcohol,
Speaker 1: those things work for a little while. It was like,
Speaker 1: if getting ego fulfillment didn't work at all, it would
Speaker 1: be easy to see through it. It would be easy
Speaker 1: to be like, that's not ultimately going to make me happy,
Speaker 1: but it does work for a little while. If getting
Speaker 1: a new car didn't make me feel better for two weeks.
Speaker 1: It would be easy to be like, well, who cares.
Speaker 1: But it does work for a little while, in the
Speaker 1: same way that drugs and alcohol worked for a little while.
Speaker 1: But it's sort of seen through the whole thing and going, oh,
Speaker 1: when I start putting all these conditions on my happiness,
Speaker 1: I'm limiting the ways it can show up for me,
Speaker 1: and I'm blocking it from coming in other avenues. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I heard it said once. You know, my ego needs
Speaker 1: a banquet every two hours, and my soul needs a cruton.
Speaker 1: You know, I've been looking for God and everything forever,
Speaker 1: and it was in getting her phone number, or getting
Speaker 1: that job, or even you know, a great looking shirt.
Speaker 1: You know that can be deliverance for a couple of minutes,
Speaker 1: but inevitably it's all fallen short. Yeah, let's talk about
Speaker 1: ego for a second, because in the book you talk
Speaker 1: for a little bit about this idea where you say
Speaker 1: that ego it's a funny thing. We need it in
Speaker 1: moments of extreme adversity, that vo race, that inner Joe
Speaker 1: Pesci can sometimes be the only thing that pushes you
Speaker 1: to get out of bed in the morning. And then
Speaker 1: you say, ego is what delivered me. It's also what
Speaker 1: totally screwed me. Yeah, I mean specifically, what I'm talking
Speaker 1: about is that during that time, my ego was the
Speaker 1: thing you know in that chapter I'm talking about sort
Speaker 1: of the duality of it, because when I was three
Speaker 1: hundred pounds, you know, playing the funny chubby guy on
Speaker 1: a kid's TV show, you know this idea that like
Speaker 1: I would make it as like an action star, you know,
Speaker 1: at a hundred eighty pounds, Like it's a nice goal,
Speaker 1: but it almost would seem you know, delusional, and yet
Speaker 1: my ego was like no, no, no, like we're gonna
Speaker 1: do it. Forget it, you know, f all that we're
Speaker 1: going to do it. And I was like, great, we'll
Speaker 1: just pass me the bread sticks and we'll formulate a
Speaker 1: play in tomorrow. And then inevitably I did do it,
Speaker 1: and I like lost weight, and I remember people would say, like,
Speaker 1: sure you want to do this, like as the funny
Speaker 1: big guy, you're one of three guys going out for roles,
Speaker 1: Like now you're gonna be going against like Jake jillenhal
Speaker 1: Not really, but you know what I mean, like proper
Speaker 1: like skinny actors that they're like, you know, thousands of
Speaker 1: are you sure, And again it was always in my
Speaker 1: brain of like, screw them, they don't get it, they
Speaker 1: don't get you. And then I get there and I was,
Speaker 1: you know, starring in this action movie, which of course
Speaker 1: I made, you know, the fact that I don't love
Speaker 1: my performance in it. You know, the movie is not
Speaker 1: The Godfather at the end of the day, Like I've
Speaker 1: also realized that twenty years later, almost that you know,
Speaker 1: I made this experience of not doing a good job
Speaker 1: in this movie allowed to sort of haunt me for
Speaker 1: over a decade, when in reality the movie was somewhat flawed,
Speaker 1: but inevitably it doesn't matter. I just remember showing up
Speaker 1: on that set going like we got here, and now
Speaker 1: I guess I should amend that. I didn't realize until
Speaker 1: after the movie was done that I wasn't ready for
Speaker 1: that part. I wasn't capable of doing it. I wasn't
Speaker 1: in the place to do that just as an actor,
Speaker 1: just emotionally, I couldn't do it. But my ego had
Speaker 1: gotten me to that moment, and it told me like,
Speaker 1: we'll just fake it till we make it, like we'll
Speaker 1: figure it out. But at that point, my ego had
Speaker 1: turned on me because I wasn't in survival mode anymore,
Speaker 1: and at that point I needed to do the work
Speaker 1: and I couldn't do it. Back to sort of what
Speaker 1: you said earlier, too little or too much of anything
Speaker 1: becomes problematic, right, you know, I mean, some degree of
Speaker 1: ego is what's needed as a human in the world,
Speaker 1: and too much of it will will absolutely make us
Speaker 1: miserable and destroy us. What you were just alluding to
Speaker 1: is um a section in the book where you are
Speaker 1: as you say, cast is sort of action hero in
Speaker 1: a movie, and that part of the problem there was
Speaker 1: you really tried to go in there and be somebody
Speaker 1: that you weren't, and then that caused you not to
Speaker 1: be who you were, which is what they brought you
Speaker 1: in to be you. And so it was sort of
Speaker 1: this thinking, I have to be somebody else in order
Speaker 1: to succeed here. Totally. That's been a theme throughout my
Speaker 1: whole life. If I'm only more masculine, if I'm better shape,
Speaker 1: if I'm a better I mean, I guess in theory
Speaker 1: it's good to want to be a better actor. But yeah,
Speaker 1: it's all these things. It's all this projection of instead
Speaker 1: of realizing like, unfortunately I'm limited by the skin on
Speaker 1: my face and the way my voice sounds like I
Speaker 1: am who I am, like people are buying it or not,
Speaker 1: so I can either be the best version of me
Speaker 1: or not do the role. My friend Brian Garretty is
Speaker 1: a great actor. You know, He's worked with Denzel Washington
Speaker 1: and Sean Penn and Julie Roberts and we're just brilliant,
Speaker 1: brilliant people. And he always said, you know, when I
Speaker 1: get a script and I'm working on a role, I
Speaker 1: have questions, usually for the director, and there are things
Speaker 1: that I need to understand or work on, and things
Speaker 1: that I might feel like neat improvement. And I try
Speaker 1: to do that with the director, and if we can't
Speaker 1: make it better, then I want to give them enough
Speaker 1: time to recast. And I love that because it's this
Speaker 1: idea of like, if you've picked me, here's how I
Speaker 1: can give you the best version of what I think
Speaker 1: is the right thing, obvious, silly in concert with what
Speaker 1: you're thinking and servicing the writing, which we should all
Speaker 1: be doing. But if we realize that we are at
Speaker 1: an impast or we're viewing this differently, or your idea
Speaker 1: of who this character is is something that I just
Speaker 1: don't think I can live up to. Well, then perhaps
Speaker 1: it's better we part ways and you find someone that
Speaker 1: can do that. But normally, before this, before I had
Speaker 1: that level of security, I would have said, well, let
Speaker 1: me just bend myself into this kind of pretzel and
Speaker 1: maybe now you'll eat me. Yes. YEA makes me think about,
Speaker 1: certainly how I used to approach dating. Was I would,
Speaker 1: you know, meet somebody and be like, all right, I
Speaker 1: want them to like me, and here's who I think
Speaker 1: I need to be in order to achieve that, So
Speaker 1: I will bend myself kind of into that shape. That's
Speaker 1: a losing game no matter how you play it, because
Speaker 1: either A it doesn't work because they're like, well this
Speaker 1: person isn't authentic and I don't like them and you're
Speaker 1: you're out the door, or be it does work and
Speaker 1: they go, okay, yes, I like that version of you,
Speaker 1: And then of course I wasn't capable of can hinue
Speaker 1: to be that version of me? Then you're in a
Speaker 1: relationship that's really the wrong place to be because you
Speaker 1: didn't enter it authentically. And as I've gotten older and
Speaker 1: hopefully wiser, I've really realized, you know, taking that into
Speaker 1: all areas of life, like the more that I can
Speaker 1: just be myself all land in places that are the
Speaker 1: right place for me to be, and if and if
Speaker 1: I don't land there, it's probably not the right place.
Speaker 1: You know, it just doesn't work for me and them, right.
Speaker 1: It's exhausting trying to keep up a false sort of
Speaker 1: projection of yourself. Yeah, it surely is. So talk to
Speaker 1: me about the title of the book, Happy People are Annoying.
Speaker 1: What made you decide to make that the title of
Speaker 1: the book. I think the title actually, in hindsight, might
Speaker 1: have been I'm not sure how I feel about it,
Speaker 1: to be honest, I think it was kitchy and fun
Speaker 1: in the interests of writing a lighter book when I
Speaker 1: first started, and then I wrote, you know, there's a
Speaker 1: book you intend to write, and then there's a book
Speaker 1: that you write again in honoring sort of what I
Speaker 1: felt like I most to give to the world, or
Speaker 1: what I thought the best version of this book would be.
Speaker 1: It was kind of being raw and honest and sharing
Speaker 1: this story and hoping that perhaps people could feel like
Speaker 1: they got from my story a little bit of perspective
Speaker 1: or just like a feeling of like oh, I'm not
Speaker 1: alone in this, because it's been through people being willing
Speaker 1: to be vulnerable with me that I've gotten so much
Speaker 1: help through life. So I think it best you know.
Speaker 1: The title and the cover is kind of this fun
Speaker 1: beating switch of saying like, I know you think you
Speaker 1: grew up with me, and you think you know me,
Speaker 1: and that is a part of me, but it surely
Speaker 1: isn't the whole picture. And now you've bought this book
Speaker 1: because you thought it was one thing, and here's what
Speaker 1: it really is. Got it. So at the end, though,
Speaker 1: you do have some reflections on happiness that I think
Speaker 1: are really important, and you say this theme has come
Speaker 1: up several times in the book. You quote a friend
Speaker 1: who says too much sunshine brings about a das joy
Speaker 1: will come as quickly and as strongly as sadness will,
Speaker 1: and the psycho will repeat in a beautifully funked up
Speaker 1: ballet of ups and downs till the sun eats the
Speaker 1: earth and it's back. I think to that idea we've
Speaker 1: touched on a couple of times. Too little or too
Speaker 1: much of one thing, you know, whether it's what we
Speaker 1: actually get or what we try to get, causes us problems.
Speaker 1: I think that's so right on, which is probably why
Speaker 1: I wrote it. No, Like, no, I love the way
Speaker 1: you said it. Yeah, it's too much sun brings about
Speaker 1: a desert. I remember when I heard my buddies say
Speaker 1: that at a meeting, and I just was like, oh
Speaker 1: my god. I just have never understood why if something
Speaker 1: is great, it can't just last and stay. But that
Speaker 1: you know, a level of balance is required in all things. Again,
Speaker 1: it's lack of reaction. It's my unattachment. Like that's the
Speaker 1: best sort of campaign or not defense of but like
Speaker 1: sales pitch for meditation I've ever heard, which is that
Speaker 1: like it's becoming an observer of these transient emotions that
Speaker 1: will inevitably come in and out of our lives on
Speaker 1: a regular basis, good days and bad days, that it
Speaker 1: has to happen, and like the ability in which to
Speaker 1: observe it, and on a real Jedi level to not
Speaker 1: react to either and just be a sort of like
Speaker 1: a resting contentment. You know, there are a few days
Speaker 1: out of the year where I am in that place
Speaker 1: and I'm like, oh, this sure is nice. So I
Speaker 1: think I'm constantly working towards that. Yeah, yeah, me too,
Speaker 1: for sure. One of the things that attracted me to
Speaker 1: spirituality when I first was exposed to it was in
Speaker 1: high school and it was then Buddhism, But somewhere in
Speaker 1: there I got the idea that, like, there was a
Speaker 1: way to have some degree of being okay amongst the
Speaker 1: vicissitudes of life. You know. I think even at that age,
Speaker 1: I was like, well, you're gonna get good and you're
Speaker 1: gonna get bad. That doesn't seem to be any getting
Speaker 1: around that, okay, So how do you cope with that?
Speaker 1: I think has been something I've been interested in ever since.
Speaker 1: And I think it's partially what when I really got
Speaker 1: that line in the Big Book that we talked about about,
Speaker 1: you know, selfishness, self centeredness being the root of my problem?
Speaker 1: That root of my problem is I'm always going Am
Speaker 1: I happy? Am I happy? Am I happy? Enough? Am
Speaker 1: I am I? You know? Oh? I don't feel good
Speaker 1: at How could I feel better? That is what makes
Speaker 1: me miserable. And when I'm able to the extent that
Speaker 1: I can let go of that is the extent I
Speaker 1: seem to get some degree of peace. Yeah. I love
Speaker 1: when people, you know, in sobriety get a year sober,
Speaker 1: and basically they get kind of like a whack on
Speaker 1: the ass, going okay, great, now go help somebody else,
Speaker 1: like stop thinking about you like the first year, like
Speaker 1: smoke a pack of cigarettes every day if you have to,
Speaker 1: and eat a bunch of junk food and play like
Speaker 1: do whatever you gotta do, just like dry out, Like
Speaker 1: the only thing you have to do today is not
Speaker 1: drink or not use or whatever your thing is. But
Speaker 1: like the moment they get like any kind of long
Speaker 1: term sobriety into their belt, it's like, okay, now, the
Speaker 1: only way this actually works is if you're giving it
Speaker 1: away and like helping someone else. It's so annoying because
Speaker 1: sometimes I just want to play video games and smoke cigarettes,
Speaker 1: not the cigarettes part, but you get it therek totally.
Speaker 1: Is there anything else that you feel like we haven't
Speaker 1: covered that feels important from your book or going on
Speaker 1: in your mind these days that you're thinking about anything?
Speaker 1: You think? Yeah, No, I mean I think it's just
Speaker 1: been a great conversation. And I'm a fan of the
Speaker 1: pod and and so I just you know, I love chatting.
Speaker 1: I'm so glad we got to do this. Yeah, Celebrity
Speaker 1: books aren't usually something i'm a little reticent on. This
Speaker 1: one was really really good. I've loved it. I thought
Speaker 1: there was so much great stuff in it. So thank
Speaker 1: you so much for coming on. Oh, thank you, And
Speaker 1: I guess I just would love to give my podcast
Speaker 1: Male Models a plug. That's it, but thank you man.
Speaker 1: This has been great. If what you just heard was
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