Emotional Sobriety: The Next Step in Recovery

• Staying In

  Having returned from the second annual Recovery Reimagined conference in Dublin, Patrick reflects on the passing of a longtime sober friend who took his own life. Allen and Thom offer their own professional and personal experiences with suicide, depression and “anti-self”, which maximizes our life’s problems while minimizing the resources we have to deal with them.   To participate in Thom’s Inner Child Workshop on Saturday, June 21st @ 10am CST, email him here: [email protected]   Some of R.T. Castleberry’s poetry: https://mockingheartreview.com/archives/volume-5-issue-1/poems-to-start-the-decade/r-t-castleberry/   https://writingdisorder.com/r-t-castleberry-poetry-2/   The closing song “No Other Choice to Choose” is by Herman Kluge & Paul Boedeker from Society of Little Friends   From our last episode, Carl Erik Fisher’s Flourishing After Addiction podcast: https://pod.link/1581713114   Learn more about Joe C., Secular AA and Rebellion Dogs here: https://rebelliondogspublishing.com   Follow us on social media. Podcast Twitter: @EmSobrietyPod Instagram: thomrutledge2 Joe C. Twitter: @Rebellion_Dogs   Friendly Circle Berlin Workshop Group meets every Monday @ 7:30pm (Berlin), 6:30pm (Ireland & UK), 1:30pm EST, 10:30am PST Zoom Link:  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5505019905   Allen’s book, 12 Essential Insights for Emotional Sobriety: https://www.amazon.com/12-Essential-Insights-Emotional-Sobriety/dp/1955415129/   Join Allen & Thom at our Thursday night, 7pm PST Zoom meeting on Emotional Sobriety and the Steps (login information below):   https://zoom.us/j/330149513 Password: 375986   For our ongoing workshop video series on Emotional Sobriety and the 12 Steps, visit our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHEM2-kqLkfp3I4c0jy-X-g   Also, please join our “Emotional Sobriety and Recovery” FB Group at the following link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/120450976662519 We’d love to stay in touch in between meetings.   We appreciate feedback! Contact Patrick, our producer, at [email protected] for any questions or comments.

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  35:33
• Bright Sunshine in the Rat Park with Dr. Carl Erik Fisher

  Allen, Thom, and Patrick welcome addiction psychiatrist Carl Erik Fisher of Columbia University to discuss emotional sobriety. In the pursuit of “making sense of what happened to him” after his addiction hit a point of critical mass and he decided to seek help, Dr. Fisher wrote The Urge: Our History of Addiction and began regular episodes of the Flourishing After Addiction podcast to look for answers. How did we get here, how are we recovering, and how can we carry a message of education and hope?   Our relationship to community, to Self, and to our own self-esteem are dynamics which must evolve for us to find that “quiet place in bright sunshine” Bill mentions in his 1958 letter.   Learn more about Dr. Fisher on his website: https://www.carlerikfisher.com   His podcast, Flourishing After Addiction: https://pod.link/1581713114   Allen and Patrick will be in Dublin for the Recovery Reimagined conference next week, which can be attended virtually or in person: https://friendlycircleberlin.org/recovery-reimagined-2025   Learn more about Joe C., Secular AA and Rebellion Dogs here: https://rebelliondogspublishing.com/   Follow us on social media. Podcast Twitter: @EmSobrietyPod Instagram: thomrutledge2 Joe C. Twitter: @Rebellion_Dogs   Friendly Circle Berlin Workshop Group meets every Monday @ 7:30pm (Berlin), 6:30pm (Ireland & UK), 1:30pm EST, 10:30am PST Zoom Link:  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5505019905   Allen’s book, 12 Essential Insights for Emotional Sobriety: https://www.amazon.com/12-Essential-Insights-Emotional-Sobriety/dp/1955415129/   Join Allen & Thom at our Thursday night, 7pm PST Zoom meeting on Emotional Sobriety and the Steps (login information below):   https://zoom.us/j/330149513 Password: 375986   For our ongoing workshop video series on Emotional Sobriety and the 12 Steps, visit our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHEM2-kqLkfp3I4c0jy-X-g   Also, please join our “Emotional Sobriety and Recovery” FB Group at the following link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/120450976662519 We’d love to stay in touch in between meetings.   We appreciate feedback! Contact Patrick, our producer, at [email protected] for any questions or comments.

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  48:54
• Flowing with Becoming feat. Joe C.

  When we try to wrestle security from life, we often get pinned. Joe Chisholm offers us this:   Dee Hock (1929-2022) wrote:    “Life is not about control; it is not about getting; it is not about having or knowing. It is not even about being. Life is eternal, perpetual becoming, or it is nothing. Becoming is not a thing to be known, commanded, or controlled. It is a magnificent, mysterious odyssey to be experienced.”   Near the end of Twelve Essential Insights for Emotional Sobriety, it captures the same becoming (the journey) vs. the outcome (controlling):  "Emotional stability is achieved in our lives by becoming aware of our toxic beliefs and unenforceable rules, the ideas that make our emotional balance dependent on external conditions....  Once we become aware of these unenforceable rules, we must surrender them. We need to move toward an attitude of “I am okay even if this or that happens,” and away from the idea that “I am okay only if this happens or that happens.” This is emotional freedom. This freedom brings more stability to our canoe; we might even dance in it if we wish!"   Learn more about Joe C., Secular AA and Rebellion Dogs here: https://rebelliondogspublishing.com/   Patrick and Allen will be attending Friendly Circle Berlin's "Recovery Reimagined" event in Dublin, more info here: https://friendlycircleberlin.org/recovery-reimagined-2025   Upcoming events with Allen Berger: https://abphd.com/events/   Join an ongoing Zoom meeting wherein participants read Bill Schaberg’s 30 Things: Practical Advice for Living Well chapter-by-chapter here: 11.00am East Coast / 4.00pm U.K. ID: 875 319 1947 Password: 2GROWIN   Follow us on social media. Podcast Twitter: @EmSobrietyPod Instagram: thomrutledge2 Joe C. Twitter: @Rebellion_Dogs   Friendly Circle Berlin Workshop Group meets every Monday @ 7:30pm (Berlin), 6:30pm (Ireland & UK), 1:30pm EST, 10:30am PST Zoom Link:  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5505019905   Allen’s book, 12 Essential Insights for Emotional Sobriety: https://www.amazon.com/12-Essential-Insights-Emotional-Sobriety/dp/1955415129/   Join Allen & Thom at our Thursday night, 7pm PST Zoom meeting on Emotional Sobriety and the Steps (login information below):   https://zoom.us/j/330149513 Password: 375986   For our ongoing workshop video series on Emotional Sobriety and the 12 Steps, visit our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHEM2-kqLkfp3I4c0jy-X-g   Also, please join our “Emotional Sobriety and Recovery” FB Group at the following link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/120450976662519 We’d love to stay in touch in between meetings.  

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  30:16
• Inukshuk with Julia Heidmann

  Frequent collaborator and fellow recoverer Julia Heidmann stops by to talk about the role emotional sobriety has played in her relationships with others and herself.   From our friends in Canada:   “Inukshuk, pronounced (in-ook-shook), is a stone monument erected in the image of humans. One of its purposes was to serve as direction markers in the harsh and desolate Arctic. It was a tool of survival and a symbol of unselfish acts of the Inuit people.   The Inukshuk symbolizes co-operation, balance and unselfishness: the idea that teaching and group effect is greater than individual effort. Each stone is a separate entity, yet each supports and is supported by the one above and the one below it. No one piece is any more or any less important than the other.   Its strength lies in its unity. Its significance comes from its meaning as a whole. The Inukshuk reminds us of our interdependent responsibilities to invest our efforts today, to direct a better way for all of us tomorrow.”   Learn more about Joe C., Secular AA and Rebellion Dogs here: https://rebelliondogspublishing.com/   Upcoming events with Allen Berger: https://abphd.com/events/   Allen and Patrick will soon be visiting Dublin, for Friendly Circle Berlin's "Recovery Reimagined 2025", details below:   https://friendlycircleberlin.org/recovery-reimagined-2025    Follow us on social media. Podcast Twitter: @EmSobrietyPod Instagram: thomrutledge2 Joe C. Twitter: @Rebellion_Dogs   Friendly Circle Berlin Workshop Group meets every Monday @ 7:30pm (Berlin), 6:30pm (Ireland & UK), 1:30pm EST, 10:30am PST Zoom Link:  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5505019905   Allen’s book, 12 Essential Insights for Emotional Sobriety: https://www.amazon.com/12-Essential-Insights-Emotional-Sobriety/dp/1955415129/   Join Allen & Thom at our Thursday night, 7pm PST Zoom meeting on Emotional Sobriety and the Steps (login information below):   https://zoom.us/j/330149513 Password: 375986   For our ongoing workshop video series on Emotional Sobriety and the 12 Steps, visit our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHEM2-kqLkfp3I4c0jy-X-g   Also, please join our “Emotional Sobriety and Recovery” FB Group at the following link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/120450976662519 We’d love to stay in touch in between meetings.   We appreciate feedback! Contact Patrick, our producer, at [email protected] for any questions or comments.

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  35:50
• Proficiency vs. Perfection

  Allen, Thom, and Patrick discuss the overwhelm that often occurs as we return to health, and in so doing take on more challenges in our day to day lives. How do we maintain that sense of balance and proportion without steering into paralysis or unhealthy perfectionism?   Learn more about Joe C., Secular AA and Rebellion Dogs here: https://rebelliondogspublishing.com/   Upcoming events with Allen Berger: https://abphd.com/events/   Join an ongoing Zoom meeting wherein participants read Bill Schaberg’s 30 Things: Practical Advice for Living Well chapter-by-chapter here: 11.00am East Coast / 4.00pm U.K. ID: 875 319 1947 Password: 2GROWIN   Follow us on social media. Podcast Twitter: @EmSobrietyPod Instagram: thomrutledge2 Joe C. Twitter: @Rebellion_Dogs   Friendly Circle Berlin Workshop Group meets every Monday @ 7:30pm (Berlin), 6:30pm (Ireland & UK), 1:30pm EST, 10:30am PST Zoom Link:  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5505019905   Allen’s book, 12 Essential Insights for Emotional Sobriety: https://www.amazon.com/12-Essential-Insights-Emotional-Sobriety/dp/1955415129/   Join Allen & Thom at our Thursday night, 7pm PST Zoom meeting on Emotional Sobriety and the Steps (login information below):   https://zoom.us/j/330149513 Password: 375986   For our ongoing workshop video series on Emotional Sobriety and the 12 Steps, visit our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHEM2-kqLkfp3I4c0jy-X-g   Also, please join our “Emotional Sobriety and Recovery” FB Group at the following link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/120450976662519 We’d love to stay in touch in between meetings.   We appreciate feedback! Contact Patrick, our producer, at [email protected] for any questions or comments.

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  31:11

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