I’m Getting Burned Out With Recovery, Is It Ok To Take A Step Back?

I'm getting burned out with recovery. Is it okay to take a step back? Hey, Tyler. Brandon, what's going on,man? Hey, my name's not Brandon today. It wasn't last week either.What is my name? You wrote it down in If anyone's not watching on YouTube, he wrote it down asTyler's sidekick. Yeah, it's his way of like just being passive aggressive with making fun of me.No, it is not. I you know what I realized? Uh last night I watched one ofmy favorite movies. What is that? The Countmani Cristo. Oh, that is a great that's a greatstory. Movie. And I didn't realize you you use the word, you know, I'm your Yakapo.That comes from that movie. That's that's exactly it comes from that story, you know, like and and what I said isit's like in the in the book or in the in the movie, the count, you know, he ends up kind of going on this big longjourney and at a certain point in the journey, he's on this beach and there's pirates that are going to kill him andhe ends up saving a man's life in there and that man's name is Yakapo. And from the rest of the story on, Yakobo becomesWait, let me say that. Let me say that, Tyler. I am forever your man. I am your man. I am your man.And he is. And he he basically follows the count. He's Yakapo the rest of the story. Andhe is his right-hand man. Like complete loyalty all the way in. Like just hisjust I need to change my name to Tyler's Yakapo. The Yakapo. We actually Yakapo.Hey. Hey. Anyone who has a few Yakapos in their life hasIt's incredible. It's incredible to have a few yakapos in your life. You have people taking advantage of them. Youhave people in your corner all the way. I know. Isn't it amazing? And it feels so good to have that kindof like safety and support. I think I think be someone's yakapo and have some yakapose in your life.Yeah. You know you're winning if you are someone's yakapo and you have some yakapose. Absolutely.So I don't know how you got on that, but that's that's where we're at because I'm your yakapo. So all right,let's before we say yakapo anymore, let's get on to our guest here. So, uh, Aussie, welcome to the show.Hey, welcome. Doesn't Is it Yakapo that means Driftwood? I think. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no.Or he's called Driftwood or something. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He his name was uh ah what was his name? I watched it lastnight. His name meant Driftwood because they found him on the beach like two miles from the islandand so they called him Satara or something. I can't remember. No, he calls Yakabo calls him Zatara.Yeah, but Zatara means driftwood. Driftwood. Yeah, there you go. Yeah. So, that's a good memory.Yeah, this is one of my favorite movies. It's very apppropo for us having a conversation. So, that's a great movie. Yeah, it's Ihaven't watched it in in years and it was awesome. Um, well, Aussie, uh,welcome to the show. If you could give us a little bit of, uh, background and tell us what's going on with you andwe'll go from there. Yeah, thanks. Thanks for having me on. Um I guess you know my story would beginyou know as a as a kid and when I was like 11 or 12 I you know discovered you know porn and masturbation all thatstuff and just kept kind of progressing through that and I had some other youknow family stuff going on but uh you know became pretty addicted and alwayshad an excuse of why I kept going and um you know went to high school I said I'd quit in college. When I was in college Isaid I'd quit when I graduated. when I graduated, I decided I'd quit when I got married and uh it never never happened.And um you know, I I kind of tried to quit myself and uh you know, was veryinvolved in church and you know, tried to you know, get their help and itreally wasn't very helpful. And uh so I didn't really know what to do. I was lost. And uh I ended up listening tobasically some video casts from a guy named Michael Ley. and he had a bunch of guests on that were, you know, sexaddiction specialists and I didn't even know that was a field and um started watching the videos and it was kind oflike you guys and I was introduced to a lot of kind of leaders in the industryuh you know Ted Roberts and uh some other folks um and uh Mark Laser and uhkind of learned about all this and I was like these guys are the who I've been looking for my entire life and this was in 2018.And um so I I just kind of started listening to what they were saying and everybody's kind of saying the samething like, "Hey, go find a seessat. Uh join a 12step group for people that arehaving the same issue." Um you know, you got to start being honest with your spouse. And I was like, "Man, thatsounds tough, but I guess I'll do it." And I just did everything they'd all told me. and uh dove real hard intorecovery, you know, studied, learned, listened to podcasts for, you know,hours a day for, you know, a couple years. And uh like in 2020, um my familyand I go to a family camp together and talking to my wife and uh I was like, Ibet these counselors could use, you know, to hear a story like this. And at that time, I'd been in recovery twoyears. I'd had no slips or relapses and I was feeling really good and uh youknow so I started telling my story and it was really wellreceived and a lot of these kids they're like 18 to 22 youknow really resonated with them and they didn't have adults you know talking tothem about this stuff and they had never heard somebody speak so you know aboutthe topic so taboo and uh this is a a Christian summer camp and um so I I I II kind of have got a heart for helping people and I knew I needed to to be in that as far as the 12th step. And soguys that would come up to me and say, "Hey, this sounds like my story or I need help." I basically said, "Uh, Idon't really know what I'm doing, but I'll help you." And so I basically kind of took on a mentorship sponsor role forthat first little bit. And then kind of slowly after every year of doing this umfor the next five years and we kind of picked up a guy here, picked up a guy there, picked up a guy here and uh endedup kind of having a little underground recovery ministry. And it was it's itit's still active. It's beautiful. But I just uh in 2024 uh I I ended up needing to start my owncompany because just some disagreements with my current company. And uh so my life kind of got flipped personally anduh work-wise. And so a lot of my emotional capacity was taken up with howstressful it is to quit your job and start a new business and and all that. And I could just feel I had you know Idon't know let's say 12 to 15 guys kind of meeting every week you know we weretrying to call each other as much as possible and um you know trying to dokind of the what you guys call the dailies and you know stay in constant communication and stay in connectionwith each other and I could just feel that was slipping for me while I was trying to do this company and slowlyover time I just felt like I wasn't being the leader that they needed and alot of the guys kind of stayed in the same cycles and they they they would grow emotionally but wouldn't find a lotof success with their sobriety and uh it I just kind of found myselfgetting more or I extending less grace than I think they needed. Um and uh Ijust was kind of the meetings became a chore. Um and I do have littleer kidsthat I you know putting bedtime is really important to to our family and uhthat's usually when we would meet is in the night time and uh so it became really just just difficult um to be kindof have the zeal and enthusiasm to help these guys and uh I know they deserve itand uh last last summer we still went to the camp and I did not share my story umwith the guys anymore. more um partially because that age group is reallydifficult um to work with too because they they're usually college age guys. they don't have the consequences thatyou know you know older married people have to quit and so you kind of get abunch of freebies it feels like and u you when that happens over and over and over and I'm I'm trying to help help andthey're not taking my advice or whatever I just found myself getting a little more grouchy and so a few weeks ago I uhI was talking to my wife and talking to some of the guys in the group like I just need to take a sbatical take a step back and My wife said, "Yeah, hey,that's fine. Uh, but you still need to be working on you, too." And I said, "Okay." And I So the the then thequestion comes and the call comes from like, "I don't really necessarily know what to do. I'm in this stage of sevenand a half years of sobriety. I spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in counseling. I've listened to thousandsof hours of podcasts and I don't hear a lot of new stuff." and and uh you knowI'm kind of tired of tired of helping people. I'm not really tired of helping people but but I'm it's difficult for meto get give a lot of time and to make time for you recovered calls in themiddle of workday. You know, we're still a very young company and uh so anyway, I was just wondering if you guys hadexperience with that kind of feeling of burnout or you know advice on what wouldbe a great next step for me to take, things like that.It's a great topic, man. I'm glad you're on here. It's pretty cool to hear someone who'sbeen in this for and actually in terms of like the sobriety part of it, winning for the last seven years.Um, and and that you've also found yourself kind of living some of the principles that the 12 steps would sayin terms of giving back and finding a way to to help and support. Um, I'm I'mkind of wondering if there's a distinction here that we could draw between two things. One is is that you're not Are you burned out withworking your own recovery? Are you burned out with working with other people who aren't working their recovery?Uh, probably both. Probably both would be a good answer. Or are you burned out with life withstarting a new business and these meetings and taking phone calls andthings like that? That's a good question. Uh,I don't I don't know that it's necessarily life, but it does feel pretty pretty challenging. I have gotuh, you know, two little boys. One's a one's one's on the spectrum and he Yeah,that that is a good segue to take is like he most of my counseling for the last two years or therapy for the twoyears after the marriage has been kind of recovered and restored. Thank God for that has been morefocusing on my my older son who who's on the spectrum who's he's got you knowwhat formerly was called oh gosh I can't remember what uh I can't remember thename of it but it's just barely on the spectrum but he for us he's very challenging very difficult especiallyfor me um and so most of my therapy has been how do I become a better dad to this kid and uh because I've got youknow just my own issues and he he tends to touch all the buttons uh for me. Andso that's kind of what I've been really focused on for the last couple years and it's been it's been very challenging andyou know just being a father to him is very challenging and so when you have these other things of a new company andtrying to help uh you know young recovery folks and it's just I don'tknow. Yeah. It just feels like I'm kind of stretched.So Azie, do you know what? Like what is your burnout saying to you? Do you Sowhat I mean is if you take a step back and you look at it like what's it communicating to you? Have you thoughtof that? Not not exactly.Um what is what is burnout a sign of?Uh I'm not I would just define it as kind of the my emotional capacity no longerhas any room for anything additional but I'm not sure. Right. So like if I'm like think let'sthink about burnout in general for a minute. Um if I'm going to a job that's burning me out and I go there day in andday out um but I'm just I'm just burned out. Um, that's telling me that what Ido day in and day out is not feeding life into me, it's sucking life out of me. Um, so I'm I'm not really likeresonating in this place of like high energy. Um, I'm uh I'm acting out of mypurpose. Um, and so that's what burnout is a sign of is that I'm feeling compelled or forwhatever reason I'm doing things that are not in alignment with um what Godwants me to do. Um, and if that's the case and I'm just going through thosemotions and doing it, I'm going to feel burned out. And that burnout is actually important because it's it's like anyemotion um or any feelings that we have in our life. It's there to communicatesomething to us. And I think with this scenario, you look at it, Aussie, andit's like, well, how can that be the case? Like, you're doing good. You're doing God's work. You're helping people.You're Shouldn't you be feeling more alive because you're working with theseguys, you know, but you're but you're not. Right.Right. Yeah. That that that's a good way to say it's like the in the beginning for the first three to four years it wasvery you it was almost an obs obsession with you know helping people and it wasfun. Uh it was it was a gift to tell my story because I knew it needed to be told and you know people need to behearing this stuff before they get in really deep troubles was my kind ofexplanation of myself. And uh and it was really it was great. And then just kind of it just kind of slowly startedfading, right? And and what why do you think that is?Oh, well kind of the same things I've kind of been sayingwith the the kids and the family and the job,right? So there's a lot of different answers, right? Like maybe your purpose is sh has shifted a little bit. Um andthis time of life your purpose is is is changed um with your parenting andeverything that you're doing. So ju just a thought um that that let's not likelike just be careful of like thinking you shouldn't be burned out. Actually you should be because you are. So westart we start there and then we look at why are you and what is this communicating to you?I just I just add a couple of things to where you guys are going with this. You know, I'm thinking Brandon, what youwere saying, what does it mean when you're burned out? And the first word that came to my mind was misalignment.And the misalignment could be a misalignment with my overall purpose. Or it could be a misalignment with my whereI'm putting my energy and my time and my bandwidth and my resources. Or it could be a misalignment with my boundariesin terms of where I'm putting all of those resources. And and um and so likeI'm thinking Brandon like in our career like I' I've never been burned out, Tyler. I don't know what you're talking about.It makes sense. Like if you look at if you look at statistics, a an addiction therapist, the averagelifespan of that career is less than two years. Um, most people get into that careerbecause they feel called to it, but then they don't know how to take care of themselves and put things inorder and make sure that they're cultivating the right inside out kind of work. And then they get working withpeople who are struggling with addiction. And you know this, Aussie, likehow many how many times does it take for a guy to come in and report another relapse before he finally gets traction?And how often does a guy come in and just want to like lift like lift theguilt off his soul by putting the story of the the relapse on everybody but doesn't want to do something else to actually shift or change or move. And ifyou're taking some kind of responsibility for that or some pressure to help or if you're pouring in yourtime and your energy and there's a phone call that comes through with that guy again and you're like, "Man, I should be spending time with my son, but now Ifeel obligated to take this phone call from this guy who's probably not really that serious anyway." like that's ofcourse going to lead to burnout. And I think where Brandon's going is a good thing to ask is it might be a newchapter in life that you're being called to. It might be that you need to likefor me Brandon, this happens a lot. I notice when I'm burned out. I am called to this work. I feel called to this workright now. I still get burned out, but that often is an internal thing where I'm like, but I'm overextending myselfhere and I'm not doing my dailies and cultivating my own heart here. And unless I do those things, I'm going tocontinue to stay burned out, right? But but then I can kind of do that assessment and then decide, is itsomething that needs a total pivot or is it something that needs a tuneup? Yep. Azie, what do you think about whatTyler's saying? Yeah, I uh I like both of those and kind ofto they all those three buckets that I mentioned, you know, that take most of my emotional capacity, they all they allseem very very important. And uh you know, this one just seems I don't know, my family's before it and I put that andthen my my job's got to be before it. I have to support the family with that. And so this one just kind of takes theback seat and it's neat to see to hear you guys say like, "Yeah, maybe maybe it's a new chapter." And that's kind ofthe story I've been telling myself, but just with a lot of kind of guilt with itis uh you know, well, you're not really allowed to take a take a break fromrecovery because then you know, you see the guys in the rooms and come back. They don't necessarily have the sobrietyexperience, but they might leave the rooms and they come back worse than when they were there. And I don't want thateither. And uh you know, then I've got kind of the the guilt of starting something really neat. uh helping youknow these younger younger guys and then I you know I don't want to betray theirtrust or anything with you know an explosion explosion of my own life but or you know kind of the smaller level oflike just not being able to serve them anymore. Azie, I if I can share just a little bitof some stories uh from my life, um things that I've learned over the years.Um so, first off, I I'm not the one that that has really the power to do this,but you have permission to absolutely take a step back. And uh and uh he'sgonna he's going to get off the call and tell everybody Brandon said it's okay for him to just chill out. Yeah.Well, we sometimes with the work like Tyler mentioned this about taking toomuch responsibility, we get over attached um to to things attimes where um we think we're we're likeso God, we get put in positions. We feel purpose and then we think, okay, we'reI'm so important and if I go away, then the world's going to crash and burn. Andum the betrayed, the addicted, and the expert. I think most of the audience knows how that went, how that finished.And and what do you know, Aussie? Like at the end of that, life went on. Likepeople figured out another resource. Uh people adjusted, people changed, andthat blew up. Like that was like we had all these listeners, all these followers. people were hanging their hatway too much on Ashton and Kobe's relationship. Um, and it was good forthose people to realize that their recovery was not dependent upon that relationship. It was good for them torealize that they didn't need our podcast in order to be okay. Um,I uh one one more story. I was working with this this family long time ago andTyler I I'd love to hear a story from you about this too because I know you got plenty.Um but they had seven kids. They had two special needs kids and um uh they wereon the brink of divorce. There's some betrayal that had gone on and things like that. And I worked with them forabout a year and I was fighting like hell for that family. Um, I was doingwhatever I could to try to save that family. Those kids needed two parentstogether. Um, I just I just knew this was my purpose. This was my calling. Iwas going to save this family. And the dad had zero desire to save hisfamily. He wanted out. He totally wanted out. I worked so much harder for him forthat family than than he did. Um,and they got divorced. And when they got divorced, you know howI felt? Like, guess how I felt?Gutted. I was crushed. Well, I'm called to do this. Um, I Ifought like hell. I just like gave everything I could because I felt like Iwas doing the right thing. I was doing the right thing for this family and they fell apartand I was I was overattached. I was taking way too much responsibility and Iwasn't aware of what my purpose actually was. I decided that was my purpose tosave that family because I wanted to feel important. I wanted to feel like Ican do this. That was not my purpose. I was way overattachedto that family. And it led to burnout. It led to like just thinking, what am Idoing day in and day out? Why do I do this work? Um Tyler, I know you'veyou've had similar experiences as well, right? I was thinking about how it spills overin other places with what you're saying, Brandon. you know, like probably the I Ihave a really pretty long fuse with my temper. I don't really lose my temper very often unlessOh, but when it blows, unless it's in the backyard playing basketball with my brothers or somethinglike that. Um, but but I but this was one particular instance where I probably lost my fuse and lost my temper worsethan I've ever have in my life. And it had to do with actual this very principle where I was working with a couple andthey had come from just the worst place. And I'd been working with them for liketwo years. Things had they kind of gone through the crisis point. They'd carved out some like winning. They were bothkind of winning. He was getting sober and he was like drinking the Kool-Aid on this lifestyle change and she wasfinally kind of getting through all the trauma stuff and they were starting to come back together. And then we starteddoing marriage therapy and I thought that was going great. I'm like these this couple is through the woods. Like we we got them. We did it. You know, I'mso excited. They came into an appointment with me like 3 weeks later and they're like, um, hey, thanks forall you've done for us. Uh, we're getting divorced. And I'm like, what? Like, like, how didI misread that so long? Like, and in my head, I was already making like judgments on you guys are supposed tostay together because like we worked so hard. for your trophy couple. You You guys have already won. You did that.You already won. And then and then they tell me that. So, I'm feeling gutted. And then I at that time I was working at UPSin the early mornings to keep my medical benefits while I was building my practice. And I went to work the nextmorning and without knowing it, one of the drivers that was there working next to me was like said some some joke abouthow no wonder nobody wants to go to see you for therapy. You're you're this, this, or this. And something inside ofme, I had nothing left in the tank. I lost it. Boom. And I just snapped. And Iwent on this raging thing. Like, you know, people say, you go postal. I went parcel. Like just, you know, just likeI'm like I'm like swearing at him. Words I never say. I'm like throwing boxes at his head like just like, you know, justlike losing it. Just like ready to punch him in the face. And then I had to go home and I had to tell my wife that Iwas probably gonna get fired at the job that I was getting my medical benefits from because of my outbursts. And so nowmy burnout, that overattachment was now spilling into the people thatactually mattered the most to me. And um and and yeah, it happens. And and andwhen you live in a when you live in the world of recovery, I mean, look at this Azie. When you look at even a 12step,one of the glaring holes in 12step is when you get to the very end, you'resupposed to turn back around and help the next man up. But how many 12step meetings have guys who have like morethan three years of sobriety in them? Yeah. Not not many at all. That's theNot many. Yeah. And and there's two I think there's two reasons for that. One is is that theyactually by nature start to move their lives into new places. If you're working an actual recovery, this happens in ourgroups too, Brandon. It's like a guy will start getting to the end of treatment and he's got things rolling.He's living the right way. He's got his sobriety going. He's kind of healing his marriage. He's taking accountability. He's living these principles ofhumility, openness, work. Like he starts calling up and saying, "Hey guys, um I'mnot making it to group tonight because I'm going to go to my daughter's soccer game instead." And and and and half of you is like,"Oh, but you got to stay committed." And the other half is like, "Thank goodness he's finally starting to make decisions for himself."And and really what it turns into is is the real question that I think you have in front of you, and I don't know whatyour kind of spiritual background is, is is whatever you're choosing to put your time and energy into, is it in alignmentwith who God says you are? And if and if you're aligning yourself with who God says you are, then thenyou'll actually go take care of yourself to stay in the arena or you'll move to the arena that God wants you in. Umthat's I think that's where it work that that's kind of where it works and and you should be in a natural progression if you're recovering. Like you shouldn'tlike if you've been in this for seven years, you're probably not going to be going to the like the foundations groupthat we're starting right now. That's probably not where you'll be spending your time. you're going to probably spending your time more in like amarriage building course or something else that's kind of moving you into where you're at in your current stage ofrecovery. Yeah. Let me ask you a question to clarify. When you're giving mepermission to take a step back, right, are you saying from my own personal recovery or the, you know, the kind ofhelping other people part of my recovery or both? Azie, can I be I'm just going to beblunt with you. Okay. Um, if you're in real recovery, you will know the answerto that question. And what the answer to that question is is there is never an end to your recovery work. Your recoverywork is a lifestyle. Um, it's uh, and so like even taking astep back from say going to a 12step meeting would be a recovery behavior.Um, you're when you're in recovery, you you trust yourself. you know yourself.You act from a place of love and intuition and that's recovery. Um, so dodo you see what I'm saying? You never take a step back from recovery work. Does that make sense toyou? I I I understand what you're saying. I I I hear it two ways in my head where youknow the the principles will always be there for for me at least is how I'm hearing it. The principles are alwaysgoing to be there. Do I need to go to a meeting every week? I don't I don't know.Well, Tyler, go ahead. I I think you probably get a a multipledifferent range of answers on this, but to me to me, Aussie, there's a there's the recipe that youuse to get yourself sober, and then there's actually a set of principles that you live that would be calledliving in recovery. And and I would say if you're tapped into the principles, those principlesgeneralize to different parts of life. So, if I'm if I'm learning to put insome right effort towards continued self-growth, if I've adopted the growth mindset, if I'm practicingaccountability, if I'm working on being humble, if I'm putting my energies into things that really matter and that Ifeel aligned with with God's purpose for me, um it doesn't matter if you're in a12step meeting or somewhere else. As long as the principles are being lived, the 12step meeting helps to strengthenthose principles. It helps to kind of build the habits. it helps to and and some guys are going to do that the rest of their lives and they're going to goand they're going to make a lot of good in the world by helping other people who are coming along with it. Um but butyou've got to know like the answer to your question is it it depends. If you're like, I'm tired of going to 12step meetings and I would want to goand uh play video games every week instead like and and you know what,I don't know if I'd be like, "Yeah, good good call." And your and your spouse would probably be like, "Uh, that's a little scary for me, right?" But ifyou're like, "Hey, I I've got I'm building a business. I still have good connections. I've still got a good team.I'm still holding myself accountable with this, this, this, and way, and I'm putting my energies into good things."like you're still living the same principles. Yeah, I think theI think the best way to say the the principles are there and for just how I've kind of lived let's just in thelast few months you my my accountability with other you know let's say friends inrecovery you know the calls for my personal recovery have been much lessum you know meetings have been sparse other than these helping other guys. Idon't listen to quite the podcast anymore. And um you know, so so theaccountability for my own personal recovery has been much less, but mywithout sounding super prideful, like my my need for accountability is not veryhigh with my need for integrity um you know, really important to me. Andbut you know there's not yeah there's just not a lot ofnecessarily temptation that I need to go back to the addiction that you mentioned anger earlier Tyler that that that's gotI kind of forgot to mention that that's what I've been working on too in addition to you know trying to be a better dad. That's part of it rightbeing a better husband and being a better dad. And uh that was I I found that to be one of the more probably themost destructive, you know, kind of um thing I'd had in my life was was that.And so um the the the temptations for me aren'tactually necessarily sexual, but the the difficulties of parenting or get havingan explosive episode or whatever like that that's going to ruin my life now. Um and that doesn't happen very muchanymore. And uh so this just the call volume hasbeen much less and I feel pretty guilty about that too. So am I still in recovery? I don't you know for takingcare of myself? It's it's the be do have thing right? Like if if you feel like at peace andconfident with what you're doing then then it doesn't the do doesn't really matter as much. Um, I just did Have youguys seen Song Sung Blue? Have you seen that, Tyler? No. Aussie, have you seen it?No. You got You guys should see it. It's a good one. Um, but the guy the guy inthere, he goes to 12step. He's like 20 years sober and he goes like every week.And I I I ran a meeting with a guy who went to a meeting every week and he wassober 40 years. Like 40 years. and and he'd say like, "Yeah, I'm never missinga week. I'm going to hit a meeting a week." And so it's a it's a both andAussie like there there's this other side of it of like should that guy be in an inpatient program for 40 years andthen if he steps down he's like not working recovery as hard because he'syou know because he should just have his whole life be about sobriety and like nono like there is times and seasons and we navigate those times and seasons andI really appreciate your question Azie It's a just your question shows some recovery because a lot of times the thethe addiction speaking is justifying minimizing finding ways around notwanting to be accountable and for you to say I just want to double check and make sure here that as Inavigate forward that that's okay. That to me shows some humility and some justjust you're checking it out with us. But I'd also sayyou don't have to stay exactly where you're at forever. And um just whateveryou do, make sure you own it. That that that you're okay with it. So, did Ianswer that question? Yeah, I like that. Yeah, that's that's good. And I you reminded me of when youguys were telling the stories of uh the difficulty of being invested in somebody else's recovery and they don't itdoesn't always turn out how you want it. And uh just on my my behalf and probablyall of your patients, even though they may may or may not say it, but you know, thank you guys. You know, thank you toall the therapists out there who who put their time, love, and effort into it. I know you guys get paid, but that's it'sstill incredibly difficult. And the two-year mark, I'd never heard that before. And uh you know, for all thespouse, you know, supporting therapists, oh my gosh, that's a whole new element, too. Um but thank you guys. you know, itmeans a lot. Oh, thank you, man. We're we're glad to have people like you come on and talkwith us and um I want to There was a comment that came through that kind of goes along a little bit what we'resaying. Um it says, "Sounds like a Pokéball variation."Um and I think what he was saying is like, "Hey, you're going to probably have some of the base kind of ingredients, but you might go fromsalmon to tuna from time to time or you might I love how you can make an analogy." He actually I think he wrote that when Isaid the name Zatara. Was that way back then? I love your analogy.I just barely saw it. I just barely saw the comment come through. So um but but but you know I'm wondering about thattoo with what Brandon said and even let's just use your example Azie for a second. Um when you got sober from saypornography if that was your first thing, right? When you got sober, youprobably had to adopt certain kinds of principles. And it happened to fall really nicely into the program you got.You got into a couple of good groups. You got into some good therapy. You started addressing your trauma. Youbuilt a team. You started being accountable. You brought things out from underneath being secret. And then youwent to work on changing some of the pav habits and patterns in your life while you also worked on changing your heartand soul. Right? And now you've kind of grown because of those principles into anew place where you probably wake up most days and you might still have obviously all the sexual drives, but youpretty much know even though you're not supposed to say this in 12step that you're probably not going to act out today. Um, but you also have somethingin your life that still needs your attention and work and effort and energy. And you're going to take thesame principles that you applied in 2018 and you're going to apply those verysame principles as a part of your lifestyle to the new target. As long asyou're in that process of working on the continued growth and the new target withthe same principles, you're working recovery.Um it might look different structurally. It might look different logistically.Um, but that's but that's really what I think Brandon's getting at.Tyler, I I love your Pokeball analogy. It actually really works. Um,thanks for the Pokéball thing a half hour too early. And that is like my favorite food, too. Butme, too. I I I want to kind of finish off if I can tell just a really quick story onemore. And And Azie, I'm telling this for you. Hopefully, you can can hear the theprinciple of it. Um, I think a recipe for burnout is working with young adultsor even teenagers and expecting sobriety because you're such a greatsupport and you know, so I had a I had a uh a group, you know, Tyler, sometimeswhen groups just come together where it's just like I had like 15 youngsingle adults join a group with me once and we had our first group and it wasreally good and everybody was excited and we got this group together and I had a session with one of the guys like aweek later. He's like, "I finally feel some hope. I feel like I'm going to be sober. I feel hope. I feel" And so wewent on and for the next year and a half, all of the guys continued torelapse. Now, I'm not saying this to like bring any hopelessness to the situation here, but all of the guyscontinued to relapse. But the group held together really welland um we we we just kept going and itwas fascinating what happened. Tyler, they all relapsed. They none of them got sobbriety.Now, if I'm there as the therapist of like all these guys better be sobercompletely by the end of this group, I'm setting myself up. A lot of these guys became like bestfriends. like they created brothers in that group. Most of the guys ended up getting married and most of the guyswent into their marriage already with a support system with accountability and Iknow like at least a few of them who have had years of sobriety now. This waslike 10 years ago. Um, so I look at that and I'm like, okay, shift perspectivejust a little bit on the purpose of what we're doing and the work that we'redoing. We could have looked at that group and said, "It's just a big failure. Brandon failed. He's tooconnected to the sobriety thing and he should have shut the group down." I didn't feel like shutting that groupdown. I didn't feel like that was the right thing to do. And um and it's actually been one of themost successful groups that I've ever run. So Azie, do you hear what I'm saying? Yeah, I I need to say that more, but Itry to say it a lot, too. It's like the story's not over. The story's not over.Right. That's right. Aussie, thanks for coming on the show,man. Appreciate Appreciate men like you. And uh uh yeah, just just like trustyourself. Give yourself permission. Yeah, I appreciate you guys.Yeah, thank you, man. We love we love having people come on who are winning at this and who are willing to come andshare themselves the way that you have today. I would say that guilt you feel towards other people, that's also partof being human because you love them and care for them. Um, but where Brandon I think is making the distinction and thisis something that helps me sometimes when I feel called to need to make shifts like I just had to I just had tolet go of one of my my groups that I love. I love so much but I had so many other things that are being called to meright now and one of them fell on the during this group slot. I felt a ton of guilt. But the other the other side tothat is I'm also not their savior. And something that's helped me is isthat when I align myself with what I think is the right thing for my life and my calling, I can surrender the rest ofthat back to, in my case, my higher power. And and I can trust that there'sgoing to be somebody else to fill in those gaps. I'm I'm not God. You're notGod, Azie. Um it's going to be okay. Um if if it's the right thing for you. Soanyway, thank you for coming on the show. Yeah, thank you guys. Yeah, I appreciate that a lot.Yeah. Um, thank you to our listeners for being here. We're grateful to have you. We love the people that we get tointeract with every single day. We feel your support. And, uh, until next time,keep on keeping on.