Pivot Points - Recovery Is For Those Who Do It, with Matt Nannis
Host: Brenda Zane, brenda@hopestreamcommunity.org
Instagram: @hopestreamcommunity
Guest: Matt Nannis, Founder, PIVOTPoint WNC
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About this episode:
When young people in recovery return to use, we often hear phrases like “failure to launch”, “regression”, or the suggestion that “recovery is only for those who want it.” Today’s guest, Matt Nannis, says it’s time to move beyond these concepts altogether.
Episode summary:
Summary of key points from the show:
Matt shared his dramatic intervention story, where 15 people showed up unannounced to confront his substance abuse. Though his initial reasons for agreeing to go to rehab were selfish (wanting more snacks and music privileges), he still managed to turn his life around. This shows recovery can work even if the person doesn't initially "want" it.
Matt discussed the concept of "failure to launch" in young adults struggling with addiction. He reframes this as "failure to fail" - failing and picking yourself back up is part of the process of growth and learning who you are. A fixed destination or definition of "success" can be intimidating.
Matt talked about the comfort but smallness of the addiction lifestyle, where your world becomes very restricted and repetitive. Recovery opens up one's world immensely in comparison.
Relapses and regressions are often part of the recovery journey and stemming from an "all or nothing" mindset. Any amount of time abstaining is positive. A long history of addiction makes occasional slips statistically more likely.
Matt encouraged parents to keep loving their struggling children unconditionally. However, the way they express love may not be received by the child as intended. Checking in on how expressions of care are landing can be helpful.
Episode resources:
PIVOTpoint WNC website
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Matt: [00:00:00] To your point, to to, to the reflection. You're sharing, you know, recoveries for those who want it and recoveries for those who need it. And I don't know that those are untrue. My opinion and experience is that recovery is for those who do it.
Brenda: You are listening to Hope Stream. If you're parenting a young person who misuses substances is in a treatment program or finding their way to recovery, you're in the right place. This is your private space to learn from experts. And gain encouragement and support from me, Brenda Zane, your host and follow mom to a child who struggled. This podcast is just one of the resources we offer for parents. So, after the episode, head over to our website at hopestreamcommunity.org. I'm so glad you're here. Take a deep breath, [00:01:00] exhale, and know that you have found your people. And now let's get into today's show.
Hey friend, super quick check in before we dive into today's incredible episode.
How are you? Are you breathing? Drinking some water? Being kind to yourself. I like to ask this now and then because depending on the team you have around you, no one else may be asking you these things. It takes so much out of you to navigate all the things that you do that I have to check in and make sure that you are caring for the mothership or the fathership because you are at the center of a lot of people's orbits.
And if you go down The whole thing goes down. So if taking ridiculously good care of yourself has taken a backseat to other things, please, please promise me that you will spend at least 10 minutes today doing something purely for [00:02:00] yourself. It doesn't have to cost money. And it doesn't have to be anything crazy.
It could be, I don't know, sitting in your car or your closet, which is where I spent a lot of time listening to music, scribbling in a journal. It could be painting or reading a few pages in that book that you keep meaning to pick up and finish. Whatever it is, please do it. It is truly a gift for yourself and for your family.
Okay. I know you like a good recovery story and Matt Nannis, the founder of the Pivot Point program in Asheville, North Carolina, does not disappoint. Not only does Matt share his almost unbelievable intervention story. He also shares his beliefs and experience about finding lasting recovery. He debunks the idea that someone has to want to go to treatment for it to work, and [00:03:00] also shared that even though his motivations in the early days of treatment We're misguided and solely focused on earning more snacks, more music, and the shotgun seat in the program's van.
He was still successful in doing a 180 in his life. Matt's life was once so small that every action he took was about partying and using, which led him in a very dark direction full of maladaptive coping mechanisms. Today, as a treatment program owner and family member who is welcomed at the Thanksgiving table.
Matt will astound you with his thoughtful wisdom and gratitude for the life he gets to live today. I can't wait for you to hear it. And I won't keep you from this riveting dialogue any longer. Please take a listen to this beautiful conversation I had with my friend Matt Nanas of the Pivot Point Program.
Enjoy.[00:04:00]
Matt, welcome to HopeStream. I'm excited for our conversation today and I know we had, we had like a pre conversation that was so good that I really wish we would have recorded that as well, but anyway, here we are.
Matt: So welcome. I appreciate. Thank you. Appreciate you having me.
Brenda: It's, it's always good to talk with people who are in the field, like working with the young people whose parents are sitting here with us in their ears right now, because I can only say so much, right.
Based on my experience as a parent, which was, you know, my son went through treatment many years ago. So I love to get conversations going with people like you who are in it day to day. Um, you see trends, you see [00:05:00] patterns, you are talking with young people every day. So it's fantastic. So I appreciate the time to, uh, join me on this conversation and just share your wisdom and your knowledge and insights with us.
It's really special.
Matt: No. Well, I appreciate the opportunity. I think, you know, I would, I would echo that I, I too can only. Share my experience and, and, and my lens on this stuff, which is a very reductive word to use when, when talking about this, um, you know, my experience and, and what I had the opportunity to engage in, I wish there were quite tangible and deliverable pivot points from my experience that I could.
kind of put in a bow and, and, and offer up in any way. But, um, I think the opportunity to have these conversations and, and just to express that folks who. 30 years ago, 25 [00:06:00] years ago, like myself, who were in the throes of a different lifestyle that involved a whole bunch of maladaptive coping skills and substances and abandonment of any semblance of a moral compass that, you know, when opportunities are presented to them.
There, there's an installment of hope. Those moments, those micro opportunities can redirect courses of action and, and lead to still challenging lives, but more fulfilling and purposeful lives.
Brenda: Let's start there because I know there's a lot of parents listening who have kids in the thick of it right now, or they're potentially new to recovery.
They're sort of trying to get their feet underneath them. And it's so hard as a parent with a child in that situation to see anything like what you're doing that, Oh, my kid would potentially be running a pro [00:07:00] owning and running a program someday. I mean, it's such a farfetched idea that they can't even wrap their head around it.
So I would love to get the cliff notes version of how you went from. being, like you just said, having all kinds of maladaptive coping mechanisms to running a program. Like that's a pretty big jump.
Matt: It is. I don't know what the elements are and I, and I, again, I wish, I wish I did. I think as a process of, um, what my.
engagement in recovery has involved, and it's involved a specific text from a 12 step abstinence based program. Um, it's, it's just the one that was, you know, presented to me and I, I responded to. Um, some of those processes involve, like, writing down fears. Um, very tangible and, and kind of theoretical. And, and when I, when I go through that process with someone who has [00:08:00] had their own experience through that process, Um, I learned just how.
Compact, how, how small of a box my existence had become, you know, and in hindsight, I think about I'm doing, I'm doing what I want to do, you can't tell me what to do, and these are my choices, and it's only affecting me, and there's this perception of, this diluted perception of freedom in that, um, because no one can tell me what to do, when in fact, every single action, decision, inaction that I made, It was dictated by that one thing and, and achieving that one thing.
And that's not freedom at all. And as a result of some perfect combination of, uh, of laziness, I am inherently lazy, um, and it was becoming too exhausting to continue to fight. Um, and that could go any number of ways, but for me, that was, it was met in synchronicity with, you know, 15, somewhere between 12 and [00:09:00] 15 people stepping into my apartment outside of Boston, Massachusetts.
Um, expressing a love for my, for, for me that I didn't, at the time, feel for myself. Um, and presenting me with a choice that was pretty cut and dry. To be honest, during, during, I had an intervention. And to be honest, during it, I didn't even hear the ultimatum. I, I had seen on TV what an intervention was.
And it, I was, I was surely the last one in that room to realize that that's what I was in. In the process of participating in, um, but the first person who read their impact letter said, you can either stand up right now. I believe the words he read where you can either stand up right now. Give me a hug.
Tell me you love me and get on this plane or and I stood up when he said or and I know, you know, memory hindsight. I'm looking back on it with what I know now and what I've experienced since then. I still feel very [00:10:00] confident that I stood up because I had put together in my head that if I didn't stand up.
I was going to have to listen to 12 more letters about the things that I was doing. So there was no, uh, bolt of lightning, burning bush moment, realization, moment of clarity in that moment. I was terrified that my nonsense that I only had with so and so reading the letter was going to get aired. All my dirty laundry was going to get aired.
I just figured that that was the most effective way. To stop everyone reading impact letters. That's why I stood up. Wow. That's it. That was it. You know, when I got to treatment and this is, this is really, this feels really significant to me. Um, I talk about this in meetings when it feels relevant. Like when I got to treatment.
I had, I was there for 90 days, and I had, uh, I was really, I hated the music that whoever was riding shotgun in the van from the housing to the clinical office was playing, and I asked someone why he got to sit up front, and they [00:11:00] alluded to the fact that it was because they were engaged in the classes, and they were actually participating, and I was like, okay, that's how this system works, I'm going to do that, and then when I started to realize that that wasn't enough privilege in special treatment while in treatment, I was trying to figure out how I could elevate my status while in, while in treatment.
And the only thing I could come up with was, I wonder what happens if I get a sponsor. That's why I got a sponsor because maybe I would get extra time in the snack room, right? Maybe I could ride shotgun and use we used iPads were what you listen to music with it was separate but not iPads Um, I don't even know what they're called
Brenda: just like an mp3
Matt: player type thing.
Thank you. Yeah, that's how that's how that Yeah, I know they're old school. It wasn't part of a phone. Yeah So I wanted to sit in the front and listen to my music. Um, I wanted extra time to get like the [00:12:00] good son chips, like really superficial, manipulative motivations. And the only way that I thought I could get that was to ask this individual who ended up being my, you know, my first sponsor, really a couple of years into moving to Asheville.
Um. To be my sponsor, it was not so that I could clean up my life and mend the wreckage of my past and re engage in a healthy relationship with my parents. It was for like sun chips and, and radio control, like riding shotgun privileges.
Brenda: That is so fascinating.
Matt: I mean that, that's, and to me, that's why. And it, but it was a genuine engagement, right?
Because it wasn't, it, the motivations were way skewed and it was a genuine engagement, which was largely fueled by the fact that when I bucked against the system in the programming, the day took forever, like an hour class felt like four hours, but when I was actively engaged in class, [00:13:00] an hour class kind of felt like, I don't know, at most an hour, but usually even shorter.
I was trying to, because I had successfully in the past, learn the system and how to maximize what I wanted to get out of it. What's fascinating is part of that process was to, to the best of my ability at the time, honestly, certainly proactively engage in reading, um, a book, which, which I now believe to be one of the many blueprints of a pathway towards recovery.
So in spite of my motivations, which were not altruistic at all. I would, I happen to be reading a book and engaging in step work with a sponsor and seeking out almost reluctantly community. And within there you find purpose and, and, and the world that had been so caging and restricted expanded.
Brenda: I think this is so interesting because [00:14:00] there's, I believe often a perception that until they want it and they're willing to go.
Um, it's not going to be effective. And what I'm hearing you say is, well, actually you probably weren't super, like you wouldn't have just up, woke up that morning on your own and decided, Hey, today's the day I'm going to go to treatment. And over time, even though like you said, your, your motivations were maybe selfish and not necessarily focused on a life of recovery.
It seems like it got you
Matt: there. That would be my assessment when I think back on it. I, I think, yeah, my plans that morning prior to the intervention occurring were to go to my dealer's house because we were about to go to a wedding in upstate New York. I didn't know that the caravan that later went to the wedding had two, two [00:15:00] roles, one of which being the, uh, participants in my intervention.
Brenda: Right. A little detour.
Matt: But yes, to your point, to, to, to the reflection you're sharing, um, my position is, again, anchored in my own experience only, uh, you know, recoveries for those who want it and recoveries for those who need it. And I don't know that those are untrue. My opinion and experience is that recovery is for those who do it, you know, because it, you know, in relationships, uh, personal friendship, family, intimate, or, or anything, um, as is probably one of the, one of the best reflections and opportunities for me to learn about myself and how to interact with people.
One of the most consistent things I learned is that what is definitively true today. Isn't definitively true tomorrow. You know, my motivations to, to begin to engage in, in the program that I decided to engage in, and I don't even know if I [00:16:00] decided to, I mean, I had asked my sponsor. If we could work the steps and he said, no, we don't typically do that.
Cause you're only here for 28 days. And I was like, well, apparently I signed myself in for 90 days. And he was like, Oh, dang. Okay. We could probably get to work. Why don't you, why don't you bring your book to my office, um, tomorrow morning? I was like, what book? And I assumed, cause I had heard some of his story.
He worked with the adolescents. I was in the young adult program. I, I had assumed that he was going to tell me to bring, um, the, the narcotics Textbook, the basic text. And he said, bring, bring Alcoholics Anonymous book with you. And I was like talking about heroin and sunshine acid when you're like under like what, but that's what he told me to bring.
So that's what we did. And I, I never, I never approached it as anything beyond I'm reading a book with a guy who claims to have read the same book with another guy. I had no lofty expectations beyond [00:17:00] likely getting more access to snacks. You know, probably getting special treatment, which, you know, I'm very delicate and really want my special treatment and, um, unlike, you know, unlike, I was about to just continue the sarcasm, much like everybody else who was in, in that, in that position, um, and I was just talking about it earlier this morning, um, at the Next Town Over.
I don't, yeah, I was asked, I was posed the question. So what, if you were off track, if that's how we could describe it, what brought you? Back, I couldn't tell you, not only could I not tell you, I find it a fascinating and enjoyable exercise to reflect on it to a degree. And then I find it just shy of a colossal waste of time because it, whatever it was or whatever series of events were, here I am, right?
I am not dead. I am [00:18:00] invited to my family's Thanksgiving holiday, um, experience moving forward. Um, I'm able to offer people rides and cars that I can pay for. Like I make rent, um, I, I make countless mistakes, countless mistakes and throw my tantrums and attempt to mitigate harm and repercussions as a result of the decisions that I make, you know?
And like, what can I pull from this? How can I move forward? How did that happen? No, it happened by like reviewing. The events of the last ten and a half years, and I'm sure there are some particular events that I could pick out that stick in my memory a little more significantly than others, but, um, I was the perfect amount of exhausted, withdrawing from chemical dependency, and blissfully unaware that apparently, during an intervention, you can jump out the window.
That never even occurred to me. [00:19:00] Had it occurred to me, there's a decent chance. I would have done it. Right. But I didn't find out until my connection flight in Atlanta on the way to Florida that I was like, who's this guy? Because the woman who ran my intervention was, I think, yeah, she's smaller than me.
And I was like, who, who's this guy who's been with us the whole time? And she was like, well, that's in case you ran. And I'm like, I could have ran. I didn't even know that I could have like in it by that point, he's like, I'm flying back to Boston. I think this dude
Brenda: does not need me. Well, I think what you said, I want to just go back to what you said about the small box and how your life has just gotten so much bigger because that's something that I.
I saw also in my son, but I didn't know how to articulate it in that I kept seeing him get smaller and smaller and smaller, trying to fit in and trying to, you know, live this lifestyle. And I kept trying to say, [00:20:00] dude, there's so much more out here. Like you're in this little teeny tiny box and there's this huge world available to you.
And, and I had such a hard time figuring out how to articulate that. And so what you said is really, I think, insightful because I bet there's parents who are seeing that and there's probably no way to really effectively communicate that to our kids. But I think it's good for us to just be aware that at some point they may realize, Oh, actually, yeah, my world is pretty
Matt: small.
When I broke down my fears and when I reflect on them today, you know, fear of failure, fear, fear of success, that's a pretty tight window to, to get. I don't even know what's in between the two. Right? Like fear of intimacy, fear of being abandoned, fear, fear of intimacy. What else is there? How do I fit in there?
Right? And it, it is, it is overwhelming, [00:21:00] um, to conceptualize what, you An existence in that tiny space might be because I think to, to, to, to kind of add onto what I'm hearing you talk about when you're saying to your son, like the world is so expansive, there's so much out there that might be relayed with an intention of like how exciting and inspirational, right?
And it can also be received as one of the most intimidating and debilitating concepts. Sure. Yeah. Because in my world. Living in Boston, I walked from my apartment to my dealer's house or the bar and back. And like, those were my footprints from there to there. I knew how many steps it took to get there. I knew depending on when, what time of day it was, who I probably was going to pass.
Like I, it was manageable. Yeah. And then back in my room doing the things that I was doing so that I could not necessarily feel the way I wanted to, but rather not feel the way that [00:22:00] I was. Right. That process was equally, uh, about as soothing or comforting as any concept could have been. You know, whether I was rolling a joint or crushing up a thing and making lines with it, whatever I was doing, I could do so with a degree of focus and attention and control that I experienced at no other point in my day.
And then, you know, after the fact, oblivion, numbness, escape. Um, so then I didn't have to feel any, and the rest of it was what I had to tolerate to return to that.
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What I hear from folks that I talk to is that there's a level of consistency and repeatability that is so comforting. In, in that state, because you know what you're going to get, even if there's some chaos to get there for the most part, that sort of ease and repeatability of getting that feeling is part of what keeps them there is because I can do this.
I know what I'm going to get and yeah, it's going, it's going to take me from the state I'm in to the state I want to be in.
Matt: I would add with phenomenal, [00:25:00] unbelievable blinders, right? Like, like I remember they were just starting to press, there were rumors of them just starting to press fentanyl into like Xanax bars.
And I was like, I don't even know what fentanyl is. Like, I don't even know what you're talking about. Um, so the whole concept of reliability and predictability of what it is I'm going to get, that's out the door. And that's having no impact. Anecdotally, like from my observations, I've not run studies, that's having no impact.
on frequency of use or, or a rise in at least nationally use. So it's this perception of predictability that becomes so ingrained and, and, and it dictates the, the decisions that I make and the action steps that I take. There's a lot of hope in the hopelessness. It's that hope for return to that first, that first feeling of perhaps blissful neutrality.
Maybe that's what, what I was seeking and it got me there once. And like, to be honest, it probably got me [00:26:00] there for a couple of years, right? Because I just kept upping the ante until I got to a place where my receptors were so out of whack that there was an amount of dopamine that my brain could release to even get me back to baseline, but up, but there was always the hope that this time I can get there.
And I think in a lot of ways, recovery, a lot of patient people, a lot of eye contact and folks just saying, even when I couldn't hold it. Even when I was terrified of eye contact and to this day, I'm still pretty intimidated by it. But, um, a lot of folks who were, were willing to just sit next to me and not necessarily even tell me what they did.
But just acknowledge that they had done their version of what I had done. Hmm. And I believed them. That's the other weird part. Why did I believe them? I'd probably, I used to go to meetings in Boston all the time. I'm sure, I have no doubt that I was hearing similar messages than when I heard when I was in Florida in treatment.
But I didn't believe it. Might be because I was probably still getting drunk and high the [00:27:00] whole time I was at those meetings, but, but it takes, again, it takes what it takes, and, and, you know, it's not about cultivating grit with the intentionality of cultivating grit, but, I had to get my reps in, I had to not only fall forward, but fall sideways and fall backwards, fall hard, and take a couple of people down with me, you know, it's, it's, is it what needed to happen?
Damned if I know, but it's what happened. Right.
Brenda: So interesting. I love hearing that. Just those, those are some of the insights that we. We can't get unless we talk to somebody who's been there and can articulate it because there's plenty of people who have been there and they they aren't able to articulate like you just did some of those things that you experienced and went through so beautifully when we talked I don't know.
It was a while back. We, we taught, we were talking about sort of this failure to launch and you work with a lot of guys, sort of young adult guys. I [00:28:00] know you also now work with adolescents, um, which I, I'd love your adolescent program with the young adult guys. There is this term failure to launch and you had a little bit of a reframe for that, that I would love for you to share, which was failure to fail.
So help us out with that.
Matt: Yeah. I will say, um, since we last spoke, we're actually, our six week program is now, um, all gender increases. So that's, that's pretty exciting. Yeah, I, I think, I think that failure to launch and, and I'll be honest, I, I spent the time since we booked this conversation geeking out a bit of a rabbit hole, um, on what parts of the brain are activated by imagination and hippocampus and what happens when you're reading novels versus, um, on the internet, which is a lot of short term and, and, um, switching and code switching and, [00:29:00] um, trying to come up with something.
Really profound and impress everybody and, and because my ego is delicate and I want to impress people and get affirmation and, and ultimately what I had shared with you then and what I'll share now is that barrier to launch to me implies that there is a fixed destination, right? Like that we're aiming for before podcast called success is subjective.
And, um, I had the opportunity to ramble on that podcast once and, and what comes up for me is, is who launching towards what, like, and for who, you know, and, um, and I think what ends up happening is similar to what we were just talking about with, you know, the walk from my house to the bartender or to the ATM or to the dealer's house.
Those were controllable and predictable to a degree and failure to launch being told you can be anything you [00:30:00] want to be. The world out there is so expansive and there's so much opportunity is with some, some resources, some gumption and some grit. I think one of the most inspiring truths, um, of existence and without those things, um, or without the awareness of how to utilize those things is one of the most daunting and debilitating concepts.
That we can present anybody, including ourselves. And so this anticipatory anxiety, this, um, this, this fear of failure. Cause I, I would submit that failure to launch is. Um, is about that buildup of kinetic energy or potential energy rather until we get to kinetic energy and what ends up happening then is I, I can anticipate all these potential outcomes, um, which is hippocampus stuff, uh, and I can really flex those that, that, that brain power about what might happen.
[00:31:00] But there's no effective or implementable growth or knowledge being acquired in a hypothetical situation. We learn by doing. And by learning by doing, what we are really saying, as far as I'm concerned, is we're, we're saying we learn by failing. So, task, hoped for outcome, anticipated outcome, action steps to get to anticipated outcome, not acquiring anticipated outcome.
If we, if we just change the words that we're using, we're talking about growth, acquiring more data, circling the feedback loop, scientific process, making more informed decisions moving forward. And then after a couple of reps, we can decide, well, okay, that's the fifth time that I've attempted to head in this direction and meet this beacon.
I wonder if maybe we got to move the beacon or maybe I don't have the all the information yet. So what am I willing to do to engage to seek out more data to find another path or access point to the [00:32:00] beacon? If I throw in self reflection and core value identification. Then I can even save myself three of those five reps by asking simple questions like this.
What I want to acquire. Is this a goal that this is even my goal? Is this my beacon? Is this my mom's beacon? Is this my uncle's beacon? Frankly, is this a beacon that I just guessed and made an assumption because it's because I hear failure to launch because I hear. About listless and, and purposeless lives and they just sit in their room and, and, um, and I'm, and I'm on my phone and everyone's projecting all these amazing experiences.
With filters and editing abilities, and maybe all of that becomes so daunting that it's easier to just kind of sit here and embrace ruminating and live in a world that, um, feels safe and manageable. I can put my phone down [00:33:00] and see, right. But like, if I can combine. An access point, a pathway towards my own core values, or at least acknowledge that those that I am currently holding might not be my personal agency driven core values, there I see freedom, there I see opportunity, um, and through, through the process.
And some of the processes that we go through in the woods, um, through this curriculum is like, cool, well, let's take a look at behavior patterns thus far. Like, it's, it's your, it's, it's your autonomy, it's your story, it's, we're pulling from the evidence of your experience. We can't dictate or provide anything but kind of some curiosity and some reflection.
And, and, and, and, and create a scenario where you are safe and supported in this exploration, [00:34:00] which is your own. So let's take a look at the behavior patterns that you've brought to this conversation that you're bringing with you to this cohort. And let's try and suss out their alignment with your stated core values.
Maybe the misalignment is, um, directly correlated to, could be directly correlated to the patterns that we're seeing in those behaviors from past, from past experiences. Um, and, and through that process, it's like, yeah, well, let's come up with new behavior patterns because I like that core value. That, that resonates with me.
That is the direction I want to head in, at least for now. Let's also put that in there too, at least for now. Maybe it's important and good that I was missing the mark. So maybe that wasn't a core value or, or, um, or beacon for me to be aiming at. Maybe that was just listless. Or maybe my behavior patterns aren't patterns and they're so inconsistent because I actually didn't hold on to that core value belief.[00:35:00]
It was just something that I picked up in a, in an episode of, of whatever, uh, or on somebody's reel, or I heard in conversation. We have an expectation that we can get the, that there is a, there's an answer and it is accessible, correct? And in many ways, that's all sorts of exciting, right? And it, and it should or could potentially speed up processes left and right across the board.
And I think. In something like math, where there are, as I understand it, immutable laws, um, it's fascinating and, and, and really exciting about the implications and, and how much faster we can go to wherever it is that that knowledge can take us. In the human experience, you know, when we factor in emotions and interaction with other human, humans having experiences that are also factored in with emotions, is any of that reliable?[00:36:00]
You know, like, and, and, and if I compare those two or try to, try to merge those twos or reconcile those two, I'm nothing but disappointed. Because I can Google them, I can take my phone out and search something and get an answer. But I don't have that consistency or reliability with any other human being in my life.
Probably some more so than others, but we're all fallible. Yeah. We all fall short of unspoken expectations. We definitely fall short of spoken expectations. If somebody articulates an expectation and that, and the other individual meets it, there's probably some spite that's going to come back as a result of that.
I mean, these are, these are the intricacies and the, and the kind of intangibles that are intrinsic to human interaction and part of disappointment and disillusionment and falling short is, is pain and discomfort. Part of failure is [00:37:00] pain and discomfort. Well, I don't want to feel either. So if I fail to launch, as people like to say, then I don't necessarily have to feel those.
I can make the stagnation. I can make that my world and that my experience.
Brenda: Yeah. And what I hear a lot from parents, it kind of related to that is this self sabotage and like. Um, we saw this amazing progress and so close to the quote unquote goal. And then this just complete either a backwards decision or just something that was so clearly, you know, a move that, that stopped that progress.
And it's, is that part of what you're talking about is just like, well, if I don't think I can get there, why am I either, either, why am I going to try or. Um, why would I take that last step? Cause what if
Matt: I failed? I think that's part of it. [00:38:00] I think that's part of it. I think there's an, I think there's a tremendous opportunity for, for like an entire overhaul of the concepts that we're talking about.
I think, I think I can be fully present, engaged, empathetic, compassionate, understanding. And purposeful in what I'm doing right now with an idea or concept or, or secondary goal of where I hope to arrive by staying present in this moment and engaging with what life presents to me in this moment, then those, those failures, those regressions, those, you know, so close to whatever the heck still just become part of the journey towards the thing.
Like it, if we're talking about growth and expansive experience, then. The particulars, the granular particulars of what the end goal is, aren't meaningless. I don't want to be that dismissive of them, but they, they, they hold far less weight than the process of [00:39:00] harm done. I found a boundary by stepping over the boundary, which by the way is the only way I know when I, when, where boundaries are is when I cross them, right?
So I walk gently in the hopes that I just I can, I can take a step back and I can, I can do, I can mitigate harm done so that I can mend relationships so that I'm now cultivating healthy, compassionate relationships with other human beings and it's all, it's all relationships with other human beings.
That's all of it. That's the whole point of this. There's no other point. Now, when I'm, when I'm in active use, I have relationships with other human beings. I do, and there's consistency there that is also comforting and grounding. You know, that person wants my money and I want what they're gonna give me in exchange for that money.
They're gonna pick up that phone and respond to that text. That's really comforting. Yeah. So these regressions, you know, this concept of relapse or return to use, [00:40:00] like, they're all stemming from this all or nothing mindset, which is just not anchored in reality. Anytime I talk to someone I know within the world of an abstinence based recovery process, you know, they've, they've been.
They haven't had a drink, or a drug, or smoked a cigarette for a year and a half. That's amazing. That's amazing. To get through a day is amazing. To get through a year and a half without any of those mind altering substances is un frickin believable, right? Then they have a return to use, or they sneak a cigarette, or, you know, have a drink but it doesn't work out, or maybe it goes on for a long time and they If, if they are graced with the opportunity to return, um, cause it doesn't always turn out that way.
We end up talking about a lot of shame and guilt and I can't, I can't remove that from anybody else's experience. But what I can do is offer up just a very practical, like, let's just look at it. Like how long were you drinking and drugging and smoking [00:41:00] cigarettes? 25 years. How long were you not doing that?
A year and a half. We talk about miracles in the recovery communities that I'm a part of, and that's part of it. It makes way more sense for someone who spent the better part of two decades getting drunk and high. It makes way more sense that they're going to wake up tomorrow and get drunk or high than that they're not.
Yeah. Just, just
Brenda: statistics.
Matt: It's just, yeah, again, it's math. Like it makes way more sense. And what ends up happening is like, can we get enough reps in of instilling, not 12 step, not, not dogmatic. Programs of recovery. Like we're talking about any path towards recovery or healing. Harm reduction is a beautiful thing.
Like, let's keep in mind that we're talking about growth and evolution, not stagnation. Failure to launch implies stagnation. Failure to fail is, is kind of that, that, that, um, that [00:42:00] starting gate, like refusing to go up so that we can get going. And sometimes it means get going to, on the first or second step, fall flat on our face and chip a tooth.
You know? And, and, and, and bust open our chin and, and bang an elbow. And then we can look down and be like, Oh, you know what? Before I start running again, I should probably tie my shoes. And then we tie our shoes and we get to the starting line again. And then the gun goes off and we run and we fall again.
And it's like, Oh, you know what? I'm not even wearing my shoes. I'm not a size 11. I'm a size 9. What shoes am I wearing? But if we can do that in an environment where when we fall, we still have people cheering us on. Yes. We still have the awareness of and the presentation of, Hey, man, like I don't mean to laugh, you know, that actually could have been hurt.
Are you okay? Cool. Let's come back to the starting line. We're gonna load up the starting gun and let's go again. Let's get our reps in. How else do we know?
Brenda: If a parent is listening and this is really resonating, they're like, Oh [00:43:00] gosh, I've kind of been thinking of my kid as failure to launch. Do you have any thoughts for them about shifts in their language or their?
presentation or their thinking around their kiddo to say, Hmm, maybe I have been sort of perpetuating this idea of, you know, there is, there is a place to launch into, or there is a right way to do this. Or is there anything you could think of that they could stop doing that would be sort of like rubbing it in, rubbing salt in the wound?
Matt: I think what's most important is any, any actions that a parent are taking, find themselves taking. that are in support of and an expression of love for their child like that makes sense and is totally valid. I feel that to my core, um, I think, I cannot, I cannot put myself in the position [00:44:00] of what my parents or any parents who are listening to this are experiencing on a cellular level in, in watching their child navigate life in the way that they are.
Um, and I cannot fathom. The responsibility that, um, one might be taking on as a result of that. One of the first things my parents asked me, um, at probably our parents weekend was like, What did we do? Like, what should we have done? And my response to them, my own parents, who were asking this question to me while I was still in treatment was, I honestly don't know that it had much of anything to do with you.
I mean, I think my therapists would probably disagree. Because there's some, there's some acquisition of love languages, I think, I think defining what success is, I think, I think all of us are invited to be real cognizant of the words in the, in the commentary that we make on, on ideas and conceptions like success and failure, right?
I know [00:45:00] growing up that, how was your day, that whole conversation, I, I, you know, our, for the most part, our family had dinner together, very, very blessed to have that experience. And we had, like, we, I mean, genuine conversation, how was your day, my takeaway from it, not saying this is the intention or what was said, but my takeaway from those conversations were, how was your day was assessed by, did you make the team?
What'd you get on the test? Did you score the goal? Did you win the race? Did you kiss the girl? Did you get a date? Like, like, very tangible external things. I don't recall ever being asked how my friendship was with my best friend who lived down the street since then. Or like, Hey, I, you know, the last time I picked you up at so and so's house, it seemed like the two of you were kind of in, in, in, had a scuffle going on.
Like, have you guys mended that? Like, have you talked about that? Have you told? You know him how you feel or how you felt when blah, blah, blah. I did not. I didn't get that. Yeah, I [00:46:00] don't fault anyone for that. It's just in my memory and reflection. I didn't get that. I think I think there's a lot of takeaways to be pulled from from what I was while I had engaged supportive parents, their word choice.
No doubt fueled by, you know, their upbringing. These are the, these are the takeaways that I formulated. Now, now my, my older brother didn't necessarily formulate the same things as me, but like, you factor in what I heard from them, what shows I watched, what music I listened to, the people that I hung out with, where they came.
You know, so when I think about all those, all those variables, to tell any, any, or suggest any parent to stop doing one thing, or keep doing another thing, keep loving on your kid. Be open to the possibility that the way in which you're expressing the undeniable love that you have for your child might not be the most effective way for them to navigate the part of their experience that they're currently in.
Brenda: [00:47:00] Hmm. Perfect. Yes. I, I think that that is a incredibly wise and insightful statement because we, uh, we tend to think, well, this worked with this kid. I'm doing the same thing with this kid. And like you said, it could be drastically different experiences from, from one sibling to another or a cousin or whoever.
So, well, thank you so much. Incredibly. Helpful to hear your thoughts, your observations, and uh, I think some parents will be maybe looking at how they're having those interactions with their kids as well and, and rethinking when they see them either struggling or flailing or falling down, that that might not actually be such a
Matt: bad thing.
Yeah, it's a scary thought, but it might not be such a bad thing.
Brenda: Thanks, Matt. I appreciate it so much. Thank you for being [00:48:00] here
Matt: with me. Yeah, it was fun. Thanks for having.
Brenda: Okay, my friend, that is it for today. Remember you can find all the guest information and resources we talked about in the show notes and those are at brendazane.
com forward slash podcast. We also have some playlists there that we created for you, like the top 10 episodes, coaching episodes, recovery stories, all the good stuff. And if you haven't already, you may want to download a free ebook I wrote called hindsight. Three things I wish I knew when my son was misusing drugs, it'll give you some insight as to why your child might be doing what they are.
And importantly, it gives you tips on how to cope and how to be more healthy through the rough times. You can download that free from brendazine. com forward slash hindsight. Thank you so much for listening. Stay strong and be very, very good to yourself. And I will meet you right back here. Next week.