Jason Lennox is your resident recovery champion. What he loves to preach about is serenity. Often times in recovery meetings, new people are brought in who remind him of how bad things are out there. Hope you've enjoyed the Christmas tree.
Jason Lennox is your resident recovery champion. What he loves to preach about is serenity. Often times in recovery meetings, new people are brought in who remind him of how bad things are out there. Instead of being judgmental, Lennox says, we should be compassionate.
So that's what I got here on this cold, chilly Sunday in Minnesota. Hope you've enjoyed the Christmas tree. This is the lights and the holiday and the music and the fun and the food. Just my favorite time of year. We'll talk to you all next week.
Good evening everybody in the Cadre sphere. Happy Sunday. Coming to you with the Christmas tree. And my name is Jason Lennox and I like to refer to myself as your resident recovery champion. Really all that means is that I'm a champion for this work in recovery. Recovery for me means from substances, from alcohol, mental health, all kinds of things. So I'm just here to share stories, share inspiration, hope, all the things when it comes to recovery, substance use, mental health. And excited to be coming to you here Sunday Serenity.
A little bit late here. Sorry about that. I had some plans here this evening and literally just ran back through the cold. If you're in Minnesota with me, it's way, way too cold for me. Single digits, so. But here we are back in the warm 74 degree apartment. Some of you will think that's a little wild, but that's the temperature it stays all year long. I'm always cold, Always cold. Good evening, junk food junkie. Good to see you. Some of you, others chiming in. Yeah, I'm coming to you tonight in Sunday Serenity.
Really what I share about, what I love to preach, what I love to just talk to the world about is serenity. Having that level of peace, lack of peace, lack of serenity. That's what drove my addiction for so long. Always seeking that kind of comfort and just stirring something up. Didn't see him for a couple months, of course, I was gone for a Monday night and it had been a while. And there he came in the sound of the day and told me about the experience of going back out and getting back into this and that and going to treatment and the family.
And just, you know, I just listened for, I don't know, 10, 15, 20 minutes, just listen, let it all come out. And I could just hear it, you know, choke up and just, I could feel the pain. I could hear the pain. And it took me back to something I think I've shared about in the past and that's that in the world of recovery and especially in recovery meetings and we talk about the new people and the people are coming back from being out there. And I think, like, the intent is typically good, but something I hear often that irks me every time is, you know, the newcomer is a really important person.
I'm glad they're here because they remind me of how bad, how bad it is out there and how painful that is when I see these people coming in. And I've had a problem with that for two reasons. One primarily, like, the first reason if my recovery, if my well being if my health, if satisfaction and any of that stuff for me is dependent on seeing somebody else in a state of suffering, pain, misery, gosh, I'm going down the wrong path. Like, if that's my way of battling my own demons, it's just not going to end well, in my opinion.
I'm using other people's pain and I'm just having to be reminded of that. I'm like going down this path of brokenness still. It's like I'm fighting the brokenness instead of building the path that has this beautiful life that doesn't have us go back to that, that kind of thinking and behaving. So that's my first reason. But second and more importantly, I just think about the new person. How does that feel? And I can't remember hearing that when I was new, but I'm certain it happened. But I think there's just so much danger in that for a new person to sit there and go, well, gosh, I'm glad that all my pain and suffering is benefiting you and your long term recovery.
Again. I haven't heard people say that. I don't know, maybe it doesn't land that way with everyone, but I think it's just very dangerous to be, to be talking that way again primarily. Like it, it says something about where I'm at, my own recovery and my own health and my own journey and two, you know, what does it say to them? But then the third thing is it probably is the difference between me sitting there in that sauna today, listening to this man and listening to this pain and the suffering and all the things that are happening.
If I'm thinking like that, I'm just going, gosh, this is. Glad I'm not there. Glad that that's not mine. This is a good reminder why I need to stay. Instead of the compassionate listener that I tried to play there, just list listening, letting some of these things come out. And so I just think there are so many things that we have to be careful about when we look at people who are struggling and suffering. And you know, I'm reminded because I talk all the time about my story, I'm reminded of how painful that was.
And that is helpful for me. Sometimes it is a helpful tool. That's my own pain. Like I'm not going to rely on someone else's. I'm not going to look at someone else's suffering and go, you know, gosh, thank God I'm not there anymore. So I don't know, it just got me down that Path thinking about that. I hear that too often and I try to speak up and say something about it because again, I just don't believe that any of our own well being should be dependent at all on someone else's pain, suffering, misery, etc.
I think we just need to be the people that show up and listen, just shut up sometimes and listen. That's the best we can do. And I tried to, you know, share and kind of talk down the shame and the guilt and the stigma that I heard coming from this person. But 80% of the time I just kept an ear, just, you know, expressed how, you know, man just respected the guy a little more after Sharon. So anyhow, that's, that's what I know, that's what I have this Sunday again. I just think the way we approach people really can make a difference and you know, frankly be the difference between someone going back out there and, you know, coming back.
I don't know, if I hear someone say that they're grateful that I'm around because I'm in pain and I'm suffering, it might just make it worse. And I go back out there versus listening, having a conversation, being empathetic and just talking through things. From a person to person standpoint, we all screw up, we all have things, we go through all these things. It doesn't have to mean any more than just that we fall short sometimes and we deal with these things and we have these psychological components of mental health and substance use that most diseases don't have and you know, we just have to deal with a little bit differently.
But we really need to help our people who are going through it too and not get caught up in, you know, being that kind of person who looks down on those people, uses their pain, suffering for own benefits. So that's what I got here on this Sunday, this cold, chilly Sunday in Minnesota. Again, thanks for hanging in there a little late here and hope you've enjoyed the Christmas tree. I try to sit here as long as I have that up. If I'm being honest, sometimes I have it up till March or April. So I don't know that I'll sit here that long, but at least until Christmas.
I'm excited. This is the lights and the holiday and the music and the fun and the food. Just my favorite time of year. So hopefully you all have wonderful weeks planned and that you all have peaceful start. We'll talk to you all next week. Thanks.
