How Coaching Gave Me a New Life in Recovery

After a few years of sobriety, I was discontent. Not because I didn’t do the steps. Not because I didn’t have a morning routine. And not because I didn’t have the fellowship and a higher power. In fact, I took many of the suggestions and was still dissatisfied. But why?

It is common for the addict or the alcoholic to experience the longing for “more”. But more of what? That, I didn’t have the answer to. I knew I was lacking, but I didn’t know what I was lacking. I brushed off this desire for more as a dysfunctional alcoholic trait — I was just being obsessive and that was my disease was talking to me. Little did I know that what I was experiencing was something that many human beings are carrying around with them on a daily basis, not just those in recovery.

Throughout my fourth step, I came to think that the problem was me and that I shouldn’t have what I want. Wanting things was bad and I am the source of that problem. I heard this over and over again, and I came to believe it.

It was all bullshit.

What I soon realized was that the problem wasn’t me, but rather my strategy in obtaining happiness. The problem wasn’t that I wanted things, but rather the quality of those things that I wanted.

What if you can have what you want? In fact, what if there was no limit in having what you want, so long as the desire comes from a mindset of integrity?

1) I want drugs and I will lie, cheat and steal to get them.

2) I want to run a business and I’m going to serve as many people as possible while fulfilling my purpose.

Can you see a difference in these two statements? Both contain a desire, and both contain a strategy. The quality of the desire and the process of the strategy to get the result are completely different.

Coming to terms with the desire for more was the first part of the freedom I experienced. It allowed me to sit with the feeling of discontentment with a clear conscience once I realized I wasn’t a bad person for wanting more out of life.

What I was feeling was an internal shift to find my purpose, but I didn’t know what it was, let alone how to find it. All I knew was that I was no longer finding what I was looking for in conventional recovery programs, though it was a great stepping stone to start my life over with.

“The two most important days in your life are the day you were born and they day you find out why.”

-Mark Twain

Now, where to find this purpose?

Though I knew virtually nothing about it, I had been hearing a lot about the coaching world. It seemed as though anyone around me who was living an exciting life of purpose, fulfillment, and constant expansion had one thing in common — they all had a coach. Unfortunately, it had quite the price tag on it.

Isn’t recovery service supposed to be free? I thought to myself. I thought it was immoral for one person in recovery to charge another for service. Though my coach is also in recovery, this service wasn’t along the same guidelines, but instead in a league of its own. I was able to utilize some of the things I had learned and expand on them with coaching, but it was not the same. Coaching offered solutions to life I did not receive in school, college, or from parents, friends, or any other type of recovery program.

I made the resolution that I would refrain from getting the coach since anything in recovery can be found for free in anonymous self-help groups. I then noticed my contradicting thought process and realized that if I had found what I needed in that setting, I wouldn’t be looking somewhere else to figure this out.

I decided to take the leap and pay for the six month’s worth of services. If I didn’t like it, at least I tried instead of backing out and wondering what it would be like if I had just went for it. I was nervous and questioned the idea. After all, I was entering the unknown and had paid for the entire contract up front.

The six months that followed changed my life for good. I can’t possibly look back. I can say with complete honesty that I never think about drinking or using drugs. Not only that, but I am constantly evolving, changing, and continuously learning while focused more on self-improvement than ever before in my life. Most of my thoughts are forward thinking. If I have a mental set back, I have enough practice with shifting my attention that I don’t stay in that state of mind for very long.

Before hiring a coach, I had no idea how to do this. To be completely honest, I wasn’t aware of it until I had started adopting some new habits and thought processes that were presented to me through coaching. I couldn’t see where I was without stepping into who I could become. It was a move strictly made from a mindset of faith and intuition.

Here was the pivotal moment for me — the moment I realized it was worth every dime I had invested:

I hired the coach in July of 2018. After about six months of steady improvement, he had me do an exercise to carry momentum into the new year. The exercise was to record all the highlights of the past year.

I reflected back to January and couldn’t think of anything.

On to February, still nothing.

And March…

To April, June, then finally July…

Nothing.

I had realized that 2018 had no highlights until I hired a coach. I went to work, came home, went to a meeting. Rinse, wash, repeat. Outside of going out to eat with a couple of friends and a few casual events with the family, life was pretty dull. I was up against the wall, and tired of the same old thing. But I had no direction.

What is worth my attention? How do I want to utilize my time? Who do I want to utilize that time with? When I am sitting on my death bed, how could I have made everything worth it? How can I maximize my potential as a human being? These were all questions I had not had until I got a coach. Even if I had those questions, answers were not there.

Paying for that coach was the best decision I have ever made.

All of a sudden, I was listening more. We met once a week, and I utilized the half hour we got and became more resourceful. I went into calls with specific intention of getting a result every time, and it started to trickle into my life outside of those phone calls. This is difficult to do when service is free. We know it will be there again, and again, and again, free of cost.

When I paid for the coach, there was incentive to take massive action. I wanted to get my money’s worth.

The result?

I achieved things I didn’t know I could. I became someone I didn’t know I could be. I had courage to change and gained confidence in the process. I have never been more clear in what I want to do with my life.

Anything worth a lot of value is going to have a price tag on it. I found out that I had the money, I just needed to redirect it. Thoughts shifted from I can’t afford it to, how can I afford it? The following six months, he raised prices, and I gladly paid. Had I not taken the leap on the first six months of coaching that was required to be paid for up front, I would never know anything of these things today. It was the best move I have ever made in my life and it was the catalyst to any and all progress I have made since. Personally, I’ll never be without one.