Al Richards woke up with one leg missing. And yet his room was the one full of laughter. New staff were warned about laughter in a room - if you hear a room having a good time, that's Al's. What made it remarkable was everything he was laughing in the middle of.
"There's nothing we can do. Your foot will continue to die."
"I'm done. I'm having him take it. The pain I'll go through is going to be healing pain."
Al is a podcaster, speaker, co-founder of the Healing Utah Success Summit and a newly certified crisis and recovery coach. In 2025, a plaque blockage cut off the blood supply to his right foot until it began to die beneath him. He chose amputation over a dying limb. Barely out of hospital, four weeks later, addiction took his wife.
This episode is about surgical choice, grief, and what it takes to turn towards the storm like the bison instead of running from it.
What we explore:
Connect with Al:
Podcast: The Other Side of Addiction (Apple)
YouTube: The Other Side of Addiction
Instagram: @mralrichards
TikTok: @alrichards780
LinkedIn: Al Richards
Facebook: Al Richards
I spent 25 years building a life that looked successful from the outside, but within, it was the opposite. Everything was falling apart, and I was throwing fuel on that fire. The joy of life had fallen away. Late November 2018, I had to make a choice: live or die. I chose to live, and everything changed. I had to confront the pain I was carrying, look at the stories, and change. I built The Brave Man Project because there was nothing like this when I needed it.
Podcast website: thebravemanproject.com
Hamish's website: hamishniven.com
YouTube: The Brave Man Project
LinkedIn: Hamish Niven
TikTok: @hamish.niven
Instagram: @hamishniven
Personal Facebook: Hamish Niven
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Speaker:I can add you to my surgeries tomorrow and we can amputate your leg." And she goes,
Speaker:you have two hours to decide. but she goes,
Speaker:I've got three other amputations I just need to let my surgical team my
Speaker:mom was with me and I said, I'm done.
Speaker:I'm done. I'm having him take it.
Speaker:I'm tired of the pain, At least when they cut my leg off,
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:the pain that I'll go through is going to be healing pain because it will subside.
Speaker:I woke up and there's no leg below.
Speaker:had a below the knee amputation.
Speaker:So guys, welcome to another episode of the Brave Man Project.
Speaker:Ow, great to see you again. We recorded 18 months ago,
Speaker:two years ago on my previous podcast,
Speaker:so it's really nice to have you back.
Speaker:Thank you so much. appreciate you asking me back.
Speaker:It's an honour.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Wow. I'm to say I had to get you back.
Speaker:Your life has changed somewhat.
Speaker:You're not quite the whole man you were last time we spoke.
Speaker:There's also a lot of things been happening in your world,
Speaker:isn't there?
Speaker:Yeah, no pun intended, but absolutely you are correct.
Speaker:tell my listeners why you are here.
Speaker:Tell me a bit about your story and what makes you such a remarkable human being.
Speaker:man, you know, ~ well, I'm here of course,
Speaker:because you know, you and I met a couple of years ago and you've been a guest
Speaker:on my show too. You know, the other side of addiction and we shared a lot of stuff.
Speaker:It's, My journey since about 2009 has been one hell of a journey.
Speaker:You know, In July of 2009, I lost a 24 year career and
Speaker:I lost it basically because, I pissed a dirty UA.
Speaker:and I hadn't been drug tested in like 15 years.
Speaker:And I had spent every weekend for eight years snorting cocaine and drinking.
Speaker:And that was like my getaway. You know,
Speaker:I had a very stressful job and not realising it until later down the road.
Speaker:No.
Speaker:you know, I was numbing a lot of things that was happening in my life,
Speaker:not realising that's one of the biggest reasons why I was doing it.
Speaker:And
Speaker:Found out at that time by someone being straight up and honest with me that
Speaker:I was known as a liar and a manipulator And that one really tugged
Speaker:at my heartstrings on that one because I looked at myself as a pretty good person
Speaker:And I actually called BS on it.
Speaker:I said yeah, you're full of shit who I am and and I started thinking
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:a little bit more and I went holy shit,
Speaker:no, that's exactly who I am and Gosh even even just talking about it I
Speaker:get I get tears in my eyes because
Speaker:That's not the human being that I wanted to be.
Speaker:And I decided at that time I was going to change.
Speaker:I didn't know how, I didn't know which direction to go.
Speaker:I mean, I didn't even know where to turn,
Speaker:period, at all. And I had always been someone that had been into fitness
Speaker:and I had really let myself go.
Speaker:was 198 pounds, couldn't see my toes if I looked down because my belly was so big,
Speaker:I had a double chin.
Speaker:And I thought, you know what? The only thing I know what to do is to
Speaker:get back in shape. And I started heading that direction and slowly started getting
Speaker:myself back in shape. during this time when all this was happening,
Speaker:after losing my job, a year later,
Speaker:we lost our house. And my wife,
Speaker:my past wife, she fell into alcoholism because it was a lot for her to take.
Speaker:and she started using alcohol to numb her feelings and numb her demons.
Speaker:And we stayed married, my gosh,
Speaker:it was a battle, a long, long battle.
Speaker:And that's really what got me to start my podcast and start public speaking.
Speaker:And I just wanted to share a lot of the stuff that I was doing wrong as a spouse,
Speaker:as a loved one, watching somebody battle an addiction.
Speaker:I never did look at myself as an addict.
Speaker:I still don't to this day. You some people like,
Speaker:well, you you's definitely an addict,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:you know, but again, I've heard this so many times.
Speaker:It's my story. It's my journey.
Speaker:I tell it how I want to tell it.
Speaker:And so it's like, look, it was a time in my life that I'm not proud of,
Speaker:but that's just who I was. It's not who I am today.
Speaker:I don't even celebrate a sobriety day.
Speaker:needs.
Speaker:It's just because it doesn't mean anything to me because it's not
Speaker:in my life anymore. It's not it's not Al Richards.
Speaker:And
Speaker:It's crazy because I like to share too with a lot of people that we can't
Speaker:get to where we want to go without help.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:cannot do our journey alone. And what I mean by that is actually spirituality.
Speaker:And I'm not talking religion here.
Speaker:Religion's completely out the door.
Speaker:I'm just talking having a spirituality,
Speaker:a higher power that you look up to,
Speaker:whatever that is for you. Again,
Speaker:that's not for me to say. For me,
Speaker:it's God.
Speaker:And while I was taking this journey,
Speaker:he just kept putting the right people in front of me.
Speaker:My old friends slowly just started dissipating.
Speaker:They disappeared. And I started coming,
Speaker:I started having people come into my life that were uplifting
Speaker:and spiritual and enjoyed life and had a great outlook on life.
Speaker:And a lot of those individuals were people in recovery.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:because they had dug themselves out of the darkness of dark too.
Speaker:and, and I do, am definitely someone who looks at it as we find
Speaker:our brightest light in the darkest of dark.
Speaker:We have to go through the darkest of dark before we can actually find our light.
Speaker:And I was starting to find light and it was a battle there for quite a long time,
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:you know, dealing with my wife's alcoholism and,
Speaker:~ it breaks my heart. I lost her last year as well.
Speaker:And as time went, you know, I get myself and I keep myself in shape.
Speaker:And I had to quit playing softball and everything.
Speaker:And that's one of the reasons why you see the slain because I've just tore
Speaker:my shoulders up so bad. And I took on hiking.
Speaker:I love being in nature and I love being up in our mountains here.
Speaker:I live in Salt Lake City, Utah,
Speaker:and we have some of the most beautiful Wasatch Mountains.
Speaker:And you get on some of these trails and you can hike up to little lakes
Speaker:and waterfalls.
Speaker:I mean, it's just beautiful, the smell of pines and sage.
Speaker:And I call that my church. I do a lot of videos up there where I tell people,
Speaker:to my church, because that's the church God built.
Speaker:No man, no man had anything to do with that but God.
Speaker:And you know, I started really tapping into myself a lot more.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And I started having some issues with my right leg.
Speaker:I started having a lot of pain in my calf where it felt like...
Speaker:My calf was being squeezed in a vice and I got to where I wasn't able
Speaker:to really enjoy hiking anymore because the pain was just getting so bad.
Speaker:And I tried a couple early hikes in 2025 and I just,
Speaker:couldn't even get into about a mile hike without being in so much pain
Speaker:and wanting to turn around and go back.
Speaker:Long story short, I finally went and had it checked out and I had a little
Speaker:bit of plaque buildup behind my knee in one of my veins.
Speaker:not in one of the vasculars, but just in one of the blood veins.
Speaker:And it was cutting off the circulation,
Speaker:so my calf muscle wasn't getting the blood flow that it needed during my hike.
Speaker:And I went in and had it checked,
Speaker:and they're like, easy procedure.
Speaker:And basically, long story short,
Speaker:is I had two procedures, and the procedures didn't go well.
Speaker:It ended up plugging up all my veins in my foot and they call it trash foot
Speaker:So basically my foot my right foot had no lifeline at all period.
Speaker:It was dying the I went through was excruciating every single day and
Speaker:I didn't want to get out of bed because as soon as my Foot hit the floor.
Speaker:The pain was just I would almost pass out because the pain was just so bad
Speaker:and I was still working and
Speaker:Finally, my daughter did her job as a daughter,
Speaker:a loving daughter. She did some checking and said,
Speaker:dad, you need to get a second opinion.
Speaker:And I've already talked to somebody.
Speaker:Mm-mm.
Speaker:I said, you need to get to the emergency center.
Speaker:And I tell you what, I should.
Speaker:when a doctor walks in.
Speaker:And asked you all these questions and you give him the history and the story.
Speaker:Bye.
Speaker:and he looks at you, facial expressions don't change,
Speaker:and he says, you may have just lost your leg.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:And I remember what he said that my youngest daughter was at
Speaker:the emergency center with me and she slid over and she grabbed my hand
Speaker:and she's like, dad, are you okay?
Speaker:And I said, man, I don't know.
Speaker:I'm just trying to process what he just said.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:You know, I've done everything to keep my health good,
Speaker:you know, especially the past 16 years.
Speaker:I mean, I've been consistent going to the gym for 13,
Speaker:been a for 13-14 years and I my best to create videos
Speaker:14 years and doing my best to watch what I eat and take care of myself.
Speaker:and carry myself and help people to believe in It's impossible.
Speaker:And now I'm being told I can lose my leg.
Speaker:This is impossible. This is,
Speaker:It's
Speaker:this is, it's not happening.
Speaker:not happening.
Speaker:I went in for a bypass. They wanted to see if they could do a bypass
Speaker:the very next day. So when I went into the hospital,
Speaker:I didn't leave. I mean, they prepped a room for me and I was in a room that night
Speaker:and my daughters were going out and buying me some underwear and some slippers
Speaker:and different things. Cause I had nothing.
Speaker:I walked in with my work clothes and,
Speaker:yeah, it was unsuccessful. Everything was plugged in there.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:was nothing that they could bypass it with.
Speaker:And, and
Speaker:We tried a few other things. The doctor that I had,
Speaker:bless her heart, Dr. Holly Ryan,
Speaker:she's amazing. That woman, wow.
Speaker:That woman busted her butt to do everything she could to save my leg.
Speaker:And it didn't happen. And after the last procedure,
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:she came up to my room and she goes,
Speaker:Al, there's nothing we can do.
Speaker:And she goes, I can release you and you can go home,
Speaker:but your foot will continue to die and the pain will just continue to
Speaker:get worse and worse. Or we can prep you and...
Speaker:I can add you to my surgeries tomorrow and we can amputate your leg." And she goes,
Speaker:you have two hours to decide. And she goes,
Speaker:I'm not meaning to put pressure on you,
Speaker:but she goes, I've got three other amputations or two other amputations.
Speaker:I just need to let my surgical team know.
Speaker:she walked, my mom was with me and as soon as she walked out,
Speaker:Cheers!
Speaker:I looked at my mom and I said,
Speaker:I'm done. I'm done. I'm having him take it.
Speaker:I'm tired of the pain, you know,
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:and it's not going to get worse.
Speaker:At least when they cut my leg off,
Speaker:the pain that I'll go through is going to be healing pain because it will subside.
Speaker:The other direction is just going to continue to get worse.
Speaker:Plus I have an opportunity to lose more of my leg.
Speaker:And so I just hit one year, March 7th of 2025.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I woke up and there's no leg below.
Speaker:had a below the knee amputation.
Speaker:Wow. Just come forward, lean forwards a little bit into the camera for me.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You're still smiling. There's a big smile on your face.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I am.
Speaker:I can see a smile. There's a smile in your eyes.
Speaker:I mean, that's just remarkable.
Speaker:I don't know how, how do you cope?
Speaker:How do you manage? just gonna go through everything.
Speaker:You got fired from your job, from...
Speaker:A drug test, failed drug test.
Speaker:Everything fell apart. You stopped the drinking,
Speaker:you got fit, you got healthy, you stopped the drugs.
Speaker:Your wife got sick, drank.
Speaker:She died last year. You lost your leg last year.
Speaker:How come you're still smiling,
Speaker:my friend? How come you have that capacity to show joy and things like that?
Speaker:I'm good.
Speaker:It is quite remarkable.
Speaker:It's a good question. And it's filling my eyes full of tears already.
Speaker:You know, when I first heard the doctor say that I probably lost my leg,
Speaker:all these negative emotions started running through my head,
Speaker:right? It's like, I'll never kick the soccer ball with my grandkids again.
Speaker:I'm not going to be able to drive my truck again.
Speaker:I'm not ever going to be able to hike again.
Speaker:You know, it's like victim, victim,
Speaker:victim, victim, victim,
Speaker:It took me about five minutes to feel sorry for myself.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:I finally came to and said, know what?
Speaker:This is my journey. There's a reason behind this and I'm going to have
Speaker:to figure it out. There's a lesson behind it.
Speaker:You know, we talked about before the show,
Speaker:you know, even the message in the mirror.
Speaker:No.
Speaker:You know, we all look at ourselves every day in a mirror and there's messages
Speaker:in there for us. That's just how I like to view it.
Speaker:But I viewed it as God just gave me a sheet of paper.
Speaker:you
Speaker:a and I can write this new chapter however,
Speaker:I want to write it and I can write it with negativity with anger Play
Speaker:in the victim frustration blame.
Speaker:However, you want to look at it or I can go You know what?
Speaker:I Got God on my side I'm gonna do everything I can to get as much as my life back
Speaker:as possible
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:The reason behind it what it is.
Speaker:I still don't know to this day even a year later and I'm still
Speaker:I'm still even looking at the lessons behind it right there because there's lessons
Speaker:behind everything that happened to us in our life.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:It's just my verse but You know and I don't want the audience to get
Speaker:the wrong the wrong idea because Every morning that I woke up in the hospital.
Speaker:I was ballin I mean alligator tears pouring down my face as I'm looking down
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:and I'm not seeing my leg
Speaker:but I allowed myself to go through those emotions,
Speaker:but I didn't allow them to stay there.
Speaker:I went through what I needed to go through,
Speaker:I felt what I needed to feel, and I took my deep breath and go,
Speaker:okay, let's move forward. Let's do everything I can to make the best
Speaker:out of this day. And the nurses loved coming into my room and even
Speaker:new nurses that was coming on shift for the first time,
Speaker:they're like,
Speaker:Yeah, I was told that if you hear a lot of laughter and things going on,
Speaker:that's Al Richard's room. He's in there.
Speaker:They're just having a blast in there.
Speaker:and it was just my way of going.
Speaker:I'm out of pain. I've got a journey ahead of me.
Speaker:I'm going to do everything I can to enjoy this journey.
Speaker:Now have every day been amazing?
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:hell no. Not at all. There's been days I just,
Speaker:I wanted to throw in the towel,
Speaker:right? I had enough.
Speaker:However, the strength and the faith and the belief that I have,
Speaker:it has really kept me going. you know,
Speaker:the test really came to because four weeks after I lost my leg,
Speaker:I got the phone call that I had lost my wife.
Speaker:And I was like, what the hell is freaking going on?
Speaker:What's happening right now with my life?
Speaker:You know, and that was harder to take than me losing my leg.
Speaker:You know, we ended up getting a divorce.
Speaker:were divorced and she ended up being homeless and living on the streets.
Speaker:She did not like me calling her my ex-wife and she didn't call me her ex-husband.
Speaker:I mean, we were still in love with each other.
Speaker:We had been together 18 years,
Speaker:you know, and it was just the alcohol that pulled this beautiful woman away and,
Speaker:you know, took her in a whole different direction and she just struggled
Speaker:to get out of it.
Speaker:And it's just been one challenge after another,
Speaker:know, just especially last year.
Speaker:And the only thing that I could fall back on was this is not what's going
Speaker:to take me down. I will not allow it.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And I found that waking up every day,
Speaker:I have a thing that I do in the mornings.
Speaker:I look at myself eye-to- eye in the mirror.
Speaker:and I tell myself, love you. Today's an amazing day.
Speaker:I am so grateful for what I have in my life at this time.
Speaker:I'm filled with gratitude.
Speaker:I'm gonna do everything I can to help somebody else because I had
Speaker:so many people help me. It's my pay it forward.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:thank you for the day,
Speaker:God. I'm grateful. And I just have continued to do this to help me
Speaker:get through even on those days that I have that bad days,
Speaker:you know, it's just helped me get through it.
Speaker:And I've done everything I can to keep that smile on my face because
Speaker:I feel there's so many of us that are going through something in life,
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:whether it's loss of somebody,
Speaker:whether it's addiction, whether it's a divorce or,
Speaker:mean, there's so many things, so many things that life throws at us.
Speaker:And you may have heard me say this,
Speaker:I like to call them shit balls.
Speaker:Life throws shit balls at us constantly and sometimes they hit a square
Speaker:in the face and it's nasty and it stinks and it's miserable.
Speaker:But do we sit there and whine about it?
Speaker:Or do we sit and get ourselves all cleaned off and go,
Speaker:okay, what can I learn from this?
Speaker:And what can I do to get through this so I have an opportunity
Speaker:to help somebody else? That's just what's really helped me keep that smile
Speaker:as well as someone who thought of suicide back in 2019 and realising
Speaker:I have two beautiful daughters and three beautiful grandkids and realising
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:it's not fair to them to take the time they have with me
Speaker:when it's not my time yet. And that has just,
Speaker:that has really also stuck with me.
Speaker:And I love that I'm still around and it's amazing because my grandkids are curious.
Speaker:They ask a lot of questions, which is also cool.
Speaker:And I'm very upfront and honest with them.
Speaker:And you know, and
Speaker:to be able to have this relationship with my two daughters and my three grandkids.
Speaker:One of the blessings, I think,
Speaker:that have come out of this amputation as well,
Speaker:which we loved each other before,
Speaker:but it's like everything's increased.
Speaker:You know, it has brought all of us together so much more than what it was before.
Speaker:Not saying that we wasn't tight,
Speaker:it's just it's really tight, it's just really brought things closer,
Speaker:if that makes sense.
Speaker:It makes a lot of sense that whole thing about everyone coming together
Speaker:and forgetting petty squabbles or silly unnecessary bickering and picking
Speaker:and just going, Dad, granddad's suffering.
Speaker:So let's see what we can do. then you,
Speaker:I I can just, I mean, I've seen your pictures on Facebook.
Speaker:There's, you know, in hospital,
Speaker:the good moments, the hugs,
Speaker:Your daughter sleeping on your bed next to you and all these kind of images just
Speaker:of you going through that process.
Speaker:And the way you described it, just that love and connection and that closeness,
Speaker:I mean, that's remarkable. I mean,
Speaker:I think that's really important.
Speaker:That's what I'm taking away from what you said.
Speaker:Go back into the whole process of...
Speaker:the leg not working, the pain,
Speaker:and then just the steps where everything began to go downhill and just sort
Speaker:of talk me through the feelings of
Speaker:Well, you know, it's the pain part of it was just That was really like
Speaker:the frustration because I'd love to take long hikes,
Speaker:know I mean I was I was doing eight ten mile hikes,
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:you know round trip, know, not one way in and one way out but round trip
Speaker:and and Just enjoying the nature and everything and it was getting to where
Speaker:I wasn't enjoying myself anymore Because I was just in so much pain.
Speaker:I mean, I'd have to walk the ways then have to stop and
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:you know, and then walk a little ways and have to stop.
Speaker:And, you know, and it was scary.
Speaker:It's like, I'm in my sixties. What the heck's going on?
Speaker:You know, I've really pride myself to stay away from all the prescription drugs.
Speaker:And, you know, I've got friends who are on,
Speaker:you know, certain medications and stuff,
Speaker:and I just, don't care for them.
Speaker:I think they're poison, you know,
Speaker:and I know some, you know, there are some that keep people alive and I get it.
Speaker:understand some of that stuff,
Speaker:but.
Speaker:For me, it was just things I wanted to stay away from.
Speaker:And for me going, if nature is taken away from me,
Speaker:that is definitely gonna be a struggle.
Speaker:It is very important for me to be in the mountains.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I would tell myself,
Speaker:well, if not, if I can't hike,
Speaker:I can take the ATV out. At least I'm riding around and doing things,
Speaker:but still just that walking and that quietness in nature,
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:you know, and being alone with myself and my higher power.
Speaker:And it was scary. It was really,
Speaker:really scary, and especially working and just being in pain all day long.
Speaker:And someone, to go back to the prescriptions,
Speaker:I was in so much pain I was taking oxycodone like it was popping out
Speaker:of a pez dispenser. I I was popping them left and right just to
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:get some relief because the pain was just getting excruciating and I went
Speaker:to my physical therapist first and she's amazing.
Speaker:Her name's ~ Cheryl Farnsworth and she owns Cutting Edge Physical Therapy here
Speaker:in Salt Lake City and I call her the woman with the magic hands.
Speaker:She worked on me for quite a while.
Speaker:And to be honest with you, she's the one that got me to go finally
Speaker:see a vascular specialist. If it wasn't for her,
Speaker:I probably would have waited even longer,
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:you know? Because she's like, Al,
Speaker:if I haven't been able to get you fixed,
Speaker:there's something else wrong. And I highly suggest that you go
Speaker:see a vascular specialist. And I did.
Speaker:And unfortunately, I chose the wrong one.
Speaker:However, again, that's the journey that,
Speaker:you know, I could go back to the what ifs.
Speaker:What if I would have chosen different?
Speaker:What if I would have done that?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But what the hell does that do?
Speaker:It doesn't change anything. You know,
Speaker:it's still what it is. And the what ifs don't count no more,
Speaker:right? They're gone. yeah,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:it was just.
Speaker:It was just also that fear of am I going to be able to continue to work?
Speaker:Am I going to be able to have some kind of life at all period and enjoy it?
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:And so it was, it was a scary time for me,
Speaker:you know, especially when I started seeing my foot turning black.
Speaker:mean, my underneath the pads of my big toe were starting to turn black
Speaker:and that was scary. It's like,
Speaker:what the hell is going on? And then you started seeing little teeny sores popping
Speaker:up, you know, and
Speaker:It's a very scary time, a very scary time.
Speaker:And you don't know what direction to go.
Speaker:Plus when you're not sleeping and you're in pain all the time,
Speaker:your mind is so, I mean, I was hallucinating and I was still living
Speaker:my everyday stuff. I was still getting up,
Speaker:going to work and working through all the pain as much as possible.
Speaker:And I work with my brother and luckily he could see that I was hurting and
Speaker:if I sat down, he didn't say anything.
Speaker:He just let me be.
Speaker:and then I'd get up and I'd work again,
Speaker:then I'd have to sit down. But it's just a scary time when you don't realise.
Speaker:And you know, us men, we have this ego,
Speaker:you know, we want to be tough.
Speaker:And sometimes our ego is our worst enemy.
Speaker:you
Speaker:Not sometimes, a lot of times our ego is our worst enemy.
Speaker:And it's like, I'm not going to the doctor and I'm not doing this.
Speaker:And finally, I just had to put my tail between my legs and go,
Speaker:okay.
Speaker:there's something wrong here and I've got to do something different.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:we are our worst enemies. Yeah.
Speaker:I can, I can attest to that. You know my story.
Speaker:I had to come down to two choices and so close to killing myself driving before
Speaker:it was like, I'm going to have to make that choice.
Speaker:Why do we do it? You said ego,
Speaker:but is it just ego? Is it more than that?
Speaker:What? There's got to be a bigger reason why we don't ask for help.
Speaker:Why we don't communicate. What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker:You know, that's a really good question.
Speaker:And I still feel, at least on my version of it,
Speaker:that it still goes towards our ego.
Speaker:know, lot ~ of us have been brought up,
Speaker:and I'm just guessing, I don't know,
Speaker:but I'm guessing that it's this way all around the world,
Speaker:right? Certain generations are brought up certain ways,
Speaker:and it's no failure towards our parents,
Speaker:right? Because they were brought up a certain way too.
Speaker:And then we're all molds, right?
Speaker:We're all created by...
Speaker:are molds of our parents. mean,
Speaker:my daughters were brought up as molds of me and their mom.
Speaker:But especially in the history and also at least here in the United States,
Speaker:men are supposed to be tough. You pull your big boy panties up and
Speaker:~ you stay strong. You don't complain,
Speaker:you don't bitch, you work through it,
Speaker:you work through the pain and that's all good and fine.
Speaker:but it's also doing more damage to us than what we realise,
Speaker:.
Speaker:you know, and especially having our ego of,
Speaker:mean, really, was days where even at work,
Speaker:I just wanted to break down and cry.
Speaker:I mean, the pain was just excruciating.
Speaker:just want to let go. I just want to burst out in tears and just release
Speaker:all this stuff. However, I was holding myself back doing it and I knew better.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:I knew better. I've talked about it in lot of my public speaking.
Speaker:And again,
Speaker:I just take it back as with our ego that we cannot get caught crying,
Speaker:especially as men, because if so,
Speaker:we're showing weakness. We're wussies if we do that.
Speaker:And it's so wrong. It is so wrong.
Speaker:I feel like this is why suicide rates have increased for kids,
Speaker:males from 18 to...
Speaker:56 or 58 and it's because we hold all this stuff in and we're not allowing
Speaker:it you talked about the communication and not opening and being open
Speaker:and talking and The only thing I can keep I've thought about it for a
Speaker:lot and the only thing I can take come back to is the ego Is our ego
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:is just it's just keeping us there.
Speaker:And then of course our subconscious which is there to protect us It also tells
Speaker:the stories. I mean
Speaker:in my version of it with my training,
Speaker:our subconscious is one of our worst enemies.
Speaker:It really is. And it does its job.
Speaker:It's doing exactly what it was designed to do and is to protect us.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You know, if we smell something,
Speaker:a certain thing happens, it goes,
Speaker:~ I recognize this, you know, be careful.
Speaker:You got to watch yourself, you know,
Speaker:and it's there to take care of us.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:But it's not also allowing us to see really what we need to see.
Speaker:And we're holding all this stuff in.
Speaker:And to me, again, my version of it is when we're holding all this stuff
Speaker:in and we're not allowing ourselves to be who God made us.
Speaker:I don't care where you're at in the world,
Speaker:God made us all the same. We all have the same emotions.
Speaker:We have these emotions for a reason.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:To feel them, to understand them,
Speaker:to get it. We're the only animal on this freaking planet that I know of,
Speaker:at least from what little study and I have done.
Speaker:that have all these feelings and we dwell on them.
Speaker:We let them just grab us and grab a hold of us and put us in places we don't want
Speaker:to be, but yet we're comfortable there.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:When we learn how to start being uncomfortable with what life is throwing at us,
Speaker:that's when our growth happens.
Speaker:mean, you know, you, so many different things,
Speaker:you know, if you want to plant some corn or something,
Speaker:I mean, you push it under the dirt,
Speaker:it's in the darkness, doesn't see any sunlight,
Speaker:it's out of sight, right? But then eventually it starts working its way up through,
Speaker:I mean, I've seen trees growing out of side of fricking cliffs.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:How the hell did a tree grow out of a f'n rock?
Speaker:You know, that determination, it wanted to go to light,
Speaker:it wanted to go somewhere. And I look at that as us as human beings.
Speaker:We cannot, we have to allow ourselves to feel our emotions
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:and understand that. My buddy and I that I used to work with when
Speaker:I was remodeling home a couple years back,
Speaker:every single day he and I would joke and it's like,
Speaker:what's your message in the mirror today?
Speaker:And we started doing it because we're remodeling this multimillion dollar home
Speaker:at the bottom of Little Wood Canyon and there was a mirror and
Speaker:the homeowner wanted to save that mirror.
Speaker:And I mean, we're tearing floors out,
Speaker:we're tearing walls out and we're doing everything we can not to bust this mirror.
Speaker:Right? So always moving around away from where we were working.
Speaker:This mirror's covered in dust.
Speaker:And we used to go there and I actually did a selfie of,
Speaker:set up my camera with a timer.
Speaker:This mirror's all covered in dust and I'm leaning and kneeling down to it.
Speaker:And I'm looking at myself eye to eye.
Speaker:And I did a post years ago on social media and I says,
Speaker:"What's your message in the mirror?"
Speaker:And so we joked about that every single day because there is a message
Speaker:and a lesson that we are being given,
Speaker:lessons sometimes every single day of our life.
Speaker:sometimes our lessons are a little tougher than others,
Speaker:you know, and I also really feel that God will continue to give us
Speaker:the same lesson over and over and over over and over until we get it.
Speaker:And guarantee you, as soon as we get it,
Speaker:he's got another one lined up for us.
Speaker:haha
Speaker:Yeah, that's the bummer, isn't it?
Speaker:Yeah, I've passed that one. Here's another one.
Speaker:Yeah. Yup.
Speaker:~ shit. Here's another one.
Speaker:I like that. So do you do that in the morning?
Speaker:Do you look in a mirror in the morning and ask it a question
Speaker:or tell yourself something? Have you got a routine in the mirror in a mirror?
Speaker:Yeah, every morning. I learned this from some training that I took last year.
Speaker:so my training that I took with EMURGO Academy,
Speaker:who my coaches are based out of Canada,
Speaker:Dave and Susan Kenny, were all about the brain first approach,
Speaker:right? It's about retraining our brain.
Speaker:And all my life, I thought our brains controlled us.
Speaker:Well, actually it's wrong.
Speaker:It's the other way around. We actually control our own brain.
Speaker:We can control our thoughts. We can control our choices.
Speaker:You know, it's all on us. And it takes time to learn how to change that,
Speaker:right? Because society has trained us to be a certain way.
Speaker:And I took some extra training last year,
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:right around the end of the year.
Speaker:And it was also talked about the brain first approach.
Speaker:And they say it's hard.
Speaker:You hear a lot of people say, you know,
Speaker:when they go into recovery, it was the hardest thing they ever done,
Speaker:but actually it was the easiest thing that they ever did.
Speaker:know, and the only reason why it was the hardest thing that they ever
Speaker:did because they're the ones that made it so hard.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:And then once you get to that certain point,
Speaker:you realise, well, this is, this is somewhat fairly easy.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:You know, as long as we keep this where this needs to be.
Speaker:And so, yeah, and that was brought up in our training.
Speaker:It's like the guy who was teaching the classes every morning.
Speaker:I get up and I look at myself in the mirror and I look at myself eye to
Speaker:eye and I tell myself that I love you and I tell myself that I'm amazing
Speaker:and I'm great and I'm awesome and I'm going to change lives and
Speaker:I'm going to continue to change my life and I'm so grateful for what I have,
Speaker:you know, ~ and I live in a 31 foot camping trailer in my mom's backyard.
Speaker:We're on an acre here and
Speaker:I'm 62 and live in a fricking camping trailer.
Speaker:It's very basic, very simple. It's a piece of cake,
Speaker:but I didn't picture myself being there right now.
Speaker:I figured I'd have my nice big beautiful home and my beautiful yard.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:And I haven't had a house, we lost our house in 2010.
Speaker:I haven't had a house since. And it took some time.
Speaker:It took some time going, am grateful because when my past wife ended
Speaker:up being homeless, that really hit my heart.
Speaker:You know, to see these individuals downtown that don't have a home.
Speaker:You know, they live in a tent or they live,
Speaker:you know, they sleep behind a garbage can or wherever they choose.
Speaker:And I'm like, I am so freaking,
Speaker:so grateful and so blessed that I have a roof over my head.
Speaker:I have a bed to lay my head down at night.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:You know, I have food in my stomach.
Speaker:And so I'm grateful and filled with gratitude.
Speaker:And I've told some people who say,
Speaker:yeah, I'm filled with gratitude as well.
Speaker:And then you hang around with them and then you hear them bitch
Speaker:and complain about things throughout the day.
Speaker:And it's like, well, you're not full of gratitude then.
Speaker:They're like, no, I am. It's like,
Speaker:well, it's impossible to be filled with gratitude and then bitch
Speaker:and complain about shit.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:go hand in hand, right? Be grateful for what we have or what you have.
Speaker:And when we do that, tell you what,
Speaker:life has just changed so much for me and getting that message in
Speaker:the mirror every morning, having that morning routine,
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:it has changed so much. And I've shared it with people that I,
Speaker:I mean, I've been going to this gym for so long,
Speaker:we kind of have like our own little gym family,
Speaker:you know, and I was sharing it with some people.
Speaker:a while back and one of my friends,
Speaker:Kelly, she came up to me a couple months ago and says,
Speaker:Al, I started doing what you said you do in the morning.
Speaker:she goes, thank you so much for sharing that with me because
Speaker:it has literally changed my days.
Speaker:And I heard a podcast that Jay Shetty interviewed Madonna.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:And Madonna has been studying
Speaker:thing called Kabbalah. Kabbalah is like a very high spiritual type where
Speaker:you really tap in the spirituality of yourself and the universe.
Speaker:Thank
Speaker:We're not talking like manifesting stuff.
Speaker:It's just very, very spiritual.
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:She says, we have all been put here to receive so we can share.
Speaker:And I found that to hit me so fricking hard in the heart.
Speaker:You know, because it's people like yourself,
Speaker:right, for doing this show, the Brave Man Project,
Speaker:right? You're bringing males on that have had heart issues in their life
Speaker:and have somehow found the resilience to work themselves through it.
Speaker:You're allowing them a place to come on your show and use their voice because
Speaker:somebody out there needs to hear it and somebody will.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:And Jay Shetty talks about how the whole universe is set up that way.
Speaker:Everything is set up to receive and share.
Speaker:I mean, constantly, right? We have the sun.
Speaker:Why do we have the sun? The sun helps different things grow,
Speaker:right? We have trees that give oxygen and we have plants that give
Speaker:us food and fruits and different things like that.
Speaker:This is just how the universe is set up and we are no different.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:least my version of it.
Speaker:And the more that we can receive in our knowledge,
Speaker:the more that we can give. I mean,
Speaker:we talked about it before the show.
Speaker:What we love about doing podcast is really it is a lot for us.
Speaker:I used to do my show on Thursdays and people asked if I did therapy and I said no.
Speaker:Okay
Speaker:And then all of sudden I went,
Speaker:~ yeah.
Speaker:I do therapy every Thursday and they're like,
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:really, who do you go to? I'm like,
Speaker:it's my podcast. Like what? And I'm like,
Speaker:my guess is therapy. Because I learned something from my guests all the time,
Speaker:just like I'm sure you do, right?
Speaker:gotcha.
Speaker:And my gosh, that is amazing. I'm gonna implement that into my life,
Speaker:Hmm?
Speaker:right? However, if we didn't have things like this,
Speaker:we'd all be stuck still.
Speaker:Totally. Yeah. One of the guys I interviewed a few weeks ago,
Speaker:he said, why are you doing this Hamish?
Speaker:And I was just like, that is a question.
Speaker:And then I just had to be honest and said,
Speaker:I get to talk to great men. I get to talk to men who have like you lost a leg,
Speaker:lost this, lost that. And rather than going,
Speaker:fuck it. I'm getting back up again,
Speaker:you know, and you have done and time and time and time again,
Speaker:I'm listening to men who've done this and now I'm on a bad day.
Speaker:I'm having a bad moment.
Speaker:I just think of you or I think of that person,
Speaker:that person. And those stories are just bringing me so much inspiration.
Speaker:it's, yeah, therapy. I like that.
Speaker:I'm getting therapy off different people.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:They don't realise they're my therapists.
Speaker:I like that.
Speaker:Yeah, we might not want to get it out there,
Speaker:Because we may start getting a bill.
Speaker:crap, yep. well, yeah, it'll be worth it.
Speaker:No,
Speaker:get to talk to people about their lives and most people,
Speaker:in fact, I think everybody has got a remarkable tale in their life,
Speaker:so why not share it? As you said,
Speaker:it's for receiving and sharing.
Speaker:I love that, so simple.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, and it's, you know,
Speaker:when I lost my leg, I went into rehab and the gal that was one
Speaker:of my caseworkers comes in and she goes,
Speaker:I have somebody that would like to come in and visit with you.
Speaker:Her name is Heather. She's a double amputee.
Speaker:And, you know, we called and told her that you were here and would you
Speaker:be okay if she came in and visited with you and we'll adjust your schedule,
Speaker:you know, to where you can have some time and.
Speaker:And I said, yeah, I'd love that.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:And we scheduled a day and my mom was there and my daughter was there,
Speaker:my oldest daughter was there visiting with me.
Speaker:And then I get this little knock on my door and in walks this tiny little blonde,
Speaker:bubbly, energetic woman just comes bouncing in my room and my gosh,
Speaker:Al, and she bends down and gives me a hug.
Speaker:I introduce her to my mom and my daughter and she gives them a hug.
Speaker:She's just got this great big smile on her face and her story was told
Speaker:on the news here back in 2020.
Speaker:And she was at Costco shopping two days,
Speaker:I think it was two days before Christmas.
Speaker:And she's on the phone with her husband and she's walking out in the parking
Speaker:lot and a car didn't see her and backed into her and pinned
Speaker:her against two vehicles. And she thought she was going to die right there.
Speaker:Right? And anyway, they immediately,
Speaker:they had to amputate one leg. They tried saving the other one.
Speaker:Eventually down the road, they ended up having to amputate that one.
Speaker:You watch this beautiful woman come walking in with this great big smile.
Speaker:And she shared with me her journey.
Speaker:Mm-mm.
Speaker:know, was it tough?
Speaker:hell yeah, it was tough. I'm not saying it was gonna be easy because
Speaker:I'd just be blowing smoke up your rear end.
Speaker:However, she goes,
Speaker:I found that this was gonna be my new life and I was gonna take it
Speaker:on however I could take it. And she already loved my attitude,
Speaker:right? Our attitudes were kind of really,
Speaker:really meshing together. And...
Speaker:It was so amazing that this woman took time out of her day.
Speaker:And as a matter of fact, today here ~ in about three hours,
Speaker:they have a new amputee that at the rehab that I went to,
Speaker:and I was just there two weeks ago with two amputees.
Speaker:And I'm the one now that they're calling and I'm coming in and I'm sitting down
Speaker:and I'm talking with these individuals.
Speaker:And this guy that I met with a couple of weeks ago,
Speaker:he was really struggling. The woman was doing really well.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:She's from Montana, but she's here in Salt Lake.
Speaker:She has a ranch and she's like,
Speaker:I'm gonna get through this. And she had a really,
Speaker:really good attitude. And this guy is like,
Speaker:I'm a big, I love to hunt and I love to fish and I'm afraid I'm not ever gonna
Speaker:be able to do this again. And I was like,
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:you'll be able to do whatever you tell yourself you can do.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Just because you got a fake leg.
Speaker:I've been on hikes. I've done four hikes since I've lost my leg.
Speaker:And all four hikes was within my year of my amputation.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:You know, and I did short ones,
Speaker:a mile in and a mile back. I was celebrating the shit out of it.
Speaker:It wasn't a 10 mile hike that I would love to do,
Speaker:but I went to, whew, I went to freaking miles,
Speaker:missing my leg. And then I ended up doing a five miler.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:That one kicked my ass. That one just about hit me on that one.
Speaker:Hehehehehe
Speaker:However, I freaking did it. You know,
Speaker:so I'm telling him, I'm like, dude,
Speaker:this is just the beginning. I know it looks bleak and I know the light that you're
Speaker:looking through is like looking through a straw.
Speaker:You don't see something, you know,
Speaker:it's not all out there, right?
Speaker:It's just this little pinhole of a light right in front of you.
Speaker:However, I picked a goal to do on
Speaker:take up my first hike last October by the end of October and I freaking made it.
Speaker:I did it. Now I did it, think it was like two days after what my goal date was,
Speaker:but I fucking did it. I told him,
Speaker:if you want to go hike or you want to go hunt,
Speaker:give yourself a goal, go after it and do it.
Speaker:And so it's people like Heather who came in to see me.
Speaker:who I went, that was so much help for me.
Speaker:And it was so inspiring to me.
Speaker:at least I could do is to give that back to somebody else.
Speaker:You know, to where I can take my leg off and show them the leg I've got
Speaker:or the foot and give them the,
Speaker:you know, what they're, their journey,
Speaker:what they're about ready to go through.
Speaker:You know, they're at their clinician every week and they got sockets that
Speaker:are continuously going to change because your leg is continuously shrinking
Speaker:and changing. And some days are going to be better than others.
Speaker:And some days it feels like your leg's in a fricking mason jar.
Speaker:You just want to rip the sun.
Speaker:and throw it against the wall,
Speaker:you know, but then there's those good days and you're like,
Speaker:my gosh, today's one of the good days.
Speaker:I'm gonna go out there and tackle whatever I can tackle.
Speaker:so chuffed that you're going out walking,
Speaker:you're going hiking. mean, you know,
Speaker:off camera, we've talked about this.
Speaker:your church. On camera, it's your church.
Speaker:So I can almost see you in October doing that mile each way,
Speaker:coming back. You've got a grin from ear to ear.
Speaker:You're celebrating, you're dancing,
Speaker:you're hopping. You're probably falling over because you've lost your balance,
Speaker:but you don't care.
Speaker:yeah, and actually
Speaker:that's how that's how it was. I mean my buddy that went with me because You know,
Speaker:i'm not comfortable hiking alone right now,
Speaker:right? because if I fall, you know,
Speaker:I got to be careful still and i'm still working on balance and things like that,
Speaker:but I was wearing shorts so people could see my prosthetic You know my buddy that
Speaker:I was with it was going hike would pass somebody and would say good morning
Speaker:And and he's like, you believe this?
Speaker:He's eight months post-amputation.
Speaker:He's out here f'ing hiking. Can you believe this?
Speaker:You know, so he's like throwing up the confetti and all that stuff for me,
Speaker:Mm-mm.
Speaker:which was kind of cool.
Speaker:I love it. I love it. And I love the fact that you've got that grace to
Speaker:go back and help people because I mean,
Speaker:that's what they did in AA. What they did in NA when I was in recovery
Speaker:was the people would come and talk to you and say,
Speaker:yeah, it's shit. It's hard. It gets easier.
Speaker:You know, and you're doing that.
Speaker:You're out hiking. Are you playing football with your grandkids?
Speaker:Yeah, you know, I'm still not to that point but I was in St.
Speaker:George at my granddaughter's soccer game and I was during the halftime and
Speaker:And my grandson always likes to get the soccer ball and take it out
Speaker:and go practice shooting goals during the halftime.
Speaker:And he comes back over and I'm like,
Speaker:come on, come on, play with Papa here.
Speaker:You know, we're bouncing, jumping back and forth and kicking the ball around.
Speaker:And he just gets a kick out of it.
Speaker:And I told him, says, go ahead,
Speaker:kick me in the right leg. Go ahead,
Speaker:kick me as hard as you want it.
Speaker:Doesn't hurt. I got a building shin guard.
Speaker:He's laughing and he's just laughing his butt off.
Speaker:But yeah.
Speaker:You know, and it's just tiny right now.
Speaker:It's not like what it was before where I'd go out and halftime with him
Speaker:and go out in the field and, you know,
Speaker:I'd be the goalie and hit practice shooting and things like that.
Speaker:However, it's still that starting point,
Speaker:right? I still have moved somewhere that some place that I wasn't
Speaker:at eight months ago. Right. So it's celebrating every little fricking win.
Speaker:And it doesn't matter if you only moved a quarter of an inch forward.
Speaker:Mm-mm.
Speaker:celebrate it, celebrate the shit out of it,
Speaker:because that is progress. And when we can celebrate things that we have done,
Speaker:even the tiniest things, gosh,
Speaker:it changes our life, right? It helps keep that smile on my face,
Speaker:right? Knowing I made progress.
Speaker:I've fricking made progress.
Speaker:And that's another bloke thing,
Speaker:isn't it? We do not celebrate our wins.
Speaker:It's the exception to celebrate what we've done.
Speaker:Now.
Speaker:It's like now, next, next, next,
Speaker:next, next. Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, celebrate, celebrate every little thing possible.
Speaker:You know, it's crazy. I go as far as when I put money
Speaker:in my credit union, I celebrate and tell God,
Speaker:thank you. All of it, because even when I put gas in my truck,
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:thank you.
Speaker:because it's a win in life because there's people I mean I've I've had times
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:in my life where I didn't even know where the hell
Speaker:if I was gonna have the money to even make a car payment or put gas in my vehicle.
Speaker:I mean, there was a time where,
Speaker:I don't know if you guys back in the UK have top ramen noodles,
Speaker:they're very cheap to buy, but I lived off of those things for months.
Speaker:My wife was either in rehab or jail at the time and literally all the money
Speaker:I was making was going straight to bills.
Speaker:And I had zero money left over.
Speaker:And sometimes I had zero money left to buy even food.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:It's a celebration. We take things for granted way too much,
Speaker:way too much, because there are other individuals out there that don't have that.
Speaker:Also, be grateful for what we have and realise too that,
Speaker:and I mentioned this at the beginning of the show,
Speaker:we're not doing this alone by all means.
Speaker:know, somebody was talking to me,
Speaker:I don't know, a year ago or so I was talking about a friend of theirs that became
Speaker:a self-made millionaire. And I'm like,
Speaker:how was he self-made? Going on and I says,
Speaker:I says, but that's not true. I says,
Speaker:he didn't do it alone. It still took other individuals to help him get
Speaker:to that point to where he's at.
Speaker:You know, and I heard him that Jay Shetty Madonna interview too,
Speaker:that Madonna says, look, we are all just vessels.
Speaker:That's all we are, right? We're just vessels.
Speaker:You know, we've gotten to where we've gotten or we have what we have because we've
Speaker:all had direction and help from somebody else,
Speaker:whether it's our higher power or somebody that God put in our path
Speaker:or wherever it goes, right? We have not done anything alone ever.
Speaker:And that really resonated with me as well.
Speaker:And I'm like, my fricking hell.
Speaker:You know, and she talked about that,
Speaker:you know, she had the privilege of knowing people like Prince and Michael Jackson,
Speaker:and they're no longer here, right?
Speaker:Thank
Speaker:And she was talking about how they were individuals that had so much light,
Speaker:so much light and talent, and they shared it,
Speaker:right? But they didn't know how to channel the light,
Speaker:and they didn't know how to vessel it.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I'm not saying I'm better than them because she says I'm not.
Speaker:I just learned that I did not do this by myself.
Speaker:And I looked at it that way because she goes,
Speaker:I was very selfish. It was all about me,
Speaker:me, me, me, me, me for a long time in my career.
Speaker:But then I realized I wasn't happy.
Speaker:I mean, I could have a house anywhere that I want to have a house.
Speaker:Hm.
Speaker:I could have 12 Bentleys, you know,
Speaker:and
Speaker:And she goes, I had all kinds of material things,
Speaker:but she goes, I wasn't happy. And I couldn't figure out why I wasn't happy.
Speaker:You know, and when she fell into Kabbalah and started learning and tapping into
Speaker:her spiritual self and her spiritual side of things,
Speaker:that's when her life completely changed.
Speaker:And she looked at things totally different.
Speaker:Thank
Speaker:I mean, I didn't care for Madonna back in the days,
Speaker:but I tell you what, I have a lot of respect for this woman now,
Speaker:just with what she shared on this podcast.
Speaker:I'm like, my gosh.
Speaker:I've listened to this podcast over a dozen times and I'm still picking things.
Speaker:You know, but yeah, when I heard that,
Speaker:that we are all just vessels, you know,
Speaker:we, have been directed and we have been given certain things,
Speaker:but then what is it that we do with it?
Speaker:You know, do we gloat on it and say,
Speaker:me, me, me, me, me, look at me,
Speaker:look at me. This, this is what I did.
Speaker:This was my idea. You know, no,
Speaker:we don't.
Speaker:We own nothing and that's what she says in the podcast.
Speaker:you
Speaker:We own nothing. Everything is just giving to us to pass through as the vessel.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:We own zero, period. And when we start understanding that with our life too,
Speaker:our life really opens up and life starts changing for us.
Speaker:talked right at the beginning of the show about why,
Speaker:why we do this. You know, I do this,
Speaker:I love having these conversations.
Speaker:And as you were saying that, you know,
Speaker:we don't do all these things by ourselves.
Speaker:like, yeah, I do. No one helps me.
Speaker:I do it all myself. I was just like,
Speaker:that's just utter bullshit. I like to think I don't trust anybody.
Speaker:I don't think I don't want any,
Speaker:nobody helps me because la la la,
Speaker:my story, my story.
Speaker:I have so much help and you've just reminded me how much I am looked after
Speaker:in this journey. know, this podcast,
Speaker:people helping prepare it, edit it,
Speaker:you guys coming on, I'm getting so much support for something which
Speaker:is really important to me and for a message.
Speaker:And yeah, I can't put my hand up and say I did this all myself,
Speaker:because I didn't.
Speaker:But no, it's, it's, the whole thing about gratitude going back to that,
Speaker:you know, I, can't, where I've heard you cannot be a victim and gratitude
Speaker:at the same time. They're just,
Speaker:they just, they're opposites, aren't they?
Speaker:Gratitude just makes you forget about all the nonsense,
Speaker:just begin to appreciate what's important.
Speaker:as you said, having someone to talk to,
Speaker:being supported, going through all those tough times,
Speaker:you know, that amazing doctors you've had.
Speaker:and that lady coming in, the legless lady coming in and just giving
Speaker:you that support and encouragement.
Speaker:It's just what we need on those tough days.
Speaker:Yeah, you know, and it's so easy for us to play the victim.
Speaker:I mean, I've played the victim my whole life.
Speaker:You know, I'm just being vulnerable and upfront,
Speaker:you know, however refuse to be that anymore.
Speaker:You know, there is a really good book that my coaches during my trainings,
Speaker:they mailed it to me it's called The Cartman's Triangle.
Speaker:Very, very good book. And I did a talk on this at our 2024 Healing Utah Success
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:Summit. I'm one of the co-founders of this event.
Speaker:And when I was taking this and we talked about it in our training,
Speaker:really, I mean, seriously, I got tears in my eyes and I'm just going,
Speaker:I've played the victim all my life.
Speaker:I feel this way because this person did this.
Speaker:Well, this is happening because this happened to me,
Speaker:right? Or I'm having a bad day because somebody cut me off in traffic,
Speaker:you know, or I got in a fight with my spouse or my child or whatever.
Speaker:Hmm
Speaker:And it's like, we're just, victims.
Speaker:We constantly play an effing victim and we're not.
Speaker:We're not victims at all.
Speaker:And when you can start going, okay,
Speaker:why did I have this fight with my spouse?
Speaker:What was this fight about? And go again and look at that message in the mirror.
Speaker:And I've had so many people even tell me,
Speaker:and I was a guest on another podcast and I said,
Speaker:I don't want to toot my own horn.
Speaker:And the host said, no, toot your own damn horn because we need to toot
Speaker:our own horns every once in a while,
Speaker:right? So I'm tooting my horn.
Speaker:I've had a lot of people say, even like what you mentioned,
Speaker:it's like, how can you have gone through what you've gone through and still have
Speaker:the attitude that you have?
Speaker:And it's because, first of all,
Speaker:my higher power has helped me get through this.
Speaker:I didn't do it by myself.
Speaker:My higher power has put amazing individuals in my life.
Speaker:Again, I didn't do it by myself.
Speaker:My training has really helped me.
Speaker:Even though I took the training,
Speaker:I didn't do it by myself because I still had coaches.
Speaker:And when I started learning more about this Cartman's Triangle
Speaker:and playing the victim, I'm like,
Speaker:I'm gonna do everything that I can in my power not to play the damn victim again.
Speaker:I could be the victim of what happened to me about me losing my leg.
Speaker:Excuse me. I could hold a grudge.
Speaker:How good is that going to do me?
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:It's not going to get me in. It doesn't change anything.
Speaker:Yeah, doesn't change much.
Speaker:I'm still missing my leg, right?
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:It's still gone. However, I also like to share this and I want to share this before
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:we sign off too is I don't know if you look at it this way or how many
Speaker:of your listeners look at it this way,
Speaker:but we see each other on this screen.
Speaker:we're seeing our shell, right?
Speaker:We're seeing who the 3D world sees.
Speaker:My version of it is we have our spirit inside of us.
Speaker:Again, we're the vessel, right?
Speaker:This outside body that we're seeing,
Speaker:we're the vessel, but we have this spirituality inside of us.
Speaker:And people with amputations, you'll hear him talk about ghost pains
Speaker:or phantom pains. I don't get a lot of pain,
Speaker:thank goodness. However, I still get sensations.
Speaker:My grandson thinks that I'm magic because I can still feel my toes
Speaker:and they're not even there. He thinks it's the coolest thing.
Speaker:Seriously, Papa, you can feel your toes?
Speaker:It's like, I can even wiggle them.
Speaker:I can even feel myself wiggling on my toes and they're not even there.
Speaker:And he thinks that is the coolest damn thing.
Speaker:But something came across to me about a month and a half ago.
Speaker:And I went, my gosh.
Speaker:If I get up, I have shorts on right now,
Speaker:if I get up and you look down,
Speaker:you see a prosthetic on my leg.
Speaker:That's what's getting me around.
Speaker:That's the 3D, right? Spiritually,
Speaker:my spirit inside me, I'm still whole.
Speaker:So I'm like, that's how I'm gonna see,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:this is why I have these phantom sensations,
Speaker:because it's still there. It's still there.
Speaker:My mind says it's still there.
Speaker:So I tell myself it's there. For a long period of time,
Speaker:I was telling myself, okay, come on now,
Speaker:my leg is not there. Do not pitch,
Speaker:it's not there. This is bullshit.
Speaker:These feelings are wrong. And I was doing everything I can to pull away.
Speaker:I had a young kid that is going to medical school up at the University of Utah.
Speaker:Tell me this. And he goes, Al,
Speaker:don't do that. I mean, I've got 40 plus years on this kid,
Speaker:right, of life.
Speaker:And he says, don't do that. He says,
Speaker:your mind still thinks it's there.
Speaker:Let it continue to believe that it's still there.
Speaker:And he's explaining some things to me and it made so much sense to me.
Speaker:So now when I have a little electrical shock that goes through the bottom
Speaker:of my foot or I feel like the bottom of my foot is itching,
Speaker:I mean, I look down and I'm like,
Speaker:hey, thank you for letting me know.
Speaker:And I actually go down there and pretend like I'm scratching it.
Speaker:Because my...
Speaker:There's
Speaker:still me, it's still there. So that's just how I like to look at it.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:Yeah, I'm trying to say you're mad,
Speaker:you're delusional, you're... it's not there,
Speaker:you're just... you're just defeating it,
Speaker:you're just pretending, you're just projecting,
Speaker:la la la. No. Your body, your mind,
Speaker:your mind thinks it's there, your spirit thinks it's there,
Speaker:so what? So if... if it's gonna help,
Speaker:help your balance, help make you laugh,
Speaker:make your grandchild laugh, bring some humour and joy into it,
Speaker:good enough, isn't it? Yeah. I love it.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:I love it.
Speaker:when we can joke about things,
Speaker:it makes things a little easier.
Speaker:I go get a massage once a month.
Speaker:That's part of my self-care. That is something that I chose that I will
Speaker:not get rid of because this is what it's self-care for me.
Speaker:It's very important for me. After a massage one day,
Speaker:I was having a hard time getting my sleeve on.
Speaker:over my leg because you know a little bit of the oil that they use when they massage
Speaker:you and I finally got it on. I get my robe on and I come walking out
Speaker:and my massage therapist says,
Speaker:are you okay? You know you usually come out a little quicker and I said,
Speaker:my gosh your name's Sarah. She is such a great massage therapist and I said,
Speaker:Sarah said, I was having issues with my leg.
Speaker:I says the damn thing didn't want me to put it on and I was chasing
Speaker:it around the table. You can't run it away from me.
Speaker:But she just, she almost spilt my drink that she had waiting for me.
Speaker:And she goes, you always seem to have such great humour about it.
Speaker:And it's like, I have to have this humour about it.
Speaker:You know, I mean, she's, and she goes,
Speaker:I can just picture you hopping around the bed chasing a leg,
Speaker:which really wasn't happening.
Speaker:anyways.
Speaker:That image is going to stick with me.
Speaker:think that's lovely. Yeah.
Speaker:You
Speaker:you've mentioned this coaching.
Speaker:What are you doing with your coaching?
Speaker:~ Man, you know, Since I've had this reverse shoulder replacement
Speaker:I have really looked at it that that's God's way of saying it's time for
Speaker:me to start doing it so I can get out of the work that I'm in because it's very
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:physical and Being in your 60s.
Speaker:It's helped keep me in shape, but it's beating up my body All my
Speaker:old injuries are starting to come out right because it's just it's very physical
Speaker:on them Yeah, and so I'm I am now working towards getting my coaching going.
Speaker:I'm still working on my logo
Speaker:And I think you and I spoke about this a little bit before the show.
Speaker:I'm going to call it Through the Storm.
Speaker:And it's all based around the bison,
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:the buffalo. I don't know how many of your listeners know this,
Speaker:but The bison is the only animal on this planet that when a storm is coming,
Speaker:it will go towards the storm instead of away from it or hide from it.
Speaker:And the Native Americans, very,
Speaker:very
Speaker:spiritual individuals very in tune with Mother Earth and the Heavens
Speaker:who I really look up to and appreciate but they they realised that
Speaker:the reason why the buffalo do this is because it gets them through
Speaker:the storm quicker.
Speaker:and it makes so much sense. And when I heard that,
Speaker:I had basically said, that's exactly how I'm gonna live my life.
Speaker:And now that I am certified as an international crisis and recovery coach,
Speaker:I decided through the storm is a good title to base it off of the bison that
Speaker:We all have storms and we've been walking in our storms for a long period of time,
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:right?
Speaker:We're doing our best to get away from them,
Speaker:but they're just following us.
Speaker:And then in all we have somebody or someone or something that changes
Speaker:our life where we stop and go,
Speaker:okay, I'm gonna get through this and start going the opposite direction.
Speaker:And yeah, so that's where I'm at right now is just getting my logo lined
Speaker:up and you know, there's science behind it,
Speaker:which I didn't know it before,
Speaker:but I'm looking at the right colors and.
Speaker:you know, making sure that's something that's going to resonate with individuals.
Speaker:and so hopefully here by the end of the year,
Speaker:I will have my coaching up and going and rocking and rolling and,
Speaker:and I'm even, talked about it before the show,
Speaker:my podcast, is AR, The other side of Addiction.
Speaker:hit five years this month that I've been doing this show.
Speaker:I have been so blessed. mean, I,
Speaker:I am booked out till August. and,
Speaker:or a week before we got on the show,
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I'm looking at my email and I got two more people that are reaching out
Speaker:to me that are asking if they could be guests on my show.
Speaker:Thank
Speaker:And it's just been so amazing that I'm looking at changing the title
Speaker:to Through the Storm
Speaker:that's such a good name. I can just see the bison head down.
Speaker:Rather than most cows in this country arses to the storm head forwards through
Speaker:the storm. very briefly, where can people find out more about you and just
Speaker:get some enthusiasm from you from their shit days I need a bit of bison from
Speaker:Al where can they find you?
Speaker:Wow, well you can find me on Facebook of course under Al Richards or
Speaker:you can also find me under a are the other side of addiction Under
Speaker:my personal Facebook. I post a lot of positive affirmations
Speaker:and type things Sometimes I get very vulnerable and share,
Speaker:you know a little bit of some things and do some videos You can also find
Speaker:me on Instagram.
Speaker:I'm also on TikTok where I share a lot of inspirational type sayings
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:and things like that. Hopefully here down the road soon,
Speaker:I'll be able to get a website up and going.
Speaker:You can also learn a little bit more about me too if you go to
Speaker:our Healing Utah Success Summit website and that is healingsuccesssummit.com.
Speaker:that's another blessing that has come out of all this.
Speaker:We're planning our sixth event right now,
Speaker:which Mallory and I, who is the other co-founder,
Speaker:who was a guest on my show. She was my sixth guest on my show.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:when I started my podcast and we've become really good friends and we just
Speaker:had this same vision to dream about holding an event that's based
Speaker:off of education and stigma and suicide,
Speaker:domestic violence, addiction. And here we are planning our sixth event.
Speaker:It's been an amazing ride, that's for sure.
Speaker:Thank you for bringing pounds of inspiration and joy and happiness and yeah,
Speaker:real gratitude for life. It's been a lovely conversation.
Speaker:I was looking forward to it and I'm glad we've done it it was really super.
Speaker:So thank you so much.
Speaker:Thank you. And again, thank you so much for asking me to come on your new show.
Speaker:I love what you're doing and I'm here to support you any way I can.
Speaker:I think, don't I have you coming back on my show?
Speaker:At some stage, we haven't put a date in the calendar yet,
Speaker:but I'll be back.
Speaker:So yeah, anything I can do to help you,
Speaker:my friend, I'm more than happy to.
Speaker:And again, it's been a complete honor.
Speaker:Thank you so much. And, and I've,
Speaker:I've really been blessed to have you in my life.
Speaker:I mean, seriously, we don't talk a lot,
Speaker:when we do, I feel like we've never missed a beat to be honest with.
Speaker:Well, there we are, everybody.
Speaker:Another episode of the Brave Man Project.
Speaker:If you like what you listen to,
Speaker:if you enjoyed it, please share it.
Speaker:Please like it. Please recommend it to somebody else because it's
Speaker:all about sharing great stories of overcoming,
Speaker:making sense of and generally becoming better people.