I started off doing the show in the throes of my addiction, a couple of years later, getting sober and then being a sober person in that same environment that quite honestly was very triggering for me. There's a lot of active addiction and dysfunction in environments like that. I had to share dressing rooms with people who I used to party with, few stations down. I used to have to show up to work and interact with the drug dealer that I used to get drugs from who worked in the theater. Jason the Chan, to your host of the Knockin' Doors Down podcast, I'm excited to speak with my guest Steven Washington. He's a former Broadway dancer who appeared in the Disney's Lion King, amongst other many great shows. And his recovery journey and what he's doing with it is nothing short of spectacular. But I want to talk to you. I want to talk to you about the rotten strawberry in the bunch. Recently, I was thinking about the way that I was changing thoughts that I had in my head about myself. And oddly, I was picking through some fruit in the refrigerator and there was this beautiful basket of strawberries. But in that basket, there was one that was rotten and it started to mess with all the other strawberries in there as well and rot them out. So once I removed those, washed everything off and gave it a clean rinse, of course. The rest of those strawberries stayed for like another week. So it just made me think of sometimes the way that we can think about ourselves. So if you have a negative thought that's repeating and a story that you tell yourself, please. Because you're amazing. Take that rotten strawberry, throw it away, wash off the rest of them, and continue on thinking good and positive about yourself because you deserve it and you're worth it. And my guest is a movement master author, recovery advocate who's passionate about helping others navigate towards a happier, healthier life. His lifelong love and key foundation to his own spiritual fitness is movement. And we're going to get into that. And he firmly believes our relationships with our body is vital for emotional, physical and spiritual health. He's also the author of recovering you, soul care and mindful movement for overcoming addiction. And it's a wonderfully unique book. I've been digging into it. It really focuses on his practices of qigong and so much more. So Steven Washington, thanks for joining me on knocking doors down. Thank you, Jason. It's so nice to be here with you. Great to be in your presence. Oh, likewise, likewise, it's always great when we get, I get a connection from someone that I have so much respect. Our mutual friend, Michelle Currell, set us up to sobriety playbook and it's like, Oh, I know I'm going to love this guy. That's great. It is always nice to find those connections with people and then they connect you to another person and then to another person. And you also realize just how small the world is and how we're not so unique, right? There's so many common threads between all of our stories. So yeah, I really appreciate when moments like this happen. Yes, absolutely. Well, one of my things, I guess, to segue off of appreciation is that daily gratitude practice, something that I don't know about you, I very much took for granted in my addiction. And so I just like to start with three things you're grateful for today. I'm grateful that I had a really good night's sleep. I'm grateful that I have a beautiful cat named Bibi who just lights me up every time I look at her. And I'm grateful for my sobriety today because everything else that I have, I wouldn't have it. I wouldn't have it if I weren't sober. I wouldn't have the relationship I have with all those things in people if I weren't sober. Yeah. And it's funny, you know, Steve, we have a cat and recently our AC unit went out. And so for people that may not understand as this recording is like 114 here. So our biggest concern was for our cat. And it really is a beautiful thing that, and I didn't think about that till now. Yeah, when I wasn't sober, I wouldn't have given a darn. Yeah. And it's sad, it's sad because we really do have these beautiful things that we get to connect with. She's the most wonderful loving thing. Now, granted, don't get me wrong. She is a cat. She can be a turd and scratch up the couch and other stuff. That's her moments. Yes. But that's what cats do. Like, if you have an expectation that a cat isn't going to do that, well, then don't get a cat. I used to have cats before this cat and this was like early on in my sobriety. And there was a time when I used to expect my cat to behave more like a person than a cat. Like, I couldn't understand. I didn't understand just the way the cats are. What's their nature? And I kept expecting her to be something that she wasn't. And with this beautiful cat and her sister, who I no longer have, I understand now that cats are cats. They're going to do what they do and just enjoy them as they are, it's been a completely different experience now. It sounds elementary for me to say that, but I'm a slow learner. I get there, but it takes me a while. Welcome to the club. I've always used the term light bloomer, but I think slow learner is more appropriate for sure. But that's beautiful, what you said, because that acceptance, I think people, we'll call them normies that they haven't struggled with addiction, may not understand or maybe even get a chance to ever understand. I mean, I'm so grateful for my recovery as well because I see life so different. And I've gotten so much better about the acceptance of things as they are. There's freedom in that. There's freedom in that. It's not always easy to, because accepting something doesn't necessarily mean that you like it. It just means that it is what it is, and no matter how much I may try to change it or want something else, it's not in the cards for it to be that way. So the best thing that I can do is go with the flow of life and accept the thing that I can't change. And there is freedom, because from there I can choose. I can choose. I have choice. I have freedom. It took me a while to figure that out. Same thing like with the cats. And once I was able to do that, it opened up a whole door for me. You remind me of how when I was in active addiction, I was like, I was moving through life like this with the blinders on. All I could see was this. I couldn't see this. And in recovery, it gives me this ability to zoom out and see the bigger picture of my experience and of my life. And from there, it's like there's so much more possibility. And I'm not also just reacting to life. I'm responding to it. And I hope I'm responding well. I do it to varying degrees, depending upon where I am in my spiritual fitness. But I am, we get a chance to respond to life instead of reacting to it. And let me ask you, your take on this, because I've been exploring a lot more consciousness. I mean, I've had some beautiful people come into my life again through this recovery thing that shows the world as big as it is. It's small, you know, Michelle, one of them, TJ Woodward, I'm not sure if you're familiar with him. But just that really beautiful exploration of consciousness and like you're saying, not being able to examine the peripheral blinders on my way forward. And that's it because that's the only, you know, because I was so struggling just to hold on. So of course that's it. But I was very much in reflection in a constant state of fight or flight or freeze for that matter. Absolutely. I think you're just trying to survive, trying to survive and recovery has been about not just surviving, but thriving, thriving, that's the thing and having the best quality of life that I could have because the quality of my life when I was in active addiction wasn't very good. Even though on the outside it may have looked good, like I think when I was in active addiction, just before I got sober, I had my dream job of dancing in a Broadway show. Like from the outside looking in, I had it all, you know, I had it all, but I was dying on the inside. I was slowly killing myself. And so recovery has just been this magical, this amazing gift that just keeps revealing more things for me to be grateful for. And it doesn't mean that my life is perfect or that I don't have difficult times. I mean, this past two years have been, two and a half years have been the most, probably the most difficult in my life. I got a divorce, a sobriety after eight years of being together, had to, you know, basically start over, was dealing with depression and anxiety. And I'd always heard about how that sometimes is possible in long term recovery that people find themselves feeling depressed or dealing with other mental health issues. But I'm so grateful that through all that, I never let go of my recovery, I never let go of my sobriety, I never chose to pick up, I never chose to check out. And I just kept trying to do the next right thing and asking for help, turning to my higher power, going to meetings, sharing about what was going on. Yeah, and then things change, things shift, things change. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that being so vulnerable. I mean, that's just, I mean, these are everyday things that are just tough to go through. But like you said, I recently, my career show, ACU went out the house, there's some other things going on, you know, career-wise or challenges. I got teenagers, you know, all these, all these different things and it is that. And I hold on to two things, eight, like you said, just don't pick up. I keep the memories of how I was when I operated in such an unhealthy way with these terrible coping mechanisms, mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually, how I felt and thus the result of what my life was. Like, some people may not get it, but like, I can remember exactly what those terrible hangovers that came with the anxiety and depression feel like, just like that. Yeah. Same. So grateful for that. Where you are now may not be where you came from. The choices you make today may spiral out of control or spin you in the right direction. Discover a riveting, true story of how Carlos Vira nearly destroyed his life and lived to tell about it. Stand up, stand firm, believe, make it happen and live through the madness. Knock indoors down along the way and don't miss others telling their powerful stories on our podcast, visit kddmediacompany.com. So grateful that even though my last drink or drug is very far back in my rearview mirror, I can still remember those horrible moments of like being in my apartment by myself doing lines of doing lines of Coke and drinking because cocaine let you drink as much as you want. And just being miserable and looking at myself in the mirror and not recognizing who I saw back at me and just saying, you know, God help me. Just a simple prayer like that just helped me because I knew that what was happening, what I was doing was not me living to my full potential that wasn't my best self at that moment. And I didn't know how to get out of it. So I was like, I need help. And then about probably a year and a half, two years later, is when I finally quit and I finally had reached the bottom of my bottom, which I hope is the bottom of my bottom, you know, bottom of course, but yeah, but I reached out to someone for help and they reached back and they took me to my first meet. That's beautiful. Yeah. And sometimes it really does, I posted a video yesterday that my original sober date was July 4th and then I ended up having to slip up relapse, whatever people want to call it. It lasted a very short period of time, but it happened. But I still remember that wonderful self reflection six years ago as of the 4th of July of being like goodness, I finally asked for help. I finally asked for help. You know, it wasn't, and I had gone to meetings before, but it was like, oh, yeah, I'm here for something else, somebody else. And it was the first time for me that I asked for help and took it. Yeah, that's interesting. When I got sober, I had never been to a meeting before. Like I went and luckily I stayed, but I know of people. I know a lot of people who had, you know, gone in and out or had been exposed to 12 step recovery earlier in their lives and eventually decided to stay, but I had never been exposed to it. No one else in my family had gone sober. No one else was able to do it. I was really, I look at myself and probably much like yourself, a cycle breaker. Yes. That's family, like breaking that cycle of addiction, breaking cycles of generational trauma. Well, you know, that, that leads me in my other curiosity, of course, I know you outlay a lot of your life in your book, which that link is in the podcast description of people want to inquire about getting Steven's book. But I'm, I'm really curious about little Steven. You mentioned, you know, this family cycle, the generational trauma, which, hey, people, it is, it is a real thing, like we could probably do a whole 60 minutes on that. But you know, I, it's so fascinating. I mean, I'm sitting here wondering, cause you danced in, in the Lion King, right? Mm hmm. Yes. So yeah, it's like, it's so interesting where it's like that outward thing. I mean, I'm even wondering, like, goodness, did he dance in San Francisco, I might have seen you dance. I don't know. But that outside perception that like everything's good and fine, look at, you know, look at that. Look at Stevie. I mean, he's dancing in Broadway show. It's Disney's Lion King. One of the biggest, you know, productions to date, I think. I think it's the biggest, as far as revenue, I can't recollect, but it's yeah, those, those things that people see and they just go, yeah, no, he's great and it's, it's a sign that oftentimes that's so not the case. Yeah, and you were my gosh, you just took me back. You took me back to my years of doing that show and I had the blessing of, of joining that production. I started off in Canada doing it in Toronto and then eventually I made my way to Broadway and then the national tour, but I started off doing the show in the throes of my addiction. And then a couple of years later, getting sober and then being a sober person in that same environment that quite honestly was very triggering for me. There's a lot of, a lot of active addiction and dysfunction in environments like that. And I had to share dressing rooms with people who I used to party with, right? It just a few, a few stations down, I used to have to show up to work and, and, and interact with the drug dealer that I used to get drugs from who worked in the theatre. So it was a really, it was a really powerful journey of truly changing within myself, but my outside world wasn't changing, but my perception of it was shifting because I had chosen a different path for myself. I would never, I wouldn't give up or throw away any of those memories of the time that I had doing that amazing show. I had an amazing experience, I did things that, you know, many would just dream of doing, like, you know, walking on stilts and, and being suspended in mid-air and flipping and singing and dancing and, and just telling that beautiful story. But there's just so many things that like life presents us with, you know, the good, the bad and everything in between. And so that my story as it relates to that time of my life and that, that, that experience is mixed with so much, but it's me, me who I am, and I like who I am. And it's been me so many, so many gifts, so many lessons. So yeah, we don't have a worker at the past and our wish to shut the door on it. Yes, yes, yes, absolutely, and thank you for sharing that too, because I, I think it's so important for people to understand, you know, I, I mean, I see it, and it's not just people that struggle with, with addiction, but just in life in general of that, well, isn't this my arrival moment, isn't this where I should be, shouldn't I feel really good? And it's, it's, I think it was, I'm a big Formula One fan, even got my Lewis Hamilton stuff on here. That's my notice. Yeah. And him talking about, you know, people like, well, you've had seven championships. Why, you know, why don't you stop now? And he's like, I still love what I do. And what I do allows me to do my purpose, because he's helping so many youth get into engineering programs. And I mean, he's just done beautiful things with a, his hard work and beautiful dedication of his family that helped him get there. All the stuff that he's been through turned all that negative stuff where he could be a bitter person, I mean, the extreme racism and, and just everything else that he's had to face and probably still does from a certain amount of the quote unquote fan base and say, God awful, terrible inhumane things. And he's still doing beautiful things. And I just have so much respect for that, for someone that figured out their values. And because of their values knows what their purpose is. And I don't think you can have a quote unquote purpose without understanding your values. Absolutely. Absolutely. I 100% agree with you. And I love that one of the things about recovery is that we're able to clear away all the things that were in the way of being able to tap into your purpose, tap into really why you're why you're here. It's hard to do that when you're just trying to survive and you're, and you're slowly poisoning yourself, it's hard to do that. But what a gift it is to, to, to be able to tap into your purpose and be of service. And there's so many ways that we can, we can serve one another. And I feel really blessed and I look at you, I see you as a mirror in terms of what you're doing, like with this podcast and everything else that you do, how you have definitely tapped into your, your purpose and you're in that flow of life, that creative flow. And, and all we can do is share it. We can share it with others. Yes. Yes. Have you dug into the archives of past Knocking Doors Down podcast episodes? The Knocking Doors Down podcast archive is available to you for free. Check it out. Here's a snippet from when Charlie Sheen was on the podcast. There's another thing to consider that's just practical and real and true and, and, and rampant. Fentanyl. Fentanyl. Fentanyl. You know, you keep fucking around with street frogs these days. I mean, it's, there's a 90% chance that it's going to have fentanyl. There's a 90% chance you're not going to survive it. This episode and so many more in the Knocking Doors Down archive. And while you're at it, hit that subscribe button. Leave this video a thumb up, leave a comment, and share with somebody else that you know will get value out of the Knocking Doors Down podcast. Speaking of that, Sharon with others, have you faced some of the resistance when it, when you made the decision to recover out loud? I, I had some people early on in this, you know, someone like, Hey, I'm here to protect your anonymity. It doesn't say anything about mine. Yeah, I had a, it's funny when I was writing this book. I had a lot of internal struggle about whether or not to, to do it because I was going to, I was going to, you know, break my anonymity. And also, I didn't want to give anyone the impression that I was trying to promote 12 step recovery, or that I was trying to be a salesperson for it. That's not it. All I could do is just share my experience with it. And, and I, and I, and I thought that in order for me to do what I felt so called to do that I would have to reinvent the wheel. And it didn't require me to reinvent the wheel. It just required just me sharing my experience, strength and hope and sharing the things that have helped me in my recovery and just give people a sense of hope and the paid through the pages of the book. But I didn't have these thoughts of like, I imagine folks were just going to come out of the woodwork and just say, how could you or, you know, this is, this is not right or what have you. I feel as though as far as anonymity is concerned, I feel like the world has changed so much since 12 step recovery began. The world is very different, you know, the internet has changed everything connected us all in really powerful ways, sometimes for good and sometimes for not. It's a different world and the thing is we're able to reach so many more people. And my, sharing my story, parts of my story in a public way can reach someone who is struggling and sees me and identifies with me and sees that there is hope. You wouldn't get that if I was just silent and didn't share my story. And I, you know, and I don't share my story because I want somebody to pat me on the back. I don't want anybody to look at me as if I've got it all figured out as if I don't need more answers. It's an ongoing journey of discovery and recovery. But I think that the benefits or the positive aspect or byproduct of me stepping outside of myself far outweigh any of the other things that were threatening to keep me silent and bad. You identify. You agree? You identify? You and I thank you. And I do because I think when we do, you know, and I'm like you, hey, 12-step work for me. I've seen so many other paths. I've seen people go through treatment and cognitive behavioral therapy, smart recovery, just getting involved in their community. I have a friend that he, as of this recording five years sober today, we used to party together. And for him, it was an exploration of his passion for reptiles, and he found a community. And within that, he found a whole bunch of other people that as well had, don't drink or had issues and got clean and stuff. And that's where he found it. It's like, I'm not here to tell you, you know, for me, a good step was and I miss it. But my jujitsu instructor, he moved back to Brazil. So for me, that was such a great loving environment when I had it and we kind of kept going right at the beginning of the pandemic or like, okay, nobody's going to come, you know. But it was great. It was great for me. And I noticed I struggled when that went away, unfortunately, you know, he had to return home and hasn't been able to come back. And I don't know if he wants to. But you know, you never know where you're going to find it. And so I think it gives people permission to go, oh, I'm not the only person that has ever felt I need help and I need to reach out somewhere. You know, if it's spiritual teachings, be it that a church group, a mosque, Buddhist practices, whatever it is, you always wanted to dance, you join a dance group, whatever, and you build community, whatever it is, I think it gives other people permission to go, I'm not alone in these feelings of helplessness and there is a way out. And I think that's the beautiful thing that we can do. That's why I keep doing this. There's not one episode that goes by that somebody doesn't go, wow, thank you for having that person on. They are amazing, you know, and I know it's going to happen. Somebody's going to be curious about qigong and what you're doing and everything else. And they're going to, and they're going to check it out. And I think it's that beautiful giving others permission and letting them know they're not alone. Absolutely. You remind me of just how important community is and in the pages of the book, I wanted to provide community, people with a sense of community by hearing my story, by hearing the stories of my friends who I interviewed for the book. And because I know that it's a healing, it's a healing thing to have social support. We all need social support. And so everything that you mentioned, common thread is just people coming together with a common interest or a common goal. And so I always encourage people in my work to find whatever works for them, what worked for me, might not work for you, take what you need, leave the rest, it's all good. And I love that you just mentioned qigong, I just want to just for a moment just tell you how, tell you and your audience about how that came into my life. Please, I was going to ask you that. Yeah. I, one of the things that I saw in my earlier use of recovery was people later in life and recovery were going back to school, getting further in their education. So many of us, when we were earlier on in our lives, were probably drinking and using and probably weren't great in school, a lot of things going on that distract you from that. So that was definitely my story. The people were inspiring me to think about that. And so I thought about that about eight or nine years of sobriety, I looked into that and I thought, oh, hey, I want to go and become a Chinese medicine doctor. And I get into a school, I move all the way to California from New York City to do this. I have to take a ton of courses just to catch up because I had made such a mess academically before that I had to make it all up. So I did that and I worked my ass off. And then if I only got accepted to a school and I joined this program and very quickly, I became really overwhelmed, became really overwhelmed, a lot of stuff that I thought I had healed from my younger years of wanting to fit in, wanting to belong, feeling like an outsider, not feeling worthy, all that stuff started to come up. And I started to have horrible panic attacks while in graduate school and just a lot of anxiety and it was getting in the way of the work, me being able to do the work. And I was led to a lot of different things to help me, I asked for help from fellow students who were ahead of me and who were doing well. I went to meetings, I shared about it in meetings, I worked with my sponsor on it, I stopped drinking so much caffeine because that wasn't helping me with my anxiety. I learned how to study better, a lot of different things. But one of the things that had the one of the greatest impacts on me was learning qigong. And qigong was part of the program. And for folks who don't know what qigong is, it's an ancient Chinese healthcare system that combines flowing movement, standing postures, deep breathing and focused intention to activate and cultivate and circulate life force energy. When you take the word qi, it means energy and breath and gong means work or skill. And when we practice qigong, we become more skillful at managing our own energy, physically and mentally, emotionally, spiritually. So I stepped to learn this practice and I noticed how it was helping me to regulate my nervous system because I was so dysregulated through those weeks of working through that semester. And eventually, what seemed impossible became very possible for me. Like I suddenly was able to function in class, do really well, had a command for all the knowledge I was assimilating. And even with all that, I decided that I was going to leave the program, that I was going to leave the Chinese medicine program. I decided to become a massage therapist instead. But I love that I left the program, not because I couldn't do it, because at first I was afraid that I was going to have to walk away because I couldn't do it. I walked away because I chose not to do it, I chose to do something else. One of the things that qigong gave me was just this ability to zoom out and just see the bigger picture and not think that I couldn't change my mind. I came from a background where if you decide to do something, you have to stick with it. You can't change your mind. If you change your mind, you're fucking quitter. Yeah. You're a cop out, you know, and that's a bunch of BS. You can always change our minds. I could, Steve, I could relate if you were saying that, man. I saw your eyes light up when I saw it. Oh, yeah. I was a, my mom, just such a beautiful person and being able to kind of go back and examine growing up in that home of addiction, I think me and my mom were kind of, you know, we were thick as Steve's. We were just, she's my ride or die and still at this day, she's my favorite person, no offense to my girlfriend's might be listening, I adore and love her. And she's an amazing, amazing woman, but it, it, I know, it reminded me of the time when I told my mom, I hit this huge growth spurt and basketball became more interesting to me than baseball. I mean, come on, I was, I got to see Magic Johnson is like, okay, that's way more appealing than when, you know, pick baseball player here, Will Clark, whoever. And kind of that disappointment of quitting, so to speak, because I was really good. I mean, an all star and all these different things. And so yeah, that, that kind of resonated with me and my dad, despite his addiction, I mean, that was the hardest working person who's set that example of just like work ethic, like my dad, he, even when he'll kind of, you know, it's been sober a long time, make statements about some of the disappointments, not being there with my brother and I or, you know, she's like, why, you know, I messed up. And I sent down watching Star Wars with you for the 900th time or something, you know, and it's like, it's okay, you're like, understand it was my journey still to pull from the good stuff. And that's what I see and take away. It's not that I don't remember the negative stuff because I do, but it's not what sits in my heart, you know. And so yeah, I know that like you don't quit, you do this, only losers quit. And I mean, on one hand, it was good for me, I'm dyslexic, school sucked for me. I always felt like an outsider got made fun of because I went to the special reading class. I even had a teacher that was to me. Are you dyslexic too? I mean, I think I'm somewhere on that spectrum and I had to go to the special classes, they used to come and take me out of class, a few of us and then we go to the special class. So, so much like shame around that, I had to work through all that too, I get it. Oh, yeah. And I've been able to talk to some of those people now as adults are like, oh my God, someone, I didn't do that, dude, shut the **** up. And then some of them are like, oh, man, I'm so sorry. Did I really? And I was like, yeah, I mean, I just kind of wanted to get some resonance with you and just kind of, I felt I needed for me to kind of speak in a lot of people, Lee, and I think about four or five, like, I'm really sorry, you know, hey, I was in a bad place in my childhood too. And the fact that they shared that, you know, what they went home to and everything else, it's like, you see the trouble kid, follow them home and see what's going on there. Wow. Yeah. I'm just feeling for all the trouble kids out there, yeah, one more triple kids. We're just acting out what they knew best and just did not know any better. Yeah. Yeah. We truly did not. We had examples set before us, especially with people that were our heroes, sort of speak. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think that both had deep for us right there, didn't it? Yeah. And, you know, and I'm not going to, I'm not going to take us down in the politics road, but you know, I look at what's being played out politically and I see a lot of wounded children who've grown up to be adults and are still acting out and still acting out. But now the consequences are greater. Yeah. Yeah. We get it. I'm not a fan of politics, politicians in general, especially, you know, I've encountered some through my work on a personal level, very few of I can, I can think of one that I went, wow, I really respect that individual. Yeah. And it's really sad because we have a lot of do as I say, not as I do going on. And it's, it's sad. I worry, I worry for our youth. I worry. Overdose is our number one cause of death in this country. Yeah. Yeah. What does that tell us? Yeah. That and like, and just the increased levels of loneliness and anxiety and isolation, which leads us to use, which leads us to commit suicide, which leads us to do, you know, commit self harm and yeah, it's an abundance. Yeah. And I wish we had all the answers here today, but we know what's out there and we do do the best we can with our part and the interactions that we have, you know, it's, it's a trippy world. Like, I bet, you know, I'm going to go back to the AC unit thing real quick here because I think it's, it was a, it was a beautiful lesson for me in that. So it went out. It was in the evening, contacted a friend of mine who happens to work for a local elected company. I was able to contact this person and I mean, I was able to get ahold of this individual. He came out and he's like, Oh yeah, no, glad you called me. I mean, this was like 20 minutes later. Like what a blessing from, you know, I'll use the word God came out was the most straight up guy about this. We've all encountered maybe the repair and anyway, no, no, it's just a component like I'm like, Oh, I'm afraid of need a new unit. I heard the fan, you know, all these things. No, it was this, you know, gave them a nice tip and it made me realize one of my favorite sayings that I learned through recovery is good people, no good people. That's this conversation. Yeah. I love that. But it was like my, my friend, this guy that's him and his wife have stood by me through so much and had my back and been there and let me cry and, you know, stay over and all these things. And it's just this nice referral of, of knowing this and it was like, Wow, that was like, I looked at my, my partner looked at her and like, I want to say a blessing for this. And, you know, she was really moved by that because normally she's kind of the leader of the way in those kinds of things. And it was like, what a beautiful blessing, like it could have been so much worse in the past. I would have went catastrophic. Would have went this. This is bull. I'm off to the convenience store, bringing home the 30 pack and the bottle of whatever it is. It's like calm, you know, find a solution, just work through this. And no matter what, my partner was there too, like, all right, we're going to be in this hot house tonight. Hopefully it gets fixed soon, you know, and it was that processing of that and, and really being able to take a look at some blessing, whereas before I went, Oh, we're out hundreds of dollars and bitch and moan. And it wasn't that it was like such a beautiful experience. Living life on life's terms. Yeah, much. I don't know. I wasn't too good at Steven. Well, I mean, yeah, you got there. You got there. I did. I did. I have a question for you. Please. You mentioned the friends who let you cry on their shoulders and I thought has it always been easy for you to, to cry, like what's your experience with that? Because mine has shifted a great deal in my recovery. In my active addiction, it was always alone. It was always alone. Now it's improved. I still have moments. I know there's still so much work to do internally, but I do allow myself to get moved. I do. It's hard. It's still a challenge at times, but I've learned to embrace joy much better. And I always confuse pleasure and joy. I mean, that was a big part of that character defect, right? I mean, it's, you know, I've talked to some young, I don't know about you newcomers and then they'll bring up like sex or something. I'm like, Oh, yeah, it's a very joyous experience. Like, what the hell are you talking about, Joy? I'm like, no, no, no, it's it. There is pleasure included in that, but that's the bottom. That's like way down below. Yes. It's, it's not the priority in my experiences. It's not the priority, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's real talk. That's real talk. Yeah. I mean, because what, what, what have us addicts have been struggling with all those areas? Right? I mean, it's, it comes with the territory, you know? Mm hmm. Yeah. I know for me, what I'd know, and maybe it also has to do with just growing older, I'm going to be 53 and in December, not December, November. Damn. People tell me I aged well. It's the filters. I got the filter now. B.S. B.S. Good genes, good genes and staying being sober, um, yeah, like I just feel as though it was very hard for me to express my emotions when I was an active addiction. Like it was not that I couldn't at all, but it would just take so much for me to express how I was feeling to, to be vulnerable in that way and slowly, but surely through my recovery. It's also been, you know, in part, having great experiences of loss, like losing my father, losing my stepmother, um, cracked me open in a, in a really big way. My early sobriety and then, um, you know, um, almost 10 years into it. And then, um, my whole Chinese medicine experience also cracked me open another layer and then getting divorced this past year, um, cracked me open even more where, where my tears, whether they're tears of sadness or tears of joy is just beneath the surface. I feel really grateful to be able to access all that because when I first got sober, I said to my first sponsor how I expressed to him, how afraid I was of my emotions. Like I used to be afraid of my anger. I thought if I got angry and really let my anger out, I wouldn't be able to stop it. And then he just encouraged me to not be, to, to feel the fear, but still keep moving forward and trusting the process of, of recovery and that, um, I will have whatever it is that I needed when I would reach those pivotal moments when I felt afraid of how I would respond to react to my life and circumstances in my life. And he was absolutely right. And now I'm so grateful for all of the, like, I think of emotions like colors, like the colors of the rainbow. And I'm so grateful that I have the ability to experience all the different colors of that rainbow emotionally. And it makes me a, a better, stronger, more resilient person, um, and it also helps me to connect to other people more, because I know what it's like to feel joy. I know what it's like to feel sadness and grief and regret and anger and resentment and, and, and, um, confusion, you know, all the different things that one can feel, I, you know, I just feel like a more of a, more of a whole human being. Whereas before when I was drinking and using, I was a little bit of a robot, a little bit of a robot, you know, on automatic pilot and not really, not really present, not really present. I was, you know, I was always somewhere else, but somewhere else than where I was in the moment. Yep. Yeah. I, I, and I think it's, it's important to take a look at those thing. You know, there's secondary emotions, anger and I don't, have you ever seen the Adam Sandler movie, anger management? I don't know if you remember where he's on the flight and there's the, the guy that's on the plane and calm down, sir, and he's like, I'm, I'm calm. What are you talking about? Like that was me angry was like the guy that was like, well, he taught me not realizing like how much passive anger was sitting inside me. And, and it was the digging like, well, what's under that anger? Oh, resentment and all these. So there was really being able to, I take a look better at the drivers of these other emotions fear. Like, what am I really, what am I really afraid of? Oh, embarrassment. Oh, what's that connected to? Oh, I felt really embarrassed as a kid, which is ironic as someone that, I mean, my career has been performing. I did the 20 plus year radio career this, uh, hosting a various events, be it mixed martial arts or charity events or what it's, it's, it's like that weird ironic part of being a performer. We're so fragile, right? Yeah. Yeah, that, but that it's that fragility that just adds to what makes us so good at what we do. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. I really do believe that it makes me think of a, of my friend of mine, this author, um, Anita Morgiani. I don't know if you ever heard of her and if you're as soon as I've ever heard of her, she wrote an amazing book called Dying To Be Me. That's about her near death experience of dying from cancer and then coming back to life and how when she came back to life, how her cancer was gone and how, um, uh, she just had a whole new perspective on life and she really became more of herself. Sure. Um, but she wrote another book recently, not the long ago called, um, Sensitive Is a New Strong. Mm hmm. Yeah. For those of us out there who are, who are very, very sensitive, that that's actually a strength instead of a liability. Cause we do see it that way. Yeah. We do. Yeah. I know for me it was like that, that liquid courage armament, so to speak, you know. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. So watch so for me too. Yeah. Even the smoking cigarettes was like part of my armor, made me tough, made me cool. You know, maybe you'll accept me more because I smoke and things like that. I'm so glad that I don't smoke anymore. The things we try to project, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, um, progress, not perfection. Yes. I mean, I can even think about, you know, like tattoos initially was to gain a greater, uh, law of attraction at one point. Now it's like, ah, I just love the art form and beautiful. I was noticing that your arm is, it's beautiful. I love all the color. Thank you. So beautiful. Like, wow. Yeah. Ironically, my, my, uh, tattoo artists, brother in recovery too. And so it's like even that strength in our relationship, like, you know, I go in, I sit down for five, six hours or something. And we have these amazing conversations, six hours. Yeah. Wow. Like to take, to do the, he had to do a project like that. It takes hours. Wow. Great. You take a lunch break? Well, takes it. Yeah. He takes break. We take breaks in there. We take breaks. Uh, well, before we get to some random questions, um, I do want to ask you, where did that passion for dance come from? I, you know, I, people always crack up. I did, was in a high school participating in a thing called dance company. People like, Oh, you were dancing. No, no, no. My girlfriend was in it. I was a decent actor. They put me in the way back, but, uh, but I do love dance. Uh, I'm just not the best. I kind of got, got one gimp leg, so to speak when it comes to try to dance. Um, I was born with it. I, I, my joke is that I came out of my mother's womb dancing. And that's an exaggeration, but not by much because I found it very early on. One of my earliest memories is of myself dancing in the living room of our apartment in Connecticut on a green shack carpet, um, dancing to Grace Jones or Stephanie Mills on the right on the radio or the record player and just dancing and just losing myself in it, losing myself, losing time and just enjoying it. And, um, and that eventually just led me to, to being drawn to the arts. I thought I was initially going to be, uh, a theater major and just do acting and singing, uh, I, uh, I intended a high school that had a dance program as well. And so I just started taking dance class and I realized that I was really, it was something that I excelled at. And that was really where my passion existed and it began from there. And then I made my way to New York city and went to NYU and was in the dance department there. And then I had a long dance career in New York for over 20 years. And, um, and I still dance, but I dance for myself now, you know, or I dance from, for the people who follow me on social media, I do this thing where I, I, uh, I dance and I talk. I talk about something, a topic, I talk about something that's interesting that happened in my life and there may be a, a spiritual message underneath it or, uh, you know, a, we call it inspirational aspect to it and I love doing that because dance was my first language in it. And when I'm dancing, it's easy for me to just talk and I have to think about it so much. And, uh, people tend to get a lot out of it. So I love dancing in that way cause then, you know, I'm not auditioning. I'm not dying for you to like me enough to give me a job or anything like that. I'm just, I'm just letting the creative energy flow. I love it. Yeah. Well, and I know you're also doing some, some stuff on YouTube as well. If you want to tell folks about that and that link's going to be in the podcast description as well. Yeah. I mean, first and foremost, my website is Stephen Washington experience.com and on my website, you can get access to all of my social media, um, accounts. Uh, I'm on YouTube, I'm on my Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, all the, all the platforms and I have, um, so many videos out there that are really useful to people. Some of them are movement based. Some of them are, um, just me talking direct to camera, like I'm having a conversation with you talking about something that I find meaningful or interesting. So people can always find me there. Absolutely. All right. Well, let's jump into some fun, random questions. How about it? Yeah. All right, um, do you have an interest or a hobby that people might be surprised to learn about? Maybe something you don't talk about. Um, well, people don't know that I knit. Uh, I don't do it all the time, but these hands can knit. Where did that come about? That came about when I was doing the Lion King and I was a, and I was a swing and I wasn't always on stage every, every night. So I, you know, I'd let, I learned how to knit from the dressers who worked at the theater. And so yeah, I can knit one pearl too. I can do that. I'll be doing that. That's pretty cool. Um, well, here's a new question I'm adding here. I'm trying to bring in some new questions people are like, Hey, change it up a bit. Um, would you rather play the villain or the hero in a movie? Oh, the villain, right? Any particular like, uh, uh, genre or like film series or storyline? It would either be a James Bond or it would have to be like a Marvel film, like super heroes or, you know, or something supernatural. I got to be a villain with powers. Yes. Yeah. Like me, it'd be, be, be a Sith like in a Star Wars thing, but I can see you like you would have that charm as a bond villain and it's like, Oh, this guy, cause it's always the unsuspecting like, you know, Oh, yeah, yeah, that's where the fun would lie. Um, let's see. These are fun. I like these questions. Yeah. I always enjoy it. Some people like you should just do a podcast like 10 minutes long called random questions. So, um, if you're having a rough day, what are the best ways to cheer you up or that you chill and cheer yourself up? Hmm. Usually is to get out and take a walk, usually get outside, take a walk. Um, and often it's just to move my body like to do, even just to do five or 10 minutes that she gone and totally just shift my energy around and just give me a different perspective. Just give me a, you know, it's like we say in recovery, move a muscle change of thought. You know, that's what I do. That's what I do. And it's so true, so true. And in addition to as I've, uh, started getting greater curiosity about qigong meditation and breath work, just like how much all of that, you know, I've been doing yin yoga. My mentors kind of got me into that. And some wonderful deep stretching that it's like we've been identifying this. This is where you keep a lot of, you know, that trauma harness, you know, neck, shoulders, grown, all these things and getting into these deep stretches and staying in them. It's like, Oh my goodness. But then afterwards you're like, ah, I feel light. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. You had an emotional release. Yeah. It's great. Um, best and worst advice you ever received. Ooh. It's hard for me to think about the worst advice I ever received, but I can tell you some of the worst advice my mother received, but she shared with me. Remember when she was younger and, and she was dealing with my father and my father was my father drank a lot. And she went to her mother and she said, you know, mom, Jimmy, he drinks a lot and I don't know what to do and, and it's really a problem and my grandmother said, well, drink with him. Oh. And that's what she did. Yes. That's one of the worst advice I ever heard, no disrespect to your grandma. I'm sure she was a beautiful lady, but oh, yeah, she was natic too. So, you know, what can you do? Sure. Sure. Yeah. That remember the source. Yeah. Yeah. Some of the best advice I got was that it's, you know, it's okay to change your mind. Back to what we were talking about earlier. When I was thinking about moving to California from New York, I was so worried that I was making the wrong decision, but that once I moved to California that I was stuck, and if it didn't work, I was stuck here. And my friend said, you can always change your mind. You can always come back if it doesn't feel right. And I honestly had not, before he said that I had not even considered that, that's how my mind, my mind was so black and white at that time. So just, just my friend, Dean at the time sharing that just totally opened up my world. It's amazing what people can say to us, if we're receptive to it, the littlest thing can have such tremendous impact. Wow. Yeah. I love that. All right. Let's try one more random question. This is a new one too. Is there a movie TV show that you've watched recently or a book that you've read that has had a good impact on you and what was your biggest takeaway? A book that I just read for a meditation teacher training course that I'm doing. One of the books was called The Luminous Self. It's written by a woman named Tracy Stanley. She is a yoga nitra teacher. And one of the chapters she talks about our ancestors having our backs and that we can always turn to our ancestors for much needed strength and support and that our ancestors don't even have to be blood relatives. They can just be people who were impactful or very important people in our lives. I love hearing that because I know that where I am today, it's like I stand on the shoulders of many people in order to be where I am today. So it's good for me to be reminded of that and to honor the people that have given me so much, like my stepmother Diane gave me so much. She wasn't a blood relative of course, but she gave me so much and if she were still alive, she'd be so proud of me at what I've been able to accomplish and not even just materially. But what I've been able to accomplish in terms of the kind of person that I am and how I've showed up for life. Yeah. Thank you. So the luminous self. Check it out. Bye. I will. Thank you. That was beautiful. Steven, that's where I like to give you the floor, anything that you'd want to lend words of positivity, hope, encouragement, maybe those struggling, loved one of someone who's really struggling. Yeah. The first thing that comes to mind is no matter what you're going through, just know you're not alone. You're not alone. There are people that have been where you've been and know the kind of struggles you have in a very intimate way. So I hope that you find those people. And I think that this whole journey, recovery journey, everything is about becoming more and more of who we are, not somebody else who we are. And when I'm more of who I am, I give you an invitation to become more and more of who you are because who you really are, like Jason, who you really are, is absolutely enough and is needed in the world. And nobody can do what you do, the way you do it. And that's important. Boy, you trying to get those tears out of me, aren't you? Whoo. Yeah. Give me chills. Okay. Let me focus here. The book is recovering you, soul care and mindful movement for overcoming addiction. Steven, thank you so much for your time. I feel I've gained a new friend here, not only in this recovery journey, but just in general, you're a beautiful person. And I just really appreciate your time in this conversation. We'll have to do it again. Thank you so much, Jason, like I feel like I've discovered a brother from another mother. There you have it. On that note, remember, no outside solutions to inside problems and keep knocking doors down. [MUSIC]
