Join me, Jason LaChance, host of the @KnockinDoorzDown podcast certified addiction recovery coach, and mental health advocate for my sit down with Dino Miliotis.
Dino is a celebrated entrepreneur known for his innovative spirit and impactful message of hope. He gained prominence for creating Bug-Ban, an all-natural insect repelling bracelet he launched in Chicago in 1996. His entrepreneurial success has been featured on Oprah, Forbes, Entrepreneur, and People Magazine.
Miliotis's journey includes overcoming a more than 20-year battle with alcohol and substance use. He shares his story and the road to recovery in his memoir, “There Is No Box” advocating for recovery and supporting others facing similar challenges.
Currently, he serves as a spokesman for OpiAID, a data science company leveraging AI to tackle the opioid epidemic. Renowned for his advocacy and speaking engagements, Miliotis is considered one of the leading recovery speakers in America, embodying his mantra of changing the world one person at a time.
Dino and I discuss the following and more
3 things Dino is grateful for? 1:07
How did Bug Ban lead to Dino's addiction? 2:20
What was Dino's moment of surrender? 6:28
What was Dino's experience with medication-assisted treatment? 13:55
Why do we embrace sober experience early in recovery? 24:13
What is OpiAID and how is it revolutionizing recovery? 40:00
Random Questions 47:10
Final thoughts 53:10
This is Dino Miliotis Knockin’ Doorz Down.
For more on Dino Miliotis https://bookdinonow.com/
For more on OpiAID https://opiaid.ai/
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Get your copy of Carlos Vieira's Autobiography Knockin' Doorz Down. Hardcover, Paperback & Audio Book https://linktr.ee/kddbook
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For more information on Carlos Vieira's autobiography Knockin' Doorz Down, the Carlos Vieira Foundation, the Race 2B Drug-Free, Race to End the Stigma, and Race For Autism programs visit: https://www.carlosvieirafoundation.org/
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in the height of my addiction it would take me four hours to balance right because i would drink like twenty four seven right and then you drink too much you got to take some blow or so a pill or whatever you get too high now you got to drink again so at a certain time there's a balance that i found even though it may have only lasted for ten minutes or thirty minutes it was a balance and so i remember i mean i had makeup i put on my rashes on my face and i'm all bloated and i show up to meetings i mean raking probably about alcohol this is the knock indoors down podcast i'm your host Jason the chance in here we unlock stories of resilience triumph and transformation hey please hit that subscribe button on whatever platform you're on and while you're at it why not leave a rating a review and my guest on this episode of knock indoors down this is celebrated entrepreneur has been featured on Oprah Forbes entrepreneur and people magazine his resonating message of hope changing the world one person at a time is his mantra documented his life of battling addiction over 20 years with alcohol and substance and this memoir there is no box as of the release of this podcast 7 7 24 my guest is celebrating four years of recovery and sobriety and now is the spokesman of opiate an award-winning data science company that's harnessing the power of ai to combat the opioid epidemic dino milio to thank you for joining me brother hey thanks for having me what a pleasure my pleasure come on now huh we talked on the phone the other day i'm like i love this guy already let's go brother let's go uh i i don't know about your practices in recovery but uh you know i'm just over three years continue about seven years total and uh gratitude is such it's the first thing i think of every morning it's it's always three to five things so i like to start my conversations that way three things you're grateful for today yeah well first thing is to be alive and given a second chance obviously and uh given a second chance not to squander it on me me but you know i was put here to inspire people that's my gift and that's what i'm doing that's what i'm doing yes sir absolutely well hey we were kind of chat here beforehand and you know it's it's really interesting to me because um you know you invented uh bug band it was uh uh all natural insect repellent bracelet this is back in what 96 1996 yeah so yeah you know you were a thriving entrepreneur and and it was interesting because we kind of talked about the the yes men and it reminded me of when i i sat down with charlie sheen here on the podcast and i told him i said it it really bothered me watching you during the tiger blood stuff because you had all these yes people around you while you were fucking killing yourself and it's so disheartening to me how people will lose their humanity you know in the name of money or whatever it is yeah that's true you know uh actually bug band was when i developed my addiction to drugs and alcohol and the reason was i mean it wasn't like a progressive success i mean it was like band overnight i mean it was literally an accident so you know one minute i'm broke as a joke and just trying to figure out how to survive in the next minute you know i'm a people magazine i'm sitting down with Oprah i'm in 63 countries i sell like over 30 million of these bands myself and so it was like complete rock star and so i'd go you know a little gas station and people would run up hey i saw you on tv i'm like who are you dude i don't know i was young i was all of the above and i just didn't know how to handle it and then every interview had to be better and better and so i found bravery in a bottle if you will or anything kind of lying around cocaine whatever um and i was just you know as we all know in the beginning you know when you when you take substances when you take that drink you know you're like almost like that euphoric moment you're like wow did you see i was great i was on point i did all these things you know and and you that's how it starts um you don't notice it right away but it's a creeper and that's how it started for me yeah how old are you at the time i was breaking 30 okay um let's say they're really really young but i mean i'm i'm gonna be 59 in in september so i mean this was a long time ago but it was instant stardom and i just didn't know how to handle it i mean it was never on a camera i was never fitting with old brother i never had people magazine in my face i mean the camera guys were like are you ready kid we're gonna take this picture you're gonna be famous i'm like uh yeah you know down its side i'm trembling i'm like wow i'm gonna be in people magazine you know um so it for me it was overwhelming i mean i obviously looking back i would have done a million things different but at the time was just like that's the tradeoff and um and it was a wild ride i mean i i was highly highly functioning for more than 20 years under the influence wow well it goes to show too that you know when it comes to our consciousness we only know what we know and it's and it's like yeah i couldn't imagine if all of a sudden see i'm lucky if all of a sudden i came up with this product and i called you and it hit the market and it took off i've got a mentor now for it because of this the using technology and relationships for good but if it was 20 years ago uh i would have been 25 i would have been i would be dead i'd be dead right right how i wasn't dead already is beyond me but you know like everybody else who gets it big who says i'm never gonna do those things i did them all anything you could think of the answer is yes anything you wanted to buy the answer is also yes i mean i blew a ton of money but um you know i mean it was it was my first taste i never forgot it you know i i stored the good stuff and obviously now i'm discarding the bad stuff so you know this particular venture at this point in my life i mean things seem like they happen easy um it's it's not i mean obviously nothing's really easy but you know without that ball and chain that i was carrying around for 20 years for me it's it's incredible i mean you're sharp you're just on point you never run out of energy you know exactly where to go that's the difference yeah that's the beautiful part of of recovery and our wonderful saying at 12 said you know it works if you work it because it's true like i have yet to find evidence of someone in recovery that has truly worked it and life isn't better that's absolutely true and that you know the thing for me is coming out of free i i went to a treatment center i said i well i i'm never gonna be that guy that goes but i did because i really needed to surrender and i mean really like swallow that big ego that i had and all the toys and the garage and i mean they're just things but literally i had all this and i had nothing i had no friends i had no family i had no purpose i i didn't care if i lived or died so when i went in you know i kind of like wrapped myself around like what are these people i mean i got to learn from everybody and the longer they were sober i mean i picked their brain and asked them stupid questions nothing stupid but you know i mean anything that came to mind but when i got out of treatment it was right in the middle of a covid lockdown and we all remember that's when the whole world stopped turning that's how i describe it and isolation for people like us isn't really a good thing especially when you just press out of recovery so you know you know i watched like four hundred and fifty six episodes of law and order right the binge of thought hey it's not me i'm not a loser everybody's binge of thought okay i'm fine you know i should get an honorary degree for watching so many you know law episodes but after a while i got boring and you know the freaks started coming out at night the demons in my head like thinking about alcohol thinking about using and this is eight months into my recovery so it's not like i'm fresh out and i'm like i shouldn't be feeling this way why am i feeling this way you know but i'm alone with my thoughts morning noon and night i didn't know about a recovery community at that time that's how naive i am i was buried in the sand so you know i mean i was work in the program and i was also uh you know following up with um counselors and therapists and undergoing MAT you know medically assisted treatment yeah and this is just my take i'm not knocking the whole medical community uh for sure but you know for me nobody wanted to hear what i what i had to say i mean there's just like how are you feeling i'm like well i oh let me tell you what i'm gonna do i'm gonna give you something for your baseline anxiety but that won't work for maybe about two months i'm going to give you something else for your anxiety that works immediately but don't take it because it's addictive i'm going to give you something else for your baseline depression but that won't kick in for a month i'm like are you serious right now you know and so before long i'm taking like eight different medications and i was like a freaking zombie i mean i didn't want to get up i didn't want to shower i did i was watching a blank tv and i was like this is this is what everybody's talking about i mean i'd rather be dead i'd rather start drinking and using again i mean i couldn't articulate how i felt and and they kept asking me will was the last time you used do you feel suicidal on a feelings chart pick the best feeling that describes you on a pain chart pick your pain i'm like dude i don't know but if you don't help me now i'm gonna crack i mean seriously so it was literally true grit and divine intervention and you know my publicist was like well maybe you shouldn't really hit on that divine it no you know what i'm gonna hit on it because you can think whatever you want for me it was definitely a clear message i said i'm not a praying man but show me what i'm supposed to do i'm in your hands i'm ready to follow you and as soon as i said that in my worst time my phone i hear a text ding ding and it's some kid that worked at a car wash like years ago and i used to bring my fancy cars into a regular car wash like a Rolls Royce why because i had an ego the size of Texas and i like the attention oh sure what you do for a living oh my god i want to be like you one day tell me the secret of your success and i'm like world good you know i mean do you can you see it i mean there's even explain it but that's true right so uh you know at that moment this kid from years past texted me and he says hey this is car wash kid i hope you remember me uh i don't know where you are these days i don't know what you're doing but i just want to tell you i have a real job now and i've used your principles of success and i've been promoted twice thank you and i was like you got to be freaking kidding me right seriously i mean that is my sign that was my moment up until that time sobriety was just sobriety it was dries over which some people call it yeah but at that time i i was i was convinced that you know what maybe i'm here to inspire people maybe i had that gift all along and i just didn't recognize it because i'm so polluted maybe that's what i'm supposed to do right funny how things just kind of happen and so i just decided like i'm gonna write my life stories really interesting at least i thought it was and i'm just gonna put pen to paper i'm just gonna write my heart up never wrote a book before so uh but for eight months i wrote 12 hour days never had anxiety never had cravings never had depression nothing i was like on a mission i was possessed and then when i was done and it got published the most wonderful thing happened this beautiful recovery community this online community that i knew nothing about starts coming out in droves thank you for your read oh what a great read it touched me i especially like this like who are these people right right you don't know but i got immersed in it i got immersed in it and before long i'm talking to people online morning noon and night because of course our addiction isn't nine to five it's 24/7 yeah right and so i'm up at all hours and i was so involved in these platforms that when the moderators had something to do or they went on vacation they would post to like 80 000 people uh i'm on vacation but if you have somebody that you need to talk to dm dino milliotis i'm like whoa dude i don't even work here so i'm just a just a visitor here yeah yeah i mean but but to me it was an honor that they would they would consider me like that steady net rock solid that they could count on me which they which they could and um and that got me noticed and that led to just a completely new life where sobriety is a thing as a moment turned into a lifestyle which is recovery yes once you embrace recovery is a lifestyle that's when you start to live again yes sir 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 Viera 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 in our podcast visit kdmediacompany.com let me ask you a little bit about you know your medication assisted treatment in addition to the anxiety meds which i always love that people you know this is addictive why are you giving it to an f fanatic then uh depression were you on anything else i mean i know you mentioned booze and and some blow in there but was there like a suboxone or uh what's the one for alcohol like vivitrol or any of that stuff too you you mean the stuff i was taking before i i got clean and sober the stuff that i was taking during mat during mat yeah okay during mat honestly i mean there's like gapapentin there was will future and there was uh club maza pan or claraza pan i don't there's so many of them there were literally eight bottles and they kept upping the dough okay so like from a small thing and said their solution was let's up the dose and let's just see what the lab red does after two months oh you're back so how's it been you know what i got night tears and sweats i have uncertainty about tomorrow i want to die oh did you say you want to kill yourself no i said i don't care if i live or die there's a difference no and i don't want to harm somebody and i don't want to jump off a bridge and i you know i mean it was just so so frustrating to get through to somebody but again in their defense trying to look at both ends consider the source you know when when you're so far into withdrawal and anxiety and pain and anguish it's really hard for somebody to articulate the right words to express how you're feeling and so what happens 99% of the time is your health professional defaults to the age-old status the 40-year gold standard in recovery which talks about historical averages so i would get things like well you shouldn't be feeling this way and i'm thinking seriously they pay you to say this i mean i should but i but i am feeling this way i know i shouldn't but i am you know so um yeah it was a horrible time for me bro seriously yeah and and i think some people you know there's a lot of folks that that watch the channel or listen to the podcast that you know it's out of wanting to gain that greater awareness and understanding around addiction and mental health struggles and i think that's the thing that people don't understand you know in my first year just over a year after doing this podcast when i had my some say a slip up i say relapse at last of the night but it was all those thoughts feelings emotions that if someone asked me well what is it it's like i don't have words for you i don't know i i literally don't know and that is the it's scary huge like now i know if i'm feeling a little pent up or you know i've moved into that secondary emotion so to speak of anger i you know i know how to identify it i've done the work to raise my consciousness of my emotional state i may not always know how to process it right away but i can somewhat communicate it but when you're in that spiral of from anxiety to depression anxiety to depression you know the loneliness the loneliness you're right that's what did it to me that the the recovery community shut down i didn't have anyone external of this town but i only had contact with people at meetings i didn't get phone numbers right i didn't i didn't have anyone online that i was like a mentor that i could reach out you know really was a situation a divine intervention that that my sponsor and and our mutual as well as our mutual friend mike diamond came into my life yeah i know i i i get you a hundred percent and the exchanging numbers you know i mean obviously everybody in the recovery community they're beautiful souls and i can't say enough i mean if somebody was vetted to to the point where like you got to be sober for a certain period of time but after that i mean i would hire every one of them but because we're the toughest tested metal there is and wow what a diverse background right because because addiction knows no one thing i mean it's an equal opportunity destroyer but they are amazing but by saying that there's also a nefarious element right so you go to these meetings start exchanging numbers god forbid they find out who you are if you have a little bit of money or you got connections and see you know they're hitting you up oh well i'm gonna get kicked i mean you want to help everybody but you know that's not part of my recovery plan you know what i mean my thing is is to come in and share fellowship with people and inspire people and get inspired by their stories it is not to be the you know building and loan for for anybody so it is scary and and i understand what you're saying yeah well and i think that's to the some of the hardships for people you know especially in those early phases that first 30 60 90 heck year like i mean year three and i'm still like it felt some of my hardest emotions that i had now to process within the last year year and a half and i and i think that is some of the things that can be scary for people when they step into a recovery room or through this process because you know those that we kept close to us before were bedfellows in our disease and so we had a really not good thing in common and so you're learning discernment and i remember i was on a retreat went down to san diego connected with the buddy we went to an open meeting and there was these younger ladies that were there then maybe maybe a couple of weeks and they're sitting near me and i see this guy across the room and i just tap them and i go hey excuse me sorry to bother you my name is Jason but at the end of this meeting the guy over there is going to come up to you and he's going to want to talk to you and it's the last thing you need in your life right now and sure as do you know at the end of the meeting he came over and they said hi and i could tell it was like a no thank you and they look to me and just did a WTF how did you know i'm like because i can spot him i know the energy i know what it is trust me next to booze the attention of a woman was my second most favorite thing there you go yeah i mean and and thank god you were there because a lot of times i mean that's what happens look when when people obviously you're you're watching really really closely the 30 60 90 days that you're sober right but when you're talking about people like you mentioned you know a year into your sobriety some people 10 years 20 years here's what happens it's not it's not that somebody's going to come to you with a let's say it's alcohol it's it's not that somebody's going to come to you with a bottle of booze and say hey look you know it's what i considered like a series of unfortunate events it's a little thing it's a little other thing and compounded and compounded and before long it's just like you're like forget it man i'm just doing it you know or it won't hurt or or if somebody's like well you know it's not so bad you know you start rationalizing to yourself right but um for me and here's something i haven't really shared but for me it was extra pressure i mean not that it's easy to recover period but it was i added extra pressure because my mom was failing in her health and my step sign also was diagnosed with cancer and this was a baby maybe about a year into my sobriety and if i didn't have divine intervention if i didn't get that moment if i didn't get clarity i would have for sure relapsed and what i mean relapsed i would have relapsed hard i probably would have killed myself because i know me i'm i'm you know it's not like coasting let me have a sip or let me i would go real far right yeah but i had to prepare myself and and i think a lot of people uh may think like this too it's like okay i'm i'm cleaning sober but what happens if we turn up the heat a little bit and you lose your job what if you got a divorce right what if you experience a death in the family or a close person a loved one you know how are you going to handle that right so it's an extra layer that i was worried about i mean i was forecasting death and um and it sounds gruesome but you know i i had to know i can handle it and i did and i did by the way yeah well that's why we're here today hell yeah i'm proud of you and thank you for sharing that because i had a a recent situation was doing some work for someone and and it wasn't anything i did they put the project on hold or it's done and i didn't realize how that was still an area for me of struggle you know and the money was nice but i was really about the purpose of it and i really had to sit in process and and even you know reach out and have conversations with people it was like did you do everything you were asked to do and i went well yeah i think i under promised and over delivered and they're like then you did everything you could and it was like wow i really had to find a space of acceptance for myself that regardless of my output that maybe things aren't going to go the way i would necessarily like them to but what does that mean that is to come next because i was a guy that always thought oh my book is already written we're getting that now like today sitting here right now talking to you this just started a new chapter yeah yeah i mean every day's an adventure you know my counselor when i when i coined out after treatment you know we all stood up the the the group that i'm graduating with right and we're all given coins and of course the the counselors that have certain people they're the ones that hand pick coins for you right and my counselor picked the coin especially for me and it was a coin that said recovery is discovery is recovery is just i mean it never ends right and i i didn't really grasp what that meant until maybe a half a year ago but it's like every day you're discovering new things and we were talking before the show we're talking and i told you that i went to visit down in uh you know boca and and tom beach then there's several times several times but this was the first time i was there sober and i was like wow you know what i mean i mean it's so simple to you know somebody else is like what's the big deal but the people like us it's just like a kid eyes wide open you're like wow something that maybe at a moment in in in our addiction we probably thought we'd never experienced right mm-hmm yeah the best i can relate to that and i've told this story to when i go and speak at high schools or even in you know where i'm doing a uh a speaker meeting type share and i talk about with my my partner and i her and i one of our first states was going to see one of my favorite bands of all time the hottest band in the world kiss yeah and i said to her as we're driving there she goes are you okay and i said you know other than like the first couple of times i saw them i i you know i never got blackout drunk at them but i said this is the first time i can remember not drinking and seeing them and i was scared am i gonna have fun and dino my ass was up the whole concert and i'm doing the Paul standing i was people i love you and i had so much fun and i remember it vividly and you remember so you got your money's worth imagine that i mean seriously the little things that we appreciate since we've been given a second chance are amazing and the energy level the quality in the day i mean you know things things that we we never thought about in our i mean in the height of my addiction it would take me four hours to balance right because i would drink like 24/7 right and then you drink too much you got to take some blow or a pill or whatever you get too high now you got to drink again so but at certain at a certain time there's a balance that i found even though it may have only lasted for 10 minutes or 30 minutes it was a balance and so i remember i mean i had makeup i put on my rashes on my face and i'm all bloated and i'd show up to meetings i mean wreaking probably alcohol but i'd get through it i have a meeting and then nobody really knew what i did afterwards what i did afterwards just go back and start balancing again all day all night believe it or not you want to know the sick part i would say to myself it's the price you pay for the life you choose like like i accepted the fact that if i want to have a successful business and by the way it's like a billion dollar empire i built okay it's not a small little thing but i'm like i have this and if it takes this to get me through if that's the price i have to pay to have all of this then that's the price i pay kind of like i can't even mean really i wouldn't even think that and then and that's why i said at the end before i went into treatment i've all this and i have nothing just literally none of it mattered none of it mattered and i chose me for the first time i chose me have you dug into the archives of past knock indoors down podcast episodes the knock indoors down podcast archive is available to you for free check it out here's a snippet from when charlie sheen was on the podcast a is not the best place for um for a famous atheist just i kept looking for that in chapter what you know so yeah um but it's not on one size fits all you know it's like it's like saying that we all think the same like our brains are built the same they're just not right now there's there's such uniqueness involved check out this episode and so many more in the knock indoors down archive and while you're at it hit that subscribe button give this video a thumb up leave a comment and share with somebody else that you know will get value out of the knock indoors down podcast that and i think you hit it so well at the start saying that rock and roll lifestyle because in all the you know rock and roll stars actors professional wrestlers that i've spoken to that you know that's that's the thing it was like well i got to get out here and i got to perform and then the uh you know the fans that are hanging out afterwards they expect me to be the party guy or the chicks that want to have their fantasy story that they whatever and you're sitting here and all of a sudden you're doing all this other stuff right that really at no point is it is it you like are you enjoying this is this a fulfilling life are you able to take the status you have and do good for others like i don't know by my my opinion of success is shifted by no means am i a monetarily wealthy person i manage my money responsibly now but for the first time i really feel like a successful person because you know i i'm i'm blessed to have people reciprocate hey thank you as the very sweet lady not that long ago a text message is you know thank you for your help i'm six months and i really appreciate it it's like that was my my honor you know i've God blessed me with this opportunity and it's it's a really good place to be in life to just look at success differently now don't get me wrong my dream car is still a Porsche GT you know 911 GT3 RS but if i don't have one my life is not going to be unfulfilled and if i have one my life isn't going to be fulfilled it's just a pretty cool car right now no you you're spot on in that and you know i my my idea of success is shifted too because for over 30 years it's been monetary right material material is just hunting right now you know what it is it's i want to be remembered is something other than the guy that had the stuff i want to be remembered as the guy who helped people or the guy who helped change the way people recover forever that's what i'm involved in now this tech company is just going to blow the roof over anything that we've been following for recovery for 40 years but but i want to be part of that legacy you know what i mean and that really for me is the definition of success yeah well and i want to get into opiate here in a bit but you said something that that really resonated with me about the not being remembered as the person that had the stuff and i think but i want to be the kind of person that i live my life that someone comes into a meeting goes i have what he wants and it's not the monetary things it's the spiritual things the values the principles by which i live and it's about what i do and not just what i say but i want my words to match what i do i like i'm all in like you want what i have good and you're not breaking the 10 commandments and doing it it's the good stuff i'm in i'm you have my time and isn't it funny that what you have doesn't get diminished by helping somebody else get it isn't it funny it's like this is something you could share that you actually don't lose when you share it which is amazing it's brilliant you want 10 bucks it's coming out of my pocket and i'm giving it to you right but you want a lifestyle i can help you with that and guess what i'm still enjoying that lifestyle that same one that i'm helping you achieve that's brilliant yeah well and i think it shows you know as we get older i think we value time so much different and i'm cool with giving that time if someone else the person people on the other end are also valuing that time to do better with themselves internally to help people with it from there moving forward because time is at the end of the day no matter what what our bank account says we ain't gonna got more time to buy when we go and meet our maker that's that's it that's our time here in this plane of existence yeah yeah yeah and you know what i mean this is this is our thing i mean it literally is a near-death experience if it took us that to just come out like appreciative and grateful and you just kind of change your tune that's what it took but you know it's it's really what it is it's got slapping you in the face and allowing you to hit the reset button on your life so you can start fresh that's when you start living again you know what i mean because the last time you felt like this was like what a teenager or as a kid growing up i mean when was the last time after that there's ailments and there was the acid in your stomach from too much alcohol or bad cocaine by the way where it felt like you're driving nails through your nostrils i mean it was just the horrible stuff we put up with in our addiction but it's just like oh i i gotta have it you know yeah it's horrible and i mean did you hit a state of the understanding of how much misery you were in because i the reason i ask that is you know i'll celebrate recoveries what i go to the most and oftentimes the the topic that is picked and i'll speak on that and i'll explain i want to share that so maybe it resonates with you because i keep that really close because anytime and and it's a pretty quick process now if there's something like at the last Tony i did the ring announcement for an mma event people are drinking like oh they're having fun and i go that is misery to me like it's that quick i know what it is for me it is about the misery like all of my greatest fears come to fruition my kids will not speak to me my finances will go to and my lady will leave me i know that for sure pretty much your life flashed in front of your eyes of what could be right with that just one slip yeah i mean i think about maybe you shouldn't think like this but i think about all the people first of all i blame me for everything i i own everything but just when i'm in the gym just when i'm in the gym i think about all the the things in my life that were the idols that i worship and all the people that allowed me to worship those idols and i turn on my heavy metal music i put my headphones on and dude you want to see a madman working on it's me you know and i just get it out because it's just like i'm not mad at them i'm mad at me and i'm just like okay i'm so grateful but right now just so i don't think about the past ever ever ever i'm just gonna be mad about it like how can you just completely destroy and waste your life like literally a train wreck i mean all that talent all that stuff all the inventions all the cash the the jobs that i created for people everything it was just what could you have been i mean if you thought that was big time you could have been more and now you have a chance to be more right don't blow it and so that's what i do yeah well and we've seen it you know not just in our selves but so many people that were at death's door and i mean you know gosh i've encountered you know men and women from from from homelessness and you know just like every physical ailment that you could imagine and the ability to bounce back and truly transform to become something completely different is possible and it's amazing when you see it like yes that's why i just i love not that long ago i was i was in between someone that had 30 years and then then i shared and then the the gentleman next to me was five days and i was sandwiched in between a spectrum of just beautiful steps of transformation that's awesome and you learned from everyone and that's the beautiful thing i mean you could just be sober one day and there's something that you can learn everybody has the unique story and there's millions and millions and millions of us by the way there's a lot more of us than them okay yeah however you know uh not everybody choose it to vocalize uh they're they're a recovery journey uh not everybody can take i mean you know look the number one fear is not death it's public speaking when you put that in perspective right there's a lot of people that are terrified to do what what we do okay uh that that is a gift for us and it comes naturally you know but and so that's what we were talking about is just embracing the gift that you were given if that means going and having a platform and using your gift so that others can be inspired you know um that's what we do and and so i i love where i'm at right now i know you love where you're at too i'm exactly where i'm supposed to be yes sir that's funny you bring up that the public speaking number one fear i still get it all the time like how do you go up and do that and you know do do do do i'm like well hey i literally did try to kill myself and understand the first time i did do these things without having some alcohol in me i was a little bit afraid but then i realized that certainly didn't kill me so yeah yeah you know but enjoy the fun of it like i get paid to be like okay my ego gets to come out a little bit because this is what i get to do but and once i'm off of that stage i go back to being the introvert that i am and kind of shy and that's okay you know that's how i work let's jump into uh before we go to random questions and final thoughts let's talk more about opiate i mean this is exciting stuff especially with what we're seeing with the fentanyl crisis and and you know addiction is in overdose the number one killer in the world now it is it's it's really scary and i will tell you you know i mean again being yeah i invented bug band i got some home runs and stuff but i will tell you and in your audience i'm not really a smart guy but in my entire career what i've been able to do is relate to ordinary people and uh sell an ordinary service and an ordinary product so when i was exposed to when i met the founder of opiate um and brilliant team by the way some of the finest people all all over the world are working at opiate right now um it wasn't the academia that i could understand i mean but what i did understand is that the revolutionary uh transformational way that mat math is going and it's going to be enhanced that i understood because i immediately went back to my bad experience with math okay and i'm just like holy cow i got to get involved in this like now you know and and and i did i immersed myself in this let me tell you what opiate is yes please so i am wearing can you see that yep okay so this is a smartwatch and it's powered by opiate now you won't see any distinguishing marks on the watch this is a samsung galaxy and the reason is is because opiate they're true north is their love for their neighbors and recovery they don't even call them attics they call them neighbors in recovery which is just it's a beautiful thing and um so they want to treat um our disease with care and compassion and so there's no like distinguishing labels like oh you're wearing a recovery watch you know it's a cool watch and by the way it works but what the what our technology does is it's able to distinguish the difference between anxiety and withdrawal hold on and it's able to measure the level of withdrawal the same way you use a glucometer to measure your blood sugar the same way you use a breathalyzer to measure your alcohol level boom like wow are you freaking kidding me right now right so if you flash back to my my time you know we'll pick a feelings chart how do you feel tell me you know tell tell me when the last time out the window now they would know okay there are people that really really need help and by the way your condition changes daily hourly weekly it's not always the same you're not going to crave the same till your next visit you know hospital visit or doctor visit this reads the biometrics my biometrics every five minutes sends it to a database the database applies our machine learning and our algorithm and spits it out in real time to the health profession at the treatment center okay so now the health professional is able to work with me and prescribe personalized care just for me so the one size fits all method is gone the take two pills call me in the morning gone the six foot five guy and a five foot six guy treated the same gone now we're handling recovery for me specifically for me and if i get better quicker the protocol will change so it is the way with the future it is the new gold standard in recovery and brother i am so excited to just let people know that there's new technology it's not in the future it's now and that there's hope is recovery for us at all based on hope and so i am going to treatment center after treatment center after treatment center and for lack of the better world we're powering them up and then the next phase is to have my beautiful recovery community i'm going to point them to the ones that have our technology yes absolutely i would be fascinated to even be a part of a case study with that i that's so interesting and intriguing to me and and i'm glad that there is that new technology that is out there we got to use these tools for betterment we just do we do we do and you know i mean and and the critical parts i mean one to 30 days one to 90 days you know hit and miss you don't know and you're not going to be under a doctor's supervision 24/7 and the people that let's say get they they're able to go home and then they have a follow up visit in 30 days what are you going to face well how was your 30 days tell me how you feel i don't know or i've had my ups and downs right this talks for you they know how you've been because it takes readings every five minutes you never take it off your wrist so we're able to help guide people provide insights towards long-term recovery but also let's face it i would know if somebody's got those thoughts if somebody's ready to OD if somebody's ready to relapse i would know it before it happens which gives the health professionals a chance to save lives yes and that's big big stuff especially now you know we won't go too far down the road but being the the work that i do i know how insurance companies have trade changed the way that folks can get treatment the longevity that they may or may not need and to have these additional tools that deliver that in real time i mean it's really huge it's it's huge yeah yeah i'm so blessed to be a part of this seriously but they couldn't have picked a better spokesperson where i thought that like my my recovery my addiction was like the walk of shame for a entrepreneur celebrated entrepreneur oh look he's coming out of rehab actually turned out to be like the greatest general stripes i can be wearing dude because it's just like recovery people get each other you know for me to walk into a building that's about recovery that's about treatment it's like boom the doors open i'm in you know where somebody else cold calling that has no idea what people like us have gone through there's like okay you're going to wait with a gatekeeper i mean it's just an immediate need immediate connection with my own people and then this is what i consider i mean this is what i'm supposed to be doing so i am exactly in my element i love it love people want to find out more it's opiate opiate dot ai and uh if you are interested in reading dino's book there is no box you can uh go to his website or connect with them on instagram i have all those links in the description so please do much like uh much like myself i know your dms are open for anyone that's got some questions or even wants help absolutely always yep yes sir and i enjoy doing it yes sir all right let's jump into some random questions before i ask you for the final thoughts these are you know for good times here um do you have a interest or a hobby that you may not talk about that people might be surprised to learn about hmm i am a drummer for over 50 years really haven't yeah and i have a 30-piece drum set and i am a beast on it but it's really hard to find people to play with because everybody knows like half a song so if there's somebody out there who wants to jam let's get together because i would love it i better brush up my skills in case we ever do get together in person uh there you go man it's all fun uh where did that start why did you drumming star i mean would grow up with musicians family and musicians just a passion for music when you're young yeah my my my dad played several instruments and so his kids he would play the guitar or you know whatever and in my brother and i would just sit and kind of listen and then i went in the kitchen and i got like this Tupperware and a wooden spoon and i started playing and i never stopped ah that's too cool if you if you could rank like your three biggest influence of drummers who might they be wow well uh uh let's uplands john bottom uh rush meal perth and then as crazy as a thousand the drummer from Pantera fantastic oh my goodness and they're like what i'm like yeah yeah look i could keep a Beatles beat i know all different kinds like you know i i all music but that's really like the level of like songs that that's that's my all-time favorite three yeah oh as far as if you look at like siblings that did music together the Abbott brothers from Pantera just i mean it's funny like you know people love walk Pantera right that june and two two notes but if you take out what is going on on drums once that song kicks in it loses everything correct correct i mean they they they played off of each other great but let's face it that guy is a machine i mean he's he's not a drummer he's like a i don't know like a cyborg or something you know uh the stuff that he did was just like i mean my jaw still hits the ground but but i mean nice nice person to look up to is his work will live on forever even if you don't like Pantera you'll like this drummer yes yes well you picked a good good three there for sure i mean guys that had they just had the chops man you know i mean that is for sure and bottom up we could i can probably talk about this stuff all day with you but let's jump to something else um if you could have dinner with any one person living or not who would it be i'd love to have dinner with my intoxicated stuff really yeah i really would so i could just flap him around a lot because seriously i mean some of the stuff that i did and said is just absolutely unacceptable and unheard of so uh it's nobody else right but it would be me um which is probably strange but anyway no that's the first time i've heard that and that is that is a really beautiful way to think about it you know because oddly my next question was going to be if you could say one thing to your childhood self what would it be it was one thing i could say to my child that you know i don't think he would have listened i i think everything played out the way it's supposed to play out um so that question would be i wouldn't say anything because little dino wouldn't have heard me if we do this again we'll have to we'll have to do a childhood conversation because i can relate to that uh all right let's do one more uh fun random question here um i've never asked this before but i've wanted to and i i think this will be a good one before i ask you for the final thoughts uh what is one thing you think can't be explained oh that's a really good one one thing that can't be explained huh it's the drive that one has the drive that i have doesn't come from anything on this planet okay and so i find it difficult to articulate this drive with people that just like think like oh well you must have gotten your training from somewhere or you have somebody in the family who may have done this or no i don't know where i get it from in fact if you compare how i live to my family you'd think i was adopted okay and i was it and i was it uh it's it's a it's a it's a drive that cannot be explained by earthly things let's put it that way uh yeah gave me chills that gave me chills uh again the uh website opaid uh for opaid opaid dot ai i got the links also if you want to get dino's book connect with them on instagram dino's where i ask you for uh any final thoughts you'd want to lend somebody struggling maybe love one of someone who's struggling sure no thank you um you know i'm not going to give a whole lecture but i am going to say that i was always so worried about stopping and quitting because oh my god i'm going to field withdrawals and i don't know if i could do this and now it's not just a great time because i got this coming up and look i will say one thing you are stronger than you think there's never a good time to start okay you're just never going to be a perfect schedule that it's going to fit into but you are stronger than you think and you have a beautiful recovery community that's made up of millions and millions and millions of people no matter who they are no matter what show they represent no matter what branding they're doing they are all there to support you so reach out don't be embarrassed they'll meet you where you're at in recovery and support you all along the way yes sir dino millio says thank you so much this has been a pleasure i likewise thanks for having me i really appreciate it and i love the work that you're doing keep it up my brother thank you that means a lot and on that note remember no outside solutions to inside problems and keep knocking doors down
