Intro

[00:00:01] Spencer: Are you a workaholic? Have you considered finding recovery for your workaholism?

[00:00:06] Welcome to episode 443 of the Recovery Show. This episode is brought to you by Beth, Claudia and Nina. They used the donation button on our website. Thank you, Beth, Claudia, and Nina for your generous contributions. This episode is for you.

[00:00:21] We are friends and family members of alcoholics and addicts who have found a path to serenity and happiness. We who live or have lived with the seemingly hopeless problem of addiction, understand as perhaps few others can. So much depends on our own attitudes, and we believe that changed attitudes can aid recovery.

[00:00:39] Tom R: Before we begin, we would like to state that in this show we represent ourselves rather than any 12 step program. During this show, we will share our experiences. The opinions expressed here are strictly those of the person. Who gave them Take what you like and leave the rest. We hope that you will find something in our sharing that speaks to your life.

[00:00:58] Spencer: My name is Spencer. I am your host today. Joining me today is Tom, welcome to the Recovery Show, Tom.

[00:01:05] Tom R: Hello. Thank you.

Workaholism, WA, and Al-Anon

[00:01:07] Spencer: You proposed a couple readings.

[00:01:09] Tom R: I'm gonna start with from Courage to Change on March 26th. Anything worth doing goes a slightly cockeyed version of the old saying is worth doing badly. Perfectionism, procrastination and paralysis are three of the worst effects of alcoholism upon my life.

[00:01:26] I have a tendency to spend my life waiting for the past to change. I want to spend the first hundred years of my life getting all the kinks ironed out and the next hundred years actually living. Such an inclination to avoid taking risks, to avoid doing anything badly has prevented me from doing some of the things I enjoy the most.

[00:01:43] And it has kept me from the regular practice that produces progress. If I'm unwilling to perform a task badly, I can't expect to make progress towards learning to do it well. The only task that I can pretend to perform perfectly is the one that I have left entirely undone.

[00:02:01] So that's reading number one. And then reading number two is from the Workaholics Anonymous book of Recovery. There's a list of characteristics of workaholics, and I'm gonna read number nine, and then I'm gonna read number six.

[00:02:14] Number nine is, we are perfectionistic. We do not accept mistakes as part of being human and find it hard to ask for help. Because we believe no one can meet our standards and that we are indispensable, we have difficulty delegating and end up doing more than our share. Our unrealistic expectations often cheat us of contentment. We are not aware of any difference between job imposed and self-imposed pressure.

[00:02:41] And then, number six, our self-esteem is based largely on how others judge our performance at work and in other areas of our life. Accordingly, our self-concept is highly unstable. We often think of ourselves as either the most intelligent, capable people we know, or the most worthless, hopeless people we know. It is hard to see ourselves honestly and accept reality when we are always trying to look through the eyes of others, rather than trusting our own perceptions. We often go on intense work binges with the illusion that we need to get the praise of our coworkers and bosses to be safe or happy.

[00:03:18] Spencer: You wrote to me saying that you were working both Al-Anon and Workaholics Anonymous in conjunction with each other and how they were, I guess strengthening your recovery. But that's all I know. So let's start with your recovery program actually, in each of the programs.

[00:03:38] Tom R: Sure. My recovery program started with Al-Anon. 34 years ago I actually came into the rooms. At that point I had left home. I wasunpacking the history of alcoholism that existed in my family, but I wasn't super close, certainly not geographically, and in other ways, I wasn't as close to my parents.

[00:03:58] So it was a luxury, it was like a support group. I came to Al-Anon. I liked the emotional honesty. I did identify as the son of an alcoholic of alcoholics. But I didn't really work the steps and I didn't get a sponsor. so I was aware of the program and I hung out in that space for a while.

[00:04:16] Maybe to go back even a little earlier though, like why was I walking in that room and why did I feel at home there? I'm not sure, actually. Oh, that's so interesting. I just realized that, I think the trigger was that I was actually having problems at work.

[00:04:28] But then I realized, I was aware of the history with my family and I decided to work those issues. I grew up in a household with parents who were very well-meaning, they were pretty committed towards raising kids well. But they were both alcoholics, and there's a fair amount of multi-generational alcoholism. My grandmother on my father's side died of this disease. So at least my dad was both a child of an alcoholic and an alcoholic.

[00:04:59] That was the environment that I grew up in. It seemed perfectly normal. I didn't think much of it. but it did mean that I was a little insecure. Like, I couldn't get the attachment, I didn't know what kind of mood my parents would be in. I think I noticed fairly early on that my mother would be more pleasant if she had had a few drinks. And so that confused things even more. She was kind of more open. I was just confused about it all. So going to Al-Anon seemed like a solution.

[00:05:25] That was my early Al-Anon history. I went fairly regularly, probably for five or six years, maybe even a little bit longer. I do remember the only step I took towards working in the steps was, and this is like a classic workaholic thing, I picked up a blueprint for progress at one of the meetings and I thought oh, it's a workbook. I can do that. I can work hard at this program. I can be really good at recovery. Anyway, and needless to say, I never got through it and I, I did years later. so that's the early Al-Anon story.

[00:05:58] Another piece of my recovery is actually I think a book that I've heard mentioned on this program before. I came across The Artist's Way. I think some people have mentioned that on this podcast before.

[00:06:09] At that point, I was in my thirties and I was the kind of perfectionist that was described in the Courage to Change book, where I basically stopped doing things if they started to go wrong, or there was any sign that I didn't have mastery and I wasn't perfect enough. I was basically a procrastinator and I kind of avoided things that I really cared about. Thanks to The Artist's Way, I got over that. There's a practice in that book called The Morning Pages where you like, write three pages no matter what, first thing in the morning. And in fact, there's a line in there which is I'll take care of the quantity, let God take care of the quality. I started applying that to my work life. And lo and behold, I came a true workaholic.

[00:06:53] Spencer: Oh, uh-oh.

[00:06:54] yeah, exactly. what happened then is that suddenly I was able to get over my own self-imposed work avoidance, which is a big part of many people in WA. And yeah, I learned how to pull all-nighters. I mean, I, I did all-nighters back in school. In fact, school was an important place for me where I realized that despite the instability in my own household, I could get praise and could feel special, by doing well in school. So I discovered that pretty early on.I would say that school, and I think in particular college, really rewards workaholism.

[00:07:36] Tom R: No doubt about it. No doubt about it. I think you're taught to, to throw everything you have at it. And you're taught to drink coffee and stay up all night and

[00:07:44] Spencer: and you get things like 24 hour exams.

[00:07:47] Tom R: Exactly. Exactly. That was what I knew before I entered the workforce, and I sort of had mastered that. But then in work it was more complicated. You had to have longer term goals, and it wasn't just enough to cram at the last minute. Although, I work in a creative field andI could do pretty well even by cramming there.

[00:08:06] Spencer: So, that brings me into my thirties and even early forties when, I had kids. I had more of a career. And when I started my own business, I really started to overwork. yes.

[00:08:21] Tom R: yeah, exactly. Yeah. the clock is always on. Paradoxically it was when I moved from my own business to a full-time job as a senior executive in a cultural institution, that all of a sudden. It used to be when I was just working for myself that I just had the boom and bust. I would work really intensely, not get sleep, stay up all night, smoke cigarettes and drink coffee, go, go, go. And then I'd crash.

[00:08:47] But when I transferred into a job, when there was always something else to do, there were always unanswered emails. That's when it really, really blossomed. And I moved out here to California. After a year of that, I was terrified. I was overworked. My marriage was starting to show the strains that ultimately led to a divorce. I remember after my first one week vacation, after a year of just working straight. I kind of had a panic attack about going back to work, and I decided to, I knew the 12 steps worked. I knew there was something good about them. I had gone in and out of Al-Anon along the way, but I remember back when I used to live on the East Coast telling a friend who was in AA and Al-Anon said, God, I wonder if there's a meeting for workaholics. Wouldn't that be interesting? So I looked it up.

[00:09:43] I looked it up, and lo and behold,25 minute walk from my house in Oakland, California, thenwas a WA meeting. And I went to that meeting and haven't gone back since. That was 19 years ago, 19 years that I've been in WA. And I, I will say that's the first program that I came in on my knees.

[00:10:02] I really felt like I had no choice. It took me a while to really admit that I was powerless and that I couldn't just work the steps on my own and to actually get a sponsor. It took me actually two years.But since then I've pretty much kept working it and kept going since then.

[00:10:21] Spencer: you have a note here that says also talk about work avoidance and aversion.

[00:10:26] Tom R: Yeah.

[00:10:27] Spencer: How does that factor in?

[00:10:29] Tom R: That's a good one because a lot of people hear about, I mentioned to some people, especially if they're in other programs, they say,there's a work program too. And they say, ah, that's so funny. I never thought that was something that you needed a program for.

[00:10:41] Say, if anything, I have the opposite problem, which is that I just avoid working and that I chronically don't work. There are programs like Under Earners Anonymous and Debtors Anonymous, and a lot of people there struggle with not working. It turns out to be a symptom of the same thing, which is that work has become sort of a, a false God, and you're terrified of it, which was the story that I had before I had some degree of healing through The Artist's Way. I was so concerned with my identity being as a successful working person, and that if I came close to failure, if there was even the possibility of failing at something that I really cared about, I was gonna stay away from it and sabotage my way beforehand.

[00:11:31] It wasn't good enough for me. I'd walk away from it or no, I can't get it right, right now. It's not what I'm really interested in. So my initial part of the story before the Fellowship of WA was sort of serial avoidance. I would work for a while, then avoid, and then I'd sit, walk away from it.

[00:11:46] Spencer: Earlier, you mentioned a streak of perfectionism. I could see that contributing to both sides of this, You know, like, I have to keep working till it's perfect. It's not perfect. I'm gonna keep working on it. I'm gonna stay up late. One more edit through this college paper or whatever. But also, from the Courage to Change reading, talked about perfectionism, procrastination and paralysis, right? That if you want it to be perfect, either you work really hard on it, or you give up.

[00:12:18] Tom R: That's exactly it. That's exactly it. and you get stuck. And the procrastination is part of that too, because, like starting is scary. Because starting, I'm gonna have to confront that I only have so many hours to do it in. Whereas in the fantasy world of work fantasies, which is what I, in some ways, got high on for a long time,everything is perfect or it's going to be perfect and I'm only gonna do it when I can do it perfectly.

[00:12:44] Spencer: I so identify with that feeling. I know that some of the recovery principles that I learned in the Al-Anon program helped me with that. Like, do the next right thing, first things first. One step at a time, it's not exactly a slogan, one day at a time or something. Breaking something down into smaller pieces helped me to get past the starting problem at least. And to keep going, okay, now what's the next piece?Working the steps. I remember starting step four, first time I did it in the blueprint book. And the first question, I came up with some stuff that I did in my childhood. And I went to my sponsor. I said, am I gonna have to make amends for this? And he said, don't even think about that right now.that comes in step eight and nine. Okay, you're far away from that right now. Just make this list. That idea of breaking things down into small steps, which, there's 12 of them. They're relatively small, Really helped me in other areas of my life, and work in particular.

[00:13:52] Tom R: It's so true. The idea of baby steps, I was thinking of some other slogans, you know, easy does it, was another one. And also, how important is it, you know, how important is it? Because sometimes before, before you start, or before you start again after the fourth time of starting and you still have so much more left to do,it feels like you have an insurmountable barrier.

[00:14:15] And usually if you just take a baby step. I renamed my to-do list at one point of just the next right thing.

[00:14:23] Spencer: As long as it doesn't get too long, like how many next right things do I have? But yeah.

[00:14:29] Tom R: But really all I have to do is just do the next one. And so as long as I have two or three of them on my list, as long as I only have a couple of them on my list, usually the next ones flow too. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. You've been active in both programs for a while?

[00:14:48] Yeah, I,I started going to meetings regularly in WA. Like I said, it took me two years to get a sponsor and actually work the steps with somebody else. An important concept in WA is the idea of having a bottom line. It's what's the line between workaholism and abstinence or sobriety?

[00:15:09] And again, never a good idea to try to figure that out on my own. So working with a sponsor, I set one of those and, with God's help one day at a time, I've been able to keep that for the last, now it's something like 17 years.That's when I started to actually experience recovery.

[00:15:29] Around the same time my marriage really started to fall apart. We had young kids. And the question of what our relationship would look like afterwards was complicated, and it was hard for a long time.

[00:15:47] I think at that point I started going back to Al-Anon meetings, partially just to deal with the feelings of that and the confusion about , am I feeling the feelings because of what I'm feeling? Or is it because of what my partner or what my kids might feel? It wasn't that long after that that also my kids started acting out. And then that really brought me back into Al-Anon in a major way, on my knees again. You know, being the parent of kids who are using drugs and alcohol is I don't know, for me it was graduate school Al-Anon because it was just sort of like,I might think that I didn't cause it and I can't control it and can't cure it, but boy, do I wanna try

[00:16:29] Spencer: Yeah. And as a parent, we like to believe

[00:16:31] Tom R: yep,

[00:16:32] Spencer: that we have some influence on how our kids develop. And if they develop in a direction we don't like, we're like, what did I do wrong?

[00:16:43] Tom R: exactly.

[00:16:44] Spencer: I have said many times as my children are in adulthood now, darn. We try to teach 'em to think for themselves. And then they went and did it.

[00:16:52] Tom R: Right.

[00:16:54] Spencer: Like, no, you were supposed to think for yourself like me.

[00:16:57] Tom R: Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. So complete with my daughter going to a residential treatment program when she was in her teens. I discovered parents meetings of Al-Anon, which saved me. Actually that's when I started listening to, to, to your podcast. And that was wonderful, especially the parents episodes, but any of them.

[00:17:17] I find that the principles of Al-Anon work. We even rewrote one of the early sections in our script to not rule out people who wanted to talk about mental illness, because that's clearly part of, that's clearly part of my kids' story is the interplay.

[00:17:32] Spencer: I know that the two programs are based on almost exactly the same 12 steps. I looked at the WA steps, and I think I see two places where there's a different word than in the Al-Anon or AA steps.In step one, we admitted we were powerless over work, that our lives had become unmanageable.

[00:17:52] Okay? So that's one word that's different.As far as I can tell, two through 11 are exactly the same. And then in 12, we tried to carry this message to workaholics. Again, one word different. So with those similarities, I am gonna guess that the programs in many ways support each other. There may be things that show up in you as a friend or relative of an alcoholic, addict, somebody with mental illness. And those same things might show up in you and contributing to your workaholism. Would that be true?

[00:18:35] Tom R: Absolutely. and they usually have something to do with each other. I like to say that all of the different programs may help you stop doing something that is very specific to the thing. Like, stopping, giving unsolicited advice to my kids is something I work on in Al-Anon. Stopping obsessing about work on the weekends when I'm not gonna do anything about it is something that I stopped doing in WA. But the underlying spiritual solution is very similar.

[00:19:02] But I did discover a very, very interesting kind of almost underground relationship between the two for me, which was, when I first came into WA I thought my problem was this compulsion to, to do. Always do more, always be more active. But, eventually I realized once I had bottom lines and I had to stop and I just had to stop, my bottom lines are a certain number of hours, and then I just stop. I put my hands in the air and walk away from the computer, whatever it is, and then guess what? I had to feel feelings. And of course, the feelings I felt were fear.

[00:19:39] I felt fear that somebody would be angry at me for not doing the work, or I felt that somebody wouldn't. I mean, essentially it boiled down to I was worried that people wouldn't love me.

[00:19:53] You know, that's an Al-Anon story or an ACA story, if you wanna call it that. it's about growing up in a family where you're just not quite sure. Why do I get loved one day for certain behavior, but not another time? There's something off that, I couldn't put my finger on. And so I felt maybe if I do really well in school, I'll get love. Maybe if I do really well at work. And so uncovering that kind of brought me from WA back to Al-Anon in some ways, to just realizing that, there are some holes that I can't plug anymore with somebody else's opinion of me that I need a spiritual solution for. And the spiritual solution is the same in both programs.

[00:20:30] Spencer: Thinking in my own experience, and whatever workaholism I might have, which I know I have some, it's not as severe maybe,as some other cases. Because, when I had children, that was a dividing line between I'm just work, work, work. And if I need to, work into the night, I'll work into the night. And, now I need to make a division between work and home. Ideally I am home when I'm home and I'm working when I'm at work. And that's a more of a mental state maybe than a physical state sometimes. Going back into the office in the middle of the night.Before kids, there was nothing that stopped me from that. And after I had kids, like there was this other important thing in my life.And I was then able to mostly turn it off, turn off the, oh, I have to work tonight thing. \

[00:21:31] Tom R: I too, when I had kids, they meant the world to me and I would read them to sleep, but then sometimes go back to work. The bottom line is that when I was working in a certain obsessed way or bringing work with me on vacations,I was just less emotionally available.

[00:21:50] And I think the impact it had on my marriage also then impacted my kids. I did definitely want to show up from the after work hours until the kids went to sleep. And that was powerful and important to me. butI needed more than just that to, to not worry as much.

[00:22:09] There's a lot of addiction in my family, and a lot of them are these behavioral addictions. you know, oh, I'll just work a little bit more. I'll just do a little bit more. and, um, you know, was I perfectly available after I got recovery? More so, more so. I mean, it was, it was powerful making amends to my kids recently , or not that recently anymore, but,

[00:22:30] Spencer: Can I ask how old they are now?

[00:22:32] Tom R: yeah,they're 23 and 25.

[00:22:35] Spencer: Starting to get into their own adult work experience, I guess.

[00:22:40] Tom R: Absolutely. And that's fascinating too. Of course. I wanna give lots of advice there, but.

[00:22:45] Spencer: I think the obvious question here is, well, there's all these things that are similar, that show up in both programs that show up in the things that both programs focus on. I guess maybe is one way to put it. What's different?

[00:22:58] Tom R: I think step one is usually different. I do work some other programs. I go to a lot of open AA meetings even, I don't identify per se as that, but in my younger years, I certainly misused substances too.

[00:23:12] So I think step one is different because, setting a bottom line in WA is a very different thing. In some ways it's been harder for me in Al-Anon because there isn't like a thing to look at. There isn't a behavior to stop doing. yes, there are many behaviors to stop doing, but it's not as simple as just don't take the first drink, or just work only 45 hours a week or something like that.

[00:23:37] Spencer: You've used that phrase a couple times, setting a bottom line, which I think I know what it means, but it's not a phrase that I've used in my recovery program. So maybe you could say a little bit more about what that means. Is this a phrase that is in the WA literature particularly?

[00:23:55] Tom R: Yep. And it's in other behavioral programs too. there's a media program where people set bottom line behaviors. People might also talk about what are alcoholic behaviors, meaning like, how can you use work a alcoholically, for example? So a bottom line is a line, the way my sponsor explained it to me is that I will take that line as seriously as an alcoholic in recovery takes not taking the first drink. So, it's the line between sobriety and using on some level.

[00:24:26] You have to create it artificially, by the way, very important to say that each addict of whatever sort needs to set up those lines with their sponsor, and they may be very different for a different person, right? For me, it's a certain number of hours a week and a certain number of hours a day, and I literally just stop when I get to that number. I just stop no matter what.And actually that stopping is almost like an act of prayer, or it's a moment of step one. Because whatever's going on, I'm trusting that higher power will take care of it. It's a moment when I stop trying to run the show and let something else take over. I track my hours and at a certain point I just, I stop. And I've kept within those hours now for 17 years. And it's not like if one week I happen to work extra hours that my life would fall apart. But it's, it is a moment when I say that it's no longer me operating on my own and that I'm handing it over to a higher power. So that's what a bottom line is.

[00:25:29] Some people also set top lines, which are more aspirational goals. Like, I want to have x number of vacation days a year, or, I wanna work even fewer hours. But it's more aspirational and something that you're shooting towards. it's not the line between sobriety and non sobriety.

[00:25:48] Spencer: Where would something like saying, I am not going to take my work laptop with me vacation. Is that like a bottom line,

[00:26:00] Tom R: Yeah. so some people, I've certainly worked with sponsees who say things like that or for them just taking a vacation is their first bottom line.

[00:26:08] Spencer: Yes. I will take a vacation.

[00:26:10] Tom R: I will take a vacation and I will leave my computer at home. And what often happens is that when you start living within your bottom lines, you then have to deal with the feelings that drove you to overwork.

[00:26:22] Spencer: It's not like it's all pink cloud at first. It's actually sometimes harder because then suddenly you have to confront the fear that made you overwork in the first place. Yeah. For me, it would be how are my coworkers gonna survive without me?

[00:26:36] Tom R: exactly.

[00:26:37] Spencer: Which, we translate that into Al-Anon alcoholic relation terms, how is my loved one going to survive without me?

[00:26:46] Tom R: Of course.

[00:26:47] Spencer: It's the same feeling, totally different context. I could see where being able to set those boundaries on my own behavior, I would need a different kind of support for each of them.

[00:27:02] Tom R: I think there's something about the specificity of each addiction that I think gets cured by being with others who understand that specificity. Right?

[00:27:12] Spencer: Bingo.

[00:27:13] I would probably not talk about, or at least much about tendency to overwork, in an Al-Anon meeting. And I wouldn't expect to get a lot of experience back from other people, if I did. Whereas presumably in a WA meeting I would.

[00:27:33] Tom R: And the literature is about that, and the bottom lines get set up about that. But

[00:27:36] Spencer: yeah,

[00:27:37] Tom R: a similar way, like, I've wondered sometimes in Al-Anon, as a good workaholic, I like to have a good, clear goal, right? and Al-Anon is always a little mysterious, what am I trying to not do?

[00:27:47] What is it?

[00:27:49] Spencer: I was just, on my way home from church. I was listening to a recording actually, of a workshop from the AA International Convention. It was about the three obstacles to success in Al-Anon. One person asked the question, what does success mean? What does success mean for me, in the context of Al-Anon?and I was like, isn't it obvious? No. And actually it's not obvious. What is success? How do you measure success? You know, as somebody who worked in a mind dominated field for most of my career, you like to be able to measure things, you like to be able to measure success, right?What is the measure of success in Al-Anon? And for me, the measure of success in Al-Anon was increased peace of mind, increased serenity, decreased,resentment, anger, fear, et cetera. Which are kind of amorphous goals in some ways.

[00:28:46] I think, as we continue to work our recovery programs, the goal line, if you will, probably shifts.early on it might be, I want to be able to go to sleep tonight, Later, it's gonna be I can get through the day with active alcoholism still happening in my life, without melting down, for even a minute. and so on.

[00:29:12] You talked about bottom line and about maybe as you progress, you might change your bottom line, right? You might start out with, I'm gonna work at most six days a week, and at most 10 hours each day. And then, maybe you add on and I'm not gonna take work with me on vacation, or I'm gonna take vacation. So success to some extent, success is a moving target as well, but I think it's important to recognize that I get to set the target.

[00:29:39] Tom R: Yeah. And I think it's really good to set it with a sponsor who can just have an outside perspective. You know, for me in Al-Anon early on. , my perfectionism showed up in Al-Anon. I often joke in my Al-Anon meeting, it's I thought I was gonna come in and I was gonna become a ninja boundary setter. I was gonna be so good and I was gonna boundary set those kids of mine into sobriety. and of course I was trying to control them. Right. You know,

[00:30:06] Spencer: Yeah.

[00:30:07] Tom R: It changes and it changes. and in Al-Anon it is just more diffuse. Although, again, some certain, somebody in my meeting says, don't give unsolicited advice to your kids. That's a useful thing to just not do. It's hard as hell. But, I keep it in mind, and it's not a bottom line, but it is sort of like, okay, what if I just trusted them? Ah, I can't possibly,

[00:30:29] what if.

[00:30:30] Spencer: I have learned to say, would you like to hear my thoughts on that?

[00:30:36] Tom R: Yes, exactly.

[00:30:38] Spencer: And sometimes they're like, yes, please.

[00:30:40] Do you see conflicts or challenges in working 2 different programs?

[00:30:48] Tom R: Well, given that I actually probably work three,

[00:30:51] Spencer: Okay, well.

[00:30:52] Tom R: no. But it's a good topic. The other program I tend to work is around media use. It's a fairly new one. but, I think it's an important question, right? My WA sponsor told me, look, there just aren't enough WA meetings, so if you want more meetings, go to an open AA meeting. I actually identified, not necessarily with the disease specifically, but with the recovery, and I loved it. Somebody who was kind of an elder in one of those meetings, when I talked about, well, I don't really have an issue with alcoholism, with, with alcohol. He said, oh, I've got at least 40 different addictions and I'd have to go to 40 programs if I was to treat each one of them. So I just treat them all with AA is what that person said.

[00:31:32] Spencer: Right.

[00:31:33] The other thing I've heard is work the program where the addiction is killing you fastest. Yeah.

[00:31:40] Tom R: That's I think good advice and don't sweat it, especially newcomers. I try to be quiet about all the different programs I work,partially because, it's a way of life that has given me huge, huge benefits.

[00:31:52] Spencer: But then as a workaholic, am I starting to work programs workaholically? Oh man. Oh,

[00:31:59] that is, as the kids say today. That's so meta.

[00:32:03] Tom R: yeah, exactly. Exactly. But, but, prayer and meditation keep my head screwed on straight. What can I say?

[00:32:10] I think what you said about the moving goalpost is really true for me. With more time and recovery in one program, I start noticing something else.and maybe I'll cut back on the other program as much as I go. Like I only go to an Al-Anon meeting once a week and I only go to WA meetings once a week at the moment. and I say only because, and for some pe for a long time, I only went to one WA meeting a week, and that was it.

[00:32:35] My life works better if I drop into an open AA meeting in the morning early on. And the more recovery is around me, the more I'm more likely to take a pause rather than doing something that's not gonna be as healthy for me.

[00:32:50] But I do think people can be obsessive, like I've noticed it even in my most recent program, that people can be program perfectionistic and think that they're gonna just, like, 12 step their way out of ever feeling insecure, out of every problem in their lives. And at some point I think recovery looks like just being more comfortable with the fact that you're gonna be uncomfortable and have feelings, than it is that you're gonna do away with them.

[00:33:15] Spencer: Yeah, early in my Al-Anon program, I also went to a regular open AA meeting. And that really helped me at that stage in my recovery journey to understand alcoholism and to understand that, what was happening to my loved one happens to a lot of people. And after a hundred or more of these, the patterns became pretty clear. Now I have a couple AA centered podcasts that I listen to on a regular basis. I'm not listening to those to understand alcoholism. I'm listening to those to get somebody else's experience and perspective on recovery. In almost every single one of those I get something that I can take, more rarely these days, something brand new, but almost always something that at least deepens something I already had. And then there's a Recovery Radio Network that publishes every weekday, a tape from a workshop or a speaker. Like you say, I may not be going to a meeting, but I'm getting a dose of recovery almost every day in some way, some form or another.

[00:34:41] Tom R: Yeah, for me, most of the meetings I go to are on Zoom. I went to a, an in-person weekend recently, and it was wonderful. It was so wonderful to see three dimensional people in recovery.

[00:34:52] Spencer: Yeah. When you were talking about, what was the phrase you used, work the program that is killing you most quickly or something?The first time that somebody who was, a dual program member, i.e. both AA and Al-Anon in that case, asked me to sponsor him in Al-Anon. I went to my sponsor and said, can you give me pointers here? What I heard was, make it clear to him that he needs to keep AA his primary focus. He needs to keep his sobriety because if he doesn't, whatever he does in Al-Anon, he'll lose.

[00:35:33] Tom R: I also think the line between, all of the Al-Anon things, like focusing too much on other people.That often came in an environment where there was addiction and work is a more functional addiction, right?

[00:35:46] so it's much easier to maintain and it it, it aligns with other characteristics of many people in Al-Anon of wanting to control things, right? Of wanting to feel that mastery over your environment. So that's a combination that is often there.

[00:35:59] Not necessarily every workaholic has Al-Anon type issues, but chances are there's some people pleasing going on there. There's something around that.

[00:36:09] I'm a fan of the layers of the onion metaphor. It's like you get healthy, there's another layer. Okay. Pay attention to that. Exactly. and I'm not aware of a limit, it's not like there's some kernel there. Maybe that's enlightenment, but I'm a long way away from that, you know, so.

[00:36:24] Spencer: gonna

[00:36:24] Tom R: Yep.

[00:36:25] Spencer: Just gonna continue to progress.

[00:36:28] Tom R: One thing that I did just wanna say just quickly is, it was very sobering literally, early on in WA to realize how many people can die from workaholism.

[00:36:39] Spencer: Oh

[00:36:39] Tom R: which not something that people think about that often, but when I think about the numbers of nights where I would drive on no sleep, and it's just that those accidents don't get, they don't get recorded as because of workaholism. Although in Japan there is a phrase of, death by over work. There is that phrase. but when you think of driving sleep deprived or, rage accidents at work. Anyway, so yeah, that one was killing me faster than some of the other things. I feel like I only really came into Al-Anon after I had more recovery in workaholism.

[00:37:16] Spencer: Yeah, I'm thinking about my brother who for the last three-ish years of my parents' lives was their primary caregiver.

[00:37:25] That meant that though there was a team of support people that we were paying, that were there a fair amount of time. He was still the primary caregiver. He was still on call. He still had the parent monitor by his bed at night.and so did not have good sleep. One time was driving them back from a doctor's appointment and fell asleep and drove into a ditch.

[00:37:49] Tom R: Yeah.

[00:37:49] Spencer: And luckily nobody was hurt, butyes, there are consequences to trying to work beyond your actual physical or mental ability.

[00:38:00] Tom R: Yeah.

[00:38:01] Spencer: I got one of the only two moving violation tickets I ever got in my life, driving home from work at two or three in the morning. Just blew right through a red light. Didn't see it. He pulled me over. He said, you went through that red light. I was like, what red light? I got a ticket. You know? but it made me aware that, oh, actually, this can be a problem.

[00:38:26] I had another question slash thought here. I've talked to people who are in a program like Overeaters Anonymous, where, with alcohol, you can avoid alcohol. You can drink no alcohol to be sober. You gotta eat. And for many of us,

[00:38:47] Tom R: You gotta work.

[00:38:47] Spencer: gotta work. So I see some parallel there in terms of the kinds of tools that you would have to keep your work boundaries and also similar to keep to your food consumption boundaries.

[00:39:07] Tom R: Oh, absolutely. I think there's something, you know, the food programs, the workaholism, the media programs. 'cause media is another one of those things. it's everywhere. It's everywhere. And some people may have a really serious gaming addiction, but then they're in the program for a while and they realize that they're also hooked on social media. I think that's where the specificity of the programs makes a difference.

[00:39:31] How they set their lines and how they maintain them and all of that. I'm not lucky enough not to have to work. Actually, I'm not sure it would be lucky 'cause frankly, like going to work and interacting with people is a blessing too. I can be sober around my bottom lines and, one day at a time, have been that way, mostly, for the last 17 years. But it still doesn't mean that I can't be a little drunk in the work process. There still are ways in which, in the work process, like I'm starting to get hyper.

[00:40:02] People talk a lot in the work program about adrenalizing. When do you adrenalize it? You're producing your own internal chemical.

[00:40:08] Spencer: Yeah,

[00:40:09] Tom R: I can still get adrenalized at work even during a nine hour day. And that is a new layer of the onion is to realize, oh, I need more breaks. You know, if I don't take breaks. By having one level of sobriety, I notice more like the consequences of not being as grounded.

[00:40:25] Spencer: But this is the thing, it's a spiritual goal at a certain point. It's about trying to live as healthy as spiritual life as you can, and there is no, like, rule all these things out and then you'll be healthy. It's more about just trying to be healthy and notice when, oh, okay, maybe I needed more of a pause before I like, wrote that email back really quickly and got adrenalized again. And that brings us into the middle of the steps where we do take a close look at ourselves. I have become so much more aware of the ways in which I act and react in life and to life situations, through the use of inventory and self-reflection. In the context of the steps, I might say step 10, right? Continue to take personal inventory.

[00:41:15] Tom R: Yeah. And at first I only noticed when I did a fourth step, right? It's like, whoa, I've had an adrenalized relationship with this person at work for years. and then eventually oh, I catch it. end of the day or the next day when I do a 10th step. And now, every now and then I notice as it's happening, I'm like partway through a sentence and I don't know, the spaciousness that program gives me. it's sort of like you have to work all 12 steps in a microcosm really quickly.

[00:41:44] Spencer: It's like step one is, oh, I'm powerless over getting adrenalized. Oh, okay. There could be something bigger than me that could help out here. Oh. Maybe I'm willing to hand myself over and then let's look at it a little more carefully and then, maybe talk it out with somebody else.

[00:42:00] Tom R: maybe talk it out with somebody else. And then also maybe ask my higher power to lift it because I can't do it alone.

[00:42:07] Spencer: Yeah.

[00:42:08] Tom R: and then maybe I need to.realize that I need to say something to make it right and then actually do it, which is the hard part, of course.

[00:42:17] Spencer: Yes,

[00:42:18] Tom R: But then even the proactive stuff of 11 and 12 of just, prayer and meditation and carrying the message to others,keeps me more spiritually fit.

[00:42:28] That's the name of the game.

[00:42:30] Spencer: This has been a fascinating conversation. I just want to ask, what might you say to somebody who thinks they might be a workaholic?

[00:42:40] Tom R: I, I love that question. First of all, it's just that health and hope are totally available around any kinds of behavior and I think despair around work. There was a poem, it wasn't like connected to workaholism, about lying awake in a hotel room somewhere across the world during a work event or something like that.

[00:43:02] and I just thought, that kind of despair is very unique and people don't talk about it that much. There aren't, nearly as many WA meetings as there are Al-Anon meetings, but the despair is real. And the spiritual not being healthy is real. And there's no shame and there is recovery. The WA program is wonderful. Workaholics anonymous. There's literature there. People are often surprised when they read the, there's a little questionnaire, there are 20 questions you can answer .

[00:43:30] But also don't get stuck in pathologizing. I get it that the disease model was critical to Alcoholics Anonymous in the thirties. That was really important. But I also think we're all human. We are human. And so in that sense, we're all struggling one way or another. And part of the human condition, I think, is to have things that might look like dysfunctions or whatever. So be curious. Be curious, look into it. But also don't get stuck in the like, am I a workaholic or am I not? There might be some recovery there for you and go to meetings, see if you identify. Same thing. Go to more than one meeting because every meeting is quirky in its own way. And have fun. recovery can be fun. It doesn't have to be all work.

[00:44:17] Spencer: Alright, I'm going to put a link, in the show notes at the recovery dot show slash 4 4 3. To this am I a workaholic, 20 questions. You can go there and check out the 20 questions or you can just go try out a wa meeting because they do have a meeting finder also on the website there.

[00:44:36] Tom R: Yeah. And also like for some people working their workaholism. Working, that seems sort of contradictory .

[00:44:43] Spiritually unfolding on whatever program they're working. it might be that you can actually do that unfolding through Al-Anon.

[00:44:52] So I guess that's the other thing is don't get stuck on am I or am I not? Like it's another tool. There could be a time when it's a useful tool. I hear a lot of people who are really sharing about their work issues and every now and then I say, well, there is a work program too. And those tools might be a little sharper for some of those issues. That's it.

[00:45:10] Spencer: I think that's a great point. Thank you.

Song 1

[00:45:14] Spencer: We're gonna take a little break here and talk about music. What is your first musical selection, Tom?

[00:45:20] Tom R: Oh, this was fun. So this was fun because I'm not listening to that much music these days. The first two came to me pretty easily. I looked up songs about workaholism, and I came across this group called Average White Band, which I, I guess was around when I was in high school.

[00:45:36] So that's kind of funny. There are Scottish R and B band. they sounded like they were not Scottish when I listened to them. But the song Work To Do. Essentially the song, the singer talking to his partner saying why he can't be there for her. 'cause he's got so much work to do. I've got a gig. I've got a gig. And you know, that was what the problem looked like to me. oh, I'm sorry, I can't be there. I've got work to do. And so it captures the disease in some ways. That, that sense of urgency, you know, got work to do, work to do, work to do is the chorus over and over again. Just relating to that, and relating to that feeling of oh, work is so important. Of course I can't not do it. I must do it. So that was song number one.

[00:46:20]

Our Lives in Recovery

[00:46:28] Spencer: In this section of the podcast, we talk about our lives in recovery. How have we experienced recovery recently?

[00:46:35] A content warning: There is some discussion of suicide in our sharing. If you or someone you know is considering suicide, you can call the 9 8 8 lifeline for help. At least in the United States.

[00:46:47] I've got sort of a little thing. It's a little big thing. I got a text from one of my sons said, can I call you? It's bad if you can't talk right now. That's fine. It'll still be bad later. Yeah, you get that text from your kid, you're like, I'm gonna drop everything and call. And I said, yes, you can call right now.

[00:47:11] My son called and told me that a very close friend of his had just killed herself, and had clearly planned this out. Because she got a hotel room. She set up texts to go out to people on a timed basis.

[00:47:32] Obviously, I felt really bad for my son. But I also was able to bring in experience from, my recovery process and my recovery community, to just say, I'm so sorry. I don't know how I would've done this 25 years ago, but I probably would've been, what happened? What did she do? Wait, wait, you know, And start trying to strategize solutions and stuff. And I knew that was not what my son needed. That was not going to be helpful.it might make me feel a little better because there's this whole thing about not knowing, that just doesn't feel good, right? I want to know. I want to know, and I didn't need to know. And I didn't need to possibly increase what my son was already feeling, by trying to satisfy my own curiosity. But also knowing that I couldn't fix it. You know, he's 400 some odd miles away. I can't even, I said, I'm giving you a virtual hug here. And at this point, like he was standing outside the hotel room in which this had happened. My wife talked to 'em a little later. They were waiting for the police to decide whether or not it was a crime scene, you know, just horrible, horrible situation. But I knew that the only thing that I could do would be to provide some moral support, some sympathy. I couldn't fix it. I couldn't do anything to change it. And I, I couldn't even do anything to make it better really, except say,I'm here. I'm thinking about you. I love you.and I'm glad that I have a relationship with my children that I can say I love you. For a while that wasn't clear whether we could do that, as they went through their teenager hood and separating in some sense emotionally violently from us. I just felt If this was the only thing that the years of work in recovery had brought to me, to be able to just be there when my son is going through this really sad, really frightening, really, I'm think angering, and many other emotions, time. It's been worth it, So I'll just, I'll leave it with that. I don't wanna bring in anything else at the moment So yeah, with that, how's recovery working in your life today?

[00:50:08] Tom R: That story just made me think about suicide and. Both of my kids have struggled with that. There have been attempts and a lot of ideation. Thankfully today, this week, it isn't an issue. it has been in the last year and a lot of recovery for me and Al-Anon was around accepting that Al-Anon wasn't going to mean that there would never be tragedy.

[00:50:34] There are other people in my parents' group who have lost their kids. And several whose kids are doing better than mine. Several whose kids are like on the streets. , I don't know. but I just, I really, I think the ability to just be present with grief. I think grief is a big part of recovery. Being able to feel grief. Grief for lost years. Grief for not having had a different past, I guess on some level. But also grief for tragedies that happen and being able to just show up for it. and then I'll say that luckily this week there wasn't that much grief for me,

[00:51:14] Spencer: Good.

[00:51:14] Tom R: which is nice, and on some level, being open to it means thatI've been trying to just take more pleasure. The weather is beautiful. I live near the water. I think I'm gonna go in the water again today. and to me, that's part of how recovery is working.

[00:51:28] I go to an open AA meeting on Zoom most days of the week, and it really is a restart. I pray and I meditate most mornings. And on Thursday I had a very complicated day, there's even some stuff involving the news and my family, and there's some stuff going on. It was kind of an triggering adrenalizing day, but at the end of it, I just come back and the next morning I meditate and go to that morning meeting.

[00:52:02] And I was looking forward to doing this recording. It was fun to read more program material. It was fun to go through the books and think about how they're similar or different. Each program has a workbook, so I looked over my workbooks from when I did those.

[00:52:15] All of the work dramas. They just don't mean so much anymore. That's the way that recovery means so much for me is they just don't last as long. Even if there is one and there are always something, there's always something going on that I could wonder or worry about, and they just don't last as long.

Upcoming in the podcast

[00:52:34] Spencer: That's great. I'm looking forward in the podcast. I've actually got kind of a busy month in recording, so by the time I get to the end of November , I'll be able to probably have episodes through until the beginning of next year. Which is pretty cool. One topic that's coming up, next one after this episode actually will be on tradition one. My friend Patrick emailed me and said, now that you've finished the steps, it's time to talk about the traditions. And I said, gee, you know, I talked about the traditions in 2014. Maybe it's time to do it again. Yeah, it's been over a decade. yeah. Tradition one says, our common welfare should come first, personal progress for the greatest number depends upon unity. And we welcome your thoughts. Please join our conversation. Leave us a voicemail or an emailyour feedback or your questions, your thoughts on tradition one, some prompts here. What is common welfare, both in Al-Anon, in your family, in your workplace, in your community. And how does unity appear? Or manifest in those different contexts?

[00:53:47] Tom, how can people send us feedback?

[00:53:51] Tom R: You can send a voice memo or email to feedback at the recovery dot show, or if you prefer, you can call and leave us a voicemail at 7 3 4 7 0 7 8 7 9 5. You can also use the voicemail button on the website to join the conversation from your computer.

[00:54:09] We'd love to hear from you. Share your experience, strength and hope, or your questions about today's topic of Workaholics Anonymous or any of our upcoming topics, including tradition one. If you have a topic you'd like to talk to us about, let us know.

[00:54:24] If you would like advanced notice for some of our topics so you can contribute to that topic, you can sign up for a mailing list by sending an email to feedback at the recovery dot show. Put email in the subject line to make it easier to spot.

[00:54:40] Spencer, where can our listeners find out more about the Recovery Show?

[00:54:44] Spencer: Thank you for asking Tom. Our website is the recovery dot show. That has all the information about the show, which includes the notes for each episode. You can listen to the podcast right on the website or in whatever app you've got that you listen to podcasts from, obviously. There we will have links to the books that we read from. I'll have some links to the Workaholics Anonymous website and the literature there. Also, videos for the music that Tom chose. And there's some links to other recovery podcasts and websites.

Song 2

[00:55:19] Spencer: Okay. What is your second musical selection?

[00:55:24] Tom R: We'll. Take a short break before diving into the mailbag. Our second musical selection, available on the website is Try by Colbie Caillat.This song is interesting 'cause I think you've had this song on your program before.

[00:55:38] I think I heard it once before, but that's not where I got it the first time. This very funny story. I travel a lot for work and when I'm trying to figure out if I have an internet connection, I just type in the word try. And I would type in the word try and I would get this song. So one day I decided to listen to it and watch the video and the video brought me to tears. The video is a woman taking off her makeup. Initially, it's all about how hard women have to try to, look special to, to have their game on. And then it switches over to, to, the chorus is, you don't have to try so hard. You don't have to bend until you break. You just have to get up, get up, get up. You don't have to change a single thing.

[00:56:26] And this is done while the women in the song are actually taking off their makeup. So that just really struck a chord, even though it's not about workaholism, it's about trying in different ways. and then I heard it actually on your show. It was in one of the songs that somebody chose along the way. And I said, I know that song. So that's my connection to that particular song.

[00:56:45] Spencer: I looked it up and it was episode 3 96. Boundaries Revisited March, 2023. So you got a good memory there.

[00:56:55]

Listener Feedback

[00:57:03] Spencer: Well, let's see what you have to say.

[00:57:06] I got an email from Rain or Rainey, not sure of the pronunciation.

[00:57:11] Hello Spencer. First and foremost, thank you for this podcast. It has been so helpful as I left my last relationship in which my codependency was off the charts. In retrospect, those are the only relationships I've had. Growing up, my parents fought a lot and I was always trying to figure out ways to help them get along. Explaining to one what the other really meant and vice versa, hoping to bridge the gap. 61 years later, I still find myself doing that. It's such a huge waste of time, and I'm resentful at the same time. I know I only have myself to blame. As I work toward letting go of those old habits and wanting to fix other people, I find myself at a loss of what to do with my time. Since I've come to my sixth decade and never really thought about myself, I have grown children and grandchildren and they are a lovely distraction, but at the end of the day, I really know I need to focus on what it is I would like to be doing with my life. I wonder if there are other people out there who struggle with filling the void. Once you take an alcoholic or someone with those behaviors out of your life, it seems like it should be an improvement, and in many ways it is. But in many ways I'm struggling. Thank you for considering an episode or pointing me in the direction of an episode, if you've already covered this. I appreciate you and your guests more than you'll ever know.

[00:58:27] I think this is something that, that many people face at various points in their life. For me, I knew that that was going to be a question when I retired from working a full-time job. You know what to do with those 40, 50, 60 hours a week that I was working.

[00:58:45] I see two aspects of this for me at least. One is purpose. Like what is my purpose or what are my purposes now that the major purpose of work has been removed from my life? That's an ongoing journey for me. Part of my purpose is doing this podcast, obviously, or maybe not so obviously, but it is. I wouldn't have been doing it for over a decade now if it wasn't, I think. But also what do I enjoy doing? What do I want to be doing? For me, there are activities that I did while I was working, just not maybe as, as much as I could now, but maybe there are new things.

[00:59:27] So one suggestion that I have is to just try things, you know, like near me, there's a senior center and they have various activities there. They have talks. They have groups that get together to play cards. I know that in particular there's a bridge group, not my thing, but it's there. There's a couple of places in town that have art classes. Maybe I'd like to learn how to do ceramics or something, you know? Beyond that, there are classes you can take in various things online. Some of them are free, some of them cost a little bit. But just try things and see what sticks. See what appeals to you.

[01:00:08] I Googled, finding purpose in life and there's a whole bunch of websites out there that claim that they can help you find a purpose. I didn't actually click on any of them, so I have no idea how good they are, but. Some of them have a set of questions that might trigger something for you.

[01:00:25] Just some ideas. But also, the suggestion to do an episode about, Hey, what do you do when you're not spending all your time trying to fix the alcoholic? If somebody's interested in guest hosting on such an episode, let me know and we'll do it.

[01:00:43] I got a voicemail from Nora in response to the episode 50 years of 12 Step Recovery with Adrienne.

[01:00:50] Nora: hey, Spencer and everyone who participates, who's a part of this community, who is just listening. Welcome. Thank you. Appreciate you.

[01:01:00] This is Nora D. I just listened to the last, episode with Adrienne and I thought it was important to mention, when you guys were talking about identifying the person that has inspired us to come in to the program of Al-Anon, that sometimes it's impossible to identify a person because, it can be generational or ancestral. Even going back so far that there's not a identifiable alcoholic or Al-Anonic. And I think that's important because everyone is welcome in Al-Anon. If you want to be there, you're there. You are welcome, and nothing has to qualify you except your desire to be there, I think.

[01:01:55] I believe. Because I know that I belong there because of myself and my attitudes. I was inspired to come to Al-Anon by somebody else's. Well, it wasn't even their behavior and their drinking. It was my reaction to it and my trying to control it and my thinking I could change it. Thank you so much, Spencer,for all you do.

[01:02:19] Spencer: Nora, you're absolutely right that sometimes it's impossible to identify a person because it might be generational or ancestral. But as you note, you don't have to identify a person who qualifies you to be a member of Al-Anon. I always say this to newcomers that even if you're not sure why you're here, if what you hear here, what we say here resonates with you, then keep coming back..

[01:02:46] Kathleen writes, hello Spencer and team, so grateful for your program. I started attending Al-Anon Zoom meetings last July with much trepidation. As an avid podcast listener, I wondered was there an Al-Anon related podcast? I found yours and truly, it has been a huge support in my program. I use it to look into things to come in my step work. I listen and relisten to shows. I've gone through many shows multiple times to soak in you and your guests experience, strength and hope.

[01:03:16] I gained so much strength at the beginning when I came in desperation to the program. From conversations on the show, I gained the courage to have a sponsor. I journal each morning now, writing a letter to my higher power. My sponsor encouraged me to be open to having a sponsee. Imagine my surprise that my sponsee ended up being a regular listener to the Recovery show also. She and I will share things we have gained from listening to the show. We are both newish to sticking with the program, but both are 35 years into a relationship with our qualifier spouse.

[01:03:50] The show we both shared kept us going as we started our first hesitant paces in the program. I'm not sure I would've stuck with the program without the reassurance of being able to listen to the show quietly, alone, gaining strength and understanding from the program passively. This allowed me to get to more Zoom meetings and keep moving forward actively. I live in a rural area now with very few meetings. Decades ago, I'd gone to a few meetings, but I wasn't ready for it. So I thank you immensely for the show helping me, and I'm sure so many others, get through the initial fear and hesitancy. I'm in such a different place emotionally since starting to listen to this program about 16 months ago. All the gains I have experienced have been partly due to your program helping me to keep working my recovery. You and your guests' honesty and candor has helped me move forward, learning from each show. I deeply thank you for helping me see that my life can be expanding and growing.

[01:04:46] I have a question. I've always loved the favorite songs for recovery. I'm looking for them on the website. Where are they hiding? There must be over a thousand songs recommended by hosts, co-hosts, and guests. Wishing all the best for you and everyone involved in the recovery show, Kathleen. Wow. Thank you so much for those kind words, and I really like that you view the show as a supplement to working your recovery program. Because, as a friend of mine, put it, kind of bluntly, you know, it doesn't say it works if you read it, it doesn't say it works if you hear it, it says it works if you work it. And so keep working it. The songs. There is a Spotify account called The Recovery Show, on which I have playlists for many of the episodes. There were times when I didn't manage to get them there, but I've been trying to do it a little more consistently, lately. So, if you actually go to one of the recent episodes like this one, the recovery dot show slash 4 4 3, scroll down to the bottom of the page and there is a link to a Spotify playlist for that episode. Which then you can find the recovery show account in Spotify because the playlist is on that account.

[01:06:11] I don't know of a way to bring together all of the songs and all of the playlists from that account. That would be interesting. Maybe I should start to put together an ever growing playlist of everything we've ever played on the show. I don't know. Occasionally also, we have a song that's not on Spotify. I think a recent episode, songs on Band camp or SoundCloud, and that was the only place we could link to. So obviously those are not gonna be on Spotify. But no, I don't have a list of all of them anywhere. This could be a, a fun project for somebody who's a compulsive completist to go through all of the episodes and make a playlist of all of the songs from all of the episodes. That might be fun. Not something I'm gonna do today though. Thanks Kathleen.

[01:07:00] Pamela left us a voicemail.

[01:07:03]

[01:07:03] Pamela: Hi Spencer, this is Pamela. I'm calling from California and I've started listening to the Recovery Show recently, and I hear a lot of talk about, ACA Adult Children of Alcoholics. I've tried that program before and it didn't really work for me. I went from there to Al-Anon. What I learned in ACA is that it actually came from Al-Anon. What a lot of people may not know or maybe they do know, is that Al-Anon has his own adult children of alcoholics faction. And there's a book in Al-Anon called From Survival to Recovery, which is about the adult children of alcoholics. I hope this is helpful 'cause every time I'm hearing that on the show, I think, I wonder how many people know that Al-Anon has their own adult child segments. There's meetings that are specifically for adult child in Al-Anon. it may be a little bit different because it is not talking about the dysfunctional family as a separate entity, and it's not.

[01:08:17] Because anytime you're growing up with alcoholism, you have dysfunction in the family. And I think for me it's easy to, since there was no active drinker, I think about alcoholic thinking or alcoholic acting, you don't have to drink to have those. That's the dry drunk phenomenon. Even if you grew up in a dysfunctional family. It could be that there was alcoholism generations before and that's where the craziness came from. Who's to say? This is Pamela in California.

[01:08:54] Spencer: Thank you Pamela for reminding us that there is Adult Children Literature in Al-Anon. There actually are at least two Al-Anon books that I'm aware of, that are aimed at adult children. One is the one you mentioned from Survival to Recovery. It's an excellent book. The other is a daily reader called Hope for Today, where the readings, as far as I understand, are all written by Al-Anon members who are also adult children of alcoholics. So thanks.

[01:09:29] And that is it for this episode. Thank you for writing. Thank you for calling.

Thank you, Tom

[01:09:35] Spencer: Tom, I want to thank you for joining me today for this conversation about Workaholism, Workaholics Anonymous, how the programs compliment each other and how they work together, in your own recovery. It's good to hear about that sort of thing for me because I can get very mono focused on, this is what recovery is about for me, but that it really is much broader, and how it's, helping other people.

Song 3

[01:10:06] Tom R: Our last song selection is a piece of classical music, and I feel like I'm being a little naughty here because it doesn't have lyrics. I, I don't know if that's ever happened before on this show, but I chose the second movement of Beethoven's seventh Symphony. And I'll say, why. Because, the first song I chose has more to do with the problem. The second one, I think to the moment of recovery of when you realize you don't have to start, you don't have to keep trying so hard. And this particular piece of music, I've always loved it because it's a second movement. It's slower, and it has this steady repeating motif that just grows and grows.

[01:10:45] And then it goes into these little happy moments and then it goes back to this steady thing. And it's kind of what, what work and recovery are like for me at this point in my life. Sort of easy does it, but steady does it, and keep coming back. There's a generosity about that piece of music. I sometimes try to think about that when I just need to do the next right thing, whether in recovery or in work

Outro

[01:11:15] Spencer: Thank you for listening. Please keep coming back. Whatever your problems, there are those among us who have had them too. If we did not talk about a problem you're facing today, feel free to contact us so that we can talk about it in a future episode. May understanding, love and peace, growing you one day at a time.