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Published: Aug. 2, 2020, 11:34 a.m.

I had the great opportunity to hang out with Dan Reeves as we discuss accepting a higher power in your life and what that looks like.

Dan has quite a bit to offer you in this episode and a number of tools along with practical application of these tools so that you can live a life fully tapped into your own spiritual being.

Be sure to reach out to Dan & let him know you heard this episode here today!

Places you can connect with Dan:

http://spiritualunderground.org/index.html

https://www.instagram.com/spiritualunderground/

https://www.facebook.com/SpiritualUnderground/

The 12 step book that Dan references in the podcast:

Brandon Handley 0:00
54321 Hey there spiritual dope spiritual is that that my podcast is so you listen after you go through like a few of them you forget like who you're even announcing and like you have to get used to your new one and just how's that gonna come out? Um, but hey guys I'm on with Moloch Dan is okay say last name de cerca. Certainly, Sadam ri is a spiritual underground. Dan, I connected just kind of just on the general idea of our podcasts and what we have to share. And it's a similar journey. But just different tales, right. So pretty. And that's the thing, right? So everybody's kind of going through something. They just, you know, there's a guy that listen to a book, Jed McKenna, and he's kind of like this salty, spiritual guy, right? And what I like about him is that he says, He goes, listen, I don't know how you're going to get there. But I can tell you what to expect after you've gotten there, which I think is kind of interesting. So Dan, Thanks for hopping on today we are we're tackling Sunday in this way. And and one of the things I, I like to ask people is, before we even get started, right, well, you and I talked, you interviewed me recently, people, we are kind of conduits for the universe to talk to, right. We're conduits, our story that we're sharing here. And what we're sharing here today is meant probably for somebody else more so than it's meant even for us. So for that person who's listening today, just to receive the message that's being delivered, what do you think, you know, what, what is something that somebody needs to hear that,

Dan Reeves 1:38
you know, the dopamine boost brought me to my knees, my, my, my bottom, so to speak. But the thing what I'm finding out as I keep on traveling this journey is that we all have some kind of room for more in our lives. That's the question I ask people whenever I'm talking outside of the 12 steps, circles about you know, if they want to change their lives Do you have any room for more and I think most people the answer to that is yes. I have actually had one person tell me no i don't really believe them. But you know there always is room for more problem as it seems like we get stuck and and hopefully with these things what I hope to be as a catalyst to unstuck people you know, no matter what direction you're coming from, is that there is a way to get unstuck and I don't know what that really is for you. I know what it was for me. But what I can promise you is that there is getting out of that hole is available to you might take some effort it's gonna take some action for sure. But But you know, there's there's a hopeless feeling when a lot of people's hearts that they're like stuck in this spot, and they're just gonna have to resign themselves to being this.

Brandon Handley 2:52
And this is all there is right? There's nothing else right? Yeah, because it gets

Dan Reeves 2:56
Yeah, that my sponsor my mentor has so rewritten this 12 steps in a way not dot rewritten but reformatted it into some modern language and in the beginning of his book he puts a statement here this is not the way my life is supposed to be this is not the way my life is supposed to be now if you don't fall under that category great but fact is I think a lot of people are you know I see this underlying you see it in the stores I think you're you know spoke to you before and and I know your spirit you see this like almost a zombie like dissatisfaction underlying most people's day to day you know, it's everything looks to be like being done in a little bit of a pain spot. Like oh, man, I have to go to the grocery store. And, and, and, you know, operate on it playing today, man, I'm peeking around the next corner seeing what's coming up next. Sure. And and And, you know, there just is you don't have to stay in that spot. But get this one, you know, and some people would subscribe to more kind of wonder about that myself about how many trips around this blue, Big Blue Marble I get or wherever else I'm not really sure about that concept, but it has landed with me. But I know this trip is the one I got now. Sure, knowing what I don't want to be doing is laying an old age wishing I would have,

Brandon Handley 4:24
huh, gosh, you know this, this is so great. You said that right? That was one of the one of the things I saved today. You know, a lot of people give Facebook a lot of shit, right? Yeah. But quite honestly, like I'm pulling up the picture right now because that was that was one of the things there's actually two things that he said that they're kind of resonating with me. But the first one is directly in line to that right says I hope your life is full of I can't believe I did this, then I should have done it. Right. Yeah, that's powerful stuff. And then and then the other line I had somebody a post today was kind of along the lines. What you're saying there, right? You know, we're peeking around this corner, or we're waiting, and we're sitting here suffering. And and the way I kind of pictured it is like, you know, there's there's always a wave coming, right? There's always a wave coming and, you know, it's your opportunity to stand there and get crushed by the wave. Or you have the opportunity to ride that wave. Right. So, but I did, I did, I did caveat it as like, if you go so you know, just as in terms of surfing, you know, it's always a good idea to go with somebody who's done that before. Right? Because you can learn on your own.

Dan Reeves 5:37
You know, why take that hard path? You know, I mean, and I'll tell you why. Because, for me, I have trouble asking for help.

Brandon Handley 5:47
Yep, yep. Yep. You know,

Dan Reeves 5:48
the crucial words in the 12 step rooms, you know, help me I don't know what to do. When somebody heard those words. I know then I didn't have somebody I can work with. The flip side of that is, I know, I know. I know. Well, look,

Brandon Handley 6:05
I mean, we I think he said the beginning, we all know what to do. Right? We all know what we're supposed to be doing. And this works in every realm, right? This is why this is why health coaching is so big, right? And nutrition coaching is like, we all know we're supposed to get to the gym, we all know we're supposed to eat better. We all know that we're supposed to floss all these things, right? But until you get like the dentist reminding you like Hey, listen, if you don't keep if you don't floss, you're gonna lose teeth. Right? If you if you don't work out, you're gonna you know, maybe live to be 70 instead of like a healthy 85 right and all these things. I need help man. That's definitely powerful stuff though. So let's give a little let's give a little background right on kind of your podcast and what your spiritual dope is right? Because as you're saying here, and I think what people may be hearing already is like you can't you come from a place where it was no street dope. Yep,

Dan Reeves 7:00
yeah, you know i and i don't fit the mold of that necessarily either what most people think about when they you know, when you see me and hear my story that I heard you say you know the video and the audio did not really line up because I came from an upper middle class back home with two parents who stayed intact. My mom passed away and 16 if they'd made it one more year to been 50 years of marriage. I had it you know, a little cliche saying I had everything I needed most of what I wanted sure, but yet still there was that thing that empty feeling me someplace and I know a lot more of that because I will talk from hindsight, right. You know, I didn't know any of this when it was going on. But I still had that little thing where, you know, I just had trouble fitting in and I you know, I allowed myself to, you know, I hung out with some people who bullied me, because the companionship was worth the pain of the bullying. I put myself in situations where I was cultivated this programming inside of me have less than that, you know, everybody else had the playbook of how to do this thing called life and I must have missed that day in school and and and what I did was watch what you did and and at one point you know I ran into the you know somebody asked me what really my very first drugs for cigarettes but I ran into something that changed the way I feel because that was really what it was doing that's why you know I needed I wasn't okay with the way I felt when I ran into these substances to change the way I felt. I thought I'd found the magic key and you know, for a long time it was and you know, early on I started running into consequences getting caught with Oh, by the you know, in in 3d as in my lifetime and various other things that would have happened that that caused some consequences but none of them would make me change. One of the things was is I came from a relatively young my dad I my hometown God dad knows everybody with a little money in a lawyer in some know somebody You get out of trouble when you're a kid. I look back at that. And I'm like, man, if I'd maybe had some secret, you know, I don't know, again, what do you do wonder I look at that now, you know, when I run into somebody, some consequences are really a good thing, because that will change your trajectory, you know, otherwise, I just keep on going that direction. I'll go on until some consequences happen.

Brandon Handley 9:18
Right now, like, and the other thing you heard I heard in your store, too. So I mean, you were at the same job for about 28 years. I haven't gotten the specifics of the job. But this was a job that was sending you all around the world. You tell us a little bit about that.

Dan Reeves 9:31
Yeah, you know, well, I got a job right out of high school. Actually, I was still in high school and I started drafting I'm mechanically inclined, I just love that kind of stuff. I was doing mechanical drafting. I was doing architectural drafting. And I got a job and held it for like three years. And the fact is, is I couldn't get to work it in the morning, the night before and I got a chance and chance again, to correct my behavior and I couldn't do it and they let me go and you know, look at that as a blessing too, because that caused some changes. You know, that was some consequences, right? And lo and behold, you know, the universe just keeps on providing and I got a job just not too long after that it's this place and it's there's a story around it, but I don't think and I didn't know where I was going and still a placement agency and didn't know where I was going. And I still remember that really uncomfortable feeling, man, I'm walking in and trying to tell somebody that they should hire me. I just could not believe it myself. But they did. And they hired me is kind of funny story. I'd come from some minimum wage job and, and I told him what I needed to start and this is like in 1991, and I think I told him I needed $6 an hour to start. This was my was my offer. And the guy here steal that. Yeah,

Brandon Handley 10:43
doesn't really matter what I was $6 an hour.

Dan Reeves 10:46
I was 20 years old, you know and, and in the God did not I don't think he I think he was on a script because I don't think he heard a word. I said, you know, he he looked at me he goes well, I'm sorry. So we started by at $8 and 90 cents an hour. Well, that Work and I'm like Did he just and so I got this job and and I traveled up you know I made I made work a real important thing and it's not a bad thing right at all but I did I worked my way up and a few years they called me an engineer I don't I check the some college box that's another thing that doesn't go it did for me it didn't go out drinking and drug and did not go fit a college schedule.

Brandon Handley 11:27
We could not do that. Well you already kind of like we already habitual user at this point in

Dan Reeves 11:32
time. Yeah, but this time, you know, by the time I was in high school, I was smoking pot every day. I was drinking on the weekends is a little harder to drink in a day for me on the weekdays, you know that I could smoke pot and function. I spent my entire senior year

on cocaine.

You know, so I was already using pretty heavy stuff by that time. You know, I was I was taking acid when I before I had my driver's license. We were reading breeze and I remember that so well is because we would be riding our bicycles.

I know it was before driving. Okay, yeah, by this

Brandon Handley 12:08
time I don't think I said something I don't think I've ever tried riding a bike while you're on so that was really fun.

Dan Reeves 12:13
It really was. I can remember coming home at daybreak you know, listening to the birds singing and writing my 10 speed with no hands you know, because I could ride it thing no handed and just cruising up the road head known crawling my bedroom window it before mom and dad knew I was gone for the night. That's about this time I was doing it, you know, and there was really nothing I wouldn't do. If somebody had it. I did it, you know, went through phases, but you know, somehow are still able to keep my feet under me. You know, I got that second DUI when I was 19 years old and and the solution was not to stop drinking and driving. The solution was to do it smarter and better. I noticed that the 2d has I had one of them was because I was speeding and the other one I got pulled over because I had a taillight out. So that meant you'd need to do an airline pilot walk down around your car before went out, you know, it wasn't a drink it was make sure that all in our lives working and do it smarter, and I didn't get my third DUI until I was 38. So two years, wow, doing that, you know, but I did the formula, I got married, had a couple kids bought a home had this job that I thought I was gonna have forever because I kept on advancing up to the ranks and making more money every year. And, and, frankly, those years it's a little you know, I don't want to glorify the use, but it was fine. Yeah, you know, and it was fine. Until wasn't any more.

Brandon Handley 13:37
Yeah, like I said, I mean, what point is it not fun anymore? And you know, throughout this whole thing, right? Are you still you're still working your job and you're still advancing? I'm still I'm functional.

Dan Reeves 13:47
Yeah, I am actually a superstar at work, because I'll pull the rabbit out of the hat. It's another kind of now look back at it is, it was more of that, you know, it was less of a drive and more of a to prove They're more the kind of thing to prove that I'm good, you know, I have a little Superman thing you know that I need to be the superstar So, you know, looking back and stuff I you know, I'll drag my feet on a project and not let them know it so that I can come in and get called in at the last minute to make the three point shot. You know, and I could always make the shot, you know, and and that would give me praise, right because Dan could pull these things off. But you know, through 12 step markers stuff I realized I wouldn't pull that stuff off really, I was I was I was dragging my heels I was saying begun to not do anything until the last minute. But yeah, everything ever I was completely functional and I really stayed that way

until the end,

and sometime around 2005 My mom had a back surgery and and a drink and wasn't working for me, but I couldn't stop. Stop drinking every day. I'm stopping to beer joint across the street from New York. And if I didn't already have kobir in a cooler in the car, I was stopping and getting some. And and I was coming home and I was playing chameleon. My wife had no idea I was drinking as many as I was, you know, look like maybe I was having to out the grill after work. But you know, effect was that, you know, I was guzzling down and I didn't you know, I didn't go to bed. I was sleeping in a recliner in my own room. You know, I'm in the main cave. I just totally disassociated myself from my family. I got these two young kids that that are that need a dad and he's absent most of the time. I mean, he's present physically, right, but I'm not there. Right. And the alcohol quit working and what I started to get my headaches every time you know that I drank it and it will just make me feel like crap. And I tried different you know, maybe, maybe I should drink some bourbon. Sure. Yeah. And you know, try to figure out the magic recipe gotta you gotta you gotta you got to up the ante. Yep. And and I come home. My mom had had this back surgery and she'd been she. Mom's health was always bad. All our lives that matter. She pulled off as many years as she did, but I saw this bottle sitting in her bedroom and picked it up and looked at it in his prescription bottles. And it said for pain. Hmm, well, you know, I had some pain. Sure, yeah. And I shook out to about two pills of each one bottle each bottle to um, there's two big pills and two little pills. I didn't read the labels any further than that and put them in my pocket. But Matter of fact, what I did is I took the two small ones right now. And I put the two big ones in my pocket. And in about 45 minutes later, no pain. The world was okay. I actually have photographs of that night. At this time. My wife is working night shift. She's a nurse working weekends, only night shifts, so she could make full time pay working just nights. And then she could be home with the kids all week and I'd be home with them in the weekend. Well, there's a picture of the party that night with the kids and I had, you know, bandanas tied around their heads and do rags answer and what I found out later is that was too oxy cotton 40 something I'd taken

Brandon Handley 17:03
40 milligrams is that Yeah, that was just saying,

Dan Reeves 17:05
Yeah. Is that little or a lot? I don't know. It was a lot for me. And they would do just one would do just about anybody. Sure.

But I didn't know that then. And, you know, in the world righted itself and grabbed a couple, you know, the next night, Saturday night I took the other take. And although they weren't what last night was they did just fine, sir. And, you know, there was a time when my drinking wasn't every day, and I would just drink on the weekends. And what I say is that that collapsed on me. I started whereas, you know, it just the disease progressed, and I was drinking every day before long and the same thing with the pills.

Brandon Handley 17:45
I like how you kind of phrased it last time when you and I were talking right? You know, just dis ease, right? Yeah. I think it's really I think it's really important to kind of state it like that, right? Because if we and if we Look at disease in of itself. That's something that kind of never goes away. And this is just me, right? Like, I'm not part of a program or anything like that. But if we if we take it and break it apart like that, right, we disaggregate that word and we say dis ease. We know that we are in a place of discomfort, right? Is that what you're saying? I mean, yeah,

Dan Reeves 18:22
I am on but also believe that this thing is a

Brandon Handley 18:26
pervasive?

Dan Reeves 18:27
Yes, I do believe this is a lifelong thing for a guy like me. I don't think that's the case for everybody. But But for me, and you know, and I'll throw something else out there, man, I'll sell you this solution in any manner, you're willing to buy it in, you know what I mean? So, sometimes that disease works for somebody and sometimes it doesn't. And if you reject that premise, well, then I'm okay with that. Right. So I have a tools that will help you get better. Yeah, they just will. It isn't really making a difference, whether it's going to be better if you believe that this works for you, but it's not Not necessarily a requirement but I do like that. You know it is it's a dis ease. I am not okay with it myself. Right, right. I'm not at ease. I'm not sure that does bring it down to fundamental stuff. But I just like not comfortable my own skin, right? I don't feel like I fit in with you. Alright. So I got three girls. My daughter and two girls stayed the night last night and they distract me over there to my right. So it did it did throw me off a little bit. Sure. But my my using stuff started collapsing. I mean, the same thing happened with the pills, so and so next weekend, I grabbed a couple more. It was just a weekend thing for a while. And they collapsed on me to where I needed these things every day. So I started getting with my doctor, I started doing other kind of things in order to get them. And if I came to your house and you had some you didn't have anyone I left. So you go through all the relatives and you go Through all that, and when that ran out on I started going in people's houses I didn't know that is called burger Lee.

Brandon Handley 20:09
I mean, this whole thing advances while and you're still working,

Dan Reeves 20:12
you're still fully functional. Again the video the video did not match. Yeah, no, I'm just I was doing your right I just want to track

Brandon Handley 20:19
it right he's tracking it right because I mean you're you're you're going to work you're a guy that's getting sent internationally to get things done. Yep. And and you know that's that's that's what everybody's seen

Dan Reeves 20:31
yeah send me to Singapore to Korea we had offices in Thailand we you know I've been all over the globe with that company trusted to go do my job. Meanwhile, under the surface is this other dude it's like almost you know it's like two distinct personalities going on.

Brandon Handley 20:48
I'm just curious kind of like did you ever kind of decide what the underlying like primary pain was that that kept it going?

Dan Reeves 20:58
I do call it the disease of alcohol. That's just what we say in our deals. It's it would be like, and it's just for simplifying terms. I'm not sure that it's really right. Okay, but I do know that there are some kind of mental instability in me that unless I am doing something to treat that actively, I'm just not okay.

Brandon Handley 21:20
Okay. Yeah, yeah, look, so let's move on to that. Right. Like I mean, so look, I think I think the story is like, you got in deep, right the story is you got in deep you were in the grip You know, you're raising a family. You're doing all the you know, theoretical exterior, right things your interiors getting leggy. But like, you know, there comes there comes a spot where like, I think I talked about like, hitting rock bottom right, like, I don't think you always have to to get better. But you had a rock bottom moment.

Dan Reeves 21:53
Yeah, I did. You know, and I actually had two of them that I'll speak quickly. One of them was in 2011 when this thing finally Ended up being enough and my marriage was getting Rocky and and that was a catalyst kind of event that this this dis ease in my marriage was becoming an issue and and I went to I called a doctor told me I couldn't claim with my wife and told her what was going on and and sought help for the first time in 2011 and then not and I went to a detox center and got some help and dove into a and and what I say now is that was basically that week that event was basically off of a bad weekend. Because all it was was just a bad weekend. No big deal. I said I had a year of sobriety and I sat down on my tools thinking I was okay that I could move forward without this. Yeah. I didn't really think it but I still

Unknown Speaker 22:51
have a lot of beer again.

Dan Reeves 22:53
Well, I stayed sober during that time and then slowly after I put down my tools, I remember my my My wife at that time was into herbal medicines and stuff and she had like these cheap vodka and brandy and stuff that she would soak like herbs and stuff into making tinctures. That's right. Yeah. And I looked over there one day when I was getting ready to pay the bills and and I look over there because I know that cabinet right there was the one that they were sitting on and there was a bottle of vodka and bottle of brandy there and I went and got a Dixie cup of all things and thought I would just have a drink. well lit up this thing that we call the phenomenon of craving, which is once I put some in me, I'm not really going to be able to stop and a lot of people think that means tonight well I had a Dixie cup or two that night not stopped. But you know, a couple nights later look like a good, you know, and in the ball started rolling again. I ended up having that Marriott lost that marriage ended up in divorce. And my whole world just started crumbling. You know, after that, to that point to where and by now I'm breaking it out of steel and pills and I got caught a couple times by friends

associated people that knew me a little bit. Mm hmm.

And of doing the deal where I would take them out of your house, and those people let me off the hook on my promise that I would go seek help. I never did, right. But then finally I ended up getting into a house and I'll tell this story as fast as I can, you know, sit here one night with a new girlfriend after coming back from Thailand. Now the thing you know, my sobriety dates didn't really I had an international sobriety date and domestic sobriety date, you know, when, when the cat's away, he's gonna play soccer pretending to be sober during this time. You know, I'm sitting here with a new girlfriend. My kids are here in the house. her kids in house, they're all in bed. I tell this girl I'm going to I'll be right back. I walk out the back door, go around the corner. It's dark. I go across the house because the old man across the street always had medicine that I like to have. And, and, and over time, they were on to me. Matter of fact, I've been continent house. Before, six months earlier, and I went over there and opened up the door, walk in their house while it's occupied their home, go back in his bedroom, where he is sleeping, reach in a dresser drawer, get to the medicine, shake out a handful. And when I turned around this time, there was a shadow standing there with a baseball bat and pepper spray. And he put this pepper spray four inches from my face and blasted it and lit into me with a ball bat, man. I got away. Wow. I wrestled by him and got out. He spent that night run in the streets not knowing what to do. I took off or in a different direction from my home. He knew who it was obviously. I come back to my house at around two o'clock in the morning and to see all the lights on in my house. I went around the side house looked over there. My parents car was in the driveway and so was that girl's car. I didn't expect that girl's car to be there. There was I lost all consideration for what was going on there during that time, you know, I was gone. What I found out was that that guy come over to my house and he had raked out two satellites and my windows and my door, he busted the window out in the door, he come in the house, he busted up everything that he could with the baseball bat. As he left in, my dad was over there, cleaning up the house. I sat down behind the pantry in my backyard and sitting there and I remember echoing over and over again, this, what am I going to do? What am I going to do? And I heard the back door open and close. And I looked up and there was my dad and he had two five gallon buckets and I didn't know what he had at the moment. And he kept walking down the pathway that leads to where we set out the garbage. And I was trying to make myself as small as I possibly could so that he wouldn't see me and, and I heard his voice say Damn. And I looked up and I said yeah, and he said, words that I will never forget. He said, Are you okay? Are you hurt? That is not what I was expecting to hear. Now, for my dad that actually is but because of what I was thinking of what I had done, those were not the words expected here. Next thing I know, I felt a hand on my knee and he sat down beside me and said, Come on, let's go inside. Take a shower, hit the sack, and we'll deal with this tomorrow.

Brandon Handley 27:15
That's powerful, man.

Dan Reeves 27:16
That's powerful. I tried to do that. And I came in and did that in the next morning. So let me finish this last little piece on this part. I come in the house. I went to bed I looked in teary eyes. My mother or my girlfriend. My kids did not wake up. The cops have been searching my house that night looking for me. My kids were spared that memory. They did not wake up as the cops for shining flashlights in our closets and under their beds. I woke up the next morning, I put that, that that girlfriend, my kids and her in my car and had them drive up the street so that if they got stopped, it wouldn't be me and gotten her car. But before I did that, I got up, took a shower went back in the backyard, got under the rock where I'd left the handful of pills that I've got Before the night before, and took a half dozen of them and put the rest of them in my pocket and moved on with my day and that's comes to show this there's a blind in the book it says we couldn't remember the the humiliation and the suffering of a week or a month ago, when we decided to drink again or decide to use again. And you know, I couldn't remember the humiliation or the suffering of last night, right. The only thing I could think to do was put more pills in my body. Alright, so watch out for my arrest and that was well went down in a whole nother angle. Just cut to the chase on that I was looking at six to 20 years in prison. The scared to death I spent the next six months going TO to see the judge every month or every couple of weeks doing these pre trial things and seeing my lawyer my lawyer and the prosecutor in jail had me convinced I was going to prison for at least six years. And I met up with some dudes on a Tuesday night and and something shifted for me that night. And that was when I met my home group is this Underground, and that's what the name of the podcast is after. Okay, walked into there and and and started doing one particular gentleman told me to do who is still my sponsor today. And I ended up getting sentenced to a year of home incarceration, a year probation and another year set on the side, set on the shelf, as we say, pending successful completion of those two. So what went from a six year to six to 20 year prison sentence, I ended up spending nine months on home incarceration and had time to do this work on myself and, and my trajectory changed forever.

Brandon Handley 29:36
For sure. For sure. I mean, you know, this is just super powerful. I love how your dad just kind of accepted you right in that situation.

Dan Reeves 29:43
He thought that my back always

Brandon Handley 29:45
Yeah, and I mean, that's super powerful. Has somebody like that there for you,

Dan Reeves 29:50
you know, and he still lives with me, you know, he may walk by here.

Brandon Handley 29:53
For sure. You know, looking you know, you lost some relationships and if I recall correctly, you know, at that job that you thought you're gonna have forever, that ends up kind of getting dissolved as well. Yeah. You know, but you know, you found yourself right? You found yourself amongst like some friends or at least some associates in the spiritual underground,

Dan Reeves 30:14
the alikom brothers, so okay really are they really are we I'm a tap on my phone away from Heaven help at my door if I need it. And, and I'm a tap away from providing help if somebody else needs it, I got

Brandon Handley 30:28
this, you know, so let's talk a little bit about like kind of living this transform transform transformative life, right? Like I mean, cuz, you know, now you're stepping into a new space, right? Like I made the joke about you know, 12 step program however, I really only know about two steps to that program. The first step is uh, you know, you kind of let go and and accept that there's a higher power

Dan Reeves 30:55
right? First step is really, I have a problem.

Brandon Handley 30:58
Okay, first steps. You got a problem. Know the one stuff you got it you know you say hey there's there's a higher power is not just me and then like one of the one of the end steps is like spiritual awakening I'm like why skip the whole bunch of steps but yeah, you know let's talk about like kind of what that journey is like I talked about maybe even some of the work that you did to get to where you are and how long you so if you don't mind me asking Dan over

Dan Reeves 31:21
five and a half years so January was my five year

Brandon Handley 31:24
modulations man thank you that that's a it's a lot right and it's a whole different life. Let's talk about like kind of the the journey though to, to, to me it's I feel like it's liberation and freedom when you no longer have to observe like that the whole that those things have not necessarily observed. But like break those addictions right? Well once you once you have something else to do then to keep running back to those things that have a hold on your grip on you. You're free to go live a whole Another life, right? Yep.

Dan Reeves 32:02
Yeah, you know,

I like to say, you know, do this say it enough a lot came into the rooms of recovery, the 12 step recovery to try to they told me I was spiritually sick. I thought that meant that they I thought they were dogging on me because I wasn't going to church I had no religion to the process and an awesome sponsor and have a great bunch of me and I came to understand that my actual spirit my essence my very being had been sick and and morehow got sick and was from living this thing called life and not in my case and not a real healthy way. You know, you don't you don't pick up good tools on the path I was on.

Brandon Handley 32:42
Definitely mentioned tools several times to what are some of the tools right,

Dan Reeves 32:46
yeah, so that's what this 12 step program gave me was some tools to work in. And I'll also say that, you know, we're now in the Louisville Kentucky area in replace, we're offering this to people who are not necessarily addicts or alcoholics if they want some concrete tools. To do so, you know that you know, and there's a lot of people a lot, there's quite a few people Brasil brands, one of them is taking the 12 steps and kind of molded in his way, but it's just really the same thing. You know, instead, I got a problem to solve, right? So I got a problem, there's nothing before gone, right? I mean, unless I have something to work on, you know, if I don't have something, then once there is a fix, you know, don't break, you don't fix something that ain't broken. So I got to come to some understanding that this is actually a problem. Number two, that step two says, basically, you know, it says some, you know, there's some pretty flowery 30 language and that's one of the things that's kind of blocks people but just coming to believe that a power greater than yourself can restore you to sanity. So there's some funny language in that that says, you know, this power grid are so everybody defaults on God, right. So, what I like to say is that, you know, when I use the word God, I am saying it, just like Kleenex, you know, if you asked me for a tissue, and I hand you a box, and there's tissue sticking out of it, you're not looking on the bottom to see if they came from Meyers Kroger's target or whatever. You know it. Kleenex it's like saying Coca Cola. It's like saying, you know, any other name brand thing. It's just an easy word to use whatever that means to you, man, that should be your inner spirit as power greater self can come from inside it can be a more of a universal thing you might be nature could be music, it could be who knows what So, you know, I always like to get over the block. Yeah, I'm not doing this because you're talking about God to me.

Brandon Handley 34:24
Yeah. Well, you know, anytime some business God like 99% of people, you know, especially in the Western Hemisphere, think that you're, you're saying you're saying, the Christian God, right, the Christian God, Jesus God, God, the God that molest all these people, right, you know, and that's a shame, right? Because now you're holding yourself back from the possibility of accepting that higher power simply over your own beliefs of what that is, right.

Dan Reeves 34:51
So, you know, it says, Do you believe there's a power that can help you to believe there is a way that power for my new sponsee is made

Unknown Speaker 35:00
You know, sure that hey,

Dan Reeves 35:02
do you think I can help you? Sure. You know, here's where I was, here's where I am. Do you think that it can happen for you? So it's just coming to believe that you can get some help, is believing that you can get help necessary. Probably not required, but it does help if you're, if you're a willing participant. Then step three is saying, okay, man, I'm willing to have some help. That's to help me step. You know, again, everybody gets hung up in this turn your will over will in life over the care of God. That's at 30 languages that that bill Wilson, the author of that stuff, you know, let's just get over the language. It's just words and stuff. Yeah, we grant these noises in column words, right? When we accept the meanings of them. If you're blocked up by the words, I will use different things like that or disease earlier in disease, right? You know, I'm not gonna let this human language be the block to how I can help you for sure. So help me that's three. So then we get into some concrete work, man and I do an inventory of my life and I sit down and write down things of everything we call resentments, but I'll write down the stuff that's happened to me and what's made me who I am. Where we've been you talked about before about being programmed, right? That we get programmed by our life experiences. Well, then this inventory, we go look at that. And in order to get deprogrammed, I got to look at the programming. And I said, my, my life experiences, it's happened to me, and what made me who I am. So we got some concrete tools on how in a real simple to this four step tool is pretty easy of going through and looking at that stuff, right? We look at three things. We look at resentments. We look at fears, we look at the things because most people run about unfair, we're scared of this. We're scared of that for sure. And and what we've done in our sex lives in our sex inventory, how we think about that, just because it's such a huge basis on what we are as a being a human being, you know, yeah. So we look at those three things. And then we do a fifth step, which is I tell somebody about everything. When I sit down and talk to my sponsor and told him all my dirty secrets, a weight lifts off.

Brandon Handley 36:55
Yeah, I mean, there's I think there's some vulnerability there too, right?

Dan Reeves 37:00
concept of it

Brandon Handley 37:00
yourself in a say you're putting yourself in a place where, you know, this person could easily come down on you for all the stuff that you've ever done how you've been condemning yourself for each and every one of those things like 1000 lashings for each and every one of those things for years now, probably. And when you come clean to somebody, like your sponsor, and then they say, what else cheese? You're like, why didn't I give you enough?

Dan Reeves 37:26
Yeah, there's some big I mean, one of the big tools in that fifth step exercises. You know, I did that take me to man, you're not alone. Yeah, we think we're hiding down in the closet with all our own dirty secrets. Ultimately, you know, to some extent, we've all done similar kind of things, and it wouldn't make any difference. I don't think you could take the attic and alcoholic aspects out of it. We still got stuff that we're you know, not particularly happy about that? We did. Sure. So we do that and we have a couple more tools or we asked this power that's greater ourselves to help us get over it help us to help take this stuff away. We call them character defects and stuff though, basically you know and I don't like that term too much either because I am not defective. Let's take the stuff that the what the way I'm operating that I don't like the things that I'm doing and the way I'm operating and I'm not okay with the things that no longer serve me. There it is. Universe please help me get rid of this stuff right help me start operating on a new plane sir now just Just let me run through it real quick. Well my my head's on to is that and then we go out and the people that we have hurt the people that we've done stuff to the people I stole pills from the people that are treated, you know, in a poor way. I go back out and I face those freakin people, man and I and I do a man's with him. And we have a very powerful recipe for doing that. We have some prep work and some different things so that we can do that in a powerful manner. And we have a thing called the ninth step promises that that are a very powerful bunch of statements of things like a fear of economic insecurity to leave you

Brandon Handley 38:55
scared scarcity mindset,

Dan Reeves 38:56
right. That's just one of them. Yeah, fear. People will leave you if you don't, yeah, you'll start being able to do things you never thought were possible. And it all comes up from going out there and clean up the past because now I'm not walking this earth, worrying about seeing you. Mm hmm. Right? Now if I'm gonna walk around and surfing right now, I'm afraid if I'm a bump into you at Kroger's, and I had that looking over my shoulder thing all the time, I'm looking over my shoulder you I can't look at where I've been. I gotta look where I'm going. Yeah, that's a nice step allows me to clean up that path where I don't have to look over my shoulder anymore. For sure. In repairs relationships, too.

Brandon Handley 39:32
Yeah. Yeah, I mean, look, it's at least kind of gets it off your mind. Right? Even if I mean that relationship. You know, you have the opportunity to go out there and you've got the opportunity. This is a kind of an exercise of courage, the right exercise of facing your fears and extra action. Right and and Jerry,

Dan Reeves 39:54
you're not necessarily asking for forgiveness from them. So much as Kind of forgiving yourself for the actions you've taken. There's, there's a lot of that there's a big piece of it is not really, you know, it looks like it's between me and that person. Really not. It's between me and my inner self, or I got it cleaned up on my end. And to be honest, if that person rejects this event and tells it go to hell and wish you drink yourself to death, for sure to have executed the action and gratitude as a successful thing. Yeah. The reaction to it doesn't matter.

Brandon Handley 40:27
I love that. Yeah, I mean, look, we all adopt

Dan Reeves 40:29
what happens though.

Brandon Handley 40:31
So but but there is that idea that you know, that that that that can still happen and and an understanding that their non acceptance of that from you shouldn't reflect on your genuine intent.

Dan Reeves 40:50
And it is so rare that that ends up happening with this formula. When you go to somebody with your heart and your hand and you own the stuff you did. And that's really what people want, right? You want that person to own that they did that. Really that's what I don't even do apologies to people anymore I do amends with people I use that same formula no matter what. Even if it's a total story not long ago I was not quite the person I wanted to be with a clerk at the convenience store that a couple of months ago I went sat in my car was getting ready to leave and I was like, man, I don't like leaving that bad juju behind and so I was like, so I get up in there and just go Hey, I'm not the guy to cut saw a man ago. I don't want to operate like that guy anymore. And I harmed you by by being a jackass here today was real bad. It wasn't like I but and I owned it. I asked her if there's anything she needs to say to me. Yeah, that a few words and got some things off of her chest. So she had a chance to verbalize her stuff. And and then I asked her for anything I can do to make it up you know, and she's standing over there jaw open because she's never had any my do that. And we fixed this little rift June 1 real quick and I mess around with that the rest of day either, right?

Brandon Handley 42:03
Yeah, that's great, man. I mean, it's kind of like a vibratory cleansing we'll call it right like yeah, I would you leave that behind, right? I love the Rift, right? same ideas a rift, right? Like a Tear Tear and like the the universal fabric,

Dan Reeves 42:17
right? You know, and that's another one of the things that I can leave behind me, you know. So part of this 1011 or 12 is starting to practice these principles in my life and doing these and using these tools that I just spoke of, and that 12 says having had a spiritual awakening as a result of doing that work doing those step work and going and cleaning out the cleaning out my past. Then I now to carry that and give these tools to other people. And I use these and Matter of fact, I did a fifth step with my sponsor, we actually did a back and forth two way fifth step yesterday over some issues that have been going on some stuff about how we feel about this whole COVID thing and the pandemic and some stuff about the where we were at personally with the the social equality issues going on in the world right now. And, and then we also had a little rift in the universe amongst our home group of guys. And so we had this little wad of undone business. So we applied these tools in inventory and wrote it out and then spoke to each other about it and we'll walk those tools out in order to get that piece of our thing you know, so that's the one that's the area that I see with this 12 step tools that I don't I haven't found personally anyplace else is that I have some concrete active tools that are not like I have to go to South America and take some wasco or Yeah, I don't have to I don't have to like go to these big huge lengths I can do this work from my bedroom and if I need to, I can do this fist up over the telephone with somebody you know, so I can I can put these principles and these tools into effect in their head they're just concrete. And and

I've never seen anybody do this work that said, I wish I didn't do it.

I will make a broad statement to Say that it that I can guarantee you that it will bring some improvement to your being it'll it'll improve, it will bring some more to your life as a guarantee.

Brandon Handley 44:12
Let's hit that what was the fifth step again?

Dan Reeves 44:14
This step is that where you speak to somebody about this stuff. I said that the step actually says submitted to myself to God and another human being the exact nature of my wrongs. That's what the step says. Basically, it looks a little like a confessional, but it's really not because you get feedback on it. And so that's, that's, that's sitting down and talking to somebody about it. And you know, that's where, you know, you would do that in the lifestyle if you have a coach, right, but not a problem. You got something going on? Well, you would sit down with this coach, and he would talk to him about it. So right, yeah,

Brandon Handley 44:46
yeah. I mean, it's the same ideas like you know, just kind of there's a blockage, right, you throw or even like, you know, hey, I there's, I feel like there's some bad juju back there, right, or, we're up ahead or whatever. And you got to ask yourself, not only does it not Serve me anymore as like, how else can I see this? How else can this be seen? Because your perception, Dan, Camp ception may not be the group's perception, you talk to your group. And so when you bring this out of the group, what's the use you, as a group see things exactly the way you do? Or is it most oftentimes, kind of different right now like, crazy, that's not feeling or thinking that sits in your head?

Dan Reeves 45:22
Right? That is exactly part of that step, Tim, where it says that we talked to somebody about it. And so you want to think I say, I can't see me very well, I really can't. I'd like to think I can see that I really can't. So like when I got something going on like that, I bump it off, either my sponsor or my support group members, my brothers in this brotherhood and say, Hey, man, here's what's going on. You know, what, what, what's your What do you see in this? So I'll get another set of eyes to see me and then the flip side of that is, you know, they don't see themselves. I always say this. I don't see me very well. I actually don't run my life very well at all. Got a guy who does right I got a guy that does a pretty good damn job of running my life. Nevertheless, that's stretching it. He's not running my life but he does a really good job of guiding me now that guy he don't do so good with his life either. But he's got

Unknown Speaker 46:13
a guy

Brandon Handley 46:16
is great. And we build

Dan Reeves 46:17
that, you know, so you know, his guys my guy also right? So I got that guy and I got this, you know, there's a thing into the back of the into the toaster and back into the there's 164 pages is the sacred text of the hugs and arms and 12 steps in the back of it. It says he will in speaking of this power power, but it's using that old, masculine Christian odd language. He will help you create the fellowship you crave.

Unknown Speaker 46:43
Hmm, yeah, I

Dan Reeves 46:45
never knew, you know, I didn't know because at some base level, when you talk about what it was that was missing, hmm. It was that connection with my people that was missing throughout that whole thing and by party didn't drink and I could get that temporary measure. than temporary connection with these people so it was it was filling that in a point came where I got to where I couldn't do that with people anymore you know either mountain being you know nobody else was doing it I gotten so bad that I was embarrassed to show my use at that level for sure now here I have this fellowship with these guys around me that I've said I've got this connection to a community now and it's broader than just you know it's a big it's the ripple in a pond thing right I got my I got my sponsor and real tight in that circle sure by the where the pebble landed in the water right and outside that next ring is my support group I really close guys that out that I work with and talk to you on a day to day and that we meet up once a week and see each other if not more times and that the guys that come to the retreats the guys that we go out to eat with

Brandon Handley 47:43
and you're running these retreats right there

Dan Reeves 47:46
yeah you know it's never one of these miracles that happen yeah. And I was one year sober and I was not one year so right ankle brace it on in my group was going to a local florist to have a little day trip retreat they were going to do and they went and I couldn't go because it's out there. by the county so the ankle bracelet that goes on like a BP Yeah. Now they would let me go do my recovery stuff. They let me go to work, they let me do the things. Let me take my kids to scouts and my daughter might send the scouts my daughters to dance and they let me do that, but this was outside where I could go and they wouldn't let me. And so the following the one of the things was is they had people run into them, and they kind of complained about that they weren't in a private location. Well, 20 years ago, my dad my brother and I built a log cabin on 54 acres outside of town here about an hour drive away. And they were talking about having that retreat and how lack of privacy and you know, you get that nudge from above, and I'm like, Hey, I got a place right and and I had in 2016 I held my first men's retreat. There you go. Yeah, this year was my seventh. So yeah, and and, and, and I say over and over, I don't know how this happens. You know, it never was orchestrated. It wasn't like I said, Hey, I'm gonna do this Sunday. No different than the spiritual underground podcast. I never did set site on saying Sunday. I'm going to be doing this podcast or I've got I've got a woodshop in the backyard that was manifested out of this recovery movement. Sure. It was manifested it like almost no dollars to me. Right? And how that happens, you know, I, but now I have this after losing that 28 year career. A year before I lost that job. We built this switch up. I got all these tools out there. I'm starting to make stuff for people outfit and doing little projects on the side for money. And that and lo and behold, you know, I say when when God built that cabin in 1999, I had no idea what he was doing. Now is where I take people to do fifth steps. Bring my guys down there we have these retreats, church Dan, and then they had no

jack that

we call it we call it the Fargo hug club. There's a little town in Indiana called Fargo and I read write nothing more than to gravel roads crossing. Right. Greenside. They're in a train they're on every corner, but we call it Fargo Hunt Club all my buddies have become that think of it as a sacred place It really is. No it did. It was built on dope and booze I stood up on that log wall driving spikes down through the walls with the beer cans sitting on the log behind me more concerned with knocking the beer over then I was driving the spike if I wouldn't Yeah, and now now it's a completely different energy down there right oh pletely different energy you know and I got this switch shot back here where now I have this gig that allows me to put my you know, I went to mankind project you know, and they have you talked about a mission you know, and my mission is to create a world of healing recovery through guiding people to find their true true purpose with the 12 steps

Brandon Handley 50:43
Yeah, yeah look and and you're doing it right now. Right so and one of the things that I hit on before I know you work on are your guys created 12 step book. Sounds like you're heavily promoting it might be something you guys are doing and kind of Cahoots. But you you also did. You became a yoga instructor. So I get that correct. I mean, so

Dan Reeves 51:02
yeah, that's another one of the things you know, my miracle list is is deep enough that if I don't, when I was brand new, my sponsor said these things were happening to me that were of great nature. And he said, you should start writing that stuff down. Right? Because you're going to forget it. Yep. And I started doing it nowadays. We'll do a little thing you'll go add that to the list. And yeah, so I became a yoga instructor. I was that list. What do you is that I called my miracle. I call it my miracle list. I just always have you know, could be also you know, there's a tool out there called a gratitude list where when you're feeling down, you write down all the stuff that's good, all your gratitude, you know, it's kind of long term gratitude lists where I can go back and look at these things that have, frankly, the universe has brought me to where I'm at right now. Mm hmm.

Brandon Handley 51:45
Yeah, you must have something valuable left.

Dan Reeves 51:47
Why in the world what I believe is gonna drop me off here, right. So I begin to doubt it. The next thing I'm not going to be supported with, right? I go, you know, that can't be, you know, I can't do that. That's beyond my abilities. Well, I'll quick look at this guy. To list this miracle list, so tell me I look at what's happened to date. What do you think it's gonna stop? Yeah. So that, that that yoga teacher training thing was another thing some girl, you know, you know, that's been our character defects is a essence I've been, since my marriage ended, certainly got no room for giving relationship advice, but a guy come into my life and she snuck me into a yoga class and She tricked me into going because she knew me I would make any reason not to do that, because that's not masculine. I can't do it. You know, I'm not flexible enough. I'm not you know, all the different reasons about why I couldn't do that. And I fell in love with yoga and it became a part of my recovery. And that's another thing that's going on in the world is a combined 12 step recovery. Yoga thing that's now combines the benefits of yoga with the benefits of 12 step philosophy and and gives you a little power punch through using those two tools. And now I coach people I'm working with to get into it because that exercise does something to me that I don't Get from riding a bike or swimming or going to the gym. You can Oh, good

Brandon Handley 53:05
spirit. Right, right. Yeah, I mean look, I'm that that that's all part of it right? I love it right? I love I love how you you know, you're, you're transitioning into this, this other being this authentic you right without without hiding underneath the pills without you know if you do have some self doubt you're facing it with you know the stories that you're telling yourself and reviewing the stories and looking at them in a different way instead of saying I'll shoot ain't gonna happen today I'm gonna have to have a beer All right, like they have today this year. And you know, you start to develop like these quote unquote, like healthier mechanisms of dealing,

Dan Reeves 53:46
right. Yeah, and it gives you that positive outlook to man I mean, it just means all the world to have these people around me we encourage one another my sponsor, they spend the biggest coach for me and encourage her from the beginning about you know, go for it day. Yeah.

Listen for it when you can do it, what can I do to help you do it?

Brandon Handley 54:03
That's, that's so important to right. So when you get that encouragement to go Be yourself. Alright? And when you get that encouragement that says, How can I help you? Right? You're like, not only are you saying that I can and should go pursue this, but you're willing to offer like assistance for that. Yeah, that's powerful. Yeah. Now, tell me a little bit about the book you guys are using to apply to daily, like, you don't have to be an alcoholic to use these tools.

Dan Reeves 54:35
Yeah. You know, kind of goes into you know, do you have to, you know, do you have to be from India to benefit from yoga, right, you know, I, we, one of the other premises and 12 step philosophy is, I gotta be able to, I gotta be willing to let go my own ideas. You know, we hang on to these camps and shoulds and it's only this way and only those kind of people can do this, and we gotta let go of that stuff. So my sponsor was sober. He just said Alberta made 36 years at the 18 year mark, he had that feeling of, there's got to be more. And he the universe provided and bumped him into some teachers. And his life changed with that many years sober from being this just not drinking dude to this plane that that I today get to benefit from. And so he had these teachers and he got this happen to him and he got to feeling like you know, you go around and this can cause a little bit of a rift but I'm comfortable speaking my truth today in this in this. A lot of recovery rooms is so so stuff going on in there. It's not the level that we can get to. It's a lot of there's a lot of less than it could be recovery going on. And if you fall into those rooms, they're just not very attractive when people are just struggling just to stay sober today. That becomes something you know that you know, we think Thank you and I you know if I'm like having a fight that hard at something, then somes not going, right. So he had all these tools and and it wasn't documented. He wasn't seeing it. And it's not in that book that that book that bill Wilson wrote and released in 1935. Plus a lot of people rejected it 1935 language, right with that God hard hand, and other kind of thousand these and things like this that would cause a guy to inherently reject this stuff. So he put these tools down on paper and started writing this book about six years ago, modernizing the language and bringing forward obviously expanding the concepts of how to have what we call squeeze more juice out of this work, for sure. Yeah. And so he did that and he wrote a book and it's called 12 step spiritual recovery. You can find it on Amazon author's James Christopher Cohn. It is the 12 steps for anybody. He goes into showing how this you know without Coxon acts we pretty clear about this booze and dope, bringing us to our knees. You know Are you rejecting that premise? You're not ready for help yet. But the normal person, what is it? You know, they needed to find what is that problem sometimes, you know, and that spiritual sickness thing is, is that, you know, frankly, our spirits get stepped on by doing this thing called life and it happens to our peer groups through our education through our parenting Archimedes this time do you find like, the kinds of ways

Brandon Handley 57:22
do you do find like the spirit really hasn't been addressed? Right? Like, I mean, it's good. Well, here's the deal, though. Like, you know, do you remember any spiritual school like any spiritual class on spirituality from like, K through 12? Right, like, I don't recall any No, I had some spiritual teachers walk through my life that

Dan Reeves 57:40
I couldn't you know, what even said right, like so yeah, but even right, yeah, no, it's a lack of exposure.

Brandon Handley 57:46
Right. And, and, and I think that even with the current western style church, is is that there's, it's very, here's what you do. Here's how They did it. But the application to the spirit doesn't seem to be readily visible.

Dan Reeves 58:08
And it's based on a lot of hope, you know, you got to just turn here, you know, just just hopeless, it's going to work for you, you know, or this 12 step stuff actually gives you some tools and the action behind it. And I'm not so sure that's the total effectiveness of the tools, although I know the tools are affecting the effectiveness may just be in that you're doing something.

Brandon Handley 58:25
Sure. I mean, look,

Dan Reeves 58:27
you know, that you got off your ass and you're doing something.

Brandon Handley 58:29
It doesn't matter, though, right? Like, as long as you do get up and you get going, right, as long as you have just like you said, take some action and start leaning into it. I think that's, that's not too different than general coaching. It sounds like a lot of the tools are, you know, here's what I'm finding more and more there's overlap with the tools, right? It's just how you apply them where you apply them when you apply them and all those things. So that's what I say about the higher power thing and the tools and all that seems like a you know, everybody wants to be able to receive that gift but you need yours tablet to blue. Robin and Bill needs his with a green one and I need a wrap on on mine. It's really all the same gift inside a box, you know, but it's just got a little bit different colored ribbon on it and because it's blue,

Dan Reeves 59:13
Brandon can accept it.

Unknown Speaker 59:14
Yeah, whatever reason,

Dan Reeves 59:16
cares why

Unknown Speaker 59:17
it's the only color I see is blue.

Dan Reeves 59:18
Yeah. Because the further down the path I get, the more you do you start getting into alignment where you see you know, the Buddhist principles and stuff out of the Bhagavad Gita and, you know, and then even beyond, but for me, it's big time growth when I start beyond actually peek into that Bible and seeing that those principles are there to you know, have to bridge that is also I actually what I get to do and that's one of the things is that I always got this message and I'm not sure if it's, I'm not sure if I took the message or if it was actually given to me. But I got this message that it was their way of highway kind of thing when any religion I would get into. I don't know that I won't say That's true, but that's the way I looked at it. We I can find a day man I get to pick and choose, I'd say through this trusted program. I get to go to Walmart Buy a brand new ball of playdough. And I get to come home and I get to form that thing up into what works for me and I get to build my own spirituality from scratch. And, and

and i think it works.

Brandon Handley 1:00:19
If it's working for you, right, I think I think that it's okay. One of the things that I kind of guess that I took away from a lot of these spiritual books and everything like that, is that if you just it's just like anything else in life. If you just follow one, you'll be cool. You probably just follow one. It'd be cool. If you just focus on kind of like one thing, no matter how small it is in life, you'll be cool,

Dan Reeves 1:00:45
right? Yep, I didn't start wrapping all these other ones and swinging them in until a little further down my path because the other thing that tells us tells me is to continue to seek. Yeah, continue to improve my conscious contact with whatever power it is that I'm getting hooked up with here. And in order to do that, I do that through yoga and I do that the man kind of do that for you in other books and I do that because when you mentioned a couple books to me on the podcast The other day I write the names of the books down because I didn't think I got that message by accident.

Unknown Speaker 1:01:13
Hmm.

Dan Reeves 1:01:14
I'll be open to looking and exploring this other stuff.

Brandon Handley 1:01:18
So you know, you've got the podcast going, you've got you know, somewhat of a movement going right you're hosting events and

Dan Reeves 1:01:26
the 12 tips spiritual record, we call it TSS, or there's a there's a, there's 12 steps spiritual recovery, calm, and there's a Facebook page called 12 steps spiritual recovery. We're hosting meetings here and lowered. They look a lot like 12 step meetings where anyone is welcome to come and try the 12 step tools.

Brandon Handley 1:01:42
Right, right. So is it t SSR? Calm?

Dan Reeves 1:01:46
Now it's got that big old long thing. Okay. Make sure recovery.

Brandon Handley 1:01:50
Yeah, wanna make sure somebody finds it right. 12 steps spiritual recovery.com

podcast is a spiritual underground.org

Dan Reeves 1:01:58
Yep. They're trying podcasts if you're the website spiritual underground.org haven't done as good a job keeping that up lately because I've got the little hit counter on it and just Matt in YouTube is two places where I've kind of invested some energy and decided that my energy hasn't been really um actually think about redoing the website just put a link to the podcast you know put other put the Google Play and apple and the links on it and just let it be like that rather than put content but yeah, spiritual underground podcast is you know all all the major platforms that are out there Google Play, Spotify, Pandora, Apple anchor anchors the host

Brandon Handley 1:02:39
Yeah, no, I love it. I love it. And you know you're putting out great content man. You're helping people you got people reaching out to you from all over the world to thank you for kind of putting yourself out there and what you're doing I thank you for you know, reaching out except in the conversations. You've mentioned some books I mean, what is what is what is like one or two books outside of of 12 step program obviously that have really impacted your journey. Hmm

Dan Reeves 1:03:07
one book is a journey into power is the Baron Baptist. He's the

Unknown Speaker 1:03:13
he he is the

Dan Reeves 1:03:16
guru of the yoga style that I do is a power vinyasa Baptist style power. vinyasa is called journey into journey into power is what it's called. And it goes through a lot of lifestyle stuff. It's not just a yoga book it's about what your diet is, you know you are what you eat to some extent you can't go put crappy fuel in your body and expect it to run good. I can't put crappy gas in my car expected to run good. He talks about meditation and and different things. So that was a that was definitely a big one. And you know, something that really turned my corner on the way I look at spirituality was there's Oh, oh preacher called him at Fox and his sermon on the mount, which you know, no I want to reject that book because of its western. For me for Dan, want to reject that because it was based on Jesus words in the New Testament and the Sermon on the Mount and most people heard about that. But he shed a new light on what those things could mean for somebody rather than the meaning I had absorbed. So out of two books that probably shift my foundation. Those two things, that girl that snuck me into yoga bought me that journey and the power book before I ever two years before I ever thought about taking yoga teacher training. And I sat down and read that book, and I still am amazed a diver sat down and read that book. There was no reason I wasn't really interested in yoga. Hmm. But I wonder like, you get a better read this my girlfriend gave it to me. I don't know. But it did it. It changed me.

Brandon Handley 1:04:52
Hmm. I love it. I love it. You know Is there anything else that you know again, you know, we get through tail end here. That if you feel like anybody should hear out there, right? So if somebody made it to the end of this podcast, what else did they hear for today?

Dan Reeves 1:05:10
Let me tack that on this sort of little bit about the podcast. Where did the podcast explore how people come to find themselves? We call it recovery. To me recovery is to reclaim or reclaim that which was lost or stolen. That's a definition I had found. And that's in the process spiritual recovery stuff. So to in I heard your guests today, listen to your podcast. You know, I think this common theme is is that we're trying to get closer to what our true selves are right. And there's a bunch of avenues to do that. My roots come from 12 step recovery. I do believe that it will work for you regardless if you're addict or alcoholic or just want some new tools in your life. What I do the podcast is have people come on and talk about their journey to how they found themselves or are moving. Yeah, I hesitate to say that max like found myself, but I'm closer than I used to be. And I'm on a journey of finding myself. Majority of it is that I think the big thing is, is that when you hear that other people have done it, especially in this podcast type of environment where you actually just hear these people's voices and you hear the passion and in them about what, what has happened for him. That translates into hope for you that it can happen for you too. Beautiful, I love those voices. So that's what I try to bring out what the podcast is that you said. It's not really for me, it's, if we can only touch one person with this podcast, and that person decides, hey, I want to be a better version of me. Then, then we then our mission is completed today.

Brandon Handley 1:06:46
And thank you so much for popping on. They really appreciate it, brother.

Dan Reeves 1:06:49
Thank you, man.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai