Sober Living And The Power Of Recovery
Sober living is a daily experience. For 12 years, Jimmy Bogen, the Sober Living Coordinator at The Retreat, addiction controlled his life, but The Retreat's program, with emphasis on the 12 steps and peer support, was the turning point. In today's episode, Jimmy explains how The Retreat helped him find the path toward recovery. He also emphasizes the power of a strong support system that goes beyond family. Discover how The Retreat's family recovery program empowers loved ones to support your journey. So, join Jimmy Bogen and learn more about The Retreat's Sober Living.
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Sober Living And The Power Of Recovery
EdHello, everyone, and welcome to Serenity Sit Down. Welcome to our podcast here, Serenity Sit Down, presented by The Retreat in Wayzata, Minnesota. I'm your host, Father Jim, and today we are talking with Jimmy Bogan. Jimmy is the Retreat Sober Living Coordinator here at The Retreat. Again, thank you for being with us at Serenity Sit Down, presented by The Retreat in Wayzata, Minnesota. Thank you, Jimmy, for being here.
Thank you for having me.
I'm delighted. Tell me a little bit. How did you happen to find The Retreat? How did you come into the experience of The Retreat?
Sure. I was living oThe Retreat focuses on the solution found in the 12 steps.ut in Park City, Utah, right before everything crashed and burned. I'd been running and gunning for twelve years or so from the time I got to college until the time I ended up in Park City. I was good at hiding my use and my addiction from my family, but that last year or so of active use, they started to catch on to what was going on. My mom started going to Al-Anon meetings. Her parents lived back in Grosse Pointe, Michigan.
She was at an Al-Anon meeting and ran into her cousin, who is a former crackhead in recovery. He had been doing well, so she started talking to him about me and what I was going through. He had not come to The Retreat himself, but he was introduced to The Retreat through a sister program, Tallgrass, out in South Dakota.
Tony spent some time here in Minnesota in the sober houses and became well-connected with John and the team here. He got on the phone with me and said, if you want to turn this around, if you want to get sober, this is what you're going to do. You're going to go out to The Retreat, do everything they tell you to do, and if it doesn't work for you, you can bail. If it works and if you do everything they tell you to do, your life's going to get better.
How long has that been for you?
I celebrated ten years about a week ago.
Congratulations, my brother.
Thank you.
Cool. Thank you very much.
It's a good way to celebrate.
It sure is. How about that? You went through the program here at The Retreat?
I did. I spent 30 days here, and then I ended up spending about two years to the day in a sober house.
What makes The Retreat a little different than other treatments? Had you ever done treatment before?
No other treatment programs.
Can you explain maybe a little bit of the difference? Because I would imagine some people you have at the sober houses have been maybe to multiple treatment centers or certainly different clinical programs. Could you share why you think The Retreat is a little different than other programs?
The Retreat
I would say actually a majority of the guys in our houses and in our program have been through at least one other treatment program, and most of those clinical in nature. The Retreat, our model is a deep dive into the 12 steps. I tell people when they call and ask about it, you're going to learn about the solution. You go to a clinical program, you hear all about the problem. The Retreat focuses on the solution that's found in the 12 steps.
The Retreat focuses on the solution found in the 12 steps.
For me, what that looked like was breaking down all the barriers I had with the idea of AA and this God they kept talking about. I was raised in a Catholic family and had a lot of resentments against the God that I was raised with. For me, it was important to come here and be introduced to the steps in a way that was palatable, if that makes sense.
Tell me more about the God that you were brought up with, if you would.
What I found was that it was a very robotic practice, going to church every week, saying prayers before bed. I heard a lot about these principles and the way you're supposed to live, but I didn't see that reflected in any of the people that were telling me to live that way.
Folks like me with a clerical collar on?
A little bit. Also, I'm gay. Growing up gay in a Catholic family is not the easiest thing in the world. Lucky that I had understanding parents who didn't just kick me to the curb as soon as they learned what I had gone through. Because of that, I think a lot of what I heard growing up sent me running in the other direction when I heard the word God.
Thank you for sharing that. Thank you for honoring me and the community by sharing some of that, because sometimes we do isolate and we don't tell people our story, our backstory, or who we are. Can you tell us why it would be important to, or what treatment did or the 12-step program did for you to help become more visible about who you are versus what other people wanted you to be?
I think what it did was it helped me realize the way that fear drove everything about the way I showed up for life. There was that what I would call it, a debilitating fear that I'm not good enough. That came from multiple places, but the religion growing up and the way friends would bully me in high school.
I was never as good at sports as all the other guys. That fear that I'm not good enough, addressing that and looking at all the different ways that that affected my life allowed me to identify when it's cropping up and take some different action and let go of that fear and be authentic, live in my integrity, be who I am, and in a spiritually principled way.
I don't have to be in everybody's face and preach that I'm better. Right. Because that's another fear thing I think that comes from ego. Just be okay with who I am. It doesn't matter what other people think. As long as I'm serene.
It took a while to get there?
I would say ten years. It was what they call the educational variety of recovery for me. There's no white light moment. I just look back and there were all these moments where I had lessons, lessons that were taught to me that showed I can make this one little change and have a different experience.
Aha moments. Anything else you would share about what about the principles of AA or the principles of the 12-step immersion program? I hear that said often. That's what you do here at the retreat. It's a 12-step immersion program.
I think that we were talking earlier about what the retreat does differently than other programs. It's that deep dive into the steps. I can go sit in an AA meeting week after week after week and not hear anybody talk about the principles of the program. What we do here brings a lot of people that have long-term recovery that have done the deeper dive that know the principles and understand that it's not just the words that are written in the 12 steps. It's the principles there behind them. Learning to practice those in everyday life.
Could you share a little bit more about the principles?
Let's start with step one.
Honesty.
The Principle Of Honesty
For twelve years, I was dishonest with myself and everyone around me about my use. I was dishonest with people growing up about my sexuality. Everything about me was trying to be what you wanted me to be and not what I needed to be, to be authentic. Learning to be honest with myself, about the way that my addiction manifested and the way that dishonesty held me back. Also, being honest about who I want to be. Not have to hide that just to please the people around me. Drugs and alcohol made it easy for me to be a chameleon. It took understanding that principle of honesty and how not just honesty about addiction, but honesty in every aspect of my life was important to achieving a lasting sobriety.
That would be the first principle. Got another one?
Do you want to just go in order?
Yeah, I bet. I think sometimes people within our community don't understand the principles. I would love to invite them to hear what the principles are, how you may use them, and how they're used in your recovery homes. Because I think that they want to hear, I know I want to hear more about what really happens within a recovery home.
Faith And Hope
Step two is hope. Step three is faith. Step two for me was about learning to understand that there is something else bigger than me out there. This was one of the things Tony said to me when he first got on the phone and said, “Go to The Retreat.” He asked, “Do you think you're God? Do you think you're the most powerful thing in the universe?” I said, “No, that's ridiculous. I know I'm not that.” He said, “So do you believe that there's something bigger than you that can help you, that can save you?”
That was easy for me to agree with. That wasn't unpalatable, so to speak. It struck me the day I left the retreat. I went to a restaurant with a bunch of friends, and I'd not walked into a restaurant as a sober adult where they served alcohol. It struck me in that moment that I could sit down and order a beer, and this group of people with me that I'd been in treatment with were probably not going to let me get away with it. There was just something safe about that. There was something bigger than me in that, that was going to keep me safe in that moment. If I could find that thing in each situation, then I could learn to understand what a higher power could be.
Thank you. What else?
Faith, surrender.
I like to focus more on surrender than faith. Surrender and being willing to stop making my own decisions and take direction from others. The first part of that was agreeing when Tony said, “Come to The Retreat.” The rest was just continuing to be willing to hear the feedback and take corrective action when I was showing up in a way that wasn't conducive to recovery. Even at ten years sober, there's still a lot of that that I do. I need to be willing to trust in the feedback I get from others and trust in the things that my higher power directs me to do that allow me to live a serene and happy life.
Cool. Can I share? Jimmy's sharing this with a smile on his face. I think that that's important to see. Can I share a little observation? It's just not within your eyes, but it's in your guts. I think that that's what makes life much more joyful. Anything else that you'd like to share at this point a little bit? What do you do at the homes?
At the sober houses?
Please.
The Sober House
We require the residents to go to at least four AA meetings a week, work with a sponsor on a weekly basis, have a home group, and have a service commitment at that home group. They abide by curfew, which usually isn't that big of a problem. Work 20 to 40 hours. Stay busy, but also have a focus on recovery. We say 20 to 40 hours, but we get the guys that want to push it 50 or 60 hours a week. We see how poorly that works out a majority of the time.
Because they're exhausted.
Absolutely. There's no time for recovery. Who wants to go to an AA meeting when you're working twelve-hour days, six days a week? You get one day off and have to go to a meeting.
What else? How many homes do you have here at the retreat?
Six total homes, five men's houses, and one women's house.
Can you explain how many people in those houses?
Anywhere from seven in our women's house up to 15 in our biggest men's house. Residents start in shared rooms in all the men's houses. They have single rooms in the women's house. All of the houses, men's and women's, have single rooms available based on seniority.
How long they're there. They make it as many months that they're there that they can all of a sudden jump in that single room when somebody moves on. We require a six-month minimum commitment. We want people to be committed for at least six months. The line I always use is that we'd make it a year if we could. We see greater success, I think, from people that stick around longer than they have to.
Do you get most of your guests from the area, or do you see them come from around the country?
I would say it's a good mix. We get a good mix from places like Chicago. I know there's a big support for The Retreat in Denver. A lot of people come from Colorado, Michigan, and the Chicago area. Quite a few local people, but I would say 50-50 almost.
Is that interesting to hear that. What makes The Retreat sober living homes different than maybe some of the other sober living homes?
Absolutely. It's the 12-step focus. We require one more meeting than I think most other homes do, four instead of three. We also require that out of those four meetings, the residents attend at least one with another housemate or two of those meetings.
They're having some built-in accountability and building some community along with their meeting attendance. If they're just going to four meetings a week by themselves, nobody's watching to see if they're telling the truth. We find that there's a little bit of community built in that requirement to go to meetings with each other.
The other big difference, this is a huge one, is that our houses don't have live-in house managers. Our managers are all mostly former residents of either our houses or some form of sober living with a little bit longer-term sobriety. Instead of taking the guy that's been in the house six months and putting him in charge, we've got people that are a couple, three, or four years sober that have successfully completed their sober living program and have a lot more experience to share and are a little bit more stable in their recovery.
That's very unique compared to other homes because usually they have a house manager that lives within the house. Am I correct?
Absolutely. The retreat's peer-driven model is the reason behind that. Nobody is going to respond as well to a house manager who's barking orders at them as they are to a peer. For instance, I had a peer of mine early in my time in the sober house who overheard me having a conversation with my mom on the phone where I was demanding money. He pulled me aside after and just said, you sound entitled. You might want to look at that because you're not taking any ownership over your situation. You're putting all this anger out at your mother and it's not her fault you're here. It's not her fault you don't have money for food.
You got to get out there. You got to get a job, and you got to start paying your way. Again, if a house manager would have told me that, I don't know that I would have been open to hearing it. A peer pulling me aside and saying, this is what I noticed made a difference for me.
Talk to me more about peer to peer, because I think that that's an essential aspect. I don't necessarily always hear that. I think that that to me is huge.
Again, what's developed as a higher power for me is this, being open to the things that I hear from others. My higher power will speak to me through others when I need to hear something. Having people that I trust, whether it's housemates, a sponsor, or close friends in recovery, or family that are understanding of recovery, willing to give me feedback and to know that I'm open to it, allows me to be held accountable when I need to be.
I think that, again, it's that authority that alcoholics and addicts have a problem with in general. It's a thing amongst our community. When there's somebody who's not in a position of authority that's willing to say, you might want to look at this, that's helpful.
That was very much of an eye-opening and open-heart moment for you, was it?
Absolutely. That wasn't the only thing, but that was the one that stands out as, again, just one of those moments that it's like, I'm going to remember that forever because it was such a, I don't want to say white light because I said I didn't have a white light experience, but it was an eye-opening experience for sure.
Great. Anything else that we should know about recovery homes that you think would be important for the community to hear about in the retreat?
Sober Living
I think just when we were talking about honesty earlier, I have to be honest with myself about my ability to do this on my own. I'm not the kind of person that's going to go home to mom and dad's basement, or if I have a spouse to go home and let my wife or boyfriend or girlfriend tell me what to do. What a sober house did for me was put me in a situation where people that didn't have any stake in me held me accountable because it was hard to tell them no. For whatever reason, again, it's the lack of authority. When they said, get off the couch, let's go to a meeting, let's go join this committee and do service. What was I going to do? Sit around on the couch and do nothing or go do something? I think that, again, just having that support is super important in early recovery. I can build the foundation and learn some good habits, but I don't come into this with good habits. Not at all.
No. The 12 steps work strong within the community. Do you have open meetings? Do you just have step meetings? How does the community operate? Is it consistent across all the homes or is every home a little different?
I would say consistent across the retreat homes. The community in St. Paul, there's such a wide variety. I think somewhere north of 300 meetings every week that are within about a five-mile radius. You've got your speaker meetings, your open speaker meetings, discussion meetings where you have a speaker on a step and then you break up into small groups.
What I love, there was a meeting we called Issues and Tissues, Problems and Solutions, where you just share something you're dealing with and guys would give you feedback. It wasn't so much a big book-based meeting, which is always the negative feedback I hear about it, but it was a place where I could go and learn to listen. I think that unique format, putting me in a position where there's 100 guys in a room and I'm not under pressure to share anything, allowed me to learn to listen.
Which I wasn't good at. I liked to sit there and think about what I'm going to say. St. Paul just offers such a variety of meetings in a tight, close space that it's hard to get away from the 12 steps. If you want to try, it's there for you.
Anything else that would be important for a community to understand about sober living?
Do it. If you have the opportunity, do it. There's no reason not to. I've never heard somebody say they regretted that they did it. I've heard a lot of guys say they regret that they didn't. There's a lot of fear going into it. A lot of us haven't lived with another roommate in years. A lot of us aren't used to having other people tell us we have to do something. That's exactly what we need in early recovery. Just do it. No amount of family support is going to match what you get out of that experience in sober living.
Most people aren't used to having others tell us we must do something, and that's what we need in early recovery. Just do it.
Family members support any family programs throughout the recovery homes at all? Or that is all prior?
Mostly prior. They have access to that if they come through the retreat program.
Correct.
They're included with that tuition as one family program participant. We could do a better job of bringing in the outside referrals, the people that don't come through the retreat that live in our houses, into our family recovery program a little bit more. But it's a great opportunity for those that are aware of it. Anybody can participate in the retreat’s family program, whether they have a family member come through or not.
I understand that.
I know my mom went through it and years later, she still occasionally communicates with the people she met there. I found that funny that she would come here, make friends, and still communicate with them, including the retreat guests that participate in the family program with her.
Is that right?
Yeah. She took a stake in their recovery and always wants to know how they're doing.
Is that right? It's about the family as well, isn't it?
It's great to have family that's open to learning how to help themselves too. It takes the pressure off me to help.
Good for you. Anything else before we wrap it up here, Jimmy?
Not off the top of my head.
Come on.
What would I say about the retreat in addition to having such a strong 12-step curriculum? It’s well known for having some of the best food around.
It is. I've heard that.
If you're worried about eating cafeteria food for a month, don't, because you won't. When they throw salmon out there, you're going to be mind-blown at how good the food is.
It's just not a rubber chicken, is it?
No, not at all.
Thank you, Jimmy. Thank you for being here. It's just a simple conversation about sober living homes under the auspices of The Retreat Center. Am I correct?
Absolutely.
This is Jimmy Bogan, the Retreat Sober Living Coordinator, and this is Serenity Sit Down at The Retreat in Wayzata, Minnesota. If we could invite you, if you and/or a loved one is struggling with addiction, there is hope, and The Retreat is here to help. Again, we have a primary program, a 30-day program, as well as sober living homes that you're welcome to be a part of, PHP and IOP programs. There is a multitude of opportunities to get sober with joyful and better living. Am I correct?
Absolutely.
For more information, visit www.TheRetreat.org or call 952-476-0566. Again, this is your host, Father Jim, and welcome to Serenity Sit Down presented by the Retreat in Wayzata, Minnesota.