I work with people who many of you
stereotypically loathe they're
alcoholics they're boozers and they're
drunks they're addicts they're pill
poppers and they're junkies you see I've
always wanted to understand why people
do what they do because I believe if I
can figure out the why and I can find
ways to help them help them find a
better life and heal so I worked as a
clinician for probably about 15 years
and I watched as drugs and alcohol
destroyed people's lives so I made the
decision to go back to school and I got
my PhD because I thought maybe through
research I could find some of the
answers to the questions that I couldn't
answer as a clinician and what's really
exciting is that I'm finding some of
those answers and I'ma share some of
those answers with you here tonight you
see when I was a clinician I watched so
many people who wanted to get sober work
really hard to try and get sober but
they just couldn't and again it wasn't
because they didn't want to it was
because things just got in their way so
let me tell you a little bit about Anna
when I met Anna she was trying to get
clean from meth she'd probably been in
treatment maybe five or six times and
she'd burned all of her bridges but she
told me she wanted to get clean and so
we found her a program where she could
go in this particular program I was
gonna be a little bit tough for Anna
because while it was a no-smoking
program and Anna smoked cigarettes in
addition to the math and she was there
for maybe a couple hours before she lit
up there were no second chances they
kicked her out they actually drove her
down the road to the 7-eleven and
dropped her off she had no money and no
phone and really her only opportunity
right at that moment her only choice was
to hitchhike back to the meth house and
that's what she did I heard from Anna a
couple weeks later and she wanted to try
again
but this time in order for her to get
into treatment she was going to have to
go through a detox program
she went to three detox programs before
she actually found one that would take
her the first one she went to it was a
medical detox and well if you're not
gonna die they don't want to admit you
to the program there's no risk why
bother and when you come off meth it
really hurts
but you don't die the second program she
went to was cash only she had no money
you can't pay you can't stay but she
found this third program and they
finally finally admitted her ten hours
after she was admitted to the program my
cell phone rang it was four o'clock in
the morning the nurse on the other line
told me that she was done
she'd completed her detox treatment and
now they wanted me to come and get her
it's four o'clock in the morning but you
see if I didn't come and get her they
also said they were gonna make her just
leave and I knew where she was gonna end
up so I went and I got her and this is
where things actually got really hard
because now she's on a waitlist for
treatment and we didn't know if it was
gonna take a day a week or a month for
her to get in and she had no idea what
to do next
Ana's not alone in America today there's
23 million people struggling with
addiction and of those ten percent are
able to get treatment and of the people
who get treatment forty to sixty percent
of them relapse within the first year so
after a year only about half of the
people are still sober and the question
remains even if they've gotten treatment
what do they do when they get home
what's next
and what about that ninety percent of
people who don't get treatment at all
what are they supposed to do you see
chances are their cell phones are filled
with phone numbers of people who they
drank and they used with they can
go back to the bars and the parties and
they really just don't know what to do
because they burned all their bridges so
think about it for a moment if you're
one of these people what would you do
can you even imagine what tomorrow might
be like well about 10 years ago I was
climbing the The Rock Gym in Boston
Massachusetts and I met this guy named
Scott strode and we became friends and
climbing partners with Scott and um he
told me he was in recovery but I didn't
really think anything of it because the
truth is as we were climbing and we were
having so much fun
and there was this one New Year's Eve
weekend where we got a whole group of
people together and we went ice climbing
and again knock it out of the park we
had so much fun a few weeks after that
holiday weekend Scott told me that it
was the first time that a holiday had
come and gone and he hadn't thought
about drinking and he shared with me
this idea he had for doing things
different he wanted to take what he had
learned from his personal experience in
recovery and give it to other people and
me I thought it was a no-brainer you see
Scott got sober
after years of binge drinking and a lot
of cocaine and lucky for him he wandered
into a boxing gym and then
mountaineering and then triathlon and
with every mountain he climbed and with
every finish line he crossed his
recovery grew stronger but what he
struggled with was the stigma and the
shame and telling people he was in
recovery was really hard and he often
felt alone when I met Scott it changed
my life because I realized something
from spending time with him and that was
that people are not their disease so not
long after this great weekend
Scott was very inspired and he decided
he wanted to make this happen so he
moved here to Boulder Colorado
and he started a program called Phoenix
multi-sport and he asked me to help him
so we created this program where addicts
were no longer defined by their
addiction instead shoulder to shoulder
the climbed mountains and they inspired
others and in 2006 Phoenix multi-sport
was born Phoenix multi-sport is a sober
active community for people who are in
recovery from drugs and alcohol and gets
them involved in an active lifestyle and
through things such as climbing and
hiking and running and cycling and
strength training people are finding the
strength and the support they need to
recover in Colorado right now in the
Front Range Phoenix has served over
8,000 people
and in case anybody is wondering we have
goals of taking over the world
our instructors facilitate probably 55
events a week which is really amazing
because what it means is that every day
of the week there's something for people
to do and there's some way for them to
connect they don't have to be alone the
other thing that's really unique about
Phoenix multi-sport is it all of our
instructors or what we call peer
professionals which means they're in
recovery themselves because we believe
that they're in this unique position of
knowing what really works and what
doesn't and what matters most and they
can also connect people into a broader
sober community that as a clinician I
just could never do it's pretty amazing
the other thing people ask me all the
time if we're just replacing one
addiction for another
you know the alcohol and drugs we're
replacing that with running and climbing
the answer's no you know the sport
brings people together but it's this
experiences people have it's the fun and
the people that keep them coming back
and help them heal a lot of our members
wear t-shirts that say Phoenix
multi-sport or it says sober across the
chest you see it's really hard to be
tied to stigma and shame when so many
people around you are proud of who they
are and they're open about their
recovery and you remember in the
beginning I told you about that 23
million people who were struggling with
addiction half of the people who went to
treatment actually we're able to stay
sober at Phoenix three-quarters of the
people who come to our programming stay
sober
and what's also really amazing is that
when we ask people who relapsed if they
would come back over 90 percent of them
said yes and that they would come back
without any feelings of shame or guilt
or worry and that's huge because
addiction is a chronic relapsing
condition and if we can get people to
come back at least we can minimize the
damage that has been done and get them
back on track and moving forward so we
call that a huge win we also believe
that recovery is more than sobriety
alone and our participants tell us that
by participating in Phoenix they
actually are seeing benefits to their
physical health their mental health and
their quality of life
so while I've been a part of Phoenix
multi-sport I've learned three really
important things about recovery and the
first one is people matter going it
alone by yourself and recovery is really
hard but when you do it together it just
makes it all that much easier second fun
matters because if you're not having fun
today and you don't see joy you have no
hope for tomorrow and that brings me to
my third point tomorrow matters if we
can imagine a better tomorrow and we
have hope for our future and we see a
bright tomorrow it makes dealing with
the crap we have to deal with today a
lot easier together these three things
are creating a tipping point we're
living sober is just a little bit easier
it's a little more accessible it's
valued and before I leave here tonight
I'm going to leave you with one last
thing because I think this is really
important for recovery or Beyond and
that is that people are not their
disease it doesn't matter if they
struggle with addiction diabetes
depression cancer it's a piece of who
they are that's it and when we tell
somebody who's struggling with addiction
that they're an addict or a junkie what
we're telling them as they are their
disease but I want you to think about is
that they're actually the person who's
sitting next to you it's your mother and
it's your brother and it's your sister
it's your cousin it's your best friend
it's you
there are also teachers and mentors
they're engineers they're doctors or
lawyers or even presidents so you
remember Anna while she waited to get
into that treatment program she came to
Phoenix multi-sport every day I had
lunch with Anna a couple weeks ago she's
been sober for five years
[Applause]
Anna was and always will be more than
her disease and the people that I work
with at Phoenix multi-sport you might
not agree but I got to tell you they're
not just alcoholics and drunks and
boozers addicts and dope fiends there's
so much more thank you
[Applause]
[Music]