Unlock True Freedom: Stop Fighting Yourself & Find Inner Peace Now!

KATHLEEN: Hello everyone and welcome to the Journey of an Awakening Spirit. This is Kathleen Flanagan, your host, and we're streaming on the Bold Brave TV network. The purpose of the show is to help you realize that you are not alone, that you are in control of your life. It doesn't matter where you come from or what the circumstances are.

KATHLEEN: We've all experienced pain, suffering, hurt, abandonment, loneliness, and hopelessness. This show is here to help you turn those dark moments around and create a whole new you. Despite your success, have you felt lonely, angry, frustrated, or even suicidal? Do you long to be supported, recognized, and respected for who you are and not just the awards and accolades on your walls?

KATHLEEN: You don't want to be known, identified, or remembered in a way that feels fraudulent because you achieve things out of obligation and not passion. Do you find yourself sitting quietly at lunch, listening to what lights you up, only to feel shame? Fear, frustration, and resentment.

KATHLEEN: Your inner turmoil and limiting beliefs surface, making you feel not good enough and afraid of doing something different. You've read the books, attended the seminars, and practiced new concepts and principles, yet you still find yourself in the same rut. The lies you tell yourself perpetuate a cycle of disappointment.

KATHLEEN: You say you'll change, but your self-limiting beliefs keep running the show, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. As a certified coach, I empower you to become your authentic self. My Soul Journey program aligns you with your true self and guides you to find your soul vision, helping you discover your purpose in life.

KATHLEEN: I provide tools to step you into your true magnificence and remember who you are. If you're interested in learning more, contact me at BraveTV at KathleenMFlanagan. Com. Each week, I start the show with the sound of tuning forks, bringing in love. Happiness and balance to set the tone for the show and bring out the best in both myself and my guests. So let's begin.

KATHLEEN: Daryl Dittmer is an entrepreneur, recently published author, and has been sober for decades. He's here to discuss sobriety, but more importantly, how life can go from a dead-end mess to something you can't imagine in your wildest dreams, inside and out. He's here to share his experiences in the hope that it will help all of you decide to listen, if you decide to listen. Welcome, Daryl.

DARYL: Thank you so much, Kathleen. I really appreciate you having me on.

KATHLEEN: Well, I'm so glad that you're here. I know it's been a while since we set this appointment, but yet here we are. So tell our listeners a little bit about your journey of becoming an awakening spirit.

DARYL: Sure. Well, it all started in the beginning. The Midwest.

DARYL: I was raised really in a Protestant work ethic environment. My dad was a mechanic. My mom took care of us kids. My dad was also a Navy veteran and a pretty tough guy. He was a strict guy, a pretty tough guy. My mom was probably just as tough, if not tougher.

DARYL: And we grew up in an environment where we needed to follow the rules, get good grades, act right, have great manners, all of those things. With my dad, it was stand up straight, shoulders back, chest out, all that sort of stuff. I think he learned in the military. And, it was an interesting upbringing, I guess I could say.

DARYL: It was something that we kind of looked at ourselves, I guess, as the all-American sort of family. And, you come to find out years later, maybe that wasn't necessarily the case, but which is fine.

DARYL: I think a big part of my journey is not recognizing and acknowledging my past, but not blaming my life on my past. And I think that's a huge component and has been a huge component for me for a long time. So when I was around 13, I took my first drink of alcohol, and it ended up being several more drinks of alcohol that particular evening.

DARYL: And it was something that I just remember wanting to do again. All of those insecurities, all of those things that were difficult for me as far as relating to people and having a good time and sort of letting myself out of my shell. Well, those all happened with... The first drink and then subsequently as I went through my teenage years, I got into drugs.

DARYL: I just became a liar, a cheat, a thief, all these things that were necessary as far as what I thought at that time to help me get what I wanted, which was to feel differently. To feel what I thought was feeling good.

DARYL: And it got to the point where I did a number of different drugs and hallucinogens and cocaine and, all those sorts of things. I started dealing drugs. I was stealing from my jobs.

DARYL: I was just doing things that I was not raised to do. So there was that grating inside of me, that friction, not living to what I thought to what I knew was right. I was doing things that were definitely wrong in terms of the way I was raised.

DARYL: And that was difficult for me. It threw me into a bit of a tailspin.

DARYL: So when I was 18 years old, my parents basically intervened and gave me the option of either talk to this drug and alcohol counselor or for all intents and purposes, just get away from us, leave. And, so that was a scary moment for me. That was a scary time. I was 18 years old.

DARYL: I didn't, I thought I had it all together, but at those kinds of moments, you figure out that you don't. And, so it was probably a couple of weeks hence that they said, if you're going to go meet us at this place and this time. And, so I ended up deciding to do that. I decided that I didn't want to feel how I had been feeling about my life.

DARYL: I was in rough shape as an 18 year old kid. So, that was probably the scariest part of my life to that moment. And I went to talk to this counselor. And the first thing he said to me was, because I planned on lying, I planned on just not telling.

DARYL: Truth and the survival skills that I had learned to that point and the first thing he said was you can't lie to me don't bs me; I don't want to hear it and he intimidated me i was i was very much intimidated so i told him the truth to the best of my ability at that time which whatever that was I have no idea what I said but I know that it was the truth to the best of my ability at that time because I was scared and I was intimidated So then I went into treatment January 3rd of 1985.

DARYL: And the last sort of episode that I remember before going into treatment was I was at a New Year's Eve party, December 31st, I guess, 1984. And I was in the midst of, had to be a couple hundred people, to the best of my recollection. But I had never felt as lonely. I had never felt as scared. I had never felt as isolated as I felt that night.

DARYL: And the thought crossed my mind, I'm not sure if I want to be on the planet anymore. Then a couple of days later, I went into treatment. So that was the end of the old era and I guess the beginning of my new era.

KATHLEEN: I can relate to that story. 10 years earlier.

KATHLEEN: Yeah, very similar story of when I went into a drug rehab. And I knew that my parents were going to find my stash. I knew it. I knew it without a shadow of a doubt that they were. And I was like, you can hide this and you know exactly where to hide it that they would never find it. And I chose not to because I desperately wanted to get help.

KATHLEEN: And I think before that, my sister was sniffing glue. And I think I ratted on her because I thought that was worse than smoking pot at the time. And we both ended up in the police station that day. And the police officer said, daughter number two will survive. Daughter number one, no, you better do something with her now because she is on a path of self-destruction and she will kill herself.

KATHLEEN: I mean, it was like that blatant. And I remember when my dad came into my room and said, get up and pack your bags. And that moment I woke up and it was like, I'm going to die today. I mean, there was no doubt in my mind because I had never felt an empty feeling as deep as I felt that at that moment of today is the day I die. And then he comes back in and says, pack your bags.

KATHLEEN: And then I realized I was going to get help. And I ended up in Florida in a drug rehab. So it was the thing that changed my whole life too. So I totally understand as a lost teenager and again, very similar family life, probably a little bit more abusive than yours, but definitely the whole thing about the standing up straight and all the things and all nasty parents and so on and so forth kind of thing.

KATHLEEN: But yeah, so tell people a little bit what happened once you went into recovery because I know my whole life. Was a trajectory change for the better. And I've never stopped my whole life on that learning and growing because I discovered there was something bigger than me in that process that I didn't know was there.

KATHLEEN: So I know that there's got to be something along those lines for you being a young man, being very lost and confused and saying, okay, yes to me, because you had that really gut-wrenching feeling of isolation that... It's a very profound feeling when you feel it. That is something you cannot deny. I don't care what anybody says. You cannot deny that unless you're just totally lying to yourself.

DARYL: 100% agree. Yeah, I mean, that's the rudiments of honesty with myself probably sprouted when I was in that office with that social worker guy.

DARYL: And that was where it all began. And so I went into treatment. And I don't remember a thing about treatment. I really don't. I remember the detox part of it and just sort of just weird.

DARYL: I remember there was a part where I was being pulled off the bed toward the floor. I thought I was dreaming it. But then I woke up and it was actually happening. And it was just the weirdest thing, just coming off this stuff. And I remember sitting with her.

KATHLEEN: Drinking by that time to have that type of a detox. That's really habitual.

DARYL: It was drinking and or drugs. Okay.

KATHLEEN: Okay. So it's a drug, alcohol. Got it. Okay.

DARYL: Yeah. Both. Great. Both. Okay.

KATHLEEN: That makes sense now.

DARYL: Yeah.

DARYL: So, treatment was something I don't really recall exactly what happened, but I do remember that I had to own up to my stuff. I had to be forced to start to get honest. I was introduced to the 12 steps while I was in treatment, which for me was a very cool thing.

DARYL: And the other thing I got out of treatment was hope. I got hope that I could start to look people in the eye, that I could start to feel confident that I could start to have reasonable conversations that I could be deemed as someone who might be able to do something with their life. All of those things became a hope that I could move toward those things.

DARYL: And, the 12 steps importantly to me gave me a roadmap for taking out the garbage, for changing myself, for changing how I live, changing. What I do, how I survive, all of those sorts of things and like every teaching, right, every teaching runs deep, you know, there's...

DARYL: the surface level, which to me was getting rid of the alcohol and drugs. But then I had to start to dig. There's only one step that has to do with getting rid of the substances. The rest of them have to do with digging yourself out, and creating a life. Creating a life by getting rid of some of that wreckage of the past and making amends.

DARYL: And, just doing the things that I would probably never have learned had I not been introduced to the 12 steps. And I can't necessarily say that maybe 10 years later, 20 years later, whatever, maybe that would have happened for me, something like that. But the most important thing was to find a community, to find people who could relate to what I was talking about.

DARYL: And, I had to talk myself out of some things, too, because there were people who were significantly older than me. I was 19 years old. And so they had lost cars. They had lost spouses. They had lost homes. They had, all of these sorts of things. I'm like, wow, I didn't do all that. But the key for me was that the wrenching inside.

DARYL: And everybody could relate to the emotion. Everybody could relate to the anxiety and the fears. And the guilt and the shame and not feeling like we're good enough. And that's what I related to with the people around the tables in the 12-step groups. And I would say I probably averaged a meeting a day for at least the first five years.

DARYL: And then eight to 10 years. And you had mentioned finding there was something bigger than me out there.

DARYL: That's the cornerstone of what allows me to wake up in the morning these days with a smile on my face. Because I'm grateful. And it all starts with the gratitude. It all starts with, thank you for my life.

DARYL: Because not everybody gets that. And not everybody gets that, I'm almost 60 years old. And have been through a lot of interesting stuff. You know, life is a gift to me at this point.

KATHLEEN: It is. And we're going to go ahead and take a quick commercial break.

KATHLEEN: Welcome back, everyone, to the Journey of an Awakening Spirit. This is Kathleen Flanagan, your host, and we're streaming on the Bold, Brave TV Network. And I have Daryl Dittmer in the... Room with us today and he was sharing a little bit about his recovery process and his story.

KATHLEEN: And his hope was that he found a being higher than himself and opening and moving through gratitude and how his experience of going through his recovery wasn't so much about what he did as we all think it's, we could justify off as somebody who's been at it worse older and here we are younger saying, oh, that's not me.

KATHLEEN: I can't relate when it's never that. It's about the emotion and it's about our humanity. And helping and supporting each other. So Daryl, what I'd like to know is a little bit more about when you started finding that, how did your life change when you started embracing the higher power?

KATHLEEN: And because you said you went like every day and then you started dwindling off as the years progressed. Excuse me, but I know that there was a lot more that went on as you started rebuilding your life because we know that making amends sometimes is...

KATHLEEN: Eating a lot of crow and it doesn't feel good, but you have to do it and that type of thing. And what, besides what else happened in your life as this recovery, I mean, the upward trajectory, so to speak, because we know that you can only go up when you're down in the pits of hell.

DARYL: True. Yeah. I started with a big hole in the middle of my chest and I think that's how I best. Describe it. And that's how it feels to me, how I used to present to the world.

DARYL: I had a big hole in the middle of my chest and that had to get filled with something. And I started working the 12 steps and I got a sponsor. Actually, I had a couple of sponsors, but my sponsor that was just the mentor of my life. Was a gentleman named Bud.

DARYL: And nobody in my family had ever graduated from college. And so I ended up going to college. I wasn't planning on it. I just said, you know what? I'm sober. I'm going to do everything I can to wear myself out and beat myself up and do something with my life. And that's really what I wanted to do. And that's how I started. So I went to college, and I was about eight months sober at the time.

DARYL: And I met Bud at a meeting and I was scared to death. College was all new, studying was all new, taking responsibility was all new, doing all of these things in addition to trying to get my life together inside of me. I had to work out all these things. So there's the outside part and then there's the inner work and I know they intersect and all that sort of thing.

DARYL: Significantly, but they really are two separate things. Because if I can go about my life and just run at a thousand miles an hour and do things and not experience burnout and not experience wearing myself down and feeling like I just can't do it anymore, if I could just do that, that'd be great. But I can't. I have to take care of myself in the process.

DARYL: And so I learned the importance of taking care of myself. I started to learn, and this has been so many years in the making, but I started to learn that, I have to take care of my body. I have to take care of my mind. I have to take care of my heart. I have to take care of my soul. You know, these are all things that create me and then make up me.

DARYL: And it wasn't necessarily...

DARYL: I couldn't articulate it like that way back then, but I knew that if I wasn't doing the right things, I didn't feel good. And I couldn't continue that way. So it was a lot of course correction. It was a lot of bobbing and weaving, trying to get to that, I call it the true north trajectory, right?

DARYL: Where you're heading north instead of south or east or west. And I think that's been... And even if it's just a little bit north, that's okay. You know, and we continue to correct as we go. And that's what I did. I got out of college. I had a criminal justice degree. And college was very difficult. After the first year, I was fried.

DARYL: I was fortunate to have played basketball.

DARYL: I had a girlfriend back home, which was also not something you're supposed to do within the first 12 months. Getting injured. So, I did all this stuff wrong, but that's okay. I learned and I didn't drink and I didn't do drugs and I continued to learn lessons.

DARYL: And I got out of school and in the most comfortable place for me because I had done farm work as a kid, I had done carpentry as a younger person. And so the most comfortable place to me was not to use my criminal justice degree. It was to start doing carpentry again. And so I did that. And I was framing homes and condos and that sort of thing.

DARYL: And it was good, hard outside work. And it was great for me at that time. Beat the crap out of myself. You know, just physically doing that because I was always trying real hard and trying to lift as much as I could and work as hard as I could and all those sorts of things. And I to learn some balance.

DARYL: So, I'm throwing all these things in the pot of things that I need to get better at. And and trying to find some balance between doing the work and taking care of myself and trying too hard and taking a break and eating. You know, eating is important. Sometimes I would go a whole day and I wouldn't eat because I'm busy.

DARYL: And all those things can do the opposite of what we're trying to accomplish. And so it's been a long road. But I got involved in, again, I had this blue collar upbringing and somebody asked me to get involved in sales, somebody from college.

DARYL: And I said, sure, why not? So we took off and went out to Boston and it was all these guys who were not sober and me who was sober, kind of like college, there was one other sober guy in college, and he and I hung out and we stayed. I started taking risks.

DARYL: I started doing things that were uncomfortable. I started, and I heard people talk about these things and I read books about these things. And I listened to cassette tapes, which nobody knows what the heck those are, but I listened to cassette tapes of Brian Tracy and Zig Ziglar and Deepak Chopra and, all of these sorts of things.

DARYL: So, I was feeding myself. I was feeding myself. As much as I could because I really wanted to get better. And I really wanted to have a life that I could be proud of. And quite honestly, I wanted my parents to be proud of me, in addition to me being happy with what I was doing with my life.

DARYL: So I got in college, I was introduced to... East Asian civilizations in one of my classes, which was my favorite class. So I was introduced to Buddhism and Taoism and legalism and Confucianism and all that sort of stuff. And I'm like, wow, this is cool.

DARYL: And the concept of Bushido and honor and, all of those things that were just resonated with me. And, that's how I wanted to live my life. That's what I wanted to do with my life. And not from an occupational perspective, but from a living perspective. And so I just kept integrating and integrating. And I still do.

DARYL: I read tons of books.

DARYL: I do the things that feed my body, mind, heart, and soul. And I think that's the important thing for me today to make sure that I'm attending to all of those aspects of me.

KATHLEEN: Something you said that I thought was really interesting that like a little bomb dropped off in my head was no matter how much our parents tried to feed our body, mind, spirit, and soul by how they brought us up with church and discipline and, support and non-support, however we interpreted it, no matter what they did, I don't think because we were so young, we couldn't.

KATHLEEN: Comprehend that. And we had to find our own way. Because as you're talking about the Eastern philosophy, I just wrote, because I'm writing a chapter in a book that I was asked to write in, and I brought up that I suffered in silence is how I describe myself. Because to the outside world, I was very successful. I was happy. I was a leader. I was intelligent.

KATHLEEN: And yet, on the inside there was the hugest disconnect I didn't know who I was I didn't know where I was going it was that feeling of I'll fake it till I make it but I didn't think I could actually do that because again that hole in the center of my chest that something was desperately missing. And when I discovered Eastern philosophy, I mean, I just like you, I resonated with that Eastern philosophy.

KATHLEEN: I couldn't speak it, but I resonated with it and studied the Eastern and Western philosophies to see the difference. And I was more resonant with the Eastern because it was that feeling. It was the true essence of our spirit that I felt. And I was thinking when you were talking is. No matter what, our parents tried to do that, but it's really up to us to find that within our own self of what resonates with us.

KATHLEEN: Who are we? Why am I here? What is my purpose for being here? Because we know it's way bigger than getting a job and going to work and raising 3.2 kids in the white picket fence and dying. I knew there was something bigger than that and I had to find it. And with that, we're going to talk about that when we come back after this quick commercial break.

KATHLEEN: Welcome back, everyone, to the Journey of an Awakening Spirit. This is Kathleen Flanagan, your host, and we're streaming on the Bold, Brave TV Network. Excuse me, and we have Daryl Dittmer in the room with us today.

KATHLEEN: And during the break, we were talking about how our religion that we were raised with didn't quite serve us the way that we needed, even though it was, I'm a recovering Catholic, as I call myself, and there were a lot of things when I was 16 years old that I did not believe in what happened with my mother in the Catholic Church.

KATHLEEN: And I remember arguing with her and she said, whatever you want to do, because she knew exactly what I was talking about and she didn't argue with me.

KATHLEEN: And that was when I discovered, was in an Edgar Cayce meeting that I went and I had a meditation for the first time when I thought God presented me with the world, the rod and the staff saying you're going to change the world. And I told him it was crazy. Go find somebody else because I'm going to die first.

KATHLEEN: I mean, later I learned it was the Archangel Michael, but I didn't know that at 16, but that was enough for me to start questioning that there's something else out there for me to study and look at that would sustain that spiritual connection that I knew that I had that I didn't understand that I had at the time.

KATHLEEN: So Daryl, I'm going to turn it over to you because I know that you obviously had a very similar situation or experience. In that process of your recovery.

DARYL: I did. And I liken myself, when you said recovering Catholic, I liken myself to a recovering Lutheran. It has a lot of similarities.

DARYL: I know my parents did the best they could to introduce me to something that would feed or they hoped would feed my soul and feed my spirit and help me help put me on a track of life that was only the best for me I'm sure that's what they wanted for me and so I absolutely am grateful for that but there was never a time when I was in church or I was talking about religion or somebody was talking to me about religion where I felt like, oh, okay, this resonates.

DARYL: This is something that feels good to me. I never felt that. I always felt like they need me to do stuff. They need me to say things the right way.

DARYL: They need to believe exactly what they tell me to believe.

DARYL: And, that's their stuff. That's their religion. Fine. It just did not hit with me. And to the point where, we were the Wisconsin Synod Of Lutheranism, and you couldn't believe anything other than the Wisconsin Synod Of Lutheranism because the Missouri Synod Of Lutheranism was wrong.

DARYL: You know, that kind of stuff. And I'm like, well... They're Lutherans, like, how could they be that wrong? And, but apparently they were. So what it brings to mind for me is, and I read this recently, and I don't know where I read it.

DARYL: And I can't attribute it to anyone, but I'm going to say it anyway. Somebody said, and if I find out, I'll email you Kathleen, but you know what, I read the Bible. And I didn't find any religion in it.

DARYL: And that struck me. And I heard that years and years ago. And that struck me. Because I love the Bible. I do. I think the Bible is full of wonderful teachings and wonderful parables and wonderful ways of understanding things.

DARYL: But I don't ascribe it to a religion. Just like I don't. Ascribe the Tao Te Ching to a religion or the Bhagavad Gita to a religion.

DARYL: It's all things that we're supposed to learn and ingest. And it's based on stories and it's based on, it's not based on you have to believe. It's based on what resonates, what allows me to be a passenger on this ship of the universe. And have a wonderful experience with it. That's what it's about.

DARYL: And that's what I aspire to and have aspired to in my life. I want to be a passenger on this ship and do my part and have it resonate and help other people and move forward in my life in a way that matters and that contributes. And that's what I tried to do today. So there's nothing wrong with religion. And I think religion fits with many people.

DARYL: And I don't feel like it's, I think it's a wonderful thing for many, many people. And so there's not an issue with that. It's just my path ended up being different because I, at one point in my early sobriety, I had to tear apart my past and I had to take all the little pieces of me and I had to put them out on a table and I had to look at them and I had to say what works and what doesn't work.

DARYL: And the easiest thing to find is what doesn't work if I allow myself to see those things. So a lot of stuff got jettisoned and which included religion.

KATHLEEN: Makes sense to me because I was in the same boat. I mean, what do we know about ourselves at 16, 17, 18 years old? We don't know anything. I mean, we're just lost little creatures and we're saying, okay, you're 18 years old. You're an adult, go have fun. And you're like, wait, what does that mean?

KATHLEEN: We don't know. You know, and you look at the kids that go off to college and what's the first thing they do? They're party animals because it's like liberation, freedom. Who am I? And they're expressing themselves in ways that, their parents probably would have had. Cardiac arrest over, but that's what we did because we...

KATHLEEN: We finally were able to start making our own decisions and then we made bad decisions. And they may not have necessarily been bad. I mean, our parents would have said that, but they were learning decisions for us to do what you said. What's working, what's not working. And I went back to, well, I know what's not working, but I have no clue what's working because I don't know the difference between that.

KATHLEEN: All I know is that. If I was in a place of suicidal tendencies, that meant I better to get rid of anything that would encourage that. And so I surrounded myself with people who were loving and kind and supportive and allowed me to just battle with whatever I had to battle with at times because depression was very strong and I didn't understand that depression at that time.

KATHLEEN: I have come to learn why I was dealing with depression and why I... Was suicidal. It all had to do with my childhood rearing and bringing that up in this chapter is seeing it like magnified in a whole new level that I hadn't seen before. And, it was the thing that changed the trajectory of my life.

KATHLEEN: I mean, I was not on this path at all and this changed the trajectory. And then I had to find myself back through it. And the only reason I know that I survived was because I had guidance from the angels, from my guides, from guide, whoever you want to call it, from God, whoever you want to call it, because that was the only thing I knew how to hang on to because I had nothing else.

KATHLEEN: I walked away from everything in my life at one point so I could find me in the noise because there was so much noise going on up in this head. I didn't know what was my voice and what was somebody else's voice because there was too much noise. And I had to stop that. Because that was a downhill spiral for me.

KATHLEEN: And that's why Eastern philosophy touched me so much was because it was the only thing that stopped the noise long enough for me to hear.

KATHLEEN: And then I was able to start putting the pieces of, well, who am I and what is it that I want and where do I want to go? And that's how I came back from my world and... And then I just became such an observer of my life as well, because we all have drama, okay? And I just knew that I didn't really care for drama.

KATHLEEN: And yet I created drama, but I didn't like drama. So I had to figure out how to stop the drama so I could be like a whole healthy human being instead of some wacky, crazy girl. Because sometimes I was a little out of control, a little wacky, and I was nuts.

KATHLEEN: And I wanted to just have that strong inner foundation, that strong sense of being, and that I could walk this earth with confidence and pride with my head held up high because I did the work. And that's not an easy place to come to any more than what you went through. And anybody that's been on this show that's been through any kind of drug, alcohol, suicidal tendencies. It's hard work to get there.

DARYL: Without a doubt. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's, for me, it has been a series of creating disciplines for myself and things that I consistently do and adhere to that, that helped me. And, that I remember when I was just getting sober and I'd pull out a yellow legal pad and I'd have so much stuff going on in my melon.

DARYL: I didn't know what to do. I didn't know where to turn. I was upset. I was scared. I was whatever. I was confused. And I didn't know what to do. So I just pulled out a yellow legal pad and I started writing. And I wrote and I wrote and I wrote and I wrote. There was no, I didn't call it a journal. I didn't call it anything. I just called it writing.

DARYL: But when I got it out, I could see it. And I could, and it.

DARYL: Kind of sorted itself out a little bit and it was a relief because it wasn't just up here it was actually I allowed myself to let that free to whatever degree that I could and so again to the Eastern philosophy I've the things that I do today are a breathing practice which is actually what I've been doing in the morning the first thing is reading which is just a really quiet time.

DARYL: I got to a point, I don't know if you can relate to this, Kathleen, but... But I'd read in the afternoon after I get done doing all my stuff, working. And then I'd start falling asleep.

DARYL: You know, I'm just like, oh, all right, I'm done. Ten minutes in, I'm starting to fall asleep. So I thought, okay, well, I'll start reading in the morning. And it's the coolest thing.

DARYL: But anyway, so then I do my breath work. I do pranayama, which a good friend of mine taught me a while back. And it's just, it sets the stage for me for calm. And it sets the stage for me going into my meditation practice.

DARYL: And then after my meditation, I practice gratitude, which is absolutely crucial. I just thank for everything.

DARYL: People say, do you pray? And I say, well, I don't really pray. I just say thank you. I just say thank you. And it's the coolest feeling to feel like I don't need a bunch of stuff. I don't need anything else. You know, I'm cool.

DARYL: And, I exercise and I eat right. And those sorts of things I try to do on a daily basis. And the only thing I would caution because I've done it both ways, I've done everything a thousand miles an hour. And, then when I don't do it to my satisfaction, I'd get angry with myself or, Oh, you forgot this, or you didn't do this.

DARYL: And, my sponsor said to me long ago. He said, as I was wrestling with some problem and just fighting life, he said, Daryl, when you stop fighting, the fighting stops. I was like, oh. So I've been noodling that for the last 40 years, just having that resonate more deeply and more deeply to where, the fights get much more subtle.

DARYL: You know, they're not the big fights anymore. They're more the little fights. And, it's okay. I'm allowed to have some of those now. I recognize them and I let them pass, and that's how I live my life now.

DARYL: I do everything I can to not, beat myself up. And because I'm not perfect and I'm not going to be perfect and I don't need to be perfect. And, there's no aspiration to be perfect. I'm going to do the best I can. Put the best me I can out there every day for myself, for my family, for the world. And that's what I can do.

KATHLEEN: I agree with that because I was always, I could have done better, always could do better. And I never stopped long enough to give myself one iota of credit for anything I accomplished in my life. I'm a very accomplished woman, but I never gave it until probably the last, this past year, I really started to look.

KATHLEEN: At what was working and winning in my life. And when I did that, I felt the brain synopsis switch. I could feel things got easier. A limiting belief came up. It was like, you don't know what you're talking about. And I could just start releasing it. I stopped that, my own personal battles with myself.

KATHLEEN: And I also was in an organization. And we would have these monthly calls and there were so many people that were just constantly beating themselves up. And I just would go on there and say, you've got to stop this. You're human. It's okay. Give yourself permission to be like a jerk. If you're going to be a jerk, it's okay.

KATHLEEN: You're allowed to be, because maybe that's what your spirit needs right now is to be a jerk because there's a lesson in there. But when we beat on ourselves. We don't give ourselves that opportunity. And so when I kept hearing the word, give yourself grace, it was like, well, that makes sense.

KATHLEEN: But you don't know what that means until you give yourself grace and find out how hard that is to do. And so I decided that I just said, I'm perfect, whole and complete just the way I am. And God loves me for just the way I am. I'm perfect, whole and complete. God could be learning for all we know. He could be a messed up person for all we know.

KATHLEEN: You know, we don't know, but we give all of our power outside. But God is not outside. God is inside. And when I started to realize that that Eastern philosophy talked about the God within, that made a big difference because is God going to beat you up? Is God going to starve your body?

KATHLEEN: Is God going to sit there and do all these nasty things and say nasty things about you? No, that's not the guy. And I mean, Catholic. The Catholic Church definitely had that God was hellfire and damnation kind of God, but I came to realize that God wasn't that. That's why I'm a recovering Catholic, people, just so you know.

KATHLEEN: That had a lot to do with being recovering Catholicism. But it's still a very strong faith. I mean, Catholicism is what I was raised on. It's still very strong, but it's my interpretation of what that is on spirituality. So I just wanted to just acknowledge that, too, is we have to be nicer to ourselves. I mean, if you're being an outright jerk, that's a different story.

KATHLEEN: You need to have a conversation with yourself and change that. But if it's a simple thing or if it's part of your journey of growing and learning, because that's how we learn. And as I keep hearing this whole week, for some reason, the diamond is made when it's under pressure. You know, we are going to contract.

KATHLEEN: We go in through constriction and expansion. And when we're in the constriction part of forming and changing and seeing something bigger, better, more beautiful coming out, we have to allow that to happen. And we have to be kind with that because, and I'm not always the best when it comes to that, but I understand it more now.

KATHLEEN: I understand when it's happening and it's like, okay, get off the stage and just watch it unfold. And that's what I do. I watch it unfold. I watch what's coming out here, how I'm feeling, how I'm reacting. And I also know what's going to be on the other side.

KATHLEEN: So I'm really not going to beat myself up because I know what's on the other side. And that's what age has a tendency to do for us as well. So Daryl, what is one thing that you would give to our listeners, one piece of advice that would help them on their journey or help them to create a better life for themselves?

DARYL: The first best piece of advice I ever received was, Daryl, when you stop fighting, the fighting stops. The second best piece of advice I ever got was, first things first and the rest will be added on. If I take care of the things that take care of me and my body, my mind, my heart, my soul, and I do those first, everything else will come.

DARYL: And I've seen this happen time and again in my life. And I've also seen it happen the other way, where if I don't take care and it doesn't matter if it's my body, mind, heart, soul, or all three or four or two or one or whatever it is, it's me not doing what I know I could be doing with myself. I don't use should on myself, but these are things that I could do.

DARYL: So first things first and the rest will be added on. I know, you know, we've probably all heard first things first, but the rest will be added on is absolutely crucial because it comes with an element of faith. And if I'm doing those things, and it only takes a couple of times to convince ourselves.

DARYL: It only took a couple of times for me to say, wow, I'm doing the stuff and life really is getting better and I'm feeling better. And, my relationships are better and my job is better. What's going on? Well, it's because I was putting first things first. So that would be the advice I'd give to people who are looking for a direction or something to focus themselves on moving forward.

KATHLEEN: I love that. How can people get a hold of you?

DARYL: I have a website. It's daryldittmer.com, which is D-A-R-Y-L. D-i-t-t-m-e-r.com. That's probably the best place to find me. I've written a couple of books. The first one is When I Stopped Fighting, The Unexpected Joy of Getting My Head Out of My Derriere, not derriere. And two is When You Stopped Fighting, The Road You're On is Your Own Asphalt.

DARYL: So those are the two books that I wrote and they're... about recovery. They're about exactly the things that we've talked about today, Kathleen. It's sort of all in there. And if anyone has interest, then that's where to find me.

KATHLEEN: Perfect. Well, I want to thank you so much, Daryl, for coming on and joining me on the show today. It was a great conversation, brought out some interesting topics and reminding me of lots of things that I have forgotten because, our journey through life, we live a lot, but we don't always remember everything unless somebody helps us to remember those moments.

KATHLEEN: And I want to thank all the listeners today for joining us as well. And if you found any value, please feel free to like and subscribe to the show and give the link to anybody that you feel would benefit from this. If you have any questions or concerns, you are more than welcome to reach out to me.

KATHLEEN: You can set up a 15-minute call through my Calendly link, or you can email me at BraveTV at Kathleen M. Flanagan, or you can even reach out to Daryl because I'm sure he would be more than happy to talk with you as well.

KATHLEEN: My books, Dancing Souls, The Call, The Journey of an Awakened, The Dark Night of the Soul and Awakened are up on Amazon and my website as well. I am offering the free de-stress meditation for free at KathleenMFlanagan. Com. And that concludes our show for the day. And I will see all of you next week at 4 p. m. And from my heart to yours, I hope you all have a fabulous week.

DARYL: Thanks so much, Kathleen.