By Kyle G.  Johnson  

         My life and world had been turned upside down. The peace, comfort and joy of community along with family and church became a far off and remote part of me. Not only in a logical sense, But also a spiritual sense. My actions and events around me resulted in my checking myself into a chemical dependency treatment center called the Oasis, 800 miles from anything I could call my home. I was gone from a place where they called me Father, Husband, Brother, Friend, Coach or Son. Gone was the respect of others. More
        While a resident of the Oasis I was able to learn of what had occurred in life and the actions that had put me on this course that had all but killed me. Now I had found hope and some tools to use to help dislodge me from that course and live a life free of chemicals and despair. After several years of abusing prescription medications and narcotics along with medically prescribed antidepressants my mind, body, and soul were on the edge of literal physical and spiritual death. Was I a chosen and blessed soul, lying in the detox with what Society would call the dredges of society? Addicts, drunks, criminals and robbers. Could it be I was as they? Could it be? To explain what the body, And soul go through when the body is in ridding itself of the toxins and poisons deposited over the years of abuse is very difficult. Just suffice it to say, “I have seen tough men, gang members of the toughest and hardest kind cry out to their God, their mamas or any one else we thought would listen.
        One individual “Billy” took it upon him to be my caretaker, My guardian if you please. He had a detoxed a few days earlier. Billy was a slight man who had such a loving and caring soft-spoken way. I would learn later of his life of alcohol and drug abuse, criminal nature and his life in general. When not using drugs and alcohol or in prison he was as I saw him. Otherwise he was the addict, the criminal, the wino on the street.  He would awaken me before the morning meeting, bring me juice and sit with me. He helped me through the simplest of things. Where the showers were, the towels, he made my bed for me. I was in essence a baby learning to live again. Learning to talk, walk, and think again for myself.  As much as my mind rebelled at being a part of this place or these kind of people it was where I found myself. “Surely I was different, I was better than them, wasn’t I?” Either my soul knew I needed to be here or no one else wanted me. I think it was both and more of the later than I cared to know.
        As the days grew in to weeks I learned more about Billy and even more of myself. Billy’s idea of life while on drugs along with drink was to do it to the point of death then commit an infraction that would land him in jail. In jail he ate regularly, had medical attention and could gain his strength back and was safe. Upon his release he would do it all over again. Alcohol and drugs, criminal lifestyle, homelessness and disease then to jail all over again and again and again. The “Billy cycle of life.” As both Billy and I progressed in the program we became closer. We had finished intensive inpatient program and had “graduated” to work and sober living society. We were assigned to the same halfway house in the heart of Anaheim CA. We shared the same bedroom. Billy still lived Up to the role he had taken on earlier, that of my caretaker. He realizing that he was a lot more familiar with where we both found ourselves than I did.
        I had obtained a job managing a health equipment store in the Laguna Hills Mall. Suburban America at its finest, Caucasians and children, husbands wives and me. I was in familiar surroundings again. After work I would return to the inner city, the noise the confusion. A halfway house full of convicts on the way out of prison, addicts who chose rehab rather than go to prison, teenage gang members, a hell’s Angel member who did tattooing in the kitchen for those willing to pay and me. Me, a member of the Mormon Church, a priesthood holder, farms boy from Idaho and father of five beautiful children. What a collection! They “ lovingly” referred to me as “Mormon Spud Boy!”
        I had become quite depressed because of my lot life. Why had God done this to me? Why would my children’s mother divorce me at the lowest point in my life? Why would my family leave me here to die so far from home and love? One Sunday afternoon found me lying on my bed. Lying in my discouragement and self-pity. My buddy “Billy” came into the room and was examining the pictures of my children I had recently hung on the wall above my bed. His comment was “ Wow! You had it all!” To which I responded with my very well rehearsed and perfected; “yeah I did but screwed up, I’m nothing but a failure, why me? Why am I so stupid? Why would God and my family leave me here?” There was a strange quiet as I realized Billy had not commented on my words or jumped in to assist in my poor little old me routine. I looked up at Billy. I looked up in time to see his eyes filling with tears. “You didn’t hear me.” He said, “at least you had it!” It was at that point I realized the one thing I needed and God wanted me to know. You see, for Billy living in a sober living environment with eight other people he had a roof over his head, was eating regularly, had money in his pocket and was clean and sober. This life for Billy was the absolute best he had ever known; yet for me it was the absolute worst.
        How blessed and thankful I should have been for the things and experiences of this life I had been so fortunate to receive. I was not. This one experience, a knock on the side of head, a blast to the body and soul created the turning point in my recovery and my life. “The worst I had ever been or ever had was the best that another brother on this earth had experienced,” I find myself at times back on that bed, back into self-doubt, self-pity and ungratefulness. Then I remember Billy’s words “at least you had it.” When I hear those words it is my clue to count my blessings. I am alive, I have a lovely wife who adores me and I adore her. I support my children and myself. Each of my children in their own way has found there way back in to my life. Of all these, I enjoy this blessing More than any other, “I love and I am loved. God loves me. I am learning to love me and becoming my own best friend.”
        Life is how we make it, how we receive it and how we perceive it. A prayer of gratitude feels so much better than a prayer of despair from the foxhole. I am sure both are heard and answered, maybe more prayers of gratitude would make the fox hole prayers less frequent or even needed at all. I ask that you learn from my mistakes, my trials, that you won’t have to experience them yourself. Know, as I do; God loves you no matter what your condition or location on this earth. His son, our brother will take your hurt and pain, your depression, your sins and heartache from you. In fact he is hurt when we try to carry them ourselves. Together they are the answer for all things. It is for us to allow them, acknowledge them and realize, “we can not do it alone”. I have done this. Not perfectly by any means, Yet even done in my imperfect way have felt the hurts and pains, the sorrow and guilt lifted from my body. Lifted and carried away from my mind and my soul to have them replaced by feelings of Gods Love and the love of myself. The peace and serenity that the one we call “the Prince of Peace” can grant unto us will be the greatest high you’ll ever achieve. No matter where it comes from, No matter the price. Get out of your self-pity and unworthiness! Get out of your discouragement and depression! Place yourself on your knees. Ask God for his help. Admit to him and yourself your inability to do it alone. I tell you, I profess to you, I pray from the bottom of my heart and soul that if you can do this he will answer you. He will answer you in ways your finite mind cannot comprehend. Give to him your guilt’s, your shames, your fears and disgrace. He will joyfully take them from you. His arms are outstretched, stretched out to you. Yes You! Let his infinite knowledge, wisdom and love into your heart and into your soul. Let him love you till you can love yourself. Allow love from God and yourself into your mind and for once put an end to the conflict between the mind and the soul. They are one in the same. The mind will lie to us, our soul will not. It is the conflict of the mind and the soul that creates depression, anxiety and behaviors that are unbecoming to us as Gods Children. Put simply; “I cannot, He can, I will let him.”