Participants: Cheri Peters (Host), Wayne Blakely
Series Code: CLR
Program Code: CLR000119A
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00:01 The following program discusses sensitive issues
00:03 related to addictive behavior. 00:04 Parents are cautioned that some material may be 00:07 too candid for younger children. 00:12 Welcome the Celebrating Life in Recovery. 00:14 My name is Cheri, I'm your host 00:15 and this is a friend of mine Wayne Blakely. 00:18 Wayne, you're coming out of the gay culture, 00:21 are you ever tempted? 00:23 I think you're gonna have to watch the show to find out. 00:25 Oh, man. Come join us. 00:56 Welcome, this season, you remember 00:58 we were talking about the book Celebrations, 01:00 it covers everything, from choices to exercise, 01:05 to liquids or you know, all the kind of stuff, 01:07 how to take care of yourselves, 01:08 physically, mentally, spiritually. 01:10 Right now we're on integrity and I hate that. 01:13 You know, what I hate about it and I am gonna go into that 01:16 because what I hate about it is that it really does 01:19 call us to look at who we are really. 01:22 And I am gonna tell you-- start out with story 01:24 and the story I loved, there was this mother, 01:27 she has this little boy and she adores him 01:29 but he's not following her advice on what to eat 01:31 and he's eating too much sugar and stuff 01:33 so she takes him to Mahatma Gandhi. 01:36 Right, she takes him to Gandhi and says, 01:38 you know, tell him not to eat sugar. 01:40 And Gandhi looks at her and says, 01:43 no, you know, bring him back in a month. 01:46 And the mother is like, she's got so angry like, 01:49 bring him back in a month? 01:50 I did this track to see you, I brought him here to see you 01:54 and what do you mean, bring him back in a month? 01:56 And so he says, bring him back in a month. 01:58 And so she does, a month later she brings him back. 02:01 And He leans over and he gently takes the little boy's hand 02:04 and he says, you know, don't eat so much sugar. 02:07 And the boy is delighted, he loves him 02:10 and he walks away. 02:12 And the mother's like, 02:13 why couldn't you do that last month? 02:14 I mean, what's the deal with that? 02:16 And he said, I couldn't because last I was eating sugar. 02:20 And I thought oh, shut up, how fun is that? 02:22 It's says so integrity 02:24 is don't tell someone to do something 02:26 that you are not doing yourself, 02:27 that you are not-- that's not really who you are, 02:30 all of that kind of stuff. 02:31 And so I am gonna tell you something that it's so hard 02:34 that at one point I thought, I am just gonna tell you, 02:38 and when I first started ministry 02:42 I had not remembered years of my life. 02:45 I mean, when somebody says, what was your school like, 02:48 elementary school? 02:49 I don't remember. 02:50 You know, I remember a few incidences, 02:52 a few more or less times I got beat up, 02:55 I mean, that kind of stuff, times that I got really injured 02:58 or whatever but I don't remember the day to day stuff. 03:01 And about family life, 03:03 I remember some really tragic stuff 03:05 but I don't remember the day to day stuff. 03:07 So in recovery, you know, I have these stories 03:11 that I've told over and over and over again, 03:13 these things that have happened over and over and over again. 03:16 And there was a point in my recovery, 03:18 years into my recovery, I had even sat with 03:20 authors in the beginning when we wrote 03:22 Miracles from the Street and they would ask me, 03:24 Cheri, what year did this happen, you know. 03:28 And so I am thinking, who knows. 03:30 Like you know, my sister and I hitch-hike from 03:32 New York to California, we were kids, 03:35 you know, all the stuffs that happened on the trip 03:38 and all that kind of stuff and they said what year? 03:40 And I said, I don't know. 03:41 They said, well, try to think, do you remember anything, 03:44 anything that was on the radio or television and whatever? 03:46 And I thought, you know, we stopped in Oklahoma 03:49 and we were at the world's fair, 03:50 not the world's fair but the state fair. 03:52 We were at state fair, President Ford was there, 03:55 and he had just been-- somebody tried to kill him 03:57 just recently from or whatever, some Manson follower. 04:01 And so I made a joke at the fair and I said, 04:04 what if they think new are here to kill the president? 04:06 You know, I don't know why I thought that was funny. 04:08 But I cracked up and all the sudden 04:10 we are surrounded by secret servicemen. 04:12 I mean, it was like they got us right away. 04:14 Well, I remember that. 04:16 So somebody checked the year, 04:17 when was Ford at the Oklahoma state fair, 04:20 what year was it, all that kind of stuff. 04:22 And so a lot of times I would actually 04:25 get dates of events from that kind of stuffs, 04:28 sitting down and brain-storming and al that. 04:30 But when somebody says, well, when-- 04:32 how old were you exactly when you got kidnapped 04:35 by a motorcycle gang, by the bikers? 04:38 And I am thinking, okay, I think I was like 14 04:40 but I am not sure because I am a druggie. 04:42 And I want to say that to you guys, 04:45 I am a druggie, I don't know, was it Tuesday, 04:47 was it Wednesday, 04:48 what is 20 years ago or 50 years ago. 04:51 I don't know. 04:52 I mean, that whole time was just lost to me. 04:54 We tried to figure it out. 04:56 So as I am going into recovery I read this book 04:59 and the guy says, 05:00 in your recovery try to think about 05:03 something that was delightful in your past. 05:06 Try to think about something that was healing in your past. 05:08 And so I tried to think of that and I remember thinking about, 05:11 at one point my mom and my mom, you know, all the memories 05:17 I had were pretty kind of twisted and, 05:20 but I just kind of tried to do a suicide attempt, 05:22 I injured myself and I got braces 05:25 and all kind of stuff on, 05:26 and my friends came over and they were going skating. 05:29 And I was trying to figure out how to go skating with them. 05:32 And so it was on my good leg, I had braces on one side, 05:35 but on my good leg I was trying to put skate on. 05:37 And my mom walked by and she smiled and she said, 05:41 nothing ever stops you. 05:44 And I remember looking at her and smiling. 05:46 And it was such a cool thing, 05:48 it was almost a respectful thing. 05:50 So I started to remember way into my recovery 05:52 some of the cool things that happened, 05:54 some of the times that were good in my life. 05:57 And as I started to remember 05:59 that I started to get more healing. 06:01 I also talked with my mom, my mom used to joke 06:05 around a lot that she was born on Pearl Harbor day. 06:08 This is gonna really tell you exactly how old I am, 06:11 so that's fine with me. 06:12 But she' born on Pearl Harbor day. 06:14 So I thought, I was born in 1955, 06:17 so from Pearl Harbor to 1955, 06:20 how old was my mom when she had me? 06:23 You know she was 14 years old. 06:24 So I thought, man, she was young. 06:26 And I remember thinking that, when I figured it out, 06:28 I thought she was young. 06:29 Well, years later, I mean, not too long ago my mom said, 06:33 no, no, I was born on Pearl Harbor day, 06:36 not the day they bombed Pearl Harbor. 06:39 But when she joked as a kind it was like 06:41 when they were blowing up the ship she was born. 06:42 I mean, it sounded like that. 06:44 So now I realized that she was actually probably not 14, 06:47 she was 15 or 16 when she had me. 06:50 And then I find out from my grandmother, 06:52 my grandmother got married to my grandfather 06:55 but she lied about her age 10 years. 06:58 She said, she was 10 years younger. 07:00 So that changes a lot of my recognition 07:04 or recollection about stuff. 07:06 So anyhow, so I am starting to look at that kind of stuff, 07:08 I am starting to look at okay, what was real and what wasn't, 07:11 all of that. 07:12 And I think as I heal I am forgiving people 07:16 and I am looking at these stories 07:17 and I am thinking that you know, 07:19 what, I got to tell somebody 07:21 because what if I keep saying the same stories 07:24 as if they were same stories, when I am starting to realize 07:27 maybe they are not. 07:28 I was sitting with my mom, my mom was a mess, hated me. 07:32 I felt like she was hated me, that's what I got. 07:34 She didn't bond with me, she didn't' touched me, 07:37 she didn't hold me, I left and I felt like that, 07:39 I still feel like that today. 07:41 But one day I am at my mom's house, 07:43 its 2:30 in the morning, 07:45 we are sitting there on the computer, 07:48 she's on the computer, I am on the computer 07:50 and she pulls her chair behind me and she says, 07:53 can I speak to you? 07:55 And I thought, yeah, you know. 07:56 And so she comes over and she says, 07:59 I just want to tell you 08:00 something that happened to me as a kid. 08:02 And so I said, okay. 08:03 And I felt like God said, don't turn around, 08:06 don't turn around because if you turn around 08:08 she will stop talking. 08:09 So I just kept on the computer and kept doing something 08:12 and she said, when she was a kid she got given by her mom 08:16 to someone else, her mom was alcoholic 08:18 and so anyhow she gave my mom to an aunt 08:22 and the aunt was raising her. 08:24 But the aunt got her into a school 08:28 that really developed her artistically 08:30 and in the arts and painting and drawing 08:32 and all that kind of stuff and she was very gifted. 08:35 So then she got a scholarship for a high school 08:38 when she was 12 years old, she was really young 08:40 but really smart. 08:41 I hope I got some of that but she was really smart 08:44 so she got put into a high school 08:46 on the scholarship for the art. 08:47 So she get's in this high school 08:49 and she's telling me, 08:50 I don't know any of this, I've never heard of any this. 08:52 So she's talking behind me, and she said that 08:54 she even didn't want to go to the high school 08:57 because she thought maybe they gave me 08:58 the scholarship because I am young 09:00 and they just though that was cool 09:01 and maybe I am really not as good as I think 09:04 I am or I am not artistic or whatever. 09:06 And so I am thinking, that is so amazing, 09:08 I didn't know that about her you know, 09:10 that she really liked the art and drawing and all that. 09:13 So anyhow she is talking on and on, 09:15 when she got accepted in the school, 09:17 when she finally realized that it was her abilities 09:20 that got her the scholarship she settled in 09:22 and she started to make friends 09:23 and she said my whole life was turning around, 09:25 it was so amazing. 09:27 And then her mom met another alcoholic 09:30 and decided to come 09:32 and take her from her aunt's house, 09:33 move her from Canada to California, 09:35 didn't asked her about school, 09:37 didn't asked her about her life or anything, 09:39 just came one day, packed her up and moved here. 09:41 And she said I stopped dreaming, I stopped-- 09:45 I was so angry. 09:46 You know like, if there is a God how could this happen. 09:49 And as she's talking I wanted to just weep for her, 09:52 I wanted to cry for her. 09:54 And I remember thinking I am so sorry that you went 09:56 through that and I knew I couldn't turn around 09:58 because she wouldn't talk. 09:59 My mom doesn't share much with people. 10:01 And she says, do you think that changed my life? 10:05 And I wanted to weep. 10:07 I said, I can't even-- my heart breaks 10:10 because you shut down so much, 10:12 I think that took everything from you. 10:14 And as I am listening, 10:16 I am thinking that my perspective 10:19 on the whole childhood thing in the whole background 10:22 really is changing because I am looking at my mom 10:25 and her stuff and what she brought to the table, 10:28 what she gave and couldn't given 10:31 what she could given 10:32 and it just started making a difference. 10:34 And so when I tell the story now about 10:37 not being loved and being neglected 10:39 a part of me aches 10:40 because I want to say every single time, 10:43 can I tell you about her life 10:45 because her life was really intense also. 10:48 And so as God's healing me I no longer feel like this-- 10:53 I no longer feel that she was so cool to me. 10:58 What I feel like is the devil had a strategy 11:01 for generations before I came. 11:03 And if I am going to recover, if I am gonna stand up, 11:06 if I truly I am gonna live a life of integrity 11:09 not only am I gonna start to heal, 11:11 I am gonna start to try to honestly 11:13 look at the things that I tell you about 11:16 the people in my life. 11:17 And sometimes I am gonna have to tell you, 11:19 you know what, my take on it 20 years ago 11:21 is so different than my take on it today. 11:23 Was it a lie 20 years ago or 10 years ago 11:26 or five years ago, it was not. 11:28 But I want to say that I am changing 11:30 because God is changing me. 11:32 So we're gonna look at integrity, 11:33 those issues, what happens in our recovery. 11:36 And don't let someone not let you speak out loud 11:39 because if I don't say this out loud 11:41 I can't grow any further than what I've got done so far. 11:44 And I am gonna say to each of you is 11:48 when you start to learn the truth in a different way, 11:50 when God unravels even your own stuff 11:55 in a different way, say to somebody. 11:57 Man, I am sorry for how I thought. 12:00 I am sorry for the things that I've said. 12:01 I am sorry for even the anger that I've had towards you. 12:05 I forgive you, please forgive me 12:08 and step into your life with integrity. 12:10 When we come back 12:11 I am gonna introduce you to a friend, 12:13 Wayne Blakely, has a ministry coming out, 12:16 ministry it's amazing. 12:17 And he's really gone to a lot but he's standing up 12:20 in such a cool way right now 12:22 that I think you're gonna be blessed. 12:24 I'll be right back. |
Revised 2015-01-08