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I am a person in long-term recovery
from a substance-use disorder.

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(Applause)

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And what that means
is I haven't smoked crack,

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snorted a line of cocaine, or touched
a sip of alcohol in over 19 years.

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(Applause)

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I had my first beer at 11.

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One of my cousins gave it to me.

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I had my first line of coke at 15.

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I had just gotten out of a psych ward

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for being suicidal.

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From 15 to 24, I drank
and used my way through life,

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and eventually ended up in Boston.

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At that point, my addiction
had gotten so bad

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that I was paranoid,
and afraid of everything.

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I found myself locked in my apartment,

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and there in the dark,
huddled on the bathroom floor,

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I had been using cocaine
for almost 24 hours straight.

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My heart was pounding,

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and it felt like it was going
to explode in my chest.

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I knew that's how I was going to die.

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And when the sun rose
on Boston that morning,

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do you know what I thought of?

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I thought of my mom.

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I thought, "Somebody
is going to have to tell her

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that her son died on a bathroom floor
from a cocaine overdose."

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And that's the last night I used.

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No one ever dreams they're going
to grow up to be an addict.

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I found my way into a boxing gym,

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and something about
getting in the ring for the first time

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helped chip away at my addiction.

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Eventually, I saw a brochure
for ice climbing.

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And on the cover was this guy
on a steep ice climb,

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and I thought, "I want to try that."

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I signed up for a class,
and I didn't know it at the time,

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but I had begun my path of recovery.

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See, there's something
special that happens

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when you tie into a climbing rope
for the first time in the winter.

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You look up at the glacier
or the climb ahead of you,

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and everything else seems to melt away.

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All the problems, all your worries,

41
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all the shame and self-loathing
from your addiction

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that so many addicts feel -

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it all drifts away and you're left
just in that moment.

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All you hear is the crunch of the snow
under your crampons;

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the sound your ice ax makes
when it cracks into the deep blue ice;

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the sound of your breathing
as it drifts away

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and is muted by the soft falling snow.

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In that moment, in that place,

49
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I caught a glimpse of the possibility

50
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of who I could be:

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courageous and confident.

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Climbing would evolve into racing
mountain bikes, doing triathlons,

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eventually racing Ironman.

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And every time I stood
on top of a mountain

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or crossed a finish line,

56
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I was a little bit more a climber
and a little bit less an addict.

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I was fortunate; I found hope
on a mountaintop.

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And from that hope,
I began to heal from my addiction.

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But for so many people
that are still in their addiction,

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it can feel pretty hopeless.

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An estimated 23 million Americans
struggle with a substance-use disorder,

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and the average American
is more likely to die from an overdose

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than a motor vehicle accident,

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a mass shooting,

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and a terrorist attack,

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combined.

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So many of us get a loved one
plugged into formal treatment

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and we think, "Now
they're going to be fixed,"

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only to find out that 40 to 60 percent

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of people coming out of formal treatment

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will relapse within the first year.

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Why is that?

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I think we can't talk about
healing from addiction

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unless we also talk about
healing from trauma.

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I'm not just talking about
the big traumas -

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growing up in a war-torn country,
physical and sexual abuse.

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But I'm talking about
those little traumas -

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what it felt like
when your parents got divorced;

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what it felt like
when you were bullied in school;

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what it felt like when you
were abandoned by that loved one.

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Even though these traumas
don't leave a wound that we can see,

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they affect how we see the world.

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I believe that trauma is the number one
public health crisis in our country.

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(Applause)

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Why was I compelled
to drink at 11 years old?

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Why was I using cocaine at 15,
and also suicidal?

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I think in part, it comes
from generational trauma

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that was passed from my father.

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See, his father left him
when he was young,

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so he carried a pain that he passed to me.

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My dad also struggled with mental illness,

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so he would yell at my siblings
and I if we lost,

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and he'd also yell at us
if we won the soccer game.

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He would publicly shame us,

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and I remember that always
made me feel so...

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...small.

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There's also a unique kind
of inadequacy that you feel

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when you see a sibling that you love

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being abused,

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and you can do nothing to stop it.

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I think about how that must have
imprinted on me when I was little.

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Yes, I was once little.

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(Laughter)

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And when we're little,
we're emotional sponges.

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We absorb the energy around us
from our caregivers,

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and if that energy
is negative or traumatic,

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we often internalize it
as we did something wrong;

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we were failures.

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All of those little traumas
are tiny emotional cuts,

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and with enough of these cuts
it can add up to a big wound.

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I know what you're thinking: some
of those things happened to you,

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and you're not an addict.

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Well, there's other ways
we cope with this.

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Many of us seek our emotional well-being
from something external.

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Maybe it's what we look like,
maybe it's how much money we make,

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maybe it's whether or not
our sports team won the Superbowl.

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Go Broncos!

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(Laughter)

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(Cheers)

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We have love addiction,

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we have love avoidance,

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we have workaholism,

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eating disorders,

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and the list goes on and on.

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So how do we heal from this?

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I know standing on top of a mountain
can be part of it;

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that goes directly
to the self-esteem piece.

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But what about the opposite of trauma?

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We have to learn how to build
nurturing communities

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for our children to grow up in.

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I want you to think
about that for a moment.

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What kind of environment would you want
your children to grow up in?

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I want you to make a list.

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Here's mine:

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encouraging, full of joy,
accepting, loving,

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a place where we are physically
and emotionally safe.

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With the understanding
of these two things coming together -

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the power of standing
on top of a mountain,

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and the power of a nurturing community -

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I thought, "How do we give this
to others that are struggling?"

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I thought, "How do we take
thousands of recovering addicts

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up a mountain in a nurturing environment?"

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It seems impossible. But it's not.

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And that's exactly what we did.

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With a core group of people,
I started a nonprofit,

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and we created a sober, active community.

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We've since served
18,000 people in 10 years,

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in five cities, in three states.

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(Cheers)

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(Applause)

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All of those programs are free
to anyone who's 48 hours clean and sober.

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They come to yoga,
hiking, biking and climbing.

153
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They find a positive coping mechanism,

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and they find a peer group
that supports them in their recovery.

155
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And there's a code of conduct
that frames the community.

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It says that anything
that isn't nurturing isn't welcome,

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and with those simple boundaries in place,

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it's had a profound effect
on people's lives.

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Seventy-three percent of people
had improved self-esteem.

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Eighty-two percent felt emotionally safe.

161
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I think the other 18
were probably on that wall.

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(Laughter)

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Sixty-five percent had improved
attitudes towards sobriety.

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And three-quarters of the people
that attend stayed sober.

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(Applause)

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Now I want you to imagine for a moment

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that I'm someone
who's 48 hours clean and sober,

168
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and I show up at this gym.

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I walk up to the door.

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I grab the door handle.

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It feels so heavy.

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It feels so heavy because
this is my first time as an adult

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walking into a roomful of people
without a drink or a drug in my system.

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On top of that, I'm about to do
my first CrossFit workout.

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(Laughter)

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So, am I even going to make it
through the warm-up?

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You know what?

178
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Maybe I'll just go get a drink.

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The guy at the front desk gives me
the waiver and the code of conduct,

180
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and I'm filling it out, thinking,

181
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"I'm just going to hand it
back to this guy,

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and I'm going back to that old apartment
where my friends are still using."

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You know, that kind of apartment
where addicts go to die.

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Or, "I'll just grab a handle
of vodka, and I'll numb out.

185
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I'll make the pain
and the anxiety go away."

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This guy at the front desk, though,
he can tell I'm a little anxious,

187
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and he starts to share his own story.

188
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This guy was a heroin addict?
How's that even possible?

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He's so fit.

190
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Well, he walks with me into the gym,
and in that moment,

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I feel accepted here.

192
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This guy and this other girl
come over to me

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and they help me set up my weights.

194
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They give me a white PVC pipe
and they start to warm me up.

195
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They're teaching me the clean and jerk.

196
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I learned this lift when I was in prison,

197
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but never with technique or form.

198
00:11:01,905 --> 00:11:06,541
"Strong back," they say, "stand it up,
triple extension, high pull."

199
00:11:07,116 --> 00:11:09,057
Now we go back over to the weights.

200
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The room is full of people.

201
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We line up at our barbells,

202
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and the clock starts to count down
to start the workout.

203
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Five, four, three, two...

204
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I look around the gym.

205
00:11:23,357 --> 00:11:25,673
Everyone in here is in recovery.

206
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I can feel that they believe in me -

207
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me: a junky, a drunk.

208
00:11:31,894 --> 00:11:34,136
As a matter of fact,
they believe in me so much

209
00:11:34,160 --> 00:11:37,068
that in that moment,
I start to believe in myself.

210
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The clock clicks over
to start the workout.

211
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I reach down to grab my barbell,

212
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a seemingly unmovable weight.

213
00:11:45,623 --> 00:11:47,313
But I grab it, and I pull,

214
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I pull with all the technique,
strength, and courage

215
00:11:50,097 --> 00:11:52,482
that I draw from the people around me.

216
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And for a moment, it becomes weightless

217
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and it lands on my shoulders.

218
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The bar oscillates from the weight

219
00:12:00,958 --> 00:12:02,904
and I jerk it overheard,

220
00:12:02,928 --> 00:12:06,506
stand it up proudly,
and let it crash to the floor.

221
00:12:07,894 --> 00:12:10,775
I get an acknowledging smile
from my new friends,

222
00:12:11,402 --> 00:12:13,895
and a fist bump
from my new workout partner.

223
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And in that moment,
I find supportive community.

224
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And in that community,

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I find hope.

226
00:12:22,154 --> 00:12:24,487
(Applause)

227
00:12:24,511 --> 00:12:27,227
(Cheers)

228
00:12:27,251 --> 00:12:28,412
Thanks.

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00:12:28,436 --> 00:12:30,568
(Applause)

230
00:12:30,592 --> 00:12:34,338
(Cheers)