#116 - Headspace with Chad Towersey
Let The Journey Begin
This week, Jason and Alex are joined by local Orange County personality, Chad Towersey. Chad grew up in a very nice Newport Beach household with all sorts of sports aspirations, including baseball, golf, and surfing. Even with things seemingly as good as they could get for a young teenager, Chad describes how his first sip of alcohol, almost as if magic, soothed a deep-rooted feeling of anger inside him that he had always had. He believes he was already suffering from untreated alcoholism from the get-go and things only intensified as he got older and made his way into college. Today, with...
info_outline
#115 - Quest For More with Diana Beals (Part 2)
Let The Journey Begin
Celebrating her eight-year sobriety anniversary, Diana Beals returns with Jason and Alex to conclude the story of her recovery transformation. In this week’s episode, Diana discusses how at the beginning of her sobriety journey, she wrestled with the idea that she was truly powerless, which she believes is one of the main reasons why it took so long for sobriety to stick and why she ultimately passed through so many different treatment centers. Diana has always admired organizations and their traditions, and she tells the story of how a simple sobriety birthday candle would end up being a...
info_outline
#114 - Quest For More with Diana Beals (Part 1)
Let The Journey Begin
Jason and Alex are pleased to be joined this week by Director of Operations for Catalyst Recovery, Diana Beals. From an early age, Diana always described herself as a thrill-seeker. She would jump her bike off an unfinished deck in her backyard as a young girl because the feeling of inner peace she achieved was something she would continually strive for. She believes that this was an early indicator that the addict gene was in her all along…it was just waiting to be kindled. She eventually was introduced to hard drugs by an unlikely source, and it was only a matter of time before she dove...
info_outline
#113 - Decision Making with Dr. Alan Barnard
Let The Journey Begin
This week, Alex Meschi and Jaana Woodbury are joined by speaker, entrepreneur, app developer, author, and CEO of Goldratt Research Labs, Dr. Alan Barnard. From an early age, Dr. Barnard was always fascinated by human decision making. He would wonder what would influence individuals to make the decisions they did and why many good people made bad decisions. He has since dedicated his work to the study of behavioral psychology and decision science to hopefully find an answer to these questions. He discusses with Alex and Jaana the idea of positive/negative responses in accordance with life...
info_outline
#112 - The Gift and The Secret with Veronica Valli
Let The Journey Begin
This week, Veronica Valli: author, recovery coach, and host of the Soberful Podcast, celebrating her 22nd year of sobriety, joins Alex Meschi and Jaana Woodbury. Veronica was introduced to alcohol and drugs at an early age. She discovered substances seemingly went hand in hand with a few other things she adored: partying, dancing, and going to nightclubs. Things began taking a dark turn, however, when she found herself hospitalized after a bad hallucinogenic experience and compromising her integrity and dignity while under the influence. All the while, Veronica was completely bought...
info_outline
#111 - Fork In The Road with Cade Saurage (Part 2)
Let The Journey Begin
This week, Hilary and Jaana conclude their conversation with Ocean Recovery CEO, Cade Saurage. The previous week we left off with Cade describing the moment he finally surrendered, and we pick back up this week as he describes how things went from there. Both Cade and his then-wife were battling addiction, going through treatment at the same time, and raising kids amid their struggles. With over 15 years of sobriety under his belt now, he discusses the differences between short-term and long-term sobriety and how much his routine has changed over the years. For Cade, having a relationship with...
info_outline
#110 - Fork In The Road with Cade Saurage (Part 1)
Let The Journey Begin
This week, in Part 1 of a two-part episode, Hilary and Jaana Woodbury are joined by Ocean Recovery CEO, Cade Saurage. Growing up surrounded by drinkers, Cade discovered his liking of alcohol at an early age. Lots of drinking in high school eventually evolved into a liking for cocaine later in his college years. It all seemed like fun at the time in his early 20s, but he found out how difficult things would become after college when he had to “grow up”. Cade thought he could do all the right things for himself and his family while also maintaining a thriving party lifestyle. He found;...
info_outline
#109 - Bring The Light with Pastor Earl Fitzsimmons
Let The Journey Begin
This week, Hilary and Jason welcome Bring The Light Ministries Founder, Pastor Earl Fitzsimmons. Feeling out of place in his younger years, Earl just wanted to be “one of the guys”, believing that drinking was the answer. He quickly found out, however, that his drinking was different than that of his peers and that he was drinking alcoholically. Things progressed, as they do, into his early twenties to the point in which Earl would plan his whole day around his drinking and he would be "poured" into a cab by the end of the night. Yet, one day, something snapped within Earl, and he...
info_outline
#108 - One Step Ahead with Mataya Mandarino
Let The Journey Begin
A few weeks earlier, Danielle Provot was kind enough to share the story of losing her husband to addiction and having to overcome her own struggles with the same disease soon after. During this time, Danielle had two young girls…Mataya was one of them. Today, Mataya Mandarino joins Hilary and Alex to give her perspective of what it was like losing her father at such a young age and how her parents’ struggles with addiction affected her. Losing her father and watching her mom work through it put her into a state of constant anxiety. Mataya felt like she had to be the mother of the household...
info_outline
#107 - Recipe For Success with Angie Wisdom
Let The Journey Begin
Life and Business Coach, Angie Wisdom, joins Alex and Ariel Gale this week, as they fill in for Hilary and Jason. Stemming from a desire of always wanting to help people, Angie began an early career in nursing. She quickly found out, however, that this was not the right fit for her. She also grew up loving numbers and finance, so she then transitioned into a career as a financial adviser, recognizing this as another method to help people by way of establishing a solid financial well-being. After doing this for many years, she made her way into life and business coaching and has been...
info_outlineThis week, Owner/CEO of JDS Consulting, Inc, James Sewell, joins Hilary and Jason. Growing up in Omaha, Nebraska, James never felt like he could truly be himself; however, during his time in college he finally felt comfortable letting loose and being who he was. He talks about having generalized anxiety and feeling different than his peers, but alcohol was the solution able to bring down the barriers. For him, letting loose meant going out to the bars six days a week and what was once an opportunity to have fun, quickly escalated into a problem. Eventually, his drinking career resulted in several DUIs over a span of a few years and his court-ordered treatment from one particular counselor is what changed his life. He began looking at all the reasons why he drank and by working on those deep-seated problems, he has been able to stay sober for over 10 years. One of James’s main messages in sobriety is to be kinder to oneself and how it is important to accept the reality of sobriety. During addiction, the substance is what makes the world around us and our situation feel great; however, the world is not like that. There are good days and there are bad days and James stresses the important part for him was to arrive at a place in which he can accept this reality and live in it without needing a substance, a reality in which James refers to as “The Gray Area.” Today, James works in the recovery and mental health field in hopes of improving some of the shortcomings addiction treatment can have.
You can connect with James and find his work at:
- JDS Consulting, Inc (Insurance Billing and Consulting for Behavioral Health Facilities): https://www.jdsconsultinginc.com/
- TRUST SoCal (Detox and Residential for Primary Mental Health): https://trustsocal.com/
- Training Institute for Addiction Counselors: https://www.traininginstitute.org/w/
For more information on the Red Songbird Foundation, please visit:
If you are interested in donating to the Red Songbird Foundation, please visit:
Follow us on Instagram at: @redsongbirdfoundation
New episode every Thursday!
Check us out on YouTube every Friday! Let The Journey Begin Podcast
Please subscribe, rate, and review!
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.