Recovery
Ratings5
Average rating3.4
15
Ratings5
Average rating3.4
"A guide to all kinds of addiction from a star who has struggled with heroin, alcohol, sex, fame, food and eBay, that will help addicts and their loved ones make the first steps into recovery; 'This manual for self-realization comes not from a mountain but from the mud... My qualification is not that I am better than you but I am worse'--Russell Brand. With a rare mix of honesty, humor, and compassion, comedian and movie star Russell Brand mines his own wild story and shares the advice and wisdom he has gained through his fourteen years of recovery. Brand speaks to those suffering along the full spectrum of addiction--from drugs, alcohol, caffeine, and sugar addictions to addictions to work, stress, bad relationships, digital media, and fame. Brand understands that addiction can take many shapes and sizes and how the process of staying clean, sane, and unhooked is a daily activity. He believes that the question is not 'Why are you addicted?' but 'What pain is your addiction masking? Why are you running--into the wrong job, the wrong life, the wrong person's arms?' Russell has been in all the twelve-step fellowships going, he's started his own men's group, he's a therapy regular and a practiced yogi--and while he's worked on this material as part of his comedy and previous bestsellers, he's never before shared the tools that really took him out of it, that keep him clean and clear. Here he provides not only a recovery plan, but an attempt to make sense of the ailing world"--Provided by publisher.
Reviews with the most likes.
This is one of the most powerful, winsome books on personal growth and change. It shows us that the 12 steps are for all who feel some sort of ache that they are not who they want to be–in other words, all of us. Through beautiful and profound insights, narratives, and a whole workbook section, Brand shows us that there is hope, however like hell it'll feel like to get there. Amazing. Can't recommend it enough.
I started this book to understand addiction. I finished this book understanding myself (1% more).
Yep. Changed my life. Holy moly.
Yes - grain of salt - yes - but that's with anything...Could probably skip the whole anecdote in step 6...
but other than that I was really really impressed with how this managed to communicate that it's OK and it's Human to make mistakes, to give in to the monkey mind, to choose the wrong ‘program' to solve our darkest, deepest woes - it's human to suffer in this way.
But it's also human to believe in something greater within, and this is one of the many ways to find that.
Some quotes:
‘The inner condition is what we must address.
When you start to eat, drink, wank, spend, obsess, you have lost connection to the great power within you and others. The power around all things. There is something speaking to you and you don't understand it because you don't speak its language - so you try to palm it off with porn but it's your spirit and it craves connection.
Spend time alone. Write. Pray. Meditate. This is where we learn the language.'
“If we all feel we are alone then how alone are we? If we all feel worthless then who is the currency of our worth being measured against?”
“We are all here suffering together. Our job is to help and love eachother”
“I think it's part of being human. To carry a wound. A flaw. And again, paradoxically, it is only by facing it that we can progress”
++++ for Alfred the way he speaks of Meditation & solitude.
PS my favourite quote from the book, and a reminder of how much we are changed by everyone we interact with:
‘In chemistry, when two substances are introduced, if either component reacts at all then both are changed forever'
