Sunday Serenity: Mission Matters

Happy Sunday, Cadre crew. I am happy to be here. I'm Jason Lennox. I'm your resident recovery champion, and thanks for hanging with me here on the time change. Today is not only Sunday, it's Super Bowl Sunday. For those of you that watch football, I will be watching that game later on, and I would pause and take time for this, but I think it might be too loud to hear anything but a bunch of noise in the background. So here we are doing an afternoon session of Sunday serenity. And today I want to talk about mission.

And last week, I talked about purpose, and I look at purpose as kind of the why I'm doing what I'm doing, why we are doing what we are doing. And mission is really the what. What is it that I am trying to do? And, you know, fittingly, on Super Bowl Sunday, each of those teams that start out, there are 32 of them, start out with the same mission, to get to this day and win this game, to be crowned the champion of the entire league. And it's easy to see, year after year, the people that continue to be rooted in their mission.

You'll see the same team showing up. So interesting that we're talking about mission. Good afternoon, Sherry. It's good to see you. So I want to talk a little bit. Again, we talked about purpose last week, which is why we do what we do. Hello. Good afternoon, Joe. I now want to talk about mission and the what it is. And, Luke, you know, never fails. Love seeing you, too, buddy. I have a mission that I like to think about as trying to give back to this world as much as I can. This world that saved my life, because that's what happened.

The people that were there in this space of recovery, who walked the walk before me were there to help save my life because it was going to end, and it was going to end young. Almost did several times. And so that's my mission now. It's easy to stay in that when things are going well. But this last week, I had some sickness. Come on. Actually, the second time I've been sick in, like, five years. It hasn't happened often. I had COVID once a couple years ago, and now this cold that came on and kind of knocked me out for several days.

And I had some other noise and just some personal stuff, really challenging stuff going on in my life. And it's been that way for a couple weeks, and so it's a little bit harder to stay in mission there now. I was speaking and reminded of mission and why it matters. I was speaking to a treatment center, the treatment center I actually went to, I get to do this about once per month or so, and I've done it for probably six or seven years. And even though I was sick, even though I had the struggles, I decided, yes, sicknesses are going around.

I decided I was going to do this. These are people that maybe they need to hear something. And so I joined. And it just so happened that one of the women who worked there and was attacked when I went through one of the most instrumental people in my early recovery, for sure. In fact, I wrote about her in my book. She was there. She was in the room, and she's not there often. So of course I'm telling my story and things are a little bit different, especially when I'm talking about her and I get through my story and I'm always really up another level when that happens and when I get to share with people who I empathize with, who I really want to see get well and who I know may be in a position, maybe one statement, maybe one story away from life or death.

I mean, that's what kept me on this road for many years and sometimes still does, is the stories and just the strength and hearing from other people that it is possible. And so that's why I was sharing it. You know, I get to the end and I'm a little, you know, I'm a little wired. I'm fired up. I'm glad I did this. And sue, the person at the treatment center that I mentioned who worked there, she still worked there. She's done this for many, many years and served a lot of people. She said, why don't you stay on after a little bit?

I want to talk to you for a few minutes. So I hang on and there are a few people there in the room from the treatment program that hung back, and then the rest kind of went their own way. And she kind of got emotional and she said, you know, I've been able to watch you. I've been able to read the book. I've been able to do what I need to do to see where you're at and the things that you're able to do in life. And I just have to say, this is like the work that Bill and Bob did. She's like the work that you get to do and the work and the impact that you're having, taking your messages, sharing, helping, serving, living the life that you live is exactly what they did.

And so don't ever quit that. She said, there are going to be dogs barking there are going to be things happening, but drown them out. And it was so fitting because all this stuff is kind of going on as I'm sharing, and she doesn't know that, but she just happens to be speaking exactly what I needed to hear. And so she continued down that path, just, you know, keep doing this and keep doing this and keep doing this. And it reminded me then that, yes, and I had a call with my coach the next day and I said, you know, my job is to protect and carry out my mission, which is to help as many people as I can in a world that saved my life.

And that's what I'll continue to do. And when I can stay rooted in that, man, all the challenges aren't as challenging. They're still there. They're still the things. But I realize that I'm blessed because I went through the pain, the suffering and everything that I did to come out the other side and try to serve people. That's been my mission. That's been my mission since I found recovery, because I didn't think I was going to be here. And when I found recovery and I found a different way to live, I thought, what the h***?

I might as well leave it all out there. I might as well give as much of it away as I can. And that's how I. That's exactly how I try to live my life. And yes, you're welcome. I'm glad we all have missions, and sometimes it's just about pulling them out and documenting and thinking and then remembering those when the times get a little bit challenging. So that carries me through, carry me through the last week, hopefully carries you through. You can point back to, what am I here doing? It's really meaningful to be connected to that and to continue.

That's why companies have mission vision values, because it's something to point back to when things get challenging and when it's not going as expected. And so I will continue. My call to action. The ask of you is to think about what is your mission? Find that mission and live in that, and do it with a couple things in mind. Being authentic, one of the things I preach more than any, being authentic and then staying in integrity. Because those two things, when we start to break those two things down and not really live like that, it's really hard to follow the mission, right?

It doesn't make sense as much. So following the mission is one thing, but continuing to live with authenticity, continuing to strive for integrity over and over and over, that's what's going to help us get there. Yeah. Thank you, Sherry. I love reading what all of you have to say. And got to have coffee the other day. And glad to see all the great things you're doing, too, Luke. Everyone on here would love to meet others. I know that we're in this together. And there you go in your coaching practice.

Authenticity. That's where it's at. We relate with each other. So, anyhow, check out your mission, think about it, and leverage that when times get a little bit challenging. And remember, be authentic and strive for integrity, because that's what matters. Have a great Sunday.