Sunday Serenity

Good evening and happy Sunday to the Cadre Sphere. I hope you're all having wonderful weekends, winding down, getting ready for the week. This is Sunday Serenity and I am Jason Lennox. I'm your resident recovery champion, here to talk about all things recovery, mental health, well being. And I'm excited to share a little more last week and Mother's Day. So I kind of took a detour and just took some time to honor all the moms out here. But a couple weeks ago when I got back from Ireland, I shared about the lesson that I learned there, the number one lesson, and that I relearned because this happens to me seems like at least on an annual basis where I kind of get this moment of yeah, I just need to say yes or I need to take the chance.

And so I shared about take the chance as kind of the number one lesson that I brought back from Ireland and I shared a little bit more about that. Good evening, Jules. Great to see you. Hope you're having a wonderful weekend. I shared a little more about it on some social media platforms that there's actually another level to it. A good evening, Sherry. Great to see you as well. But yeah, there's taking the chance there, saying yes, there's doing some of the things and we don't feel like it. We're comfortable or we're trying to avoid discomfort, whatever the case may be.

So taking the chances again, just something that believes strongly in. But what I shared about is there's another level of taking the chance when it comes to kind of success and what it takes. And that's being okay with failing because we take a lot of chances in life. I'll give you a few examples for me of things that happen and things that seem like they're successes. But behind the scenes, what people don't see is that this is just a repeated effort and taking a chance over and over and over, knowing that there's going to be failure.

So I want to give you three examples of that. First of all, I two weeks ago, maybe, maybe a week ago, I don't remember when it was, but maybe sometime last week. Either way, I ran. I got out and ran a 5K and from 2013 until 2018 had six knee surgeries. Two of them were major on my five of them on the same knee. Two of those five were very major, kind of life altering. I didn't really ever plan on running again. I was kind of told that I wouldn't, that it probably wouldn't be a good idea. And then 2018, 2019, I thought I'm gonna try running a half mile.

1 miles. So I ran a mile, then I ran two and then I tried to, maybe I ran three before. Anyway, I ran the 5k. And ever since then, the last three years, I'll say I've run, we'll call it one a month. And I've done a couple that I've participated in Turkey Trot down in Faribault. And anyhow, I, last week I ran the fastest one that I had ever run. And I ran a month ago or something and I was a minute slower. I mean it just. Is this an example of. Yeah, like I did that. But I also over and over and over fell short of what I was trying to do.

So that was one example, another. When I went to Ireland, I wanted to go see what their treatment system was like. Mental health, substance use, I could talk about that, especially on the mental health side. It's such a broken system. Mental health and substance use, they're not even connected. In fact, I'll just share this little bit, this tidbit that I couldn't wrap my head around. There is a rule for folks who are Medicaid that have co occurring disorders, so substance use and mental health disorders, that those folks cannot get mental health assessment or mental health therapy until they first address substance use disorder.

They have to be sober essentially for six months before the state will pay for any mental health treatment. Which is baffling to me because the fact is mental health often is the underlying condition. And how would you ever be able to address substance use if you don't address mental. So anyway, that's just a little side note there. So I wanted to get in and kind of dig into their system and I shot a whole bunch of messages off to a bunch of bigger programs I could find around Ireland and fully expected, like I'm some random person coming from out of the country.

Who the heck's gonna answer? I got a whole bunch of non responses. And then there was one person that answered, yes, it is backwards, Sherry. So then there was one person that answered and she was from a program, she was a leader in a program, it's one of the biggest in the country of Ireland. And they had, they were going to set me up and have me come visit a site. Okay. So I got there and we had planned on me going to this men's site and they messaged and said, actually, can you come to the family site?

Because it's family Day and it might be cool for you to see change of plan. So last minute pivot. I went to the family program. I happened to meet there again, that division leader they had, their department leader, the CEO was even there. I got to spend some real time talking with her about the states versus Ireland and just all the cool things that they're doing and the way their program is structured. They had. The local senator was there, so I got to meet her and chit chat a little bit there.

Anyhow, all that seemed like a really big win for my time in Ireland, but none of it would have happened again. And like, I had a whole bunch of non responses. So it was about reaching out, taking a chance, just throwing it out there, throwing spaghetti at the wall. I guess that's what you call it. Knowing that I was probably going to fail. And the last example I'll give my brother had a benefit. My brother is younger than me, 34, and was recently diagnosed with stage four lung cancer that had spread to his brain, his eyes, his bones.

This happened in January. So we started, of course, went down the benefit route and hosted that. And I did a lot of the planning and a lot of the outreach and trying to just really make this thing something special for him. And we had John Randall who headlined the event. John Randall is one of the greatest Minnesota Vikings ever. One of the best football players of all time, actually, for his position, easily one of the top five, but hall of Famer. And he showed up and it was just him, and it was absolutely amazing.

People see that, people look at that and they go, wow, what a successful event. Actually, my brother got to play him. I asked him to. Another chance I took because I was working with his liaison and asking, would he do this? Would he do this? And she said, you should just stick to what you asked for, which is a meet and greet. Don't try to go too far and ask too much because, you know, it's just he's not got a lot of time. Anyhow. I said, okay, well, I'm done talking and asking her. But when he got there, I went and asked him anyway and asked if he would play a game of beanbags with my brother and then sign the board so we could live auction the Minnesota Vikings beanbag boards.

Of course he said, absolutely, let's do it. So it looks like this, this wonderful time and success, but what people don't see again is like, yeah, I just had to reach out, how did that happen? I said I don't know. I reached out to so many people in a few weeks span I must have sent 40 or 50 messages. I only received three responses, two of which were no go's and one of which was John Randall who ended up showing up. So my point is for us to kind of move to the next level and do these kinds of things in life, to have these every day, like these big time moments.

It requires us to take the chance and do it regularly, consistently knowing that sometimes it's going to result in failure. And I think we are pretty well equipped to deal with that. Now the other point of this that I want to make here and this happens over and over and over in my life, I'm just regularly like I've started several businesses. I'm just always looking for different ways to kind of grow and to serve and to be just a steward and a person who contributes to this world rather than takes from it.

I'll tell you what really helps with all of that. And this is so important. This is something I believe wholeheartedly in and this is something that I, I think gets, gets us through life farther and faster than any other thing there is. And it's one word, it's called purpose. So when I was going over to Ireland, I'll start there, I had a purpose. I wanted to get over there. I wanted to understand globally, like how are these things happening? How is it different over here? So I didn't care if I was going to get 10, 15, 20 non answers.

In fact, again I expected it. I would expect that from a random person from another country. Just ask him to come show up. The example with, with my, my brother again, like there's obviously that's my little brother, what he's going through is, is tremendously hard, very tragic and everything that's happening easy, right? Like purpose is there, that's gonna drive me. I really don't care what people say. I don't care if there are no's. I don't care if I don't even get any responses. I don't care if it takes me 15 hours to try to do something just to make that moment where he got to dominate.

By the way, John Randall in beanbags. That was full of purpose. And I think purpose again is what drives. I used to have this Cancer foundation. We would take events into hospitals for children with cancer and other serious diseases. And it was, you know, some of the most meaningful work I'd ever done again. In the beginning, nobody knew who we were. This was a new business, it was a new conversation and people just didn't know. So there were a lot of nos. There weren't a lot of people willing to support financially.

I had to start with a committee of three or four to help and there just was a lot of that. But at the end of the day, when I could think about those little kids and the thing that I was trying to do and weave in my purpose, I didn't really care. And so I think that's important because again, I gave the message at we do big things and we have great lives. When we take chances behind that there's another layer. We take chances consistently knowing we're going to fail to be able to do that. Because again, like in this 2025 world where everything is so quick to be gratified and we really need all that assurance all the time, it's hard to just show up and know that you know and accept that we're going to fail at some of these things.

But, but when the purpose is there, when the underlying purpose is there and I can tap into that and I can understand this is why I'm doing what I'm doing, the rest of it doesn't matter, matters a little bit. Maybe it crosses my mind, but when I can go back to the John Randall and I can think about my brother and I can imagine what he's going through and I've had to watch some of that easy, easy for me to go all in and do the things I'm doing. So again, I just wanted to elaborate a little bit on Take the Chance, I believe is just a three word powerful statement.

Take the chance, elaborate a little bit. Knowing that we're going to have to do that consistently realizing that we'll fail, failure will be a part of that process. But as I said in the post, failure isn't necessarily a bad thing. In fact, failure and all those other moments just kept pushing me toward the path, toward the door that would be open. All those closed doors that I kept getting were kind of swaying me over here to the one that I knew would eventually open. And to do that again, to be able to go head to head with failure, with no's, with non responses, with the just depressing, kind of like defeating feeling that comes when you're trying, we're trying and we're trying and not getting anywhere.

What makes that possible for me is purpose. And I found so much purpose and work in this, in this industry of recovery of Mental health of treatment, but also the purpose that I found in serving the world and I don't take a lot of credit for it. That was my network early on saying, look, your life and the amount of fulfillment that meaning that you take from it and that you bring to your grave is going to depend on how much you're willing to serve the world and its people. So I listened to that because I was so desperate.

I just listened and I was willing to do and listen and act and do all the things that these people said would make a difference. And being of service is one. And having that purpose again is what gets me through kind of the darker times and understanding, you know, it's not always going to work out the way we want to. So again, few things take the chance. We do it consistently knowing that we would end up, we will end up failing. But what makes that possible to get through those moments is, is the purpose that's behind what we're doing.

We can find purpose in this world. We're so much better off. We have something to get up for, we have something to live for. When I have purpose in my life, the need to go out and seek external gratification through drugs, through alcohol, through food, all the things dwindles a little bit and I can just be and that's fine, I'm serene and I have some peace. But expanding my world and life, which is what I get so excited about, really creating this like never ending feeling of just meaning and fulfillment comes from purpose and how much I'm willing to serve.

So I hope you have some of those things in your lives. If not, I would love to chit, chat a little bit and share, share more. I mean I'm happy to sit down and have these conversations with anyone. This is my jam, this is what I love doing. Talking about purpose, how we find that, how we fulfill on this life and most of all how we end up being healthier, better versions of ourselves. Because that's the end result. Even though that's not what I'm seeking, I know that my level of service and my commitment to other people will ultimately give me the joy and satisfaction that I've experienced over and over.

That's not why I'm doing it. I'm doing it because of the other people, the places, the things that I know we can make such a difference in. So hope you've gotten a few nuggets out of this. I look forward to catching up a little bit next week. Exciting for you. Maybe. Maybe you'll be a little envious but I'll probably be doing this thing Sunday night. If I do it Sunday night, it's going to be from Hawaii. I'm actually taking my little brother there. So try to get in a good spot there where I've got some wifi and maybe a better background than what you see here.

But I'll plan on doing it either way. And like I said, maybe it'll be from some beach. I hope you all have wonderful weeks and look forward to doing it again in seven days. Bye.