Yesterday I celebrated seven years of sobriety. It was a perfect day. I took two naps. Worked on Dumpster Fire with Maggie and Sam. Ate sushi and watched the Dodgers game 7 while live-chatting with the phetasy.com community. Friends reached out to congratulate me and catch up. I marveled at how calm and stable my life is currently. After decades of chaos, the fact that my life looks supremely boring and normal is undoubtedly the biggest miracle of sobriety. And there have been many.

But the day after an anniversary is always weird. It’s appropriate that it falls on a Monday this year because it feels like a Monday no matter what day it falls on. Yesterday I woke up filled with gratitude, humbled by how much I have in my life and feeling a sense of connection to the people in my life, God and the community we are building here. Joy. Optimism. Hope.

Today, the black dog scratches at the door. Depression sniffs around, looking for a place to get comfy. Nothing happened that I could pin point. It’s slightly disappointing that neither one of my parents called me yesterday or probably even knew it was my sober anniversary. I don’t need their approval or their accolades, it’s just a painful reminder of this feeling that has persisted since I was a child and followed me into adulthood.

NO ONE IS COMING.

Sometimes I think I’m putting distance between me and that sensation. Other times it’s right there. Like some apparition that stands in the dining room, reminding me of the nights, weeks, years of being alone and trying to figure out how I was going to figure it out. As a child. As a teen. In my 20s and 30s. That age old loneliness and fear. Boo.

Boo fucking hoo. So instead of feeling sorry for myself, I do 10 pushups. It always works to shift the brain chemicals, even if just for a moment.

Then I went on Twitter for all of 30 seconds to promote Dumpster Fire and it made me anxious and unsettled. I felt like an autistic kid covering my ears. There’s so much fucking noise pollution on that site. Toxicity and projection and mental illness on display. Why am I partaking in any of this? Maybe it’s just the time of the year. Getting darker earlier. Winter is coming. I want to hibernate and read and check out. I crave silence.

Dumpster Fire was hard to shoot this week. In fact, it gets harder every week as more and more censorship comes down the pipes and China grows in power globally in our absence and we get closer to what looks like will be a highly contested election no matter what the results. Divided we fall. This is why when people ask me why I give a shit about some semblance of unity— our founders understood that—they understood we had to have some common purpose to keep us from either self-destructing or being overtaken. It’s usually a combination of both when a global power falls. The strange sensation of being on the back end of an empire’s peak, knowing, it’s probably gonna get a lot worse. LA is a physical reflection of this. The city is boarded up. The homelessness and violence and crime and mental illness gets worse every single day. It’s not clear how this situation improves as it’s only deteriorated for the past decade.

The mental illness spreading in America is disturbing. It’s been elevated to the highest offices and positions in the land. We reward entertainers who aren’t well with podcast appearances and money and attention. So that they can make more money and get more attention and continue spreading whatever insanity seems to be infecting the whole populace. Children acting out. Bad behavior being rewarded with attention.

And yet--I can't do a damn thing about any of it. I’m powerless over 98% of the things that concern me. I can control my behavior. My habits. I can reach out to others and see how they’re doing. I look for ways to be of service. Organize my office. Meditate. Read. And do whatever it takes to keep myself sober and as sane as one can be.

So today, after a rocky start, I did what I’ve been taught. Pray. Meditate. I went to a meeting. I shared that I’m struggling with them, and now you. I’m writing. I’ll work out at noon and food prep after that. The beauty of sobriety is that I’m cool riding the waves of anxiety and depression and insecurity and loneliness and fear. Right now in this moment, everything is okay. Hope is sleeping soundly next to me. There is a roof over my head. Everyone in my life that I love is healthy. I’m healthy. I have food and water.

The black dog will move on. And this too shall pass.