I have just finished reading Russell Brand’s book “Recovery – Freedom from Addiction”.

Yeah, I have a few addictions as most of us do…. food, TV, Social Media etc etc etc

What Russell does in this book is uses the 12 Steps Program of Alcoholics Anonymous to tackle most of life’s problems – particularly the ones which are making our lives unmanageable…. e.g. drinking, gambling, being a shit partner in a relationship.

I will let you decide if this is workable for you or not – just buy the book. Try Amazon (the Aussie site) as it is pretty cheap and mine arrived in a couple of days – I still think shopping on line is a bit like magic.

Anyway, the point of this brief post is to say one of the things Russell looks for in his life of 12 years sober, off the drugs and off the chicks is ‘signs’. The often difficult part of the 12 steps program for your average skeptic is the ‘God’ part. This is fantastically addressed in the book – bloody hell I should be getting so sort of kick back for this but I am not. I am a great believer in ‘signs’ in our lives but I’m more of a follow your intuition, follow your gut type guy as opposed to the burning bush – who knows they may come from the same sourse.

So, the point is the other day a mate was having a few hiccups in hospital and struggling so I paid him a visit and we had a chat about dialectic thinking (just thought I’s chuck that one in to confuse you and now I can’t remember if I have ever written a post on it – note to self, check if I have, if not write one – also you might want to try Dr Google on that one!)…..

…. I then went to a local football Club in Adelaide (I will name it – Kenilworth!) where a mate had raised a heap of money and the new Club rooms were open…. it’s the old Panther Park at St Mary’s I think, but if you’re around check it out. Love seeing my mate and the tour of the fantastic new Club rooms…. a lot of how are ya mates and quick introductions and even a snag and a piece of bread – actually the perfect end to the day and I reckon I had a few ‘signs’ to say I was doing the right thing. Thanks Universe, God, etc etc whatever you’re flavour is…..

I then get an intro to a bloke; we have a moment ….. not in a gay way and not that if it was there would be anything wrong with that…. but, we then had that laugh at the same time when we realised we knew each other. Yeah, the catch was we hadn’t seen each other for 35 years.

This blokes name is Alan Stringer who was a Glenelg footballer back in the day. Married to a mates sister and a few cans we had in our early 20’s.

We sat and chatted and my jaw dropped. We had the same struggles and it was like he was talking about my life.

There is a pod cast with Graham Cornes which is worth every minute of the time you take to listen to a man that went into the dark places and came out the other side – yep, there was damage and he owns it. Click here for the link to the pod cast.

Alan is now helping other footballers who are tackling the ‘black dog’ and the Advertiser did an article on it. Click here for the link were you don’t have to subscribe – it is via Twitter so just click on the article.

So, time to finish this post which is really about ‘signs’ – and most of all as it turns out connection to an old mate, who fought his demons and not only won, but is helping others. We exchanged numbers and had another sausage and bread and knew that fate, the Buddha etc etc etc etc may have just aligned the universe for us to meet up.

I know one thing: that is just what I needed that day.

I need to sit and have a think…. maybe Russell is not only funny as anything but may have just pointed me in the right direction in a lot of ways.

There might be 12 Steps, but I think at a local footy Club the Universe pushed me forward on my first couple.