138: From the Perspective of an Addict’s Loved One: Transmuting Pain Into Service with KL Wells

When we are in deep pain or we have these hardships in our life, we have to learn how to transmute them and turn them into something different – not just overcoming it. As for KL Wells, she decided to transmute her pain into service by helping others whose loved ones are struggling with addiction.

KL is a businesswoman and she has a 30-year-old son who is a recovering addict. Through the course of her life, she has lived the generational story around addiction, not struggling with addiction herself, but being able to see addiction from a different perspective. Her mom was addicted to prescription medications, which was something popular back in those days. Then she had a brother who was addicted to cocaine. She married an alcoholic and divorced, and had her son out of that marriage. She subsequently remarried a recovering alcoholic of 28 years.

Seeing her son being arrested at gunpoint and who was yelling at her to save him was a very traumatic experience for her. In that moment, every dream she had for him shattered. Her heart broke, but in that "cracking open," she also knew it was meant to happen for her, fully aware that you have to give yourself permission to completely dissolve, and let the emotions work through you.

Hearing KL’s story, there's so much resilience flowing through her. When you have a child who is suffering from a disease that could kill him or her, it has a catalytic impact on us, as parents, like nothing else can. She knew she had to put this down in a way that she can help other people because it's incredibly painful to witness the people you love in so much suffering.

Today, KL talks about her project, Voices InCourage, a community that provides that space where you actually feel heard on a multitude of layers and levels, and that people get you because they've walked that path. Then you can be raw and real, and transmute it for yourself so it serves your journey.

In this episode, you will hear:

• KL’s journey as the loved one of different addicts
• The two major questions from which Voices InCourage was born out of
• The two life-defining moments for KL
• Transmuting your challenges instead of overcoming them
• Embracing our traumas and grief

Key Quotes:

[06:56] - “Pain pushes until vision pulls.”

[08:36] - "When you have a child who is suffering with the disease that could kill him or her, it has a catalytic impact on us as parents, like nothing else can."

[12:17] - “You have to give yourself permission to completely dissolve, and let the emotions work through you.”

[14:53] - “In the midst of COVID, with all the numbers just skyrocketing in terms of overdoses and relapses, addiction going up, alcoholism going up, and abuse going up… We're in a pandemic of proportions we've never seen before.”

[16:59] - “We are on the planet to serve. All of our life experiences are building blocks to service.”

[18:26] - “We're human beings, and we have a full component of emotions and sadness and grief are part of life.”

[25:37] - "95% of our success or failure is predicated on the community that we surround ourselves with."

[26:46] - "One of the top human needs is to be heard and we're not trained to do this as a society, as a culture, as a world."

Supporting Resources:

https://voicesincourage.com/

Man's Search for Meaning Book by Viktor Frankl

Episode Credits

If you like this podcast and are thinking of creating your own, consider talking to my producer, Danny Ozment.

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