Episode 1101: When You Feel Like Giving Up

Episode 1101: When You Feel Like Giving Up

Curious about how others navigate their sobriety journey? This conversation on Take 12 Recovery Radio’s *Came to Believe Recovery Podcast* digs into what really happens when you feel like throwing in the towel—and why that might actually be the turning point. Host Monty “the Monty'man” Meyer and co-host Tom Williams start with some light-hearted “whining” about modern frustrations—endless customer service bots, duplicated medical forms, and the joys of trying to reach a real human being.

It’s funny, relatable, and sets up a bigger question: what do you do when life feels like too much and giving up seems easier than carrying on? They unpack the difference between surrender and submission in recovery. Surrender, as they frame it, is that exhausted moment you stop fighting a losing battle. Submission is what happens next: choosing, day by day, to follow a new way of life.

As Tom puts it, “Surrender is dropping the oar because the river is too strong. Submission is choosing to row in the direction the river is already flowing.” The pair respond to emails and comments on common recovery phrases like “the only requirement is the desire to quit” and “take what you want and leave the rest”, challenging how useful these really are for newcomers.

They stress that many people are willing to surrender, but far fewer are shown *how* to submit to a practical programme of action. There’s also a powerful moment where Monty describes telling a struggling friend to write down everything he *can’t* do, then list what he *can* do—and start there. It’s tough love, but grounded in real experience of getting unstuck one small action at a time.

If you’ve been feeling paralysed, stuck in your head, or tired of “just coming back” without much changing, this chat might nudge you to ask: have you surrendered, or are you actually ready to submit to a new way of living?