Episode 69 | The RecoveryFirst Podcast with Mike Todd | "Finding Our Greatest Joys In Life & Recovery"Episode 69 | The RecoveryFirst Podcast with Mike Todd | "Finding Our Greatest Joys In Life & Recovery"
The Recovery First Addiction Recovery Podcast by Freedom Recovery Services of Greenville
Mike Todd reflects on leaving a decade of recovery housing work, standing at a personal crossroads, and seeking his greatest joys through faith, service, and community. He encourages others to pause, become "human beings" rather than "human doings," and pursue the kind of joy that comes from helping others.
10:14•17 Mar 2022
Finding Joy at Life’s Crossroads: Mike Todd on Recovery, Purpose and Service
Episode Overview
- Quiet reflection and faith can help clarify the next steps when life feels like a crossroads.
- Community-based recovery and shared housing can create strong accountability and support.
- Pursuing work that brings joy, especially in serving others, can sustain long-term recovery.
- Spending time with people society overlooks, such as drug users and those who are homeless, can be a source of deep connection and purpose.
- Everyone is encouraged to identify what brings them joy in giving and to follow that as a way to improve both their lives and their communities.
“I challenge you, if you're in recovery, not in recovery, to spend some time being a human being and finding out what your greatest joys are.”
Get ready to be moved by real-life accounts of what happens when recovery, faith, and purpose collide. In this RecoveryFirst share, host Mike Todd sits at a personal crossroads and talks honestly about what comes after a decade of intense service in recovery housing. Mike reflects on how his life was shaped by living with other men in early recovery, long before structured recovery housing was common.
That tight-knit community, accountability, and belief that addiction is a disease laid the groundwork for the last ten years of his life, where he helped create and improve recovery housing in South Carolina.
He notes, "I really haven't had that mundane existence, and I give that credit to God and recovery." Recently retired from his recovery housing work, Mike shares how he's using quiet time and faith to figure out his "next chapter." He talks about moving from being a "human doing" to a "human being," sitting still long enough to ask, what actually brings the greatest joy?
For him, it’s working for himself, following an entrepreneurial streak that’s focused on helping others, and spending time with people "that nobody else wants to spend time with" – drug users, people who are homeless, and those on the margins. He also loves helping others launch or strengthen recovery housing, spotting gaps in the community where people aren’t being served, and stepping in there.
Throughout, he gently challenges anyone listening – in recovery or not – to pause and ask what brings them joy in giving, and to chase that: "If everybody would pursue their greatest joy in how they can give and change people's lives... it's just an amazing concept." If you’re standing at your own crossroads, this honest reflection might nudge you to ask: what are your greatest joys, and how could they help someone else?
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