The Eagle and the Flamingo

The Eagle and the Flamingo

How do people find strength in their journey to sobriety when old habits of anxiety and catastrophising refuse to budge? This Untoxicated Podcast episode shares one of Matt Salis’s “underlying issues” with a story that’s as funny as it is uncomfortably relatable. Ten years sober and skilled at creating emotional safety, Matt admits he’s still wired to stress over things that don’t really matter. To explain, he introduces Nash, his impeccably dressed ex-boss – the “eagle” to Matt’s “flamingo”.

Nash is the kind of man whose ties come in tissue-lined boxes, who once made Matt return a rental Lincoln Town Car with the line, “We are going on sales calls, not a mafia hit.” Through sharp, often brutal workplace anecdotes – wardrobe mishaps, savage one-liners about a colleague’s back hair, and a humiliating golf dinner – Nash becomes an “unwilling mentor”.

He never sits Matt down for a heart-to-heart, but his standards and sarcasm push Matt to ask for clarification instead of assuming, and to stop taking himself quite so seriously. The turning point comes in a small bar-and-grill, where the two are stressing over a huge customer crisis.

Nash spots a man in a bathrobe playing Space Invaders, drinking beer from a pitcher through a straw, and drops the line that sticks with Matt for life: “Do you think that guy gives a shit?” The problem that once felt catastrophic doesn’t even register in Matt’s memory now – but that sentence does.

For anyone in recovery who still lies awake worrying about work emails, social slip-ups, or imagined disasters, this story offers a gentle nudge: most of what keeps you up at night doesn’t deserve that power. Maybe it’s time to ask, with a wry smile, “Who gives a shit?” and let a little of that weight go.