- [Narrator] What does it take to make a strong community?

It takes people coming together, working side by side neighbor to neighbor.

At Bath Savings, we're committed to strengthening our towns and neighborhoods, helping neighbors, buy homes, entrepreneurs start businesses and nonprofits make a difference.

So when you trust us with your savings, we keep your money here in Maine, where it belongs.

Call or visit today to learn more about neighbor, to neighbor banking.

Bath Savings, your neighbor, your bank.

- We needed the Bath Skate Park to be more than just a skate park.

- I think what makes us truly unique is how we support kids here in our community.

We support kids at the middle school and at the high school.

- Play basketball, skate, go out in the field and like play kickball football and all of stuff.

- The staff here are phenomenal.

They're you don't even need to, you just meet 'em once and you already know, they're just, they're amazing.

- We have after school and summer programming through the department of education in Maine.

We also offer high set education for those looking to pursue their high school diploma.

We offer support to homeless youth in the area.

- I've worked with kids my whole life.

And I think that when you hear a kid tell you how much you matter to them, how much this place matters to them, that's a really powerful thing.

- A lot of things that I love about the Bath Skate Park, but mainly the reason I come here is cause there's just so much love and support here.

And everybody just has great energy.

- My favorite thing to do would definitely be, you know, helping out with the activities that they have going on, definitely skating and stuff like that.

And just, you know, being a good, positive leader and a good mentor for the younger audience.

- This is very fun to be here and it's really good.

Yeah, I love it.

- [Narrator 2] Special thanks to our sponsors, Bath Savings in partnership with Midcoast Youth Center.

The stories you're about to hear are true.

The struggles, losses, and paths to healing, all woven into Voices Of Hope, The Rugged Road to Recovery.

(birds chirping) - When I get in the water, you know, it transforms me no matter where I am mentally before I get in.

Once I'm in that water, I'm thinking about nothing else.

I have a smile on my face.

I'm exercising, there's sun and salt water crashing around.

I always get out feeling better even on a day where the waves aren't great, it doesn't really matter to me.

I got out in the water, I did something, I feel better.

You know, there's a certain saying that I read one time about surfing.

They said the best surfer out there is the one having the most fun.

And I think I qualify because I just love getting on the board and doing tricks and just seeing other surfers and talking to people.

I mean, there's so many natural highs happening all at once out on the water, it's freeing.

And what we see over time is people who use drugs a lot there.

- [Narrator 2] Neuropsychologist Matt Bellace is an expert on the brain science behind drinking and using drugs, particularly when it starts at a young age.

He's also the author of the books, "A Better High" and "Life is Disappointing" in which he encourages students, all of us to pursue other ways to feel good through a natural high.

Beyond means beautiful landscape.

There's a dark, desperate crisis, a substance abuse epidemic.

We set out to capture the faces and stories caught up in it and discovered there is a science to addiction.

There is also a way out.

These are the Voices Of Hope.

- So what is a natural high?

It's any activity you do that elevates your mood, jump into a cold body of water.

You're gonna feel different.

Go for a run, dance for five minutes straight.

Or when you exercise, there is a release of neuro chemicals like dopamine and serotonin that are going to make you feel better when you're active.

There are cognitive improvements in things like memory and mood, and ultimately you improve your balance.

And I argue that there is no drug on the planet that could replicate the richness and complexity of one of those powerful, natural highs.

So we're out here in nature.

We have bird sounds and wind and water.

We have negative ions in the air.

They're highest at the beach and at the mountains.

And they make people feel better.

They improve your mood.

They reduce anxiety.

There are so many ways to get a natural high, but the tough part of course is you have to put in some work and they're not gonna be as intense as chemical highs.

And honestly, what I love about natural highs is that, you know, you can incorporate three or four into every single day of your life.

You go for a jog, you bike ride, go for a swim.

Like all these things can make you feel better.

You cook a great meal, you laugh with friends.

It's a matter of appreciating the subtleties, the little things in life.

I recommend natural highs for people that are in recovery, because ultimately you need to find a replacement for the chemicals that we, you were using to regulate your mood.

Now you have to find natural highs to do it.

I think what a lot of people in recovery don't realize is their drug of choice, says a lot about their personality.

And when they're pursuing natural highs, they should consider what their drug of choice was.

So if they pursue drugs that gave them a rush, they're gonna probably really enjoy natural highs that do the same thing, you know, be it something extreme.

They should look for things that, you know, make them feel that powerful rush.

Now for other people, they may have chosen drugs that were more calming drugs, drugs that had them relax and maybe disconnect and finding natural highs that do that too, are powerful.

Some people love to pursue things like yoga and meditation.

They love to get really involved in creative activities or building something, things that really, you know, put them into this zone into this place where you have a sense of flow, where there's nothing else going on around you, you get kind of lost in the moment and it's very common for you.

Choosing your natural high is based on your personality can be really effective.

But at the end of the day, just knowing that, getting your blood flowing, increasing blood flow, say to the frontal lobe over the brain, which is what exercise does is going to improve your mood and your focus.

- What happens when you move, you are activating more brain cells in the brain than in any other human activity.

- [Narrator 2] Dr. John Ratey is an associate clinical professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and is internationally recognized in neuropsychology.

His book "Spark" the revolutionary new science of exercise and brain has made him a foremost authority on the brain fitness connection.

- And one of the quotes that I'm famous for is that, I say about of exercise is like taking a little bit of Prozac and a little bit of rhythm, which is an antidepressant and a stimulant.

So that in other words, it, we actually are doing the same thing as using those medicines.

I learned early on that exercise promotes the release of substance called BDNF because our brain cells are active and we have a hundred billion of them.

They always, when they fire and we're firing more of them when we're moving.

- [Narrator 2] Dr. Ratey refers to BDNF, that's Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor.

It's a key protein involved in the growth and resilience of brain cells and is a crucial link between our thoughts, emotions, and movements.

- I called it miracle growth of the brain because it's brain fertilizer and it helps brain cells grow, which is the way we learn.

I think people are sort of shocked still that exercise has a profound effect on our ability to think and learn on our attention system on our actual ability to log in information and use it.

What we know is that kids and adults with ADD are 60% likely to have substance abuse issues.

So people that have a quirky brain from the beginning are much more liable to get stuck with addictions, whether it be pills or video games or gambling.

Much more likely to become a dangerous part of their life if they have attention deficit disorder.

Almost from the beginning, when I was talking about writing about researching the effective exercise on the brain, a big group that I was, that I championed for exercise were people with ADD and they're prone for the addictions.

So it was a natural sequence that I saw that this really was one way to it prevents the initial addiction.

The more fit you are, the less prone you are to an addiction.

If you're trying to stop and you're trying to quit, and you're trying to change your life, exercise is a perfect antidote because all the withdrawal symptoms, the persistent withdrawal symptoms that come up, as you're in recovery are, you know, are anxiety, stress, depression, mood shifts, motivational problems, sleep problems, all of which are well served by a chronic exercise program.

- [Narrator 2] Throughout his career.

John Ratey has been involved with a recovery community, including helping form Sparking Life, The Boston Bulldogs and Treehouse Recovery.

- Treehouse recovery is an all men's drug and alcohol treatment program.

We are located in Southern California.

We're reconditioning the prefrontal cortex by asking it to engage in functionality that ultimately leads to a healthier, stronger, more capable social connector.

We put guys on teams and we have them work interdependently in an environment that promotes stronger social connection.

The US Navy SEAL teams by far arguably the most connected, the strongest and the most capable teams.

And so we consulted with some former SEALs and we put together a program that actually utilizes the training methods from the SEALs, as well as the assessment tools for team behavior and we incorporated that into the development of the modality.

And then now we actually use one of their training methods as a way to promote this kind of connection.

And we call that surf passage where they're all working together.

There's seven guys on a raft.

- Part of what we wanna do is we wanna get that part of their brain working again.

And it's almost impossible to do it by yourself, but they'll get on a boat in the ocean and then get tossed and turned for a while.

Then you'll see them catch that one wave and you'll see the biggest smiles.

And the first thing they do is look for someone else to share that moment with.

- Some of the most powerful moments that we see in treatment happen on the beach with these guys, because they are realizing for the first time that they have this like deep connection with somebody else.

And that ultimately equates to long term connections that we're seeing that go on well, after treatment.

- Welcome to Thursday night, running with the Boston Bulldog.

It's a little rainy, but it's fun.

It's fun to run in the rain.

The wellness tip for the day is really focusing on rest and recovery.

A lot of times we do a lot of hard runs.

We run almost every day.

So being able to take that time that you need to allow your body and your mind to rest.

So let's go around and kind of just say your name.

I know we've got a good amount of people that are running the marathon.

Boston Bulldogs is a wellness based, recovery running program.

We focus on helping those that are in recovery heal through wellness and movement.

The Thursday night run club is one of our weekly run clubs.

They have about anywhere from 10 people to 30 people that will show up.

Our principles are giving back, self leadership, showing up for yourself and being transparent with where you're at.

We find that wellness in movement really helps kind of get us out of our own heads.

It helps develop our recovery and gets us into a community of like-minded people.

- [Narrator 2] Wellness may get people out of their own heads.

It also promotes the release of endorphins, the body's natural pain killer.

- Get those shoulders nice and mobilized.

My name is Tim Mustion.

I'm one of the founders of Temperance Training Foundation.

We started in April of 2017 with just one idea in mind, which was to provide free community based CrossFit classes to anybody in the recovery community.

There you go.

So you feel that right?

I wanted to provide free classes to anybody who's sober because it works so well for me.

We believe in the mind, body and spirit, cause a lot of the times you just see meetings and groups, no emphasis on their body.

We provide them with the rush of endorphins, your body's natural pain killer.

It's a natural anti-anxiety medication and over time, those neurotransmitters are getting back to where they were quicker than just being abstinent.

- The only consistency I had in my life was soccer.

So growing up soccer was a huge part of my life.

I'm talking every day, all day.

I grew up in Pembroke, Massachusetts, a nice home, played soccer my entire life.

My entire family did, my sister, my brother, my other sister, all played at a college level.

It's been, it was part of who we were and what we did.

So I have like two versions of my life happening at the exact same time.

I'm an elite soccer player, but yet I drink and I go out every weekend, starting in junior high school.

I'm Jon Cross.

I'm the founder of Cross Wellness.

And I've been working in the human services field for seven years.

I work in social work, coach college soccer, started and co-founded a nonprofit called Kennedy Park Football Club.

And I've worked in sober houses and speaking to kids ever since.

- [Narrator 2] Which is what brought Jon Cross to Cape Elizabeth High School on a summer afternoon in August.

Members of the soccer team, on the grass giving Cross their wrapped attention.

- I drank all the time.

I started smoking weed really early in my life.

I started dealing weed in seventh and eighth grade.

So for a 10 year career, I sold drugs from eighth grade until I was 28.

So I thought I was just gonna be a little part-time thing in junior high school.

And I'll tell you right now I have no business selling drugs in junior high school.

I come from a, my family would've gave me anything.

Like I wasn't like hurting for money.

I did it to be cool.

I showed up high to a practice.

My coach said, please go home.

I said, no.

He said, go home, you're done for the day.

That's it, I said, okay, I quit.

So my junior year, this is my high school team in Boston college High School in Dorchester.

I'll tell you right now as a soccer coach, now I've learned if you cut a mental virus out of the team, things might actually work out for you, even if they're one of the best kids on the team.

And I'll tell you, they cut me.

They won the state championship without me.

I was on JV, eating oranges.

It's truth.

- [Narrator 2] If it sounds like a scared, straight talk, Jon says that's half, right?

He wants kids to know that addiction could easily happen to them.

- So like, if you're this person that's complaining behind closed doors, unbalanced and making the team worse when the coach isn't around, I would advise as a consultant to a coach cut that player.

So if you're, I'm not saying demonize it, right?

If that's the case, what you're doing in your life, just change it cause talent isn't everything.

I decide to actually go to school in Florida, not even play soccer at all, which is a weird thing for me because it was a huge part of my identity for so long.

So with a loss of that identity, like my drug addiction and my alcohols were kind of skyrocketed down in Florida.

Drank all the time, went to clubs all the time.

Wasn't a soccer player.

I was just some kid from Massachusetts that moved to south Florida, extremely lost, not sure who I was, turned into daily drinking, daily drug use, Oxycontin per 30s.

That skyrocketed as well when I went down there, barely graduated college.

And then after college it was like, you know, you're no longer a student.

You're no longer a soccer player.

And then it gets involved into heroin and full-time, I'm a full-time drug addict at that point.

You know, all's I do everything I do is surround around opiates and heroin.

So like that's all I do.

But I got into recovery seven years ago and I've been working with youth ever since, because I look at my own story.

I look a lot of people I worked with in the human services world, especially in the adult rehab world, even athletes in particular is like that moment when you're like no longer an athlete, like who are you?

What are you gonna be?

And that's kind of why I started Cross Wellness was I really push meditation, yoga, authenticity.

So I really say, you know, who are you outside of an athlete?

Who are you outside of this elite soccer player or this college student or whatever, right?

Do you like other things?

When you walk around all day, do you believe what you're saying?

Six months go by my life's getting better seven months, eight months, nine months, 10 months.

It's always getting better, playing more soccer.

And I remember at 11 months I was getting somewhat in shape and I had volunteered, coached at the University of Southern Maine.

Then I worked with a bunch of kids for a while.

And then about a year in, I was like, I'm gonna go back and play college soccer at 28 years old.

I remember I fought the NCAA, what am I gonna do?

Blah, blah, blah.

Wrote in a little email to him.

Hey, I'm Jon, I wanna come back and play college soccer.

I'm a drug addict, blah, blah, blah.

They write back.

They're like, no, you already tried to play three or four years.

You're done, you graduated, the rules say you can't play.

Please feel free to write why.

And a bunch of people write me letters saying, hey, he's in recovery.

He struggled his first time around.

You should give him a year.

You should give him a year.

- [Narrator 2] At the age of 28, Jon Cross became the first person in NCAA history to ever get eligibility back due to drug addiction.

He played one final season at the University of Southern Maine.

His mother was also diagnosed with terminal cancer.

- My trainers knew I was in recovery.

Everybody, my coach, I knew my mom was sick.

So all these things about me make it easier to be me.

I remember it was senior day.

I remember they said Jon, they listed like the bazillion colleges I went to.

He's 28 years old.

He's a leader.

And my mom's on the sidelines.

She had never been to a game that whole time, cause she's had cancer and she's bald right, has a wig on, my dad's holding her up.

And they said, all right.

And I jog out and I give my mom flowers and it was one of the best days of my entire life.

Cause I felt like I finally accomplished what I was supposed to in the soccer world.

We didn't do that well that year, that's fine.

And I took that picture and my mom said, I love you, goodbye.

I'm not feeling that well, have fun.

She goes home.

- [Narrator 2] Jon's mother passed away several weeks later on Thanksgiving weekend.

- I put everything I had into that season.

I had a pole growing, I was pulling my leg around.

I never cut any corners.

I was never cutting the corner on the sprints.

Everyone knows that, right?

Like the little whoop, right?

I did the, I wasn't doing that.

I'm proud.

I would take that year over the national titles that we won with my club team anytime.

The time that we were, we almost won the Tampa Cup.

The time that we beat Freddy Adu's team, all that stuff I would throw away for the losing season I had at USM.

- [Narrator 2] Jon co-founded the nonprofit, Kennedy Park Football Club, a community based soccer club in Portland, weaving together his talent on the field with his desire to help kids find a healthy, safe community.

- We give free games.

We do a mentorship program that helps people get to the next level.

But we also push that, you gotta be more than a soccer player.

You gotta be more than just the kid that can kick a ball around.

And that's all influenced by my past as well as my co-founder's past of being a complete human.

Most important thing in a youth's life is community.

So like more things we can do to promote like inclusion with kids and not in the sense of, hey, we're here to help you.

But you know, for what I've noticed with the Kennedy Park Football Club is they're soccer players first and then we can help 'em with other stuff.

It becomes too I don't know, forced if it's, hey, we're here to help you with, fix your life.

Soccer player first and then maybe we can do some stuff after that.

For me, the working with kids is the hard thing is cause you never, you won't see the outcome until years later.

Sometimes even if they mess up, you won't see the outcome until years later, but it feels good.

It feels good to give my pains and purpose for sure.

- But let me just gauge a rating, individual ratings for anxiety zero to 10.

So zero being the most chill and least anxious, you've ever been in your life, 10 being the most anxious you've ever been.

What do you think your number is?

What's your rating?

Zero to 10.

Three, four.

- [Narrator 2] It's a Saturday morning and Dr. Matt Bellace is working with a group of students from Greeley High School and Colby college.

The topic, anxiety.

- The physical sensations of anxiety are important to point out, chest tightness, sweaty palms.

You notice you might be agitated, heart racing, catastrophic thinking, some shallow breathing.

One of the goals of cognitive behavioral therapy is to acknowledge our thoughts, these anxious thoughts, but don't pretend that they're written in stone and they mean anything.

They're byproducts of our brain working.

And some people are more anxious than others.

- [Narrator 2] This anxiety lesson has a purpose.

The connection between anxiety and substance use disorder is growing at such a fast clip it is impossible to ignore.

According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, an estimated 20% of individuals diagnosed with anxiety disorder also have a substance use disorder.

Their study found that living with psychological distress, emotional turmoil and physical symptoms associated with anxiety can make individuals more likely to use addictive substances as a form of temporary relief.

- We know as you go from low to medium to high levels of support, look what goes down.

Symptoms of depression, anxiety.

So there's strength in numbers.

There's strength in having people have your back.

You can do some amazing things, especially when your peers are present.

Ready?

One, two, three.

- [Student] Oh, I was early.

- Nice round applause for that.

- Dr. Bellace is using the technique to reduce anxiety that was derived from Navy SEAL training.

These students have had multiple sessions to counteract the fear of heights.

The first step is to set a goal and use imagination and visualization to step by step, see yourself achieving the goal.

The second step is positive self-talk.

The third step is to add positive emotion.

Study show that we can build stronger neural networks when we add positive emotions.

The final step is simply to practice.

- If we can teach them some mastery over their emotions and they can generalize that into the real world, there is a chance that they're not gonna need substances, alcohol and other drugs aren't gonna have the appeal because they know that they can handle these emotions on their own.

- [Narrator 2] And in 15 minutes, these students will be tested.

They will face an anxiety inducing challenge.

They will take on this massive rock climbing wall at the Colby College field house.

If they reach the top, they will be 42 feet up off the ground.

- You may have the thought, oh my God, I'm gonna get hurt.

I'm gonna die.

But that thought can be treated like an interesting sort of bubble, like, oh, look at that.

My brain is thinking I'm gonna die.

But as you look at the wall and other people going up and down safely, you can use that evidence to counteract the anxious thought.

That is a powerful technique.

It really works and helps lower anxiety.

We're gonna close our eyes.

I'm gonna walk you through climbing up that wall.

And you may find that it's very helpful at reducing your performance anxiety, and you get yourself strapped into the harness and you approach the wall.

And at first you're feeling really confident as you get your hands and your feet in the first holds and you hoist yourself up and you begin to climb and you say to yourself, positive things like I got this, I can do this, one step at a time.

I'm gonna be all right.

You hear people cheering for you down below.

They want you to succeed.

You have a team of experienced people telling you what to do next, what handhold to look for and you take the next step up.

- [Student] Yeah Jackie.

- Aidan's wall is the climbing wall featured in this building.

- [Narrator 2] SJ Tinker is the director of outdoor education and leadership at Colby College.

- Aidan loved climbing.

Aidan was a really competitive sport climber.

- [Narrator 2] Aidan Silitch tragically died in a ski mountaineering accident in 2019.

He was 17.

His parents dedicated the wall in his honor.

- The most important part of Aidan's legacy for us is creating a really welcoming, inclusive community, a space where students can push their bodies, make friends and explore climbing because it is such an amazing community opportunity.

- [Michael] And back through here.

Yeah and the only thing it just needs a little bit more.

- [Narrator 2] Danielle and Michael are, what's known as the wall staff at Colby's rock wall, they're in charge of fitting students with gear, including flexible climbing shoes, managing the rope system called belay and ensuring each climber feels safe.

- Are we good to go?

- Yep.

Climbing.

It's great kind of showing people like, okay, hey, here's our system, here's the knots we're gonna use.

Here's like why we use them.

I kind of I love the history part of it.

And I think those kind of things make people more comfortable when they're going up the wall to go like, okay, this is why I'm tying this knot.

This is why we have the rope banker in this way.

- But you get a lot of people that are like, okay, like maybe this is something I wanna do, but maybe I have a fear of heights.

And so kind of just talking them through it and being like, it's okay if you wanna come down.

It's okay, if you wanna take a break, like we have you and kind of showing them the knots and showing them the devices that we use and being like this has you.

- [Student 2] Go Andrew.

- I'm feeling really anxious.

I'm terrified of heights, like deathly afraid.

- I have a pretty big fear of heights.

The height part isn't as bad, it's like, what could happen?

That's the part that really comes in.

- [Student 2] Andrew.

- Ah, yeah, I'm pretty anxious.

My hands are sweating so.

I was really nervous, like going up about like three quarters of the way up, cause there wasn't many holds and I felt like, I'd just be kinda like this for a second and then I'd pull myself up.

And yeah, but it was good.

Once I reached the top, I felt really accomplished.

- It was definitely like, I felt really confident going up.

And then I got most of the way up.

I looked down, I got really freaked out for a second.

As I like was trying to find a hold because I felt like I was gonna fall.

Then I remembered I was pullied and I felt better.

So like I just kept going.

- Having the strong team behind you, it's how Navy SEALs are able to go out and do the most dangerous jobs you can imagine.

Cause they have a team that's pushing them on to keep going.

You can do this, you have this, you know, type of mentality.

- Come on Jackie you're so close.

You're killing it.

Almost there.

- Definitely a few times I felt like a little bit of anxiety.

Like I didn't know where to grab, but I would look around and take a breath and just like find a good spot to hold on.

- Personally, I think that I work through the anxiety of just thinking, cause originally I was at a three scale and just like, yeah, I've rock climbed before.

So I wasn't as nervous, but I didn't know what I was really getting myself into.

And then when I saw the wall, I was like, okay, the angst is going up a little bit cause it's really tall.

And so I was just like, it's okay Coltrane just breathe and you got it.

- Towards the end, I definitely got more comfortable.

And my anxiety went away.

- There was a couple tight squeezes where I had to make a really big jump and it frightened me and made me freak out.

But so I just decided to sit there and just chillax, for a second and it really helps to stop and take a breath and just imagine that you're gonna have a good outcome and it really helps.

- [Student 3] Honestly bro, it was kind of stressful.

- How was your first time?

- It was great.

I just, I used our hands way too much more in my legs.

- Yeah, climbing's actually a ton of legs, which is not what you expect.

- And then there's this top.

- [Danielle] You're ready?

- [Narrator 2] All 10 students made it up successfully reaching the top of the climbing wall.

Now it's Dr. Matt Bellace's turn to get to the top.

He knows he must overcome inherited anxiety.

Both his mother and his father struggled with it.

- So I had no chance of not being anxious.

I had panic attacks when I was 16, 17, first got my license driving on a rainy night, over a bridge.

That kind of thing would provoke all sorts of an anxiety responses.

- Just keep working those feet up.

You got it.

- I will talk to some anxiety halfway up, you know, you heart's racing, hard to grip things.

I got a little nausea there.

I mean amazing.

I didn't think I would get that way, but I thought to myself, no, I have a great belay person here.

She's got my back.

I can't fail keep going.

And next thing you know, I got to the top, it was thrilling.

- [Narrator 2] Matt Bellace has practiced just what he teaches to young people to get him to the top of that climbing wall, using a cognitive technique, he says he learned when he was in graduate school.

- Don't put so much credence in the thoughts that come out of your brain.

You know, we think all these thoughts all the time and they're often negative because of the negativity bias we're looking for what's wrong and what's missing.

So our brain will produce these thoughts.

Why we're not good enough?

Why we're gonna fail?

And if you can just create the ability to say, oh, that's an interesting thought, but not take ownership over it and just let it float away.

Like clouds passing above you.

That's empowering because you know, some of the thoughts are coming behind them.

Different thoughts, maybe better thoughts.

- [Narrator 2] And in his most recent book, Life is Disappointing and other inspiring thoughts, Bellace focuses on dealing with disappointment plus sharing techniques for coping with pain, loss and failure.

- You know, life is incredibly disappointing, bone crushingly.

So you know, it can be common these days for young people to have the thought what's wrong with me?

Am I broken?

Why am I thinking this?

Why am I doing this?

And the message should be, you're not broken.

There's nothing wrong with you.

You're a human being.

You're suffering.

You're disappointed.

You're in pain when we're feeling like we're broken or something's wrong with us or we're not comfortable in our own skin that running to some sort of escape product, the drink, the drug, the screen, ultimately denies us of the ability to learn how to cope with life on life's terms.

We can do this.

Sometimes we need help.

We need to speak up.

We need to acknowledge our weakness and our fragility as human beings.

But when we can be honest, I mean radical honesty and say, yeah, I'm suffering right now.

I'm struggling right now.

That's powerful and acknowledging that sometimes, yes, life is filled full of pain and loss and sadness and that's okay.

And we can sit with that, feel that, but that's gonna pass and a different feeling is gonna come.

And we can also use our disappointment to inspire achievements.

That to me is the point of emotions to begin with, to motivate us to do something different, to take these feelings, especially when they're negative and use them to propel us forward.

I mean, and that to me makes life so much more interesting and enthusiastic.

For the most interesting people I know have been through some stuff, they have struggled, they have failed, but they took that energy and said, no, I'm gonna be more focused next time.

And their performance is at a different level.

And when you get help and you overcome it, you can look back and say, oh, I didn't need those products.

I didn't need the drink or the drug, all I needed was to search inward and find the strength that existed within me all along.

- Hey Donna.

The first time I had, I would say a panic attack or increased anxiety was actually a few years into my recovery.

I found myself having some chest pains and shortness of breath.

Then my mind started saying you're having a heart attack.

Like all these worst case scenarios.

I had some internal anxiety when I was younger, but then found substances, alcohol and other drugs.

And those are what made that manageable in those internal feelings.

So they didn't increase enough to be full blown anxiety.

And then using substances for 17 years was enough to keep that level of anxiety down.

And that's just a guess, but it seems to make sense to me.

Like when you talk to a lot of folks, say like, what do you like about PRCC, they seem to always say, it feels comfortable.

- [Narrator 2] Justin Reid works at the Portland recovery community center's recovery hub.

He coordinates peer recovery coaching and training throughout the state of Maine.

And since his own recovery in December, 2014, Justin has gotten married, welcomed a baby daughter and helped to build the recovery coach academy.

His life, smooth and balanced and these days for the most part anxiety free.

- Last week, I had went out to Colorado Springs for a work related conference.

And the idea was that I would learn some new information during the days, but also being in Colorado have some opportunity in the evenings.

And then the last day of the conference was a half day.

So we'd get to go out and explore.

- [Narrator 2] Justin an avid outdoors guy first visited the Garden of the Gods, a natural landmark known for its massive red rocks, sticking straight out of the ground.

His next adventure nearby Pikes Peak, the highest summit of the Southern front range of the Rocky mountains.

It's more than 14,000 feet high.

- On the drive there just started seeing some beautiful scenery and rock formations and got to the gate, the park entrance at Pikes Peak.

And that just being in Colorado Springs, I believe starts somewhere around being at 7,000 feet in elevation, not something I really considered.

And then as you keep going up the mountain, it starts to increase as far as how fast the elevation's increasing and the slope.

And the further you go up, the less trees and more rocks kind of naturally occurring.

But then the roads start getting really curvy and almost like 180 degree turns and so it's like, you know, you're going one way then suddenly you're going the other way.

And the higher you get, the less you can see.

And what started happening was when I got to a certain point all you could see to the right of my car was no guardrail and just drop off.

And that's when something started to happen.

First thing I noticed was my hand started to get sweaty.

I realized that I was kind of tensing up and grabbing the steering wheel with both hands that's when my mind started doing certain things and telling me things like, if you go two feet to the right, right now, you're gonna fall off this cliff and you're not gonna make it home to see your daughter and your wife.

So as the thoughts increased, then so did my heartbeat.

I think at that point I was about 13,000 feet up.

There was nowhere to pull over, like pulling over is off the side of a cliff.

Just found enough motivation to carry on around one more corner and probably elevate another a hundred feet or so to where I could actually pull over safely.

Reflecting on the fact I thought I just almost passed out and created a real dangerous situation or almost fatal situation if I did, I called the Park Rangers and just let 'em know where I was on the mountain.

And that was about 13 and a half thousand feet.

And I could literally see the top, the peak of the mountain right above me.

So I'm like feeling disappointed, like it's so close, but I said, this is where I am.

This is how I'm feeling.

I need some help here.

- [Narrator 2] Safe, but rattled by what could have happened, Justin Reid realized he'd had the tools to help his anxiety and he tapped into the program that's been paramount to his recovery, the 12 steps of AA.

- I would say that the tools that help the most, I pulled directly from my experience in recovery.

So the first step when I got to that safe spot was take those deep breaths and really just start focusing on my breathing.

So some longer inhales, some longer exhales with a little pause in between, make sure I'm getting all the oxygen I can in and to my brain.

I think in this particular situation, it was extra helpful, me at that altitude.

The second thing I did besides making the phone calls to ask for a little help was say a prayer.

You know, I'm not a religious person, but I pray.

So I just prayed and for me that looked like, you know, saying just help me to have some strength to make it down so I can make it home to my family.

So it was the breathing, the prayer, the calling, somebody else for some help.

So if I was talking to my younger self, I'd probably say something like, relax and take it easy.

You know that's pretty simple.

But for me, whether it was real or just something I perceived to be real, just kind of feeling that pressure of the world.

Like you need to go to college and you need to do this.

And then this and this, and always feeling like you needed to live up to those expectations for me, that was gave a sense of anxiety.

So like I think just remind myself to relax, like take a step back and just enjoy, enjoy the ride versus, you know, be stressed out about the next thing or what that person's thinking about me.

When we're looking at helping people in recovery, meeting them where they're at, but maybe just reminding myself to do that.

You know, would've been helpful when I was younger.

It's okay, wherever you are.

And just, you know, taking that breath, reminding myself to just take a breath.

- One of the things that kids have to get used to is that mistakes are not failure.

Mistakes are learning.

That you have to drop a ball thousands of times before you actually can keep three of them in the air.

- [Narrator 2] These young people are members of the Scarborough based Gym Dandies.

They build amazing skills that many would believe impossible.

They follow a simple formula that we can all use to program our own brains.

It all starts with goal setting, visualization, positive emotion and repetition.

- I learned how to unicycle and I learned how to juggle.

And I never thought that I'd make it this far from third grade to fifth grade, but here I am.

And I was about to forth from at the conference.

I'm really excited.

- [David] These kids know that hard work and determination and repetition make the impossible look easy.

- [Narrator 2] While neuroscientists debate the nature of consciousness and our ability to be self-aware, the students in this room are busy demonstrating how it works in real life.

And they probably don't even know it.

- This type of training can ultimately prepare them for learning difficult tasks in the future.

As they get older, they're gonna be used to the process of saying, wow, I can't do something, but maybe I can learn.

- [Narrator 2] The Gym Dandies are also learning skills they can use in and out of the classroom to help deal with the fear and anxieties of taking a test or getting up on the stage.

Matt Bellace says learning difficult skills gives these students the courage to overcome difficult tasks.

- That's a developmental asset.

That is positive social support.

What they're learning in this program is how to face something that's challenging, but push on and gain some mastery and ultimately have success.

- These are what we call the performance level kids, the ones who we take the performances, they work on routines, they build their skills and they do amazing things that one of the things that we hear most at performance is I never could do that.

That's impossible.

I can't, this is amazing.

- One of the things that I like the most about this program is that it gives us a sense of togetherness in these two years that have been very isolating.

We all work together to achieve the same goals.

No matter if we're in third grade or a senior in high school, when we do these things together, there's never a wow, I did this really.

It's a, wow, we did this.

- Gym Dandies really helps me because like, as a kid, because it's kind of a group of people who are in like intermediate school all the way through high school.

And that's really amazing to make those connections and to be friends with different age groups.

And then also to just like, come and have fun and learn new things after school is just amazing.

- I feel like all kids could really benefit from access to this program.

It's like getting brain gym.

There's a lot of crossing the midline and a lot of stuff that sort of stimulates and grows new neuro pathways, let alone just the growth mindset of, I might not be able to do it yet, but I will be able to do it if I put the time and practice and anything's possible.

- I've been doing this for around seven years and my specialty is stilt walking.

I can juggle, have to say, I'm not the best at it, but it's decent.

- Those kinds of activities, strengthen pathways that will serve them for the rest of their lives.

These are beneficial in so many ways, not just healthy from a physical activity perspective, but in terms of the brain, having the ability to wire certain skills, unique skills that will give confidence and empower them to realize they can do difficult things in the future.

- When we nail a performance, I feel so proud of myself and also everyone else in the Gym Dandies.

It's just so nice to be like, we did that together.

- When we absolutely nail a routine, it's one of the best feelings in the world because we've made ourselves proud.

We made our instructors proud.

Our audience is amazed with us.

And it's just this amazing feeling that is really hard to put into words.

It's a natural high.

- The key to these activities with the Gym Dandies is the positive emotional response.

When they nail one of these skills and they get that intrinsic motivation of yes, I did that.

That reinforcement makes 'em want to keep going and seeing what can I do next?

What am I capable of?

Wow, my brain is amazing.

I didn't think I could do this and now I'm doing it.

That's so empowering for young people to feel that, to see that and then keep pushing forward because they have a social network that says, yes, keep going, you can do this.

I mean, that's literally how careers are made in all kinds of creative fields.

- But yeah, you gotta spin them just right.

So that the handle falls into your hands, which is pretty tough.

Right now I'm still learning how to do what's called the BC wheel.

And basically what that is, is a unicycle with no seat and the pedals stay still.

So basically you have to just run up and balance on it.

It's very difficult.

I believe only one other person could do it in the history of Gym Dandies.

- I've been trying to learn how to juggle five balls.

There's been a couple people in and out of the program that have been able to juggle five balls continuously.

- The kids really that stay with us and keep going up through the grades are the ones who get excited by it.

The one that I see most often is they're ecstatic when they've learnt something, they just beam.

In fact, I beam when I see it, because it's just this wonderful moment when a kid finally masters riding a unicycle, or finally gets three balls going and they don't drop them.

- It's just made us all better people.

It's made us few other people better way view the world better.

I think that a lot of times people have a tendency to try to fit in, especially when you're our age, you know, just go with the norm.

But knowing how to do these things gives you a lot of uniqueness I suppose, that is really good for your self esteem to like, know how to do stuff like this I think.

(pleasant music) - [Narrator 2] If you are someone you know, is struggling with substance use disorder, reach out to the, knowyouroptions.me website.

Resources by county are listed with direct contact information.

If it's an emergency call 911, you could be that critical link to saving a friend or a family member.

Next time on Voices of Hope, on the front lines of the addiction battle.

- Every person is different.

Every situation could be, you know, trying to hook one person up with like a doctor, you know, or you know, maybe one is in like a crisis, like a mental health crisis and you just never know.

You just never know what's gonna happen.

- [Narrator 2] Plus life on the street.

What does it take to survive?

- You can make a choice about living in the despair of being homeless, or you can find something to do on a daily basis to pass the time.

- [Narrator 2] How one man's sobriety became art for the world to see.

(piano playing) ♪ Slow down just a little bit ♪ Let go ♪ Your problems are around of your control ♪ ♪ You don't need to find the reasons to start a war ♪ ♪ But you already fighting, took a rub like a thief ♪ ♪ And the blood that you bleed wearing on your sleeve ♪ ♪ Cause you've been broken ♪ And there's no way to fix it ♪ The corners in hole mine ♪ feeling with your tears from her eyes ♪ ♪ I danced today ♪ And you'll find your way ♪ Its okay but ♪ Are you okay cause ♪ Gotta find way you were ♪ Gotta find something wonderful ♪ ♪ But it hurts it hurts it hurts ♪ ♪ So you keep on running ♪ Gotta find way you were ♪ You gotta find something wonderful ♪ ♪ But it hurts it hurts it hurts ♪ ♪ So you keep on running