12 Step Group

REINVENTED With Author, Attorney & Addiction Recovery Advocate Brian Cuban


Welcome to REINVENTED with Jen Eckhart! In this episode, it’s tales of the bar, booze, blow and redemption! In this brutally honest and inspiring interview, Jen goes one-on-one with best-selling author, attorney, speaker and addiction recovery advocate, Brian Cuban. They discuss how his brother, Dallas Maverick’s owner and billionaire investor, Mark Cuban, saved his life, his recovery from alcohol and cocaine addiction, including two trips to a psychiatric facility, jail, and the cratering of his law practice. Brian also shares how he managed to reinvent himself, the moment he stopped seeking validation from others, his mental health advice to anyone suffering from clinical depression, as well as his brand-new debut legal thriller The Ambulance Chaser.

 

Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe on Spotify, Apple, and YouTube. You can also follow @JenniferEckhart on Instagram and Twitter. Thanks for listening!

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Listen to the podcast here

REINVENTED With Author, Attorney & Addiction Recovery Advocate Brian Cuban

JE: I've always said that the true heroes in life are people who have known defeat, people who have intimately known struggle, have faced hardship, and have had to fight, scratch, and claw their way out of the darkness. People who unapologetically own their struggle and share it with the world while lighting a path forward for others to do the same. Those are the people I consider real champions in life.

I am honored to be joined by someone I consider a champion in more ways than one. His story has inspired millions. He is the brother of billionaire investor Dallas Maverick's owner, Mark Cuban, but he is so much more than that. He's an attorney, a successful author, a speaker, and a fellow crazy cat person like myself, but he's also an addiction recovery advocate, moving towards fifteen years of sobriety. Brian Cuban, welcome to the show, my friend.

BC: Thanks for having me on. I wore my Party Sober t-shirt so you can see it.

JE: You make it so that people can party sober and not feel awkward. I feel like people forget that you can attend a party and still have a good time and not partake in the drinking.

BC: That can be a difficult transition when you've spent your life using those substances so you can walk into that room, whether it's drinking. For me, it was also cocaine in the party scene.

JE: Liquid courage, if you will.

BC: Liquid soothing as well.

JE: You are the living definition of what it means to reinvent oneself. I always joke about the Forbes 30 Under 30 list, because they are truly meaningless. I feel society tricks us into believing that folks who achieve great success at an early age are otherworldly or magical in some way. The truth is that for the vast majority who achieved success much later in life, their journey wasn't always easy. I look at someone like you and I always say show me the list of people who have reinvented themselves at age 60, or the person who decided to get sober, or the person who decided to go back to school to finish their degree much later in life. Show me the single mom who scored their first book deal at age 50, or the person ringing the cancer-free bell.

When I think of people like that, I do think of you. You are 60 years old. You have a bestselling memoir. You just released your debut legal thriller. You speak on hundreds of stages across the nation, but none of it would've been possible without your sobriety. Your recovery from alcohol and cocaine use didn't begin until age 46. You've knocked on death store numerous times, had a problem drinking, cocaine addiction, two trips to a psychiatric facility, jail, the cratering of your law practice, and failed marriages. You say it wasn't the journey you wanted, but it was the journey you needed. Why?

BC: I've lived two lives. There's a scene in The Natural that I love. I don't know if you've ever seen it. Robert Redford plays this baseball player over the hill. He's talking to the character played by Glenn Close, who was his high school sweetheart. She says, "We lead two lives, the one we were born with and the one we learned from." That's like me. I've led a life of addiction. My second life began in recovery. I've used that first life, as rocky as it was, to learn, reinvent myself, and do the things that I am truly passionate about.

If you compare those two lives and what I have accomplished pre-sobriety and post-sobriety, there's no comparison. That's not to say I didn't accomplish anything. I was an alcoholic. I finished law school at Penn State. I don't say that as something you should try. How much better could I have done and how much more could I have achieved if I had gone through college and law school sober?

The Addicted Lawyer: Tales of the Bar, Booze, Blow, and Redemption

JE: I love the about section of your first book, The Addicted Lawyer: Tales of the Bar, Booze, Blow and Redemption. I love how brutally honest it is. There's so much beauty and power in cutting through the bullshit. There are a lot of memoirs out there of people patting themselves on the back, telling the world how great they are, but you own your history. You take it to the face and wear it as a badge of honor. Can you share an abbreviated version of your journey into recovery and what your rock bottom moment was that sent you on a path of reinventing yourself from the inside out?

BC: The Reader's Digest is that at eighteen years old as a freshman at Penn State, I started with two eating disorders, bulimia and exercise bulimia. Exercise bulimia is an obsessive-compulsive exercise for the primary purpose of offsetting calories. That transitioned into alcohol use, alcoholism, and problem drinking. By the age of 26, I did my first line of cocaine in a bathroom of a nightclub in Dallas, Texas. I instantly became psychologically dependent on it. Cocaine and alcohol took over my life. At 44, I had my first of two trips to a psychiatric hospital after a near-suicide attempt in which my brothers came into my house at the prodding of a friend. I had a.45 automatic on my nightstand and was whacked out on cocaine and Xanax. I had three failed marriages because of drugs and alcohol. I would try so hard to hide what I was doing.

When you spent all of your energy hiding your problems and your addictions in a relationship, you end up putting up this wall around yourself. All the energy you do doesn't leave any room for love to get in. It doesn't leave any room for love to get out. That invariably goes to your significant other may be saying, "You don't love me." To say that you do risk everything in your mind and you have to open that wall. You have to take the bricks out of that wall so a little bit of love can get out, but you're scared. It becomes easier to take the path of least resistance and say, “You're right, I don't,” and let the marriage fail. That happened to me three different times.

I've been arrested. I've been to jail. I lost my law practice. Finally in 2007, Easter weekend, after a two-day drug and alcohol-induced blackout, my girlfriend at the time, now my wife who stood by me, came home and found me. We went back to that same psychiatric hospital. I’m standing in the parking lot for the second time, waiting for intake. A few things occurred to me. 1) If there would be a third trip, I'd be dead. 2) She'd leave me, I'd leave, but she didn't. She stood by me while I rebuilt the broken trust and found recovery. Now we've been together going on for sixteen years. 3) I thought of something my father used to say to Mark, Jeff and me. I'm the middle of three boys, Mark's the eldest. He said, "Guys, wherever you go in life, no matter what you do, pick up the phone and call your brother and tell your brother you love him. Make sure your brother is okay.”

My father is a veteran of the greatest generation. He fought in Okinawa and Korea. He was the middle of three boys. This was the relationship he had with his brothers. He was passing down this gift of family. It is a gift because many don't have it when they struggle with addiction or whatever it is. I thought about that. I wasn't ready to lose my family. Not that I would lose their love, but families get frustrated. They try. They don't know what to do. All of a sudden, you're not getting together. You're not seeing your nieces and nephews and all these things. You're only hanging out with the people who love you, at least until the cocaine is gone. I wasn't ready to lose it.

That was the moment standing in that parking lot. The next day I began my journey of recovery. If you want to know how that gift stuck, all of these years later, 1,200 miles from Pittsburgh, PA, decades later, Mark, Jeff and I live within walking distance of each other. My dad, until he passed away, lived across the street from me. That's how that gift stuck.

JE: The Cuban family has always been close-knit. Addiction knows no boundaries. It doesn't discriminate. You could be sitting in AA, there will be a successful finance guy in a three-piece suit, and then he's sitting next to someone who just got out of prison.

BC: On an individual basis, it does not discriminate. Does it impact different demographics differently, underserved demographics and things like that? Of course, it does. You only have to go to Kensington, Philadelphia to understand that. They're struggling big time. Individually, it does not.

JE: In a lot of your social media posts, you say, "This is why I recover out loud." I love that so much because it is important for people. This doesn't just apply to addiction. In being vulnerable, whether it's mental health, suicide awareness, if you have cancer, or if you're a sexual assault survivor, sharing your struggle with those who are also struggling takes a lot of guts and strength. I was curious, can you explain what it means to recover out loud and why it is important to own that struggle, break down those barriers of pride, and step out of your comfort zone?

BC: I'm Jewish. There is a Kabbalistic saying in the Jewish faith called Tikkun Olam. That means changing the world with acts of kindness. Recovering out loud for me means that I can change my little part of the world one story at a time. I get messages of hope. That's all I'm trying to instill, hope, because everyone has a different path. I get messages all the time from people who say, "You've given me hope." That doesn't mean they're ready for recovery. That doesn't mean recovery is a straight line from them. Hope means that you might take that step. There is only one thing required to recover from addiction.

I ask people what that is and say, “You have to want it. You have this and that.” No, be alive. Stay alive. That is the only prerequisite to recovering and finding your best life. That's what I try to do. I try to give people hope to stay alive and keep pushing, even if that push isn't always forward. Sometimes you get pushed backwards. I've been pushed backwards. Recovery is rarely a straight line. It looks different for everyone.

The only prerequisite to recovering from addiction and finding your best life is to stay alive.

JE: Recovery is certainly not a straight line. It's not linear. It's ups and downs. Sometimes it's one step forward and five steps backwards.

BC: For families as well, they walk those steps with you. It can be frustrating. One of the first memories I have of hope is I had just started speaking and I had been to a Rotary Club. I was talking about eating disorders at the time. I walk into this Rotary Club and it's all these people now my age, and I'm going to talk to them about body image and eating disorders. I tell my story and I go back. I open Twitter. This was in the early days of Twitter. There's a message from this young girl. She says, "You don't know me, Brian, but my father is a lawyer. He was at your talk today, and we were having dinner for the first time in a year.”

JE: I got chills.

BC: It wasn't the eating disorder. It was my talk about my family that resonated with him. I gave him hope that he might have repaired something that was clearly missing with his daughter. I gave her hope that that might be repaired as well, whatever that was.

JE: You see how you're impacting lives. Life is short and hard. We have to hold onto each other. Hearing your story made a profound impact on me. Addiction has run in my family. Who doesn't know somebody who has struggled with this?

BC: Even if you don't know, you know.

JE: In fact, somebody close to me who I love is very much struggling with alcohol abuse. He's celebrating three months sober now. I asked him if he had a question for you. I don't struggle with substance abuse. I know a lot of people who do. I wanted to hear from him what questions he had for you. He said that after years of abusing substances, whether in the form of alcohol or drugs, a person's mind tends to be cloudy. This even applies to somebody who's experiencing severe trauma or someone who has PTSD. A lot of people struggle with adopting healthy habits and routines. How did you end up seeking clarity and finding your passion? That's hard for people who want to be happy, but they're struggling.

BC: One of the hard parts about that, especially for someone who's early in recovery, is you don't see. It's terrifying to look beyond three months or four months or six months. You are still attached to a life that may be still pulling at you, and your mind is still being pulled to that. As an example, everyone goes through these rituals. When I walked into the room of 12-step, you throw away all the alcohol, but there's a liquor store right down the street.

JE: If you're going to get it, you're going to get it. You can throw it all out, but they're going to find a way.

BC: You change your phone number and you delete your dealer's number, but I know the numbers in my head. These are all these little rituals we go through. The mind is still foggy in all that. It was important to me to put my compassionate community around me to support me in those foggy times, my girlfriend, my 12-step group, and my family. To make sure that I always had someone in my circle of compassion so that I can reach out to or who is reaching out to me. That was the toughest time for me, the first three months.

It's not a bright line where the mind automatically slips over, “Now, I'm not cloudy anymore.” It's a process where things are clear. When they clear, all of a sudden, you're having to feel real feelings. That can be a problem and a trigger in itself. That is why it is even more important to have a compassionate community around us. That's what I did. Underneath that, I had my therapy. I'm still in therapy now. I walk in the rooms of 12-step, and that's about abstinence. There are many other paths to recovery, but mine has to be abstinence. There's no such thing as “recreational cocaine or drinking.”

Addiction Recovery: When your mind automatically slips over to your real feelings, it can trigger your addiction relapse. This is why having a compassionate community around you is important.

JE: I've noticed that's a trend now in Hollywood. Have you heard of this term, California sober?

BC: That's fine.

JE: You smoke weed, but you won't drink. A lot of people are up in arms about that saying that's not real sobriety.

BC: I'm not a gatekeeper of recovery. Who is it for me to say what sobriety looks like for anyone? If you go to the SAMHSA’s definition of recovery, it says nothing about sobriety.

JE: It can't be defined.

BC: It talks about all the pillars of living your best life. I've passed my State of Texas recovery coach certification. I don't go and charge people to do that. You help people. If someone comes to me, I want to know what recovery looks like for them. I don't judge Demi or anyone who smokes weed or anyone who says, “I'm not using my drug of choice.” Whatever your recovery looks like, that's fine. Recovery shifts as well. Demi came out and said, “I'm no longer doing that recovery. I'm doing something different.” People go through different aspects of recovery.

JE: It ebbs and flows. It was great that Demi Lavato came out. She said she's no longer smoking weed.

BC: I don't target Demi or anyone. I believe you meet people where they are, whatever recovery looks like for them. That could change a month later. If some celebrity said, “I'm smoking weed again. I'm not doing that,” that's great. If that's what your recovery looks like, that's fine. I have a big problem with these celebrity recovery rockstars, “I am the recovery celebrity. You must do what I think is recovery.” Whatever recovery looks like for you, do that. See how it's working for you. How is your family? How is your work? How are your relationships? How is this? How is that? You have to analyze all of that. Recovery isn't just about abstinence.

JE: There's no cookie-cutter, one size fits all strategy.

BC: No matter what someone tells me what their recovery looks like, I will support them in that. If they tell me a week later, it's something different, I'll support them in that. Is it my recovery? Maybe not. Who am I to tell somebody what their recovery should look like? Shame on me if I ever do.

JE: I love that you shared that, Brian. That's important. Another story I wanted to shed some light on is, and you did mention this briefly, at eighteen years old as a freshman at Penn State University, a lot of people don't know this, but you had anorexia, which transitioned into bulimia. You own your struggle with childhood bullying, fat shaming, and body dysmorphia. As a male speaking out on these issues, it's not spoken about enough. We're used to guys having these walls up and these tough macho men. What you're talking about is important because I do feel that there are many other men and women out there who can relate to your story. You have a story involving tighty whities that had a profound impact on your life. Are you able to share that story?

BC: I was a heavy kid. I was growing up in the '70s in Pittsburgh. I was bullied severely over my weight. I was fat-shamed at home as well by my mom. To make it clear to all of your audience, I do not blame my mother for the things that happened to me.

JE: We're not blaming Mrs. Cuban for anything.

BC: There's a difference between cause and correlation. My mother was struggling with her own mental health issues and had a brutal relationship with her bipolar grandmother. She had her own things going on.

JE: Everyone has their own demons.

BC: There's no parent blaming here at all. This was back during the Saturday Night Fever era. The movie or the album had just come out. It was the disco era. My brother Mark taught disco, believe it or not.

JE: We'll have to bring him on and talk about his disco days.

BC: He was big into going to the clubs and stuff back then.

JE: Back to your tighty whities.

BC: He had given me a pair of shiny gold bell-bottom disco pants that he owns. We're close. I love that he gave them to me. Mark wasn't a heavy guy. They fit him. I had to jump up and down and spray the water bottle. My butt looked like fifteen cats trying to get out as I slid those pants on. I didn't care because they were a symbol of my brother's love for me. I was at school and the kids made fun of them, as you might expect. They bullied me, fat pig.

JE: Now in 2021, bell bottoms are back in style. Go figure.

BC: I didn't know that. I walk around in sweats 90% of the time. The kids made fun of me. You have to remember, this was back in the ‘70s when cellphones were two cups attached to a string, when social networking was playing dodgeball on the basketball blacktop, and when going viral meant fifteen kids in the lunchroom knew you had a crush on a girl. It’s a very different time, but the bullying doesn't hurt any less.

I'm walking home from school. I'm about a mile from my house along the busy street with this group of guys who were the popular guys in my mind, the prom king, the prom queen and queens, the kids who were going on their first dates, kissing girls, going to the after-school parties, all the things I wanted so badly and associated with popularity. I had a brutal middle-child syndrome. I was shy. I was withdrawn. The thought of even talking to a girl was beyond my comprehension in high school. I didn't go on my first date until law school. That's how shy I was.

I'm walking home from them. They start making fun of the pants. The next thing I know, they're tearing at them. They physically assaulted me. They ripped them off down my Fruit of the Loom tighty whities, my Pittsburgh Pirates t-shirt, my tube socks, and my Ked's tennis shoes. They threw them out in the busy street and went on like they had done the funniest thing ever, high-fiving. I walk out in the street, gather up the shreds that I could, and I cover up my tighty whities. I walk home and people gad. No one stopped. It’s a very busy street.

I get home and no one's home. It's funeral quiet. I walk down these wooden stairs to our basement and the stairs creaked. My mom still lives in the house now. The stairs creaked as I walked down into the basement. With every creak, I felt like the whole world knew my shame, that I didn't know how to stand up to bullies, and that I was this fat pig who would never be accepted.

JE: I wish I could hug that Brian Cuban back then.

BC: I hug that Brian Cuban in therapy to let him know it wasn't his fault. I felt like my brothers, mom, and dad knew. I decided that no one would ever know. I took those pants and buried them in a waste basket hoping that that would bury my shame, but that's not how trauma works. That event was so traumatic that I could take you to that spot in Pittsburgh, PA now and show you exactly where it happened. It was right around then when we talk about trauma and how it threads through our life. Our body remembers trauma more than it does pleasure.

The body remembers trauma more than it does pleasure.

We talk about snapshots of trauma. That is one of the first major snapshots of trauma that I remember seeing my reflection in the mirror, and for the first time starting to see this ugly monster who would never be loved by anyone. Not his mother, who loved me dearly, but was dealing with her own stuff. His brothers would say, “You can't stand up to bullies?” My father. I never told a soul until many decades later. That was the beginning. We talk about cause and correlation. Different people might have reacted to that differently.

For me, it was a perfect storm because I was this shy, withdrawn, and already trending towards isolation person who wore everything negative said about me like a skintight suit and those shiny gold bell-bottom disco pants. That was traumatic. I used to Facebook some of those kids who did that. I'd talk about that. I've never identified them. I would get asked, “Don't you want to tell them what they did?”

JE: Don't you want to call them out?

BC: These are grown men, grandfathers probably. These aren't 15-year-old or 14-year-old boys.

JE: Who probably have unresolved trauma of their own that they're passing on to their children.

BC: Maybe, but I don't want that for them. I want them to have happy lives, happy children, and happy grandchildren. Hopefully, not repeating cycles. This isn't a reality show. I'm not your father. I'm not looking to confront those kids or those adults now.

JE: I always say the best revenge is living your best life, not wishing revenge on anybody, but just being healthy and living your best life.

BC: I keep it in perspective of how these events changed me as a person. As a quick example, I became a horrific bully to one of my college roommates at Penn State in my freshman year at Penn State. There were four of us sharing a dorm. In my mind, the way to popularity and convince these other kids that I belonged to hang out with them was to bully this kid who we called Hawaiian Dan. He was from San Diego, go figure. He wore these flowery Hawaiian shirts. We called him Hawaiian Dan. I bullied him without mercy until his brother showed up during spring break and threatened to beat me if I bothered his brother again. I never did. Hawaiian Dan, if you're tuning in, I'm sorry. I hope serendipity brings us together one day so I can tell you in person how sorry I am. I regret that to this day.

JE: Maybe Hawaiian Dan is tuning in to the show.

BC: I hope he is because I regret that to this day. It causes me pain to this day that I did that to him. I don't lose sight of what happened to me in terms of bullying.

JC: You can't. It's brave that you also shared the fact that you too became the bully.

BC: That's not an unusual dynamic, but that didn't make it any better for Hawaiian Dan.

JC: One of my favorite quotes is from Brené Brown, “If we share our story with someone who responds with empathy and understanding, shame can't survive.” By you sharing these stories, you're breaking down barriers. You're challenging the stigma attached to bullying, mental health, body dysmorphia, and addiction. Thank you so much for sharing that. It is going to have a profound impact on my audience. Who hasn't been bullied? Who hasn't been through tough times like that?

BC: How do you define bullying? There was a power dynamic. I used it to my benefit to try to be popular and accepted. I'll tell you something, an overblown need for acceptance can be as powerful as a line of cocaine and cause destructive behavior and unkind behavior.

JE: That is true. Caring about the opinions of others and seeking that validation. One thing that I learned in my own personal journey of reinvention is the importance of autonomy and having a sense of self and purpose, and not letting society or the press write your story or that narrative for you. It's no secret, your brother is a billionaire investor and Shark Tank TV personality, Mark Cuban. What a lot of people don't realize is Brian Cuban had an eating disorder before your brother Mark became internationally famous.

You had a cocaine and alcohol problem before your brother Mark became famous. You're even on the record saying that when you have no identity of your own, you seek validation from others. I thought that was powerful. I am curious, how has your brother, Mark, played a role in your recovery good and bad? I say that not because I want to throw Mark under the bus. I say that because a lot of families go through challenges.

BC: My brother saved my life. I was going to put a gun in my mouth. Let's be real here. Mark as a person has had no bad impact on my recovery. My identity rests with me, not with him or anyone else. He lived his life. He's living his best life. During the time when Mark became internationally famous was when I was going through my worst times in drug addiction. It all happened before him.

He didn't cause any of it. His fame didn't cause any of this. What happened was I was such an empty shell and I hated myself so much. I had such a void in my stomach of self-respect. In my mind, it made perfect sense that I could be Mark Cuban's brother and I could date girls half my age. Those relationships always revolved around drugs. I could go into any nightclub I wanted in Dallas, walk right in, go through the line, get bottle service, get free cocaine, this and that. Mark Cuban's brother sounds pretty good for that Brian Cuban.

Because I had no identity, that made perfect sense to me. I could utilize my name fame and prop myself up so I didn't have to look inward and see what I hated, which was myself. Beginning in recovery, you have to deal with those feelings. I deal with them. I've worked hard to create my own identity. Let's be honest, my last name gets me noticed for my books, for this or for that. It's my last name too. I still get that on Twitter or whatever. You are on your brother's jock, this and that. You let this stuff roll off.

JE: I was sharing with Patricia Heaton. She was the last interview that I conducted. We were talking about Twitter and social media, the sometimes negative impact it has on society and how it ruins the public discourse. There are a lot of good aspects and components of social media, but there's also a lot of hate and vitriol. I am curious, with having the Cuban name, is there an insult you have received that you're proud of?

BC: If someone says to me, “You're only known because of your brother,” great. I'm proud of that. The more I am known, the more my message gets out. I'll tell you a funny story. I was speaking in Canada. I was speaking not far out of Toronto. I was one of several speakers, but I was one of the only ones being paid. There was another speaker who was clearly irritated that I was being paid and he wasn't. I did my talk. He's standing in the back of the room. I take Q&A. He raised his hand and said, “What is it like living in your brother's shadow all the time and only being famous because of your brother?” I looked at the room. I smiled and said, “It doesn't suck.”

JE: I like that. Good answer.

BC: You have to let it roll off. I do well on Twitter. I get cokehead and all those things. I get all the time, “You're riding your brother's jock. You're only famous because of Mark.” That means you're not buying my book.

JE: That's such a powerful response. Own it. The more people who take notice of you, the more your message spreads to the masses. That's the way I look at it.

Addiction Recovery: The more people notice you, the more your message spreads to the masses.

BC: It's funny when I do shows, people say, “We're not going to mention your relationship with your brother.” They're worried that I don't want that. Mention it. I want people to watch the show.

JE: It's not the elephant in the room. You guys are family. He is your brother. He's successful, but you're very successful in your own right. I appreciate you shedding some light on that because I know sibling dynamics can be tough. You're not the only sibling out there who's famous, who has feels, or society is like, “They live in their brother’s or sister's shadow.” That's so ludicrous.

BC: I wouldn't call her friend. I met her once when I spoke on Facebook, but Randi Zuckerberg used to get that same stuff. I see it on Twitter all the time, "The only reason anyone knows who you are is because of your brother. The only reason people are buying your book is because of your brother." I'm not the only sibling with a famous sibling who gets that. Everyone deals with it in their own way.

JE: Ashley Simpson, the sister of Jessica Simpson, has a song that was in her autobiography. I can't even believe I'm sharing this, but it's funny. I'm an Ashley Simpson fan, but she has a song. She's vulnerable. It's called Shadow. She's talking about living in the shadow of someone else's dream, trying to have a hand to hold but every touch felt cold to me.

BC: Ashley and I look at it differently. I don't see it as living in Mark’s dream at all. A few years ago, I got this message from someone who was trying to get at me. He said, “Do you know your brother was on Kramer and he said you're not motivated.” Mark would never do that. I go back and look for the episode. I'm curious. The question was, “Are your brothers motivated the same way you are?” I am not motivated to achieve the same things as Mark. He was telling the truth.

JE: You guys are on different life paths.

BC: We have different life paths. I wouldn't know an NFT from a PFT. Until not too long ago, I thought Bitcoins were mined in caves where you need to find them. It's not my thing. It's never been my thing. We're different. I've never viewed myself as other than that one time when I used my name fame to get what I wanted. I've never viewed myself as living in Mark's shadow. It's a totally different shadow than mine.

JE: Switching gears here, Brian. I know that it's no secret the holiday season is upon us. I don't know about you, but alcohol use, substance abuse, and depression feel like it's more on the rise than ever before. Your dad passed away from dementia. He played a significant role in your life. I'm curious, what would Brian Cuban say to somebody out there who is struggling in the aftermath of addiction or is maybe suffering from food insecurity or is having a difficult time coping with the loss of a loved one this holiday season? What advice would you extend them to give them a little bit of hope?

BC: There are people who love you and want to support you. It's normal to project out that they don't want to. They're too busy. I can't put my problems on them. If you pull out, pick out the five people or the top five people who love you and you love, and you'll find that they are your compassionate community. Insecurities, whether it's shame. It's why I cringe at there's no reason to feel ashamed because it delegitimizes. Shame is a natural body defense mechanism against many things. Sometimes, it can be a motivator. It depends on how much it's taking over your life and what it is. It's normal. Food insecurity is normal. No one knows it more than I do.

If you pick at least five people who love you and you love, you are already forming your compassionate community free from insecurities and shame.

JE: I felt insecure going back for a third Thanksgiving plate this past Thanksgiving.

BC: My biggest struggle now is my relationship with exercise and food, the exercise bulimia. There are people who love you and want to support you. There is no need to go through it alone. I know that the first step is brutal because, in that first step, you have to fight through the projection and all the negative self-talk that you've given yourself as reasons for them not wanting to help you. It's tougher alone than with a compassionate community. What I tell people who are afraid, write it out. Pick that one person. Write out your script. Whether it's getting back together or wanting to talk about what you're going through, write it out and read it.

JE: Writing has been therapeutic for me. One thing I love and admire about how you use your platform is you're vocal about mental health. Social isolation is a big factor in how one copes and manages day-to-day stressors. Different and apart from what we know from the pandemic like socially isolating, isolating oneself can be due to shame and embarrassment.

BC: It’s common with clinical depression.

JE: Inability to properly communicate how you're feeling. There have been times I didn't even want to get out of bed in the morning. How does someone fight through that want to socially isolate themselves? What advice would you give to them?

BC: We have to distinguish between wanting to be alone. We talk about social isolation as it's a negative thing around it. It's okay to want to be alone now and then. You don't want anyone around you. You're going through it. That's a form of social isolation.

JE: I love a good bubble bath and put it on my Spotify.

BC: You're socially isolating yourself, but not through these long stretches. When you're doing it through these long stretches, that's when a compassionate community is important. Are you noticing your friend is no longer communicating? Are you reaching out? There is something I call the two-ask rule. When you think somebody is struggling, it could be depression or just a bad day. How many seconds does it take or how many words does it take to reach out to them, whether it's by phone or a call and say, "Are you doing okay? I know you're struggling."

Before that conversation breaks, the second question is, “Do you know that if you want to talk ever, I am here for you?” That’s the two-ask rule, twice. What you've done, and they may not be ready, it could be a transitional bad day, and people who are suffering from clinical depression, you may even have trouble getting them out of the house. That's why it's important for friends to be compassionate as well as to check on their friends and their family.

JE: Even if they're not ready to talk about it, they know that you're there and that you're willing to talk.

BC: They know that you're there, but just as importantly, it can't be performance art. You have to be there. You have to be ready to be there, go check on them, and do those things because it’s friends, family, strangers, and no performance art.

JE: I always say, check in on that funny outgoing friend of yours who on social media acts like they're living this perfect life and they have it all together because 9 times out of 10, they don't. We're all struggling.

Addiction Recovery: Check in on your funny and outgoing friends who seem like they are living perfect lives regularly. Nine times out of ten, they are also struggling.

BC: The two-ask rule means not mailing it in either. You call your friend who you haven't seen in a few days, "I'm doing okay, just lying in bed." "How long have you been lying in bed? What did you do yesterday? What are your plans today? Do you want to get together?" You can ask more questions without accusing them of it. You don't want to be accusatory. You want to be compassionate and empathetic. You can get a good gauge of what's going on. If you think something's wrong and you don't know what to do, believe it or not, you can reach out to all kinds of people who can help you figure out what to do.

JE: You're not alone. Anyone who is feeling a little bit alone this holiday season, you are not. Text me and Brian. We're here for you.

BC: Reach out to me. I'm always going to be there to support people and people who are struggling with depression. Believe me, I've been suicidal in sobriety. I understand clinical depression and major depressive episodes, and people with depression. I've heard it before. Part of depression is not giving those answers. There's no magic pill to this, but you have to engage. Be engaged. Especially for me, when I became suicidal, it came over me like that. We can't be there every moment with our friends, but we can be engaged.

Even though we can’t be with our friends at every moment, we can continue to be engaged.

JE: We can be engaged over the holiday season if you're traveling. If anyone out there is looking for a good read, if you're socially isolating, and you want to curl up with a good book, Brian Cuban happens to be the author of The Ambulance Chaser. It is a must-read legal thriller about murder, memory, and personal consequences. It sounds ominous but you can't put it down. It is a roller coaster. Brian, tell us a little bit about the book and share where they can purchase a copy.

BC: The Ambulance Chaser is about a personal injury lawyer who finds himself accused of the murder of a high school classmate 30 years prior after her remains were discovered in a vacant lot. He is charged with her murder and he flees becoming a fugitive from justice to find the one person who can prove his innocence and also save his abducted son. I'm excited about it as my debut novel. It is already sold thousands in pre-orders. It's launched.

JE: How can people purchase it? Is it on Amazon? Where do they go?

BC: You can find it on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and indie bookstores. If they don't have it, ask for it. You can also find different places at AuthorBrianCuban.com.

JE: I'm going to run to my nearest bookstore here in Manhattan and I'm going to put it front and center.

BC: Demand that they stock it.

JE: I call it the book shuffle. I'm going to shuffle out yours with the New York Times bestseller.

BC: Please, do. I'm excited about it. It has done well so far.

JE: I hope that you're able to come to the New York City area. We would love to have a Brian Cuban appearance for a book signing. Hopefully, that's able to happen. Lastly, I am curious, this new book of yours is a big change from your previous memoir, The Addicted Lawyer. I have to say it again because it's so fun to say, Tales of the Bar, Booze, Blow and Redemption.

BC: It has the alliteration there.

JE: It's so great and honest and true. Everyone should go out and purchase his memoir as well. It is fascinating, his comeback story and his journey of reinvention.

BC: If you think about it, those four words encapsulate my life.

JE: In your new book, the only way the main character can survive is if he overcomes his addiction so he can face his childhood demons. I am curious about what inspired you to write this. How much of this is fact versus fiction as it relates to your own life?

BC: The protagonist, Jason Feldman, it's my mother's maiden name to honor my mother, as you might expect, he struggles with drugs and alcohol. That is nothing new in legal fiction. That's a trope.

JE: It's more nonfiction. I know a lot of attorneys out there who struggle with addiction.

BC: Going back to The Verdict, Paul Newman struggle with drugs and alcohol. That is nothing new. There are parts of me and Jason, there are parts of people I've met along the way, the villain and Jason's sidekicks that help him, the police detectives. That's normal. You write what you know. Jason's father struggles with dementia. Jason has struggled with his Jewish faith as I have. Jason has lost his family and there are some underlying Jewish themes to this. Jason has lost family in the Holocaust as I have. The idea itself has a dark genesis.

I used to have these reoccurring dreams of being in my hometown of Pittsburgh in the neighborhood I grew up in with my childhood best friend. We're throwing bodies into this bonfire and watching the bodies burn with these open eight-ball eyes, staring at us. The dream fast forwards into adulthood and I'm all nervous wondering why I haven't been arrested for these bodies and for these people we killed. I've never killed anyone. I've never buried a body.

I had this recurring dream and I'd always wake up disoriented with this knot in my stomach. I'd be waiting to be arrested by the police. I'm out for a run and I'm thinking about it because you try to interpret your dreams. I'm thinking about it and it occurred to me during this run that, "There are characters here. There's a plot here. Old bodies coming back to the present," which isn't new either. That is a staple of murder fiction and suspense and mystery. I decided I could create interesting characters, and interesting situations, and have a good novel out of that. I think I have.

JE: I'm halfway through it and I can't put it down. It's fantastic. I love this journey for you. You're a budding author. The sky's the limit. It's neat that the book is such a big shift from your previous memoir.

BC: It wasn't an easy shift because writing a memoir is a different art. I know my story. You still have to learn to write. You still have to write dialogue in full and things like that. I know my story backwards and forwards and creating characters to knowing your own character. Creating characters as compared to being the character are two different skillsets.

Addiction Recovery: Creating characters and being the character are two different skill sets an effective writer must possess.

JE: I am supporting you in this journey. I hope our audience runs out and purchase The Ambulance Chaser. It is so great. Get it for your holiday gifts this season.

BC: Great for stocking stuff. It’s a little bigger. You might have to stuff it in there.

JE: It needs to be an extra thick big stocking.

BC: Your stocking will look like a snake that swallowed something but get it in there.

JE: I promise it is worth it. My friend, you have broken down barriers. You have challenged the stigma surrounding addiction, recovery, you name it. Thank you so much, Brian Cuban, for taking the time to come on the show and to show others that it is possible to reinvent and live your best life.

BC: Thank you for having me on, Jennifer.

JE: Be sure to rate, review and subscribe to this show. That's available wherever you listen to podcasts, Spotify, Apple, YouTube, you name it, it's there. That was Brian Cuban. Thank you for tuning in.

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