Healthy Living by Willow Creek Springs
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Healthy Living by Willow Creek Springs
From Isolation To Connection: Healing Addiction’s Hidden Roots with Severn Lang part 1
Ever feel like the thing that “helps” you is the very thing that keeps you alone? That’s where Severn Lang lived for years—sipping ease, swallowing pain, and drifting further from the people who could save him. What follows is a rare, generous conversation about how addiction hides inside isolation, how grief calcifies into clutter, and how the right words at the right moment can turn a life.
Severn grew up disconnected: a father battling schizophrenia who could preach to a crowd yet couldn’t speak to his own child, the loss of an older brother who had been his social bridge and his guide through dyslexia, and trauma that trained him to stop asking for help. Alcohol first appeared as communion wine and later as a constant companion that promised connection but delivered silence. As a hairstylist, he could perform sociability in short bursts, then vanish to drink and create alone. The spiral accelerated after his father’s death, peaking at half-gallons every 36 hours, the kind of pace that steals voice, work, and home.
The turning points were small and seismic: a leadership forum that stripped away excuses, a salon client who said “you look horrible” with love and urgency, and a cousin in long-term recovery who got him to a meeting. From there, Severn found the irreplaceable medicine of community—sponsorship, shared language, and people who’ve been through it. He learned how addiction transfers into “acceptable” habits like shopping, coffee, or overworking and built a practical framework to stop the drift: applying 12-step questions to non-substance behaviors, boxing up his belongings, only keeping what he used, and interrogating every attachment as need, want, regret, or heirloom.
With sobriety came a new vocation. Despite dyslexia, Severn leaned into storytelling, partnering with a co-writer to craft plays and films that make the emotional tangible. We talk about ego’s hunger for comfort, why isolation is relapse fuel, and how purpose, routine, and honest mirrors keep recovery alive. If you’re navigating addiction recovery, grief, codependency, or the slow burn of burnout, this conversation offers practical tools and hope you can use today.
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Well, hello, and welcome back to the Healthy Living Podcast. I'm your host, Joe Grumbine, and today we've got a very special guest with us. His name is Severn Lang. And uh Severn has got quite a story. He helps people see addiction for what it really is, not just a battle with substances, but the quiet everyday ways we hold on when we're when we should be letting go. Um, as a playwright and a filmmaker, he tells stories that makes the emotional tangible, like his powerful account of cleaning out a kitchen shelf overflowing with old kitchen bottles in a moment that uh mirrored his journey of letting go of grief and baggage from his father. Severin, welcome to the show. I don't like to get too deep into these uh intros. I'd rather, you know, hear you talk about it yourself. So we're really grateful to have you here and sharing your story. And uh why don't you tell us a little bit about what brought you here?
SPEAKER_00:I appreciate it. Thank you. Um thank thank you for letting me be on uh letting me be here and be present in the Sun Adventure of being a part of your story and and thank you um letting be part of your audience members as well. Um my sobriety journey and my healing process and my journey of healing is a roller coaster and like in life in general. Um my journey started in 2013 and June 10th uh was my my sobriety date, my birth date, uh as we call it. Uh started in Los Angeles. That's when I submitted to my alcoholism and said I need help. Uh but uh before that I I was heavily in alcohol, drinking heavily, drinking my emotions away, drinking, suppressing, drinking, suppressing, drinking and suppressing, drink to feel, drink to not feel. It was an ongoing onslaught.
SPEAKER_03:Isn't it wild how an addiction can solve all your problems?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_03:It can make you sad, it can open you up, it can close you off, it can do anything you wanted to.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it it's a solution of sorts, but it creates more problems at the same time. Uh and it creates what we think is a sociable environment, but it actually creates an isolation and it creates a separation of a connection. Uh it severs that connection. Uh and that that's the problem for myself because I'm an introvert and I create isolation habits quickly. Uh what I think is I'm artistic abilities, it's just a way for my ego to separate myself, to feed itself where it's comfortable, where uh I need to be sociable, where I need to connect with people. My ego, my alcoholism makes such scenarios where it wants to isolate itself. And that's part of my alcoholism that I'm trying to master, even to 12 years later, still trying to master. But my story, um, you know, my my childhood is what I thought was normal, but it's not. Uh, I was raised by a schizophrenic father who was my main caregiver, who neglected his children who didn't talk to them. And my mother was a very strong woman, but married a schizophrenic husband. Right. So that that's a powerful person of itself. But to kind of react to that, you have to work a lot to house a family unit. So I didn't really see her that much. Um, and also she with that responsibility, um she had to take on a role that you know um it just took on a different role. Father. Uh in my the one a children needs to see a a a father figure, and that and unfortunately he wasn't his paranoia, wasn't allowed to be a parent. And so I was already experiencing disconnection. That's how I socialized was disconnection. And then my brother, older brother, passed away when I was 11. He was 13. And uh that itself was an issue because uh I wasn't able to grieve because every time I asked where my brother was, it triggered my parents to grieve. And so I just learned not to ask anymore because it made them grieve out loud.
SPEAKER_03:And so how old were you at the time?
SPEAKER_00:I was 11. Wow, that's a rough time. And he was my social ring, and also I'm I'm extremely dyslexic, and he helped me with my dyslexia at that early age because I wasn't getting help with my dyslexia. He was my help. Wow, and at that time, he my help passed away. So uh so it was a lot of complications, and then on top of it, uh, I was a victim of uh uh of sexual abuse as well outside of my family unit. So there was problems on top of problems and top of problems, so I had no um escape. Okay. And then alcohol was introduced into myself when I was um taking care of communion wine when I was younger. So that was my introductory to alcohol, was communion wine. Oh wow, yeah, yeah. So uh in the world of church and communion wine, there a little tidbit, church churches are not allowed to dump it in the the sink, technically, uh, unless the sink or there's a unless the uh particular drain is connected to the ground directly.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. So the wine has to be drained blessed, and it's already it's not wine anymore according to the church.
SPEAKER_00:Correct. So it's so it has to be drained, it has to be dumped onto the onto holy ground or onto the ground itself, or it has to be consumed completely. So I just consumed it.
SPEAKER_03:You made it easy for them.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah. Uh so that that that's generally how it should be handled. It can't be re-poured back in the bottle. It has once it's poured, it's poured and consume it or dump it onto the ground. It can't be so uh at that was a young age. I didn't know that until my my best friends of now, they're like, Oh, did you know this? Like, apparently not, because I blacked out. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Um, so that's my you're what age when you're drinking this communion one.
SPEAKER_00:So you're certain like an altar server or or working that that's so both my parents were pastors. Okay. Um, my father was a pastor first, and then my mother became a pastor later. But my father was a pastor, and then due to his mental illness, uh, we were pushed out of a uh church, uh family family unit. So we moved to another family unit where his best friend was a minister as well. So we so we were joined in another church under another basically, we just adapted to another church, okay. Um, so my father could still be a minister as well. But because of his mental illness, um, he wasn't able to serve full-time.
SPEAKER_03:Right, I could imagine.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so it was it was weird. He was able to speak to the masses, but he wasn't able to speak to his family.
SPEAKER_02:Wow.
SPEAKER_00:Or to his kids. He was able to speak to his wife, my mom, but not to to me. So I was already disconnected. Um, but so I wasn't able to process emotions correctly. And so there, uh, for me to deal with emotions, I led into music and art, which is fine, and that was a wonderful unit. Um, struggle with my dyslexia, college was a problem, high school was a problem because my able to educate myself was a different process, and so that led to isolation already. And so my ego got to me, my my alcoholism. But I had it under control, I wasn't really drinking. My drinking stage happened much later in life, uh, after I became 21. Okay, which was I I think a blessing, and also not because once I hit 21, uh, it was downhill.
SPEAKER_03:Uh okay. Plus, you can just get it anywhere. You just buy it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, exactly. So once I got into my my first career, my first career was uh I became a hairstylist and I found a decent social ring and a career where uh I can be an artist as well. But I would drink and socialize heavily and then isolate to just to um drink my sorrows away and to feel my emotions.
SPEAKER_03:So you would like go to an event and be out there with everybody, and then you'd you'd be a recluse after that.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so I would only hit the the the event for maybe an hour and a half, okay, and then I'll disappear. Ah and uh one of those guys, yeah, yeah. I'll I'll just show up and then disappear when the event was for like three or four you know for five, six hours. Got it. I'll just be present and then go away. Um, when everyone was sober, I was lit. Got it. Um, and then I'll just go home and just do art. But uh my father passed away in 2008. That was I was in my alcoholism at its full force. I was drinking about a half a gallon of alcohol. Wow. About every 36 hours.
SPEAKER_01:Wow.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And that lasted for a good eight years or so.
SPEAKER_03:And I wasn't able- You never survived that.
SPEAKER_00:I I it's a miracle that I wasn't having health, major health issues at that time. Uh it's uh I'm still shocked with that process as well, because that that's a damage of its own.
SPEAKER_03:It seems that you have a purpose.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly, exactly. Um, so when my father passed away, I know that there was a problem. Uh, a there was still a hard connection between me and my father because I woke up in the middle of the morning at four o'clock and I had this intuition to go to him. And two hours later, because it would have took me three hours, he passed away. I knew it would take me three hours to get to him. So I would have made it to him right when he passed away, but I chose to stay. Okay. And then once I figured that out, my drinking habits skyrocket. Got it. And then I moved to Los Angeles for a career shift. Um and then all of a sudden uh my health plummeted and my career changed because I started drinking even more, but I isolated more. Okay. Even though I was surrounded by people, and my career was promising. And I couldn't process my emotions. I started I stopped talking to people, I stopped socializing with people, I I became pretty much mute with people, even though this career is the the hair career was about talking to people.
SPEAKER_03:Right.
SPEAKER_00:It ironically, but I drank myself to homelessness. Uh luckily I had a friend who was going through a divorce. She needed someone in the house. She found out I was homeless, and she asked me to stay in her house to have a body in the house. And uh she knew she knew I needed help. But I promised myself I wouldn't drink, and obviously that didn't last long.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Within a week, I was drinking it in the house and constricting hours, but that didn't work. Then um something broke. Uh, a friend, another mutual friend asked me to go to like a life-changing event, um like a um like a leadership training. Okay. So I went to this training thing, and they asked me certain questions. And the question was, uh, do you like what you hear? Do you think you like this? And what are you tired of? You know, things simple questions. Right. And my response was, I'm um tired of pissing in the wind. I'm just tired of life. And that's it. And I sat down. Wow. And that and that was it. And that submission of I'm acknowledging that I'm tired of this life. And it's almost it was almost like I'm it felt like a suicide note. Wow. Like it felt like a suicide note, really. And someone felt that and came up to me, like, I'm sponsoring you for this training program. And uh through this training program, it broke the ice to admit in front of thousands of people saying, I think I have a problem with alcohol.
SPEAKER_03:No kidding. Was this a faith-based joke or just a secular thing?
SPEAKER_00:It was just uh uh it's called a forum.
SPEAKER_03:Okay.
SPEAKER_00:And it it's just basically it's a leadership program for business for management, just to go in for helping people to learn how to manage people.
SPEAKER_03:Got it.
SPEAKER_00:And their method is help manage yourself to manage others. That's yeah, it was wonderful, but it breaks down the the uh breaks down the ego to help other people. Wow, and by doing that, um it made me realize I need help with alcohol. And luckily in recovery, we have the saying of the Eskimo. So my my Eskimo is my cousin, Eric Lynn. He has been in recovery since his early 20s. He's two years younger than me, so he's been in it in a very, very long time. So long, long, long time. And he took me to my first recovery meeting, but he he he's like, Hey Severin, can you take me to can you take me to a recovery meeting? Because uh I'm gonna I need to share. Nice.
SPEAKER_03:But he's like a good way to get you to come in, right?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah. Can you support me?
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So those things triggered and made me feel like I think I have a problem with alcohol. And then months later, after the realization I have a drinking problem, the only job I could have or I could hold was an assistant to another hairstylist. And I'm already six, eight years in to a path of success, and I'm assisting one day a week. Wow. Because I was drinking myself to death, slow, painful death. And a client, God bless her soul, she uh uh she grabbed me and she's like, Severing, you look horrible. What is wrong with you? And you know when you meet someone, they ask one question, and for some reason you just blurt something out, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Just catch right into you, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, um, that was it. That was like, I think I drink too much. That was it. Okay, she pulled me in.
SPEAKER_03:She's like somebody you didn't know prior to that.
SPEAKER_00:I I I knew her a couple times, and we had, you know, I I you know, I was helping the hairstylist. She's not my client.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_00:Um, she was the salon client.
SPEAKER_03:Okay.
SPEAKER_00:She was like, hey, give me your number, answer this telephone number. It's my husband. She's so he's sober for like 15 years. And then she told me her life story. She's clean and sober for 18. And uh this gentleman called me. We met for coffee. He's like, Can you tell me why my wife told you? I told the story, and he's like, My wife told you that she's clean, like, yeah, from heroin and Beth. And like, okay, that itself is a miracle. She tells no one. Wow, she keeps that lock tight, security. She doesn't tell anyone, so you must really look bad and desperate. And like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then from there, um, you know, I got I got sober. Um, and then sponsorship is, you know, a community is very important for when you're struggling. Yeah, it's huge, it's very huge.
SPEAKER_03:So it doesn't matter what program it is, no, it doesn't having somebody that you can because you're always gonna go through that moment of weakness where you're just like, I don't know if I can do it, but if you can reach out to one person and go ahead and know that they're speaking your language, you know, they know what you're going through, they've been there, they're doing it. Yeah, the big difference right there.
SPEAKER_00:Huge. The the the wonderful part of recovery is a community that's gone to similar things is knowing that you can go to someone like I'm going through this experience, like I know that feeling. Uh, or like, okay, I I don't know exactly that process, or like I've never been through that, but I do know someone that went through it. Sure. Let me connect you, you know, and I'll support you while you talk to that person, and so we can collaborate and help you. So that's the beauty thing about recovery of any program, uh, any spiritual path that has a way to heal. So as I get through this recovery process, uh, I'm I'm going through uh uh AA, that that's my steps. But I realize as we go through recovery, the 12-step program, there I can apply it to other modalities, other things. Right. And the longer I became in recovery, the longer I realized I'm in I'm in the wrong path of my career. And I need to shift my career into a different. So I realized that um my passions are more storytelling, more um, more life skills, which is vision and more directing, more uh ironically writing, because um I even though I'm extremely dyslexic, I'm a creative. I can you know words are troubling to write, but ironically, I can actually write decently to help and create a storyline and things like that. So um so it was nice to be clear-headed and realize my weaknesses is actually a great strength. I just need to find a way to work around it. So I just I found a co-writer and we write together. It's wonderful. So the more we become re-recovered, I realize the ego is my, I call it um my alcoholism, my ego, wants to stay comfort, stay in in its comfort zone. So it will fight me to stay in comfort, and that is drinking or stay uh in in my disease. So stay in my isolation mode. So I will find it will find or I will find ways to stay isolated. So I will start doing um negative things to stay isolated, and one of those things is um uh uh like doing art projects, they'll keep me isolated and not tell anyone yourself in something so you got a good ex while you're not there, yeah. And I and I won't tell anyone about it. Yeah, the thing is I won't tell anyone about it. And if I don't tell anyone about it, uh that will defeat the whole purpose of the project type of thing. But if I keep on telling people about it, that keeps me active and socializing. You're like, see, this is what I'm doing, right? You know, but I notice that I'm staying stagnant in my program, and I notice I'm I notice my alcoholism is gathering things, and I'm excessiving shopping, excessive and gathering things, and excessive um just excessive and that and so I applied my my program into shopaholics type of thing. Um, and so I decided to declutter things. Nice. So I gather my items into moving boxes and left them in each room. And whatever I got, like I needed something, I took it out and I put it away when I used it, and then I applied why I am holding on to these items, and if it's an emotional tie, then I use the program, my 12-step program, to figure out what's the emotional tie. And I have to use um is it a need, is it a want? Is it a is it a regret? And like, okay, what is my part to it? Is it something that I can work with, or is it is it can I give it as an heirloom to someone? So I I use a process to get rid of it or keep it. But if I keep it, am I able to pass it along?
SPEAKER_03:You know, then I'm insightful. I I I um I don't think that people realize so much that an addiction is easily transferred into something else. Like you see the guys at the 12-step program, they're all smoking, chain smoking and drinking cup after cup of coffee. Yeah, and it's like, well, okay, I guess you're not drinking anymore, but you're doing something else that's pretty it it is transferable.
SPEAKER_00:Like, so I had the nice blessing to be a hairstylist to notice clients and habits of like I had some clients that are divorced, and they'll say that they're divorced, even it's been 15 years. And I finally had enough with a client. I'm like, bro, you're single, you got a divorce.
