Episode · Feb 13, 2026 · 1 hr 22 min

From Needle to Nonprofit

with Zac Clark

Zac Clark founded Release Recovery after becoming sober in 2011 and now works in addiction treatment and recovery services.

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“I'm going to listen to the people around me. I'm not going to think that I'm the smartest guy in the room.”

Zac Clark

Summary

Zac Clark says his childhood was stable, but he began drinking in middle school and used alcohol and drugs through college and his first jobs. After brain surgery in 2008, he became dependent on opioids, then heroin and crack. He recounts getting arrested, entering a bank with a stolen check, and being brought home by his father, which marked the start of his sobriety on August 30, 2011. A four-and-a-half-month treatment stay preceded his move to New York and first work in behavioral health.

Clark describes building Release Recovery from sober living into a treatment operation, the role of service and accountability, and how his appearance on The Bachelorette brought unexpected attention. He and Ken discuss the people and relationships behind his organization, how its run club connects recovery and running, and how endurance training provides structure. They close by explaining how someone who needs help can contact Release and what the organization can offer.

Show notes

Zac Clark's childhood was stable. Good parents. Sports. School. No obvious "reason" for what came next, which is exactly why his story matters.

In his mid-20s, Zac had brain surgery. The surgery worked. But he left the hospital with a raging opioid addiction, and it escalated fast. Pills turned into powder. Powder turned into a needle. And eventually, a missing person report, an arrest, and one moment inside a bank that forced everything into the light.

Zac got sober on August 30, 2011. He stayed in treatment for four and a half months, moved to New York City, and started over from the bottom of the behavioral health world, one day at a time. Years later, he built Release Recovery, a sober living and treatment operation that now spans multiple locations and helps people who feel out of options.

We also talk about the unexpected curveball: The Bachelorette, sudden visibility, and why the real work starts after the camera turns off. And how running became a tool for discipline, community, and staying alive.

Read the transcript

Transcript

Made from YouTube's automatic captions and lightly corrected, so a few words and names may be off. Click a time to play the video from there.

Ken Rideout

Zac Clark, thanks so much for being here. One of my closest allies in the whole world. I'm so proud to be your friend and happy that you came here. I love you. I appreciate everything that you do. One of the true sober warriors out there living it, not just talking about recovery, but we'll get into your whole journey about how and why you started Release Recovery. And it's an incredible story, but thanks for being here.

Zac Clark

Thank you, bro. The circle gets tighter and you're in it, so that's all I need to know.

Ken Rideout

Appreciate you, brother. So, [snorts] let's start with the This is an awesome story, by the way, guys. Zac is um recovered hardcore drug addict. By in terms of scoring drug addicts, he was definitely a 10 for aggressiveness. And when you hear the story of how he transformed himself from where he was to where he is now, a leader in the recovery community, I think it's going to inspire and motivate a lot of people. But let's talk about childhood and what ultimately what you think led to your addiction and I hesitate to say downfall, but ultimately we all have to get knocked down occasionally.

Zac Clark

Yeah, I mean I think it's important for me to say my childhood was was fine, you know, and I and and I've seen a lot of people that try to manufacture something that happened in their childhood as a reason for why they ended up, you know, with a needle in their arm like I did, but for me, my parents are still happily married. I've I'm one of five kids. I don't know. I just think growing up I was a sensitive kid, like I was an emotional kid, I cared.

Um but there was nothing that I can point to that, you know, is evidence that I should have ended up the way I ended up.

Ken Rideout

And I think that that's important for a lot of people to hear is that you hear about people falling into addiction and in a lot of case right cases rightfully so, but you immediately want to think about what was missing in his his or her life. Like what how was how were they neglected as a child? And we like to use that almost as a crutch.

Like, well, this happened to me. And you and I have talked about this before, but just as we go along here, I think it's worth mentioning that like the most traumatic thing that ever happened to you is the most traumatic thing. It doesn't have to always be like some like hardcore sexual abuse. It can be being bullied. It can be feeling uncomfortable in your own skin. Everyone is on their own journey and you can never compare yourself to other people. That's why I wanted to just highlight the fact that you have a great relationship with your parents.

Matter of fact, when I hear you talk about your parents, there's like a tinge of jealousy with me. I'm like, I want to have that relationship with my parents. And I hope that my kids feel that way the way you feel about your parents. I hope my kids feel that way about me. So, when how old were you when you started using drugs?

Zac Clark

Real quick on on on the point you just made, I mean I think it's important to say and give people permission for their problems to be their problems. I mean, that's like we grew up in a world where we're staring at our screens all day and comparing out. And for me, I have problems. It might not look like your problems and that's and that's okay. And then on the point on trauma is like I heard this great definition about a year ago and it really opened my eyes.

It's it's something that should have happened to you that didn't or something that shouldn't have happened to you that did. And that's a really simple way for me to break down trauma. And as that word continues to work its way into mainstream media, I think we all need to kind of grasp what trauma really is. But in terms of my drug use, man, I mean I I remember I tell the story. So, in high school, 20 bucks, right? A $20 bill, which is not today, would get you a 12 pack of Natural Light, a flask of Captain Morgan, and a six pack of Yuengling Lager, which was one of the beers that were up up by me in PA.

And I would give my 20 bucks to a, you know, an upperclassman on a on a on a Tuesday and I would wait till Friday when he would go to the beer store. He had the fake ID and then he would pull down into the parking lot pop his trunk and you would see all the beer that all the high school kids were picking up and you'd go into the trunk and you'd grab your little stash and you'd run off into the woods and hide it.

And I just remember there's this feeling you get that I know you know. When you cop drugs, when your drug dealer responds and you know you're have another high coming, you get that relief.

Ken Rideout

To me, that's the best that's almost the best part of the high.

Right. Cuz then I'm like then I start certainly when I realized I was you know, behaving like a complete loser and an addict, which takes a little while to come to that realization cuz you're in denial. But nothing was greater than the feeling of knowing it's coming, but it would always be offset later in my journey of like, what am I doing? I know this is wrong. But that voice telling me I was wrong was like 49% of as loud as the voice like, no, this is going to be sick.

And it would be like from the moment where I knew it was coming till the moment that the most euphoric part of the high wore off was just bookended by misery and discomfort and depression.

Zac Clark

So, that's a long way of saying I I should have known back then that I had this association and this feeling just knowing that another drunk was coming. I you know, I started drinking in in middle school and then high school was very much this like Dazed and Confused kind of experience.

We thought we were at straight out of 1970s. We would wear tie-dye shirts and take bong hits and do well in sports and school so that no one could tell us, you know, not to do what we were doing. And it was a blast, you know, like I'm not going to lie to you. Running out to the woods, rolling the keg out to the woods, belting out the classic rock songs. I love to party, you know, and I love to party from the first time I had that experience with alcohol.

Ken Rideout

That's the one thing that about you that I appreciate and also sympathize with is you're incredibly hard on yourself to think like, I should have seen this coming as a, you know, a 15, 16-year-old kid. Like who the [ __ ] going to see that coming? I mean, you and I have have that in common. We're like very at times self-deprecating and and quick to take responsibility. Cuz like I think I told you before, anytime I have a dispute with my wife, with my kids, ultimately I end up asking myself, what did I do to deserve this?

What which of my behaviors caused this? Cuz ultimately we can only control ourselves. So, I would just say

Zac Clark

One That's one of the confusing parts about recovery, right? Is because we we we try to look at our side of the street. We try to take accountability for our actions. And and I'm actually hearing you say that is I'm grateful for it because I'm I'm starting to learn to take a little bit of my power back, you know, and and and understand that like you might get screwed over. You might get hurt and that's okay, you know, so.

Ken Rideout

I always like to think like you know, anyone can F you once.

But after once, I prefer to do the F'ing. I like learn your lesson. If you if if you're in a relationship where you have things going on in your life where you don't think you're being treated accordingly, like you're in control of this. You can change your station in life whenever you want. It might not be easy, but ultimately that first step is always the hardest just like getting sober. So, when you So, you're drinking in high school, kind of like the typical, I don't know about the rest of the country, but certainly in the Northeast.

And one of the things that I've noticed with my own kids, my daughter is 15. I've never seen nor heard of any of the kids at her school ever drinking. I've asked the other parents, do you ever get Do these kids have parties? Do they drink? Like what are they doing? They're like, no, I think some of them smoke and have use edibles and stuff, but I don't know of any of them drinking at all. Like I haven't even heard one incident.

Zac Clark

It's changing. I mean, to Kids today are there's so many drugs out there that are manufactured that you can almost get over the counter.

I mean, even you look at marijuana, how accessible it is. It's not We had to work really hard to get our stash back then. This is the late '90s, early 2000s. You had to find a kid with a fake ID and and and scrounge your money together. Like it was real work to get a drunk on. And now you walk into a smoke shop at 15 years old and they don't give a [ __ ] They're going to serve you whatever you want.

Ken Rideout

Including kratom, which we've talked about, which I think is one of the most dangerous things happening right now because not just for the kratom abuse itself, but I think that that can easily serve as a gateway drug to harder opioids and heroin and fentanyl, which can be deadly now.

I mean, you can't you just don't know what's in half of the stuff that people are buying on the street, but we'll get into all of that. So, when you went to Where'd you go to college?

Zac Clark

I went to York College of Pennsylvania. So, I grew up in South Jersey. I went to a smaller, you know, public school in in South Jersey and then you know, I was a three-sport athlete, so football, baseball, basketball. And my you know, the thing I say about my my relationship with my father, he loved that I played baseball, right?

And so, I don't know if he did this consciously, but he was going to do everything in his power to make sure that I played college baseball because he didn't want me to stop playing.

Yeah. And I remember thinking to myself, do I really want to do this or do I want to go to a big school and just party my ass off?

Yeah. And I I I made the right decision, I think, which was I went to a small school out in Pennsylvania called York College of Pennsylvania. And I uh played baseball for 4 years. And and and again, it was as long as I play baseball and have the girlfriend and the grades are okay, I I'm going to drink how I want to drink.

Ken Rideout

And at what point was it during college where you first started to experiment with harder drugs, cocaine, opioids?

Zac Clark

Yeah, so the opiates didn't come in till later later after college, after a brain surgery, which which I'm assuming we'll get to. I mean, in college it was it was full throttle on the booze and then anything that was going to help me drink more. So, yes, cocaine, Adderall, Ritalin, whatever was going to give me that kind of superpower to stay up later and drink more and and and remember some of the [ __ ] that I was doing was was was going to be in play.

And you know, I just The thing I remember most about college is it was probably junior year and I was talking to one of my buddies and I was explaining how I didn't remember something from the night before. And he kind of said like, "How often does that happen to you?" So, well, I don't know, every time I drink.

You know, like full throttle every time. I'm Cuz you know, I remember everything every time I drink. And it was this light bulb moment where oh, I might be doing this thing differently than my peers. And that was the first time I think internally I questioned my alcohol usage. And then the next thought was okay, there's drugs that can help me not black out.

Ken Rideout

So. I think it's an individual thing cuz I had friends also that blacked out drunk. We would drink the same amount, but at some point they'd flip a switch where they'd black out, whereas if I drank that much, I would be sick before I blacked out. Like my body couldn't just couldn't process the alcohol like they could or metabolize it. But um they were definitely the group of kids that were blacked out where you would be like, "Dude, are you on this planet? What are you doing?" So, you introduced to cocaine and then where'd you go from after college?

Did you go to work? Start working in New York?

Zac Clark

The first job So, so it's important to say yeah, I graduated in 4 years. It's 2006, right? So, the world is what it is. I I move back home really to South Jersey. So, like right over the bridge from Philadelphia and I get my first job, which is as a recruiter, you know, and and what I learned very quickly in that first job is one, you know, whatever it was at the time a 30 or $40,000 salary felt like a million dollars.

Yeah. Money in the bank, drugs to buy, no rules, living on my own. And [snorts] I also very quickly learned who in the office was going to drink and drug the way that I like to. And so, I was there for a couple years doing my thing, drinking, driving unfortunately, doing drugs, kind of like utilizing cocaine more and more to to get through the week. And then the big pivotal moment for me is I Memorial Day of 2008, I was uh packing my car to go down the shore with my friends to Jersey Shore.

And I had not felt well. And it was almost like if I closed my eyes, I would see kaleidoscopes and no one believed me that I wasn't feeling well cuz they thought I was just hungover. My parents, my friends, my family were like, "You're just a mess, you know, like suck it up" kind of thing. Which I had this intuitive thought and I was like, "No, dude, there's something wrong with me." And I drove myself to this little X-ray place. This I'll never forget this woman comes back from kind of reading my scan or whatever she had done that day and she said, "Sir, we're we're calling an ambulance." Cuz she had seen something, a tumor, and uh if we didn't get to it soon, I was going to be a dead man.

So, within 24 hours, I'm in University of Penn Hospital getting this tumor cut out cut out of my cut out of my head as a, you know, 24 25-year-old kid. And at the time there's no awareness around the opioid epidemic. There's no therapy. There's no one talking to you about what it means to get surgery, what it means to have a near-death experience, what it means to have these opioids introduced into your life. And so, you know, the surgery went well and I've never been healthier.

And the thing that I left that hospital with was a raging opioid addiction. And what did they prescribe? So, they were definitely pumping me with Dilaudid, which is basically in in in my assessment, having done both, like legal heroin, you know. That's the thing that I think is funny about hospitals. It's people will say, "Oh, you you used IV heroin?" And I say, "How do you think they're putting drugs into almost every patient in the country right now?" Intravenously.

Yeah. You know, so it's not this far-fetched thing cuz because it works better. So, if I'm a drug addict and I want something to work better, of course I'm going to shove it in my arm rather than in my mouth. Like it makes sense to me, but people want to stigmatize it and act like it's so gnarly because I'm doing it, you know, in my bedroom and not in a hospital bed. But anyway,

Ken Rideout

[snorts]

Zac Clark

I digress. Uh yeah, so it so and then and then I left with a with a litany of kind of your morphine's, your your Dilaudid in pill form. And when those ran out, I remember feeling like I had lost something. And I took to the streets, you know, I found I found a guy that was selling them. And I was off to the races. Like I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I

I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I you know, get sober.

Ken Rideout

Had you tried anything before? Like before I really became a raging drug addict, like my friends had pills here and there and we'd take them when we had them, but no one was like we weren't seeking them out.

Zac Clark

So, you get your wisdom teeth out, you get a perc 5, you get a perc 10, you kind of take them, maybe you get sick, maybe you get maybe you don't. I had been introduced to painkillers, of course, you know, I was a I was a young guy kind of running around bars and whatever in this country. And so, so I had tried them, but but never to the degree that I was introduced to them in that hospital. Yeah. That consistently and that like really that pure.

Ken Rideout

Yeah. That's the thing with drug addicts, they're like incredibly resourceful. Like you could tell if someone gives you a drug you like, like immediately you know everything about it, where to get more. And that feeling of being cut off from the legal supply is devastating. It's not surprising that so many people turn to the street. But when you did that, like you had obviously been using drugs. You had some street sense. Like where did what did you start buying? Like Percocet, Oxycontin?

Zac Clark

So so so so yeah, I mean, like look, I was I'm laughing at your comment there, too, because it's like that that's 100% right. If I know I got a good bag from the guy on this corner, like I'm going to go back to that well time and time again until, you know, his [ __ ] his stash changes. And it's the same thing like with running today. If I have a good run and I know like what I ate before that run, I'm going to try and like dial that back up time and time again.

I think it's just the mind of the addict. So, here's the timeline. I get out of the hospital from the surgery in 2008.

Ken Rideout

Long were you in the hospital? It had to be close to 20 days. Holy [ __ ] 20 days? 15. I mean, like I'm I thought you were going to say one or two.

Zac Clark

No, no. I mean, it's they took this thing out of the back of my head. You know, you're in ICU for a few days. And then, you know, you're doing the occupational therapy, up one step, down one step. It was right in my hypothalamus, so it affected my balance, my thoughts, my

Ken Rideout

They had to go inside of your skull? memory. Yeah.

Zac Clark

I mean, that's like if you see like right here, dent in the back of my head, which you know, people will be my barbers whenever I change barbers or they're always like scared to ask. I'm like, "Dude, I had you know,

You should see the other guy." Yeah. But no, I didn't go home I didn't go home for a while. Yeah, it was I mean, brain surgery.

Ken Rideout

I know, I had no idea it was that invasive.

Zac Clark

And and medicine what it wasn't what it is today, right? And so, that's 2008. I get out of the hospital. I propose to the girl that I'm dating because she stuck by, you know, the whole thing.

Yeah. June of 2009, I get married. Did she know that you were using drugs to the extent you are?

No. She doesn't know that I'm using drugs. At all? She finds out after after we get married. Okay. She finds out. But no, no idea. I was going to protect that with my life.

Ken Rideout

Yeah. You know how it is. I know, we have that in common cuz people always ask me like, "Your wife didn't know you were on drugs for the first two or three years you knew her?" And I was like, "She only knew me on drugs." So, to her I was just like kind of irrational, like what strange guy.

Zac Clark

The and the thing is you don't go from from zero to like heroin addict. You go from zero to first using opioids and you get the energy boost, you get the focus, you get the creativity, your mind kind of expands, you're better at work. She was probably pumped.

Ken Rideout

You can't imagine doing anything at 100% without the drugs.

Right. Right. Which is like the the why they're so dangerous cuz it's very difficult when people tell me they tried Percocet and got sick the first time and hate them, I'm like, "You're so lucky." Cuz you know, when when you take them and have the feeling I had of like, "Oh my god, this is what's been missing in my life. I'm operating at a whole different level right now." Until you're not, you know.

Zac Clark

Yeah. Yeah, that was not my experience. Uh so, married

Wasn't mixing the drugs though.

Ken Rideout

I would just I wouldn't drink. I would just go home, take those pills and be rocking.

Zac Clark

Right. Yeah, I mean, I was a walking pharmacy project at all times. So, married to June 2009, I'm in rehab for the first time by by October, November of 2010. Okay. So, you do about a year of marriage and abuse and then [snorts] you're like, "Oh my god."

And and my the story goes like my mom was having a glass of wine with my then wife at a bar in my hometown and one of my friends basically said to them, "Zac needs help." So, they came home that night. I was sitting on the couch and and I very quickly kind of drove myself to rehab because I wanted to avoid all the [ __ ] Stayed there for 28 days and was high within like a week of getting out of there. You know, like just crazy.

Ken Rideout

That is crazy cuz normally you come out of those experiences feeling like I'm going to do this.

Zac Clark

Yeah. I I think it takes what it takes. And that's why when I get these messages from people that say my husband, wife, brother, sister has been to rehab five, six, seven, 10, 20 times, I say, "If it was cancer, would you give up? Would you stop treating them? Would you lose the hope?" You got you got to hang in there with these people. It's the same [ __ ] With with behavioral health care, with addiction, with mental health, you never know when when it's going to when it's going to stick.

Ken Rideout

Yeah, that's the one thing that I do want to mention and we'll talk about Release Recovery or facilities in the tri-state and now down in Austin, Texas. Um the one thing that I love about you is cuz I've put out messages and I've worked with Release in terms of helping to promote and get the word out there and when people DM me, ask if I help and I connect them with you, no matter where and when it is. I'm telling you if it's Saturday night, Sunday afternoon, where at what whatever the day and time, you always respond and take a personal interest right away in a way that like you could never fake your way through this.

Like you could never pretend to be this on top of things all the time and we've had multiple It's funny cuz so many people reach out and it's crazy how low the percentages are of people that actually follow up when they handed it everything. They'll reach out, tell me they need help, I immediately connect you, bring you into the chat and and they're they're full of piss and vinegar until they get sober, then they get high again and then they're like either too embarrassed or too reluctant to take the next step.

Zac Clark

Yeah, I mean like I I always pay attention to the time stamp on those messages and it it's it's because I've been there. Yeah. You know, it's because I've been there and I know that if someone is reaching out for help, to you, to me, whoever it is, that might be the one time in their life where they are brave enough and they let their guard down enough to ask for help. And if I don't respond, I'm not doing, you know, my duty to the world, my promise to the world.

Once I Once I got sober, it's it's basically to hold on to this thing. I got to try and give it away.

Ken Rideout

I hope people listening to this get that. Like I said, we'll talk a lot about Release Recovery and where people can get help if they are seeing this and recognizing patterns in their own behavior that may indicate they need help and usually I tell people, well, if you're thinking you need help, you probably do. Um but with that being said, you get out of rehab and

Zac Clark

The first So I go to rehab the first time, I stay for 28 days. The rehab program was fine. I just wasn't ready. You know, I knew deep down inside that I still had reservations, that I still had some kind of research and development to do and the one thing that was awesome in that rehab program that that I'm forever grateful for is me and my wife basically signed a contract that if I was to drink or get high again, she was going to leave me.

And I drank and got high again and she left me. And she saved she saved my life, man, because she basically said to me and she had had some coaching and some therapy and she had gone to some Al-Anon meetings, which is like the AA for the family member, if you're not familiar, and and she basically said to me like, I love you, but I don't love this thing, this disease. And I remember kind of like hearing it. What happened was early 2011, I moved back home with my dad, you know, cuz I have nowhere to live.

She kicks me out of the house and then you know, for the next 8 months, Ken, it is a dark, gross, incomprehensible existence. Every day is a fist fight to to get high. You know, when when you're using the way that I was using, there were days where five, six hundred dollars a a day were going out to support my heroin addiction and my crack cocaine addiction and the drinking and then the gambling sometimes. I mean, it was just reckless behavior after reckless behavior and there was there was no stopping it.

And it was confusing to people in my life because I I like kind of kept it together, you know, I kind of kept it together, but once I learned about street drugs and and and not having to have a drug dealer and that I could drive into Camden, New Jersey at any time, 24/7, 365. I mean, I I remember copping drugs on Christmas Day. And once I learned about that life, it was like all bets were off because I just didn't there was no there was nothing stopping me, you know, and so the progression started.

I I got I got I I learned kind of about heroin in that treat in that first treatment program and I don't blame the clinicians or the other patients. It was just, you know, other people had different addictions and I don't I don't get caught up in in that stuff, but I do I do remember kind of clocking that and then very shortly after that first treatment program, I I drove into, you know, kind of a not so savory neighborhood near where I grew up and I started asking around and sure enough, you know, the guy came up came out and in the black trench coat and said, "What do you need?" And he made sure I wasn't a cop and we were off to the races.

Ken Rideout

So when you started doing heroin, like were you with someone who said, "Hey, this is how you do heroin, you should try it" or did you just go and buy a bag of heroin and figure it out?

Zac Clark

You I think the misconception with heroin is you you snort it. You can snort heroin, right? You can snort

Ken Rideout

So is that what you did initially? So heroin. you knew you could snort it, so you were like, "I'm just going to get a bag of heroin and experiment with it."

Zac Clark

Right. It's all about the reset of the progression. So if my addiction is, you know, two OxyContin 80 milligrams a day, right? Just to use numbers. That's 160 milligrams of OxyContin a day.

Yep. At the time, it was basically a dollar a milligram. So that's 160 dollars that it cost me to get two pills. Now, I'm driving in and I'm getting a bag of dope for 10 bucks. [snorts] So I'm getting 16 bags for the same price of those, you know, I'm getting 16 bags and then if you buy a bundle, you kind of get a couple for free.

Ken Rideout

What does a bag of heroin equate to in terms of an 80 milligram

Zac Clark

Mean, you're getting high. I mean, like depending on what you're doing. I mean,

Pill? like you're getting high one or two times off of off of a bag,

You know? And it depends, but on the strength and and how good it is and all that stuff, but definitely resetting the progression and so it's it's it's cheaper. Okay. Is the is the main point I'm trying to make and that that was the main motivator as to why I went from, you know, pain pills to powder.

Ken Rideout

Yeah, which is which is the pretty typical progression. And at what point do you start shooting it? And again, how do you figure out how to do that? Someone have to show you.

Zac Clark

Don't know. I didn't start shooting it for like, you know, it was it was a guy that I was running around with, you know, some random some random guy. I mean, you start to make friends and you start to have in a in in a very kind of poetic way, I don't know how how else to say it, a romantic way, you start to make friends and community in within that community because, you know, you're searching for drugs, you're trying to find the best drugs, you you you start to ask people, you're showing up on different sets.

It's just like anything else in life. You know, so I find myself in this environment and and I realized that the sniffing was not working as well and so the next logical thing is to have someone teach me how to shoot dope. And so that lasted for probably like you know, two or three months at the end there leading up to the day that I finally got help. And you know, the initial thing was so great, but then after that, I I knew I knew that I was on a train going nowhere.

Ken Rideout

What was the like rock bottom moment or what was the Was there an incident that kind of motivated you to like cut the [ __ ] and

Zac Clark

Yeah. Yeah, I mean, so like just to paint the picture, I mean, it's it's a it's a great story and I've told it a bunch of times, which is why I smile, but it was late August of 2011, you know, I'm in full-blown addiction, my family is completely done with me. My dad is basically living in Jersey, my mom's basically living in Florida because they're not aligned on basically how I'm I'm I'm I'm living. And I had driven up to South Jersey. We have Eagle season tickets.

My family was at the shore. I took off I took our preseason tickets, probably got like 10 bucks a ticket, you know, whatever it was, like [ __ ] money, went copped drugs, ended up getting arrested that night. I go into the jail, I get out of the jail and I What you get arrested for? I mean, I was basically on the side of the road scratching off lottery tickets, drinking booze, you know, shooting drugs and it was it was complete nightmare. I mean, I was basically parked on the side of the road having a surprise party for one.

And the cops pulled up on me and I remember I kind of knew one of the cops and I said, "You're going to let me out of this, right?" He said, "Zac, look look in the car." And he kind of shined a flashlight and that was the first time I had really seen how bad it was. When he shined that flashlight in that car and I said, "That's how I'm living right now." And so I I went to I got locked up. I didn't use my phone call.

I got out the next morning. I walked back into Camden, New Jersey where I was running around and I was there for a few days. And basically what happened was I I I had stolen one of my dad's checks and I made it out to myself for 5,000 dollars. I went into a PNC bank down in Camden, New Jersey. I walked in there probably about 240, 250 pounds at the time. I would take my I would I would do drugs all day and then I would take my antipsychotic medicine at night, which gave you hunger and then I would order Papa John's and hammer Papa John's.

And so I was just very unhealthy, massive kind of drug addict and I I walk into this bank to cash this check. And I always say, it was one of the most beautiful moments of my life because the bank teller, and her name is Rhonda Jackson, looked at me. And she had a choice in that moment. She could have called the cops. She could have told her manager that I was there or she could have done the kind thing, like just was kind. And she picked up the phone and she called my dad.

And my dad happened to answer the phone. He was at his office. She said to him, "Sir, your son is here. It does not look good. I'm going to try and hold him here as long as I can, but I suggest you get down here as soon as you possibly can." And there had been a missing person's report filed for me. My family was convinced the next phone call was going to be the call that Zack's no longer with us. And instead, my dad rushes down to the bank.

He break He kind of like breaks into the the PNC Bank open front doors and I'm sitting there kind of twiddling my thumbs and he puts his arm on my arm and says, "Son, we're going home." You know, and that was the moment I think that was the first time I really felt God and that was the first time I really felt a moment of clarity that I actually believed I could get sober and stay sober because it was just clear. It was clear that that was it.

And we walked out of that bank and I was in a treatment program. I mean it's blurry. I don't know a day or 2 days later which was my sobriety date August 30th of 2011 and haven't felt the need to drink or drug since.

Ken Rideout

What was it about that rehab? How long was it and what about that one stuck where as the others never did?

Zac Clark

I mean there's a couple things and I work in behavioral health care now. The people. The people are everything. They told me this thing that they were going to love me until I could love myself and that was absolutely true.

I felt that. I stayed for a long time. I stayed for 4 and 1/2 months. I listened to the professionals. I was at a point in my life and this is some of the same advice that I give to people who are trying to get sober now. At 27 years old my life as it existed that was my best work. All of my decisions, the culmination of my amazing decisions had gotten me to this rehab bed. Yep. So for the first time in my life I'm going to take a step to the side and I'm going to listen to the professionals.

I'm going to listen to the people around me. I'm not going to think that I'm the smartest guy in the room. And to this day I don't know where I got the willingness to do that but I thank God for it because I see people come into our program at Release Recovery. I see people try to get sober every single day and they take their will back and they fight this thing and they think that they're just going to be able to run through some brick wall and and and figure it out.

And this thing man addiction behavioral health care there's no real figuring it out. And and so I was there 4 and 1/2 months. It was an awesome program and then I made the decision to move to New York City which I had never I'd been in New York City one time in my life and I've now been there for 14 plus years.

Ken Rideout

What was What was calling you to New York? Did you have a job? Like what do you mean you would just move to New York? You just rent an apartment or what? I Set up tent in New York.

Zac Clark

It's a great question. No one's really ever dug into this part of my story. I This is where I grew up Presbyterian, right? And I I don't We went to church on Christmas and Easter. Yep. What is God? I think everyone's entitled to have their own experience with God and and and what they believe. For me the fact that I ended up in New York City is completely insane and could only be driven by something outside of myself because my experience there over the last 14 plus years has been magical.

And I'm supposed to be there. That's what I know. No, I moved into a little uh sober living house and I stayed there for three three months and then you know, started working. I got my first job in in behavioral health care kind of collecting piss and breathalyzing people and I fell in love with this work. I don't know why I ended up in New York. I really I really don't. All I know is that I made a decision to listen. I made a decision to listen and it was the best decision I ever made.

Ken Rideout

So you're working at the facility. At what point do you get the inclination or the desire to start your own and what was the What was that process like?

Zac Clark

I moved Yeah, I mean I got sober at 27. I'm 42 now so it's been 15 years of of hard work. We've had Release Recovery for We're coming up on our 9-year anniversary. So pretty pretty cool. I think I always knew that I wanted to be an entrepreneur do my own thing, run my own shop. I wasn't opposed to doing it with whoever but I always knew that there were things that I learned along the way that I wanted to apply to my own program and so you know, got awesome experience kind of working for someone else for 5 years, learned a lot about behavioral health care, addiction.

I was around the patients and the clients all day every day so I got to learn the behaviors. I got to see them in action. I got to understand that really every case is different. I've never seen the same case of alcoholism twice. I've never seen the same case of drug addiction twice which is what's so confusing about the work that we do. Something I try for you you know, in theory is not going to maybe work for the guy or gal sitting next to you.

Ken Rideout

Yeah. And and I and you tell that to a mom or a a dad or a sister or a brother who's trying to get their loved one healthy and they say, "I don't understand." I said, "Neither do I." You know? Well, the one thing I'll say is everyone's journey is different but the patterns are almost identical in a lot of ways. Which is why some of these systems and processes work like AA. Not only does it provide all the spiritual guidance and the camaraderie but I think on the simple in the simplest form it gives you something to do.

When I was at my worst in my addiction I would be sitting around analyzing my thoughts all day. Is it time to get high? Should I do this? Should I do that? But if I'm busy and I'm out and about doing things like when I did finally go to NA initially in London. When I had something to do that day and it revolved around being sober then the focus was like, "Okay, let me stay straight until I get to the meeting." Then you get to the meeting and you'd have a little bit of an enthusiasm and camaraderie and responsibility to get to the next day.

Which again is why back to the patterns they say, "Well, take it one day at a time. It's too much to think about worrying about the whole week." And then after that you just get from one period of the day to the next period of the day. But when you so so what what You felt a calling for the space then how did you actually get Release started? Like how did you conceive of it and how did you launch it? That's a great story. Um I got a call from my buddy Todd.

Zac Clark

His name is Todd Whitmer. He's worked in behavioral health care for over 50. This guy's like, you know I think he just celebrated his 52nd year sober. I mean just a a legend, a mentor of mine and he had toured a property in Westchester so about 45 minutes north of New York City and he called me and said, "Zac, I know you're kind of looking around. I know you're trying to start something.

Ken Rideout

[snorts]

Zac Clark

You got to check this property out." And I went up and I drove the 45 minutes or an hour north pulled into this driveway which was the Release house, the first the OG 482 Underhill Avenue. And there were guys that were running a sober living there before and they had um experienced um some unfortunate things and they were going to leave the business, right? They were just done with it which I which I totally get. So the heat was off. It was the middle of winter.

I looked around and I said, "This is home. This is home." And and you know, when you talk about being an entrepreneur then what was my next step? We bought the house. I bought the house and I burnt my whole life down. I moved out of New York City. I moved into the house and I and I made this thing my entire life.

How did you buy the house? Like where did you get the money? I have I have a business partner you know, like there's there was a couple business partners at the time and I had just scrapped together, you know, it was like a one one or 1.2 million dollars house so you know, I had some money that I had saved up and we kind of pulled pulled our resources together and took a risk. You know, if you're if you're I think we had to probably put put about 40% down so a couple hundred thousand dollars each, you know, 130 140,000 you know, so it was it was really like a you hang a shingle.

Yep. It was every every dollar that I had and I my dad probably helped me out a little bit there and and yeah man, it was it was it was a crazy time and I just I'll never forget driving out of New York City and and and moving into this place and just saying, "This is This is going to be my life for a while." I broke up with my my girlfriend broke up with me cuz I just wasn't present in that relationship. Like like everything was burnt to the ground to start this thing and whenever someone comes to me and they they want to start a business forget whether it's in behavioral health care or not.

I say, "Are you prepared? Like are you are you prepared to make this your entire existence? Or do you have the money to pay people that are going to make this their entire existence?"

Ken Rideout

Yeah. But even that's hard cuz you got to find people that care the way you care and you never will.

Yeah. But yeah. You have to be very involved certainly early on.

Zac Clark

Yeah. And from that we you know, from one sober living house in Yorktown Heights, New York City we now have uh 86 beds across New York City, Westchester County, Austin, Texas. We have two uh full-blown treatment centers, clinics in in Westchester and in Texas where you know, we're we're helping a a lot of people. We have 120 something employees. I mean, it's a real It's been a wild journey and we're not stopping. I'm pumped.

Ken Rideout

And then at what point for those who don't know, Zac was the a contestant and the winner, right?

On The Bachelorette. Yeah, I was the I was the last guy standing 2020. So I was uh it was 2020. All right. So to walk me through the whole process, how did you What made you apply? How did you apply? Like what was the Like I want to hear all about this.

Was crazy, dude. Super interesting to me cuz I didn't know you during this time. So and I've never even seen one episode. I mean, I've never watched The Bachelor Bachelorette just in general. I just didn't never appealed to me. But when whenever someone mentions you and they're like, "Oh, he was on The Bachelorette." I'm like, "I've got to go back and watch this cuz I got to figure it out." So

Zac Clark

No, it's a dating show, right? And I think what's important for me to say is that everyone's entitled to have their own experience, right? And I can say that I had just fundamentally a good experience with the show, with the producers, with just the way that everything kind of went for me. I think they respected me and and I respected them and that seems to typically work in life. And so you know, the story interesting or not, I don't know. I'm 36 years old. I'm living in New York City.

I am working my ass off. So there is no time for dating, for women, you know, maybe you go on a good date and I'll see you in a month kind of thing. Yeah. It just wasn't going to happen and you know, COVID had kind of set in. So they had canceled kind of the season that was about to to to to film. And my mom and my sister kind of had a conversation and they decided they were going to throw in my kind of application.

They did not consult with me on that. And so I basically got a call from one of the producers I don't know in April or May of of 2020 and the world is shut down, literally. And she said to me she started to tell me the reason why she was calling and I said, "Okay." Kind of like lose my number. Yeah.

You know, I got to this isn't for me. I'm good. But then some She said something that kept me on the phone for another couple minutes and and sure enough, you know, like I went through the process and we uh we shipped out to Palm Springs. It was COVID so everything was filmed in one place and you know, shipped out to Palm Springs in early June. And yeah, I was there with 30 other guys kind of dating the same the same girl and it was it was an interesting experience because, you know, I'm still friends with some of those guys and I I respect anyone that's willing to kind of do something like that, right?

Like it's a very scary thing and I think people do it for a bunch of different reasons, which is which is fine. Like it's your life, you can make the decisions that you want. I For me, you know, one of the things that came up is like this idea of like authenticity is is undefeated. Like I didn't know enough to know. So I just walked into that experience that I'm going to be myself. Yeah. You know, I'm just going to be myself and you know, um that's it, man.

Yeah, I mean, ended up being the last guy there and and you know, the relationship didn't didn't didn't work and that's okay, but it was a it was a good experience, you know, and I got to tell my story in a very public way, which was not the intention by any stretch of the imagination, but the thing that came out of that, you know, telling a lot I mean, look, it was COVID. No one had [ __ ] to watch. So everyone was watching the show.

The morning after I kind of the show aired that that I told my story, my phone was was You talk about blowing up. And I thought it was going to be people coming at me saying, "You crackhead, you this, you drug addict." It was completely opposite. You know, it was messages of positivity and love and acceptance and that really told me no matter what, I I need to use this platform that has been given to me to try to help some people and that's been my mission since then.

Ken Rideout

Yeah, that's the one thing I have found too is when you share your vulnerabilities and your secrets, you know, like as they say, you're only as sick as the secrets you keep. I've never connected with more people over over vulnerabilities than anything else than running. You could have freaking win the entire Boston Marathon, but if you go out and tell people that you have some shared like traumatic situation you went through, more people that's relatable to people. Winning and doing epic [ __ ] is like some people are just not going to relate to that cuz they're just not trying.

So that you know, the first step to doing anything great is to try. But the everyone can it can relate to vulnerabilities, trauma, overcoming difficulties. And uh it's interesting that you had that experience. [clears throat] What was the rest of the cast like? Were like guys cool with each other? Was it Was it Was it cutthroat?

Zac Clark

No, it was it was cool, man. It was cool. I think there's a lot of energy. I mean, look, again, my experience, all the guys were good guys. All the guys were from different parts of the country and came up in different ways and had different ideas about themselves and the world and and that's cool, you know, like that's okay. Like I don't Sure, there's there's there was some competitiveness at times. Bet your ass there is, you know, like we're all there trying to, you know, work towards this this thing and but but at the end of the day, the ability to kind of see all the guys for who they were and you know, I never I mean, I was the only sober guy there that that was never judged or held against me or anything along those lines.

If anything, I think it was it was respected.

Ken Rideout

So you win the show. And so the Bachelorette, whoever What What was the Bachelorette's name? Her name was Tayshia. So Tayshia is the Bachelorette and she picks you. Then what Yeah, you know, you get I mean, you get engaged. You're dating you I mean, like you're dating someone and then you you end up You get engaged on the show? Yes. Is that part of the that they something they insisted upon or you genuinely wanted to do it?

Zac Clark

No, you Look, dude, the whole thing with this experience and I'm just going to say it for me, it was real. Yeah. It was real to me. You know, that was my approach. That was going to be my approach. So anything that happened was real to me. Yeah. It's that simple.

Ken Rideout

So you you're on the show, you're living in this like kind of like scripted environment more or less. You get engaged.

Not scripted. Me Meaning Meaning Sorry, controlled environment. But now you're sent home and you're like, "Okay, now let's see what we're both really interested in because life life comes into play." And that's almost like

Zac Clark

That's a fair way to say it. I mean, like look, yeah, it's it's it's like I mean, I think there's a couple things here. Two good people don't necessarily make a good couple, right? And and so whether it was meeting on a show or meeting in a bar, like that to me is is not what's important. The important thing to me is you know, there was an honest effort, there was an honest shot given and and it didn't work out, you know, and and and sure, was there stress

Ken Rideout

[snorts]

Zac Clark

From the outside world? Did did did did it make it different than your typical just, "Hey, meet on a dating app or on the street" relationship? Sure. But at the end of the day, you know, I believe it kind of like everything happens for a reason. So the relationship didn't work out. No. Where did she live? She was from the West Coast, but she lives in New York, yeah. Oh, okay. So at least that wasn't an issue.

Ken Rideout

Yeah. When you told your story on the show, did things pick up at release? You mean from a business perspective?

Zac Clark

Yeah, like

Ken Rideout

Mean, like look, I think I think

Zac Clark

People were aware of it.

More people were definitely aware of it. 100%. I don't know if you know this, but I think that there is a subset of people who might not take someone on a reality television show seriously. So I had to be very mindful of the way that I I think presented myself to the world on social media, the way that I presented myself to the world in real life, uh the way that I was going to work with brands or whoever it might be because you know, at the end of the day, my true passion and my true um occupation is is helping people, you know, and and that comes with a certain level of privacy and confidentiality.

And so

Ken Rideout

[snorts]

Zac Clark

Did we lose some business because people didn't want to work with folks like myself that, you know, maybe had this reality television label to it? Sure. I think five or six years later now, 100% it has helped us. 100% we have stayed true to our mission of helping as many people as possible. At the end of the day, I believe like your best marketing is to do a good job. Yeah. For sure. We've proven that time and time again and not everyone gets well and not everyone gets sober and that would be a complete lie to to to roll that out to the world.

But at the end of the day, we treat people with respect. We give them a shot. We give them the tools that to to to recover and you know, it's a long way of saying like yes, did the exposure help us? Sure, absolutely. I'm not going to deny that. But at the end of it but but but after the exposure, we still need to show up and do a damn good job.

Ken Rideout

So after you bought the first house, when do you start to expand and like what is What's the process there cuz I'm intrigued by how you built such an incredible business?

Zac Clark

So we Yeah, we So 17, we start. 19, we enter back into the city. So we we we open a men's transitional living and a women's transitional living in New York City. Then the the city shuts down.

Ken Rideout

And transitional living for people that aren't familiar with the recovery space, what does that mean?

Zac Clark

Yeah, I mean, look, I operate we operate highly structured residential environments, right? So there is your traditional sober living, which might be two, three, four, five hundred dollars a month. Like you can find just a bed somewhere. Um you know, whereas we are offering case management, drug testing, all your meals cooked for you, like a very super nice environment. Um real accountability, real recovery coaching. You know, you're you're you're you're really in in a program minus the clinical. Now, we have since kind of integrated our clinical services into our program, but at the time uh, we were not a a clinical organization.

So, those 86 beds that I kind of mentioned earlier, um, we started really as a as a sober living, right? And we have morphed or grown into uh, a treatment uh, environment. So, now, for example, our folks live in one of our houses, and then they are going to our clinical environment 24 25 15, however many hours a week, depending on the level of care that they are in, uh, getting their treatment and then returning back to you know, the kind of highly structured residential. So, there's things that you call them Florida model or the Minnesota model, which basically means you're living in one place and you're getting your clinical services one in one place, um, and ultimately you're in you're in treatment.

Ken Rideout

What were the difficulties and how did you figure out like how to do all this? Like Because it's very involved. When I look at it, I'm like my head starts to like my brain starts smoking. I'm like, "How's he managing all these different processes?" It's hard work.

Zac Clark

It's hard work. I don't know if it wasn't a a passion or if I didn't really believe that it was my purpose that I would that I would do it. I think a lot of people see behavioral health care and think it's easy. Think you can kind of jump right into it. Think there's a real estate play and all of those things could be true. I mean, it's it's a good business if you do it well. It's just like anything else in life.

Yeah. I think for me, just going back to like what I believe in business, you got to hire people that are smarter than you. My dad taught me that early on. You got to take some shots. You got to believe in yourself. I think that people get really small-minded when it comes to business. I am always going to try to make something work, especially early on. You know, to generate revenue, to get energy going, to start to build community. Like you got to say yes. You know, we have this kind of motto at the company, which is uh, the answer is yes, what's the question?

Which basically means like we're going to show up, we're going to answer the bell, regardless of, you know, what's on the other line. Yep. But there no, there's real I mean, like we are essentially running a hospitality business and a health care business. It's it's hard work.

Ken Rideout

What's the most challenging aspect of it? The people. The patients or the clinicians?

Zac Clark

All of it. Yeah. You got you got the families. You got the clients and patients. You got the people that work for you. You know, they're not always a walk in the park.

You have your you know, your your colleagues, your referents, the people in the outside world, and it's just like anything else. I mean, relationships are really really really hard, and that is why I just continue to beat the drum with our team is if we do a good job, everything else is going to work out. People in this space get lost in the [ __ ] It's and we've talked about this, Ken, right? Like I think there's a lot of programs out there that you know, sacrifice a good product to make a couple more bucks.

Ken Rideout

Yeah. And my hypothesis is that you spend the money to hire the right people so you can build a program that can stand the test of time. Of all the challenges you've faced, what are the things that you've been able to do that you're most proud of or that you like think was the most significant or important actions to help this thing succeed? Because there's plenty of businesses, like we've talked about, that don't that are in your exact space and like you would tell me, "I'm buying this facility over here." And I'm like, "Well, what was it?" It was the same exact thing.

I'm like, "Why couldn't they make it work? What makes you think you can go in and change it?" But to your point, it's all the people. So, what are you doing doing differently than the people that can't make it work?

Zac Clark

Well, there's two questions. There's one one, what am I most proud of? Yeah. I'll start there. It's not the balance sheet. It's not the money. It's not the um, lives saved, which is which is nice. I'll tell you what I'm most proud of. This weekend two Release Recovery employees got engaged, right?

The first gal, Hannah, signed [snorts] up to intern for me 5 years ago. At 21 years old, saw me on the show, wrote it wrote this like very uber professional email in. She interned for us for a summer, went back to college, and then when she landed back in New York, she reached out for a job, and she's now been working for us for a couple years. She met her now fiance at one of our run clubs, which you've been to, the Release Run Club. They both showed up there on a Monday night, started dating, now they're engaged to get married.

He is a former client of Release Recovery. So, he came through our program.

Wow. The community you build. At the end of the day, what's my legacy? This couple right here. If I didn't lay that first brick, they're not meeting. They're not falling in love, and they're not having this experience. The second guy, Chris, has worked for us for probably 3 years now. Has grown into our director of admissions role. So, he's really the guy on the front end talking to um, all the inbound kind of calls. Starts dating a a young lady that was working for us as well in a you know, very open and honest way.

They were above board with with with with all of it, which was which was cool and appreciated, and you know, he text me yesterday we're texting about a case, and then he said, "Oh, by the way, on a personal note, uh, I think I'm going to get engaged today." And then he sent me another note afterwards, officially engaged. And so, in the span of 24 hours this past weekend, I got to experience some real legacy moments [snorts] with these people who if Release was not formed, if the risk was never taken, these stories wouldn't have happened.

And so, it's kind of this generational impact that's created through this business that I built. That's what's most important to me. Mhm. And the second question just around what makes us better? We show up. I still show up. Our leadership team still shows up. We try to keep it really simple. This work is not rocket science. You know, you got to love your patients. You got to love your families. You got to be honest with them. You got to help them understand that it's probably not going to be a straight line.

But if you can communicate that in a way that they hear it and their expectations are realistic about the possible outcomes, chances are you're going to have some people that are um, happy with the service that was provided, and then you know, end up being your cheerleaders and the people that really fly your flag out there in the community. And and and those people end up driving a lot of business cuz they refer their family and their friends, and we're in a human services business, and so we need to remember that the humans are the most important thing.

Ken Rideout

And I know that part of your journey, like mine, with sobriety involves endurance sports. How did you first get started with uh, I don't know, I guess you started with running. How did you get into running and like what part of your sobriety journey were you on, and what role has running played?

Zac Clark

The best, dude. I mean, it brought us together. You know, like that whole story that I just told about Release, I could say I could say for me and you. Um, I mean, look, dude, I hated running.

I [ __ ] hated it.

Ken Rideout

Most days I do, too.

Zac Clark

I hated it, and I was in rehab, and one day I decided that I was going to go for a walk, and I went for a walk every day for a couple weeks, and and then one day I said, "Okay, let's try to run." I started to kind of get into shape, and then moved to New York City, and and the turning point for me is my first New York City Marathon that I watched. Mhm. I didn't know what the hell I was showing up to.

And I sat there, and I cried on the sidelines watching 50,000 people kind of flow by me, and it gave me the thought or the hope that I could do that, too. Yeah.

And I kind of on that day made the declaration that I was going to run the New York City Marathon every year from that that year on, and I've I've been able to do it, and initially, I think it was to prove to myself that I could do it. I then started our nonprofit in uh, 2019, and we restarted raising money for folks [snorts] that couldn't afford to go to treatment. So, that became the thing, you know, and that's grown, and that's been really cool, and you've been super supportive of that, as well.

Um, today, currently, I am I'm trying to get faster, and I'm trying to approach it like with with a with a vigor and a seriousness that really I've learned from you and and and others out there. And it's the idea of what I'm sure you talk about in your book. I'm just getting into it. I was lucky enough to get an early copy. But like it starts with that idea that I can I can actually do this. I can do something that is hard. And at 40 years old I'm I'm faster than I've ever been.

Yeah. Which still for this drug addict's mind is not anywhere near fast enough.

Ken Rideout

If that can both be a blessing and a curse, right? You know you you want to be able to enjoy successes along the way because ultimately and enjoy the process cuz that's where we're spending most of the time. But I do the same thing. I've won races the whole entire thing and then think like, "Oh, I should have ran much faster." And I'm like, "But it was fast enough to beat everyone." But I don't know. I think that the blessing there is that you're never satisfied which motivates you to run faster.

And you know, you should take uh solace in the fact that from 42 to 50 I ran faster every single year because I just stuck with it. But I also you know, I was just telling someone I I added up all the miles for the last 5 years and I averaged 10.66 miles every single day for 5 years with zero days off. And it's hard not to get better when you're showing up that much. I don't I would never advise someone else to do what I do.

I'm sure there's a lot of people out there that will be like, "Oh, he needs to recover and he could be better if he did this." Yeah, you know what? And if uh my aunt had balls she'd be my uncle. There's a lot of things that coulda shoulda woulda. This is what's worked for me. So, if there's anything that you can take from that, I think that you're going to continue to run faster cuz I know how hard you try and how much you want it.

Zac Clark

But It's been humbling, man. Yeah.

You know, I've I've I've in my life been able to have some success and but with this running thing I haven't been able to, you know, like this past year I trained my ass off and I got slower. And the thing that's great about running cuz people ask me all the time, "How do you run so much?" It's like anyone can do it. Yeah. Lace them up and go. No barrier to entry.

Ken Rideout

That's it.

Zac Clark

And look, I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about the high. I mean, the feeling I get after a good workout or a long run is is good. So, that's why I keep doing it.

Ken Rideout

Yeah, and that's the thing people should know. The runner's high doesn't happen while you're doing it. It's typically when you're done. Right. Cuz [snorts] while I'm doing it there's many days where I'm like in hell. Yeah. But that's like that expression, you know, the road to heaven can feel like hell and the road to hell can feel like heaven.

You just got to understand what is your mission, what's your goal, and like take pride in the way you execute the strategy because life is spent in the process, in the strategy. Those wins and losses are fleeting. And a lot of times the losses can be the best thing that ever happened to you. You get the [ __ ] kicked out of you. You get embarrassed and it either motivates you to go back and like dig in and get better or quit. And this thing of quitting lasts forever.

Matter of fact, quitting in the Ironman the first time I went there changed the trajectory of my whole life. I was 41 at the time and I made it to the Kona and I was so excited and happy to be there that I completely forgot that you still have to show up and execute at the race and it was going badly and I just quit on the run for no reason other than it was hard. And as painful as that was, it changed everything in my life.

It literally changed my mindset that day. I'm like, "No, I'd rather die than feel like this cuz it felt terrible." Yeah.

Zac Clark

Was so embarrassed.

Ken Rideout

Not in front of anyone else, in front of myself. Cuz there was no reason to take the easy way out.

Zac Clark

We're basically all publicly training with Strava and and Instagram and all the things that are out there. You go out for a run unless you want to hide your stats which you which you can do. You're you're essentially showing the world each and every day if you are working or not. And and that for me is actually helpful. I mean, in some in some way.

And I don't other people might have different thoughts on this. That's fine. For me, that's that's holding me accountable. I need that [ __ ] 100%.

And and so, I think like you you you're one of the guys that I look at, man. And I just say like if he can do it, so can I. And that's like that's like really the only thought that I need.

Ken Rideout

Yeah. I have friends that have gone through Navy SEAL training and and have become Navy SEALs and I'm always like so curious like, "How did you make it through? Like what was going through your mind?" And multiple guys have said to me, "I would just look around and say when that guy quits I'm going to quit." And then if that guy quits you find another guy.

And to your point, like if I can do it, anyone can. I'm like not an exceptional athlete by any means. I played Division III football and hockey, but I wasn't like no Division I schools were looking for me. You know what I mean? And I wanted to play sports more than anything in the world. So, all that to say, the only thing I'm doing that a lot of people aren't is trying hard. Like just showing up. And to your point, everything I do I post to Strava.

So, it's all publicly available. If I miss a day, which is rare, people will be sending me messages like, "I didn't see your run today." Which, you know, is both good and bad. But I I take pride in that consistency and discipline because discipline is really what sets you free. Like I saw Eliud Kipchoge one time saying that a person with discipline becomes prisoner to their emotions. Without the discipline what it you you tend to act on whatever emotion is acting on your psyche that day.

And you know, you can wake up feeling like down in the dumps. You can be feeling jealous. You can be feeling angry. And I go through all that [ __ ] too. But the one thing that I never let it do is deviate from what I'm what I've disciplined my mind to do. Like I'm handling my first responsibility and top responsibility above everything else in the world is taking care of my own mental and physical health because without it I'm useless to everyone including my family.

So, sometimes I have to get creative with how I mix in the workouts and sometimes it can seem a little selfish. But if I don't do this for better or worse, I can't be the best version of myself cuz then it's hanging over my head. And maybe it's another addiction. And like I've said before, it's like I like I like me today much more than I do of being a slave to drugs.

Zac Clark

Yeah, I mean I I it's very simple for me, the formula. And I think as I get older, what brings me joy?

I like work. I like running. I like my relationships. I like setting goals. I like business ownership. I like going to concerts. I like playing golf. I know the [ __ ] that brings me joy. Yeah. I couldn't answer that question for the longest time, dude. And so, the fact that I now know that and that running actually brings me probably the most joy because of the sense of accomplishment and hard work, the feeling. I this year decided, "Okay, I'm going to build a schedule and create time that allows me to train better." And so, can I shift my mornings to say, "I'm a business owner.

At 40 years old I've worked my [ __ ] ass off. I deserve the right to say from 7:00 to 9:00 a.m. every morning, that's going to be my time where I train and recover and eat and like before I rush into this day." And I'm still going to work just as hard. I'm still going to show up the way that I always do. But it's about making time in my life for me today and not feeling guilty about it. Mhm. I feel guilty about this [ __ ] For no reason.

Ken Rideout

If I like doing it, I should do it. That's right. Of all the things you mentioned that bring you joy, you don't you're not really into Philly sports, are you?

Zac Clark

I mean, that's that's a love-hate, man. No, they bring me joy. I mean, look. I was the drunk 22-year-old [ __ ] Philadelphia fan at one point in my life. And now I am I try to be what I am, you know, an adult that can watch a game and understand that generally I'm watching kids play a sport. Yeah. Right? And and for me to kind of go off the cuff on them is probably not fair. And I could probably help, you know, some of the people around me to understand that.

Ken Rideout

But

Zac Clark

Um you know, it's like you hit a certain age and I'm sure you felt this. Like I'm I'm older than all the guys playing now. For sure. So, for me it's like I'd rather like strike up a conversation with them and pick their mind than trash them, you know, on sports talk radio.

Ken Rideout

It's like I love Boston sports. I I hope they win

I I hope they win so badly. But when so badly. But when anytime I catch anytime I catch myself getting too myself getting too emotionally emotionally involved or invested in the

Involved or invested in the success and success and failures of other men, I'm failures of other men, I'm like, "Get a grip, dude." I like yes, I want the Patriots to win more than anything.

Yeah. But I also can't let them losing the possibility of them losing affect me negatively. And you know, we all I I don't want to say we all, but sports people like us that are fanatical about our teams, like sometimes people lose themselves in what they're watching. And I'm like, "Yo, you know you're not on the team, right?" When you keep saying we we got to do this. We got to do that. But then of course I'll be doing the same [ __ ] And my wife will be like, "You know you're not on the team, right?"

Zac Clark

Got it. You got it. I'm the first guy I'm the first guy that's going to say, "This guy is so [ __ ] annoying." And then the next day I'm going to be the guy yelling and screaming about some [ __ ] that just doesn't matter.

You know, those are the moments that I think teach me the most about this life. Like can I truly just be who I am and not judge others and and and not have to understand why people are the way they are. Yeah.

Ken Rideout

It's really hard. Well, I'll definitely have to keep you in the loop cuz my friend Todd Krinsky, the CEO at at Reebok, is trying to arrange an interview for me with Allen Iverson.

Zac Clark

Dude. That's sick. Dude, he I mean, like buckle up. That guy is But he's done it his way, man. That's right.

That's why people love him. That's why people respect him. Has he done it perfectly? Absolutely not. Allen Iverson would tell you that. He'd be the first person to tell you. But he's done it honestly.

Ken Rideout

Yeah, I read his book. It's really good. It's like really all about his personal life more so than NBA. This idea that we need to be perfect has to be smashed. Yes.

Zac Clark

I mean, it's just it's it's nonsense.

Ken Rideout

Sense.

Zac Clark

I don't want to be perfect.

I don't want to be perfect. I want to

I want to make these mistakes and then, make these mistakes and then, you

You know, learn from it and get better. I appreciate I I appreciate you. I appreciate this. Our friendship is awesome. And it's happened because of recovery and because of running and just I think an an ability to see each other for who we are and that's like that's undefeated.

Ken Rideout

Before we wrap up, let's just talk about Release Recovery Run Club. What are the details? Where can people find you?

Zac Clark

Yeah, the run club. So, we we we've really kind of dialed it into marathon season. We were doing it every Monday night around the year and it just it just got to be too much for me and so, you know, we've encouraged people to latch on to other run clubs. But leading up to the marathon, we meet in Central Park every Monday night at 6:30 and it's it's an awesome community. We'll get anywhere from like 50 to 100 people out to run and you don't need to be in recovery.

I think the thing that's really cool about the Release Foundation, which is the nonprofit, is we have um you know, a bunch of bibs in New York, a bunch of bibs in London. Um we're really cementing ourselves as a as a name, you know, in the charitable space around behavioral health care and and and look, if I could have it my way, I would I would stop doing any of the for-profit work and I would just work for the nonprofit cuz that's just fun. You're just writing checks for people to go to treatment.

You're raising money um to help people that otherwise couldn't be helped. So, um How many bibs for New York? I think about 120 this year. 115. We had about 115 15 people run this year and then I mean, you know how it kind of works. Like sometimes people defer to the next year and so, I think we were allotted like 105 off the rip and then we had some people coming back that were injured or whatever like that and you know, we try to raise close to a million bucks each year just through the New York City Marathon.

They're the best. New York Road Runners are the best. They're the best.

Ken Rideout

Yeah, that's what I was going to say. The Road Runners they do a lot for the city of New York and they have always the world. Yeah. It's a great organization and the fact that they accommodate those charities because what's the cost for a bib? I think our cost the cost to us is like a thousand bucks.

But what does a person have to raise? 6,000 bucks. So, the way it works, if you don't know, is you commit to raising 6,000 bucks, you get a bib, you're on the hook for the 6,000. Like you can either go out and raise it or you can write a $6,000 check yourself. Which is what I like. Like the you have to make the commitment. You don't you know, you know, you can't take it and then give it half-assed effort. You know, like you you have to write a $6,000 check.

And have you had any incidents where people didn't come through with the money and then just said I can't afford it?

Zac Clark

You'll get some emails at the end of the year and you know, I think we take it case by case and try to try to be kind with people. If you know, life happens you lose someone loses a job or where I don't have tolerance is if if the person was like a direct kind of personal referral or or you know, they come to you and you know, and we kind of get them a bib and then they don't fulfill their fundraising. That's that's kind of unfortunate.

We've had that a few times and I I've had to really like you know, I know you've sent us runners over the years, which has been awesome. We really appreciate it. But I've had to kind of like step to the side cuz I'll just get texts from guys that, you know, know me or follow me on Instagram or I'll get a DM and it's hey, I love what you're doing. Do you know what we do? You know, like do you tell me what we do or do you just want the [ __ ] bib?

You know?

Ken Rideout

Funny, dude. You can see you can smell that coming a mile away when people are like, hey man, love what you're doing. I'm like on on a DM and I'm like, this [ __ ] guy doesn't even follow me. What could you possibly love? Usually when I when I see that, I answer like, thanks, brother. Not interested.

Zac Clark

Right. Yeah. So, what's next for you on the running scene? Uh well, we're doing Austin Half together. You'll probably smoke it. I'm going to try to run under a 1:30 there, which I think I'm in shape to do and then I'll probably run London. You know, it's a signature event for the foundation for Release Foundation. We have like 20 people going over to run this year. See what shape I can get in for that. I mean, I'll I'll I'll I'll give it an honest effort. I'm not doing the party racing, which you made fun of me for so many years anymore.

So, I'm showing up and I'm giving it my all no matter what shape I'm in. And [snorts] then in the fall, I got to find something that's a little bit quicker than New York. I'll run New York, but it is not going to be my A race in the fall. Like I got to shit's hard, man. That course is just hard.

Ken Rideout

It's very hard. I think you should run CIM in Sacramento. It's right at the beginning of December. I might do that, dude. It's perfect timing with New York.

What about you? Are you are you marathons Hyrox? Like you're all in? I The last year I've been writing the book. It took all my focus and energy. Like it was a lot of emotional stress right going through the process of writing that about my whole life and putting it out there is like very feeling very vulnerable, but excited to see what people think. But I'm going to run

Zac Clark

[snorts]

Ken Rideout

Austin Half Marathon on Feb 15th. I'm not in very good race shape, but F it. You just got to sometimes just got to jump in and get your ass kicked to get motivated and then I'll do the Hyrox World Championships in June. Um again, that's a race where you know, your things can go sideways in a hurry. It's so outside of my comfort zone. It's a lot of weightlifting, a lot of like strength movements. You know, there's a lot of running too if you're not a runner.

But if you are a runner, it's like I wish there were more running, you know? You know, it's like that expression. I'm trying to run faster than the lifters and lift more than the runners. Um But yeah, I'm just trying to do things that keep me motivated to stay fit because fitness has been a big part of my recovery and journey and it's given me the opportunity to connect with people like you and this podcast and Rob Moore who produces the show. I met him training for Iron Man.

Like everything good in my life came from endurance sports and taking pride in your your work ethic and your discipline and since I've started training and racing, everything in my life has improved exponentially. Like I just can't believe how many years I wasted [ __ ] around and doing drugs and like worried about the wrong things.

But you needed to do that to get to where you are today. If you didn't have that pain, you might not be as fast as you are. I believe that. No, you're 100% right. For people that are watching this and hopefully there's a lot of people that are watching that hopefully there's not a lot of people struggling. But for the people that are struggling or may feel like they're drinking a little too much, drugging a little too much. Like and like I said, if you think you are, you probably are.

Um but for those people, how do they get in touch with you and what can they expect from Release? Like let's get granular here so people know Yeah, I mean,

Zac Clark

we are equipped we are we are equipped to handle any call, right? We're equipped to handle any call and our promise to the person on the other end is that we are going to find you help. And that's a that's a fact. Between our nonprofit organization and our for-profit organization, which the for-profit, it's important for me to say does not fund the for-profit, right?

We send people to other programs. Um we're going to find you a place to go, you know, whether it's with us or someone that we've worked with and feel comfortable with. You know, the phone is still the best way to get us, you know, 914-588-6564. I mean, like that's the best way to call into the main line and our mission team is always ready to to be helpful. I would say like, you know, I thought a little bit more about your question about what makes us different.

I mean, we believe in people. You know, we believe in people and we have a we take a very structured kind of no [ __ ] approach to the process while having fun and you know, implementing some brilliant clinical minds. Our chief medical officer is a total rockstar, Dr. Michael McCormick. He's sober himself. You know, he's got a story on his hands. I mean, he was writing himself his own scripts and getting high. I mean, imagine having your own candy store every day, right? So, he's come on the other side and he's he's the man, but um you know, you call us, we're going to ask some questions.

We're going to run a little assessment. We're going to feel for who you are and what's going on and you know, we're going to direct you in the direction that we, you know, our experience tells us that you that you need to go. Um And again, whether that's with us or with someone else, we're going to find you the right place. I mean, we have you know, the website is releaserecovery.com. Obviously, you can direct message me if I'm tagged or whatever on this clip or collaborating

Ken Rideout

Put we'll put all of these

Zac Clark

Or whatever

Ken Rideout

Uh we'll put all of the contact detail in the show notes. But to Zach's point, you can DM Zac, you can DM me. We will get you the help and I think that the most important thing is making that first um outreach, whether it's a phone call or a DM and just I don't know. To me like like with Strava for running. Like once you create accountability and like tell someone like, hey, I need help. I will tell you this. If you tell either one of us you need help, you're going to be getting immediate and intense follow-up.

So, for better or worse. And it's amazing how many people will reach out probably while they're banged up and then they don't want to follow up or they get intimidated. But I'm telling you that everything all of your wildest dreams can come true if you get sober. And the chances of them happening while you're [ __ ] up are zero to very zero. Um and it's the truth. Everyone I know that's sober No one I know who's sober ever says like, oh, what a mistake. I should have stayed [ __ ] up.

I was having so much fun. And like you said, if you're wallowing in your addiction after many years, like you've how much more evidence do you need that you can't handle this? Like you have an allergy to drugs and alcohol. They don't work for you. It's just because someone else that you know can drink and drug and get up and go to work and like cool, you're not him. Stop trying to emulate other bad behavior or or or make excuses for yourself. But yeah, nothing makes me happier than helping other people achieve their goals and like move towards a better life because there is a better life out there and like I said to you on your show, like if you don't like your station in life, [ __ ] change it.

The only person that can control any decisions you make is you. Like you can do this. Look at you and I are perfect example. Like you were smoking crack and shooting heroin. I mean, what what else do you need to have happened? You didn't go to prison, thank God, but I mean, same here. I mean, I'm taking like 50, 60 Percocets a day, every day for years, and functioning, and waking up and feeling like I either going to get high or kill myself. And now I have a book coming out.

I have pride in some of the things that I'm doing, and I have a beautiful family. And

Zac Clark

[clears throat]

Ken Rideout

Look at what the business you've created for yourself is massively impressive.

The lucky ones, man. We're the lucky ones. Yeah, is it luck or is it just uh the harder I work, the luckier I get? That's it, but it's available to everyone. First step. First thing you have to do is make the make the call, take the first step. Every journey starts with the first step. Well, Zac, thanks for doing this. I love you, brother.

I love you, bro. All the contact details will be in the show notes. Thank you, guys, for being with us. Please do me a favor and subscribe to the show. It helps massively, and uh thanks for being with us. Another one down. Boom. All right, guys, I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did. Please take a quick minute to subscribe to the podcast wherever you're listening. This is a new show, so subscribing makes a huge difference. Please also take a minute to give it a review and leave a comment on Apple Podcast and on Spotify.

You can also subscribe and leave a comment on YouTube. Again, this is really important for us, especially now since we're just getting started. You can learn more about me, this podcast, and also find links to purchase my upcoming memoir at the other side of hard.com. My new book is called Everything You Want Is on the Other Side of Hard, and it comes out March 10th, available everywhere you buy books, or again, go into the other side of hard.com.

There's multiple links there where you can find all the retailers carrying the book. Thanks a lot for being with us, and we'll see you next week.

Key takeaways

Addiction can develop even when someone cannot point to a traumatic childhood or a single obvious cause.
Clark credits a longer treatment stay and listening to professionals with helping his sobriety hold.
His sobriety date is August 30, 2011, after an arrest, missing-person report, and his father's arrival at a bank.
He built Release Recovery by combining structured sober living, clinical services, and ongoing personal support.
Clark says the organization should find someone help, even if the right program is somewhere else.
Running and the Release Run Club add community and routine to his recovery life.

Nowhere to Hide

A weekly letter from Ken Rideout about doing the uncomfortable part, and the reasons we use to avoid it.

It starts with 3 Days, 3 Hard Things: one short story from Ken and one hard thing to do, every day for three days. Then one letter a week.