Meet Randall Byrge

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Randall Byrge. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Randall below.

Randall, we’re so excited for our community to get to know you and learn from your journey and the wisdom you’ve acquired over time. Let’s kick things off with a discussion on self-confidence and self-esteem. How did you develop yours?

I remember doing my first pain pill and I remember how it made me feel, I was more confident less angry and it seemed to take all of my worries away. After a 12 year addiction I finally realized that was not true. Early on in recovery I was scared to even go into the stores in my home town in fear of who was mad or ashamed of me, I was removed from the word for 3 years ( 2 years in a program in Texas and 1 year in my parents house never going anywhere without them for fear of relapsing). When I found the certified recovery specialist program in Tennessee i remember thinking this can’t be a real job how can I get paid to do what I love to do. Recovery and honesty have given me the confidence I have today. I am honest with my daughter, my family, my community and everyone I get opportunity to share with about who I use to be in hopes to share with them the testimony of who I believe healed me.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

BUT GOD MINISTRIES is what keeps me moving. Right now while on vacation in Myrtle beach I had the opportunity to revisit the first church to support BGM. It’s a small church in Wilmington South Carolina. I shared my testimony here 5 years and they told me they wanted to “ take me on for support “ I had no idea what that even ment. Since then I’ve had 4 other church take BGM on for support and I’ve not even ask anyone yet. BGM does for others what someone did for me it might be a hot meal a hotel sucks or some clothes to go to treatment but my dream is to start a recovery home for men in the small town that I live in. I want a safe place where I can show love to broken men and introduce them to men and women who have helped me become the man I am today. I don’t believe we will ever stop drugs from coming into our communities but I do believe we can HELP THEM CREATE A LIFE THEY DONT WANT TO ESCAPE FROM

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

Honesty.

Trust is the hardest thing to gain and the easiest thing to loose. I found honesty to be very important and simplest way to reach people. Even my 9 year old knows who o use to be but she also knows who I am today.

Showing up

This might not sound like a skill or quality but trust me it is. When I say I’ll be somewhere I do everything I can to get there early and stay late not just show up for “ my time “ and run out but to be respectful to the church or event I’ve been invited to show real at. This is a trait my daddy tried teaching me years ago and I’ve finally realized the importance of it.

Vulnerability

I open my life and myself up to everyone. Yes that come with a price when you open up to everyone you are allowing everyone the opportunity to hurt you. I’ve seen the good far outweighs the bad in opening up and it has allowed me to reach so many people. I don’t think we can help anyone until they know we are not perfect either. Opening up allows others to see that we all have problems

Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?

Today my biggest challenge is me. I’ve had the dream of opening up a home for 12 years now that’s how long I’ve been in recovery. But I have not been able to put it all together. I kept telling myself it’s because in a small town all the “ good ole boys” have the funds and they don’t want a recovery home here. Or that maybe I’m just not cut out to do the job that needs to be done. My favorite was that I didn’t have enough time but I recently noticed the amount of screen time I have been using and realized I had time but I was just wasting it.
Yes a good finding source for our non profit would be amazing
Yes more like minded people would change my community
Yes simply having a NICE home for men to regain what they lost would be beautiful

So I deleted all of my social media.

I used it a lot for ministry and keeping up with others but I wasted more time than I worked so it’s like another addiction. But I believe if I can focus the right people will come my way and I can give back to the community I took so much from.