“WITH THE PUBLICATION IN
A LOT OF TIMES, THOSE THINGS COME BACK TO BITE US.
2012 OF SCOTT STAPP’S AUTOBIOGRAPHY SINNER’S CREED, THE FORMER LEAD SINGER, SONGWRITER AND LYRICIST FOR OF MULTI-PLATINUM RECORDING BAND CREED DETAILED HIS STRUGGLES WITH DRUGS, ALCOHOL AND DEPRESSION.
“
It became the catalyst for his album Proof of Life, which released last year. Editor Amber Weigand-Buckley had the opportunity to set down with Scott to talk about the road that brought him to finally surrender his life totally to Christ, the support of his family and what he has learned along the way.
YOUR LIVE ALBUM RELEASED LAST YEAR. PROOF OF LIFE TALKS VERY MUCH ABOUT WHO YOU ARE. TELL ME A LITTLE BIT ABOUT THE PROCESS OF PUTTING THAT ALBUM TOGETHER.
SCOTT: Absolutely. We cut the trees down but there are roots, emotions and feelings. For me, that needed to be dealt with because at the core they were impacting my life all these years later. It all came from fear. God is the opposite of fear. God is love. So in shining that light on the areas in my life, and looking at it from that lens, I can see how and where it started in my life, and how fear impacted me. Then, it disguises itself through other things and I wanted to change. I didn’t want to live like that anymore.
YOU DEALT WITH DEPRESSION AND THAT LED YOU INTO A PATTERN OF SUBSTANCE ABUSE WITH ALCOHOL AND DRUGS. HOW DID YOU GO ABOUT PROCESSING DEPRESSION? SCOTT: I was self-medicating. I had to first get rid of the way I was doing things to make myself feel better. Alcohol and other drugs initially made me feel better. I felt all the symptoms of depression. When I
SCOTT: I look at Proof of Life as the musical accompaniment to the transformation in my life. Coming out of a period in my life where I became self-destructive in decision-making and suffered from the consequences. I finally got to the place of how did I get here, what makes me tick, what’s unresolved? So in writing my book, Sinner’s Creed, I began the process of going back and honestly reflecting on my life. What I thought was a negative and dark period, repurposed psychologically in that I now see it as something that I went through, learned from and now I can pass that story along because it’s a common story for all of us as human beings. It really demonstrates the power of what God can do in your life and how everything matters. We don’t have to regret those times when we’ve become a hostage to our decision-making and situations we’ve put ourselves in. Every day, make a decision that today is a new day to change and allow God to free us from those self-imposed prisons.
IT’S EASY WHEN WE RECEIVE SALVATION TO WANT TO BRUSH EVERYTHING UNDER THE RUG AND NOT DEAL WITH THE PAST.
THE STAPP FAMILY (L to R) Jaclyn, Daniel, Melaina, Scott and Jagger.
drank, or did some drugs, it took that away but then it became destructive and began to kill me. So removing that was the first thing. - continued -
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