Opening up about his addictions. We all have our vices. Whether it’s enjoying a cold beer after a long day of work, soaking in a bathtub, or going on a run to let off some steam. Vices can look different for us all; there can be healthy vices, but there can also be unhealthy vices. In the country music space, many artists have been transparent about reevaluating their relationship with these vices, especially when they start to teeter on the line of addiction. We’ve heard Ashley McBryde’s story of becoming sober after realizing she did not have a good relationship with it, Jake Owen got sober after realizing he did not like who he was while drinking, and Marcus King has opened up in the past about his struggles with addiction. But some vices are not substance-based, and John Rich recently opened up about his struggles with the high of gambling. Last month, country music star John Rich was a guest on the popular Shawn Ryan Show podcast, a GREAT podcast if you’re not familiar. Shawn is a former Navy SEAL and CIA contractor who has recently exploded onto the podcast scene. Completely authentic and apologetic, Shawn’s no-nonsense approach to hosting has garnered him a massive audience this year, and deservedly so. He’s the real deal. John and Shawn got to talking about everything from his start in country music to the genre’s shift towards pop, dying awards shows, spiritual warfare, his song “The Righteous Hunter,” P. Diddy, and more. During the beginning of their four-hour conversation, Rich touches on his relationship with Christ and how some “normal” activities before turning to his faith make him look back in disgust at how he used to operate like that. So what does he mean by this? Rich admits that he used to struggle with a gambling addiction, and he looks back on that point in his life, unhappy with the man he was then. “Like I had a horrible gambling problem. Horrible. I was so good at it. I was so good at it, at blackjack. So I would go in and take over a whole blackjack table. I’d play all nine seats, just me and a dealer. And I’d play all nine hands, and I’d make sure they didn’t use more than two decks. ‘Cause I could count them if it was two decks. I couldn’t count them —those six deck shoes —can’t count those. I couldn’t. But I could count two. So I was knocking their brains out, man, left and right. You go from a $10 bet like, ‘Oh, I hope I don’t lose my $10, too.’ Now that needs to be a $100 bet. Now it needs to be a $500 bet. Now it needs to be a $5,000 bet.” Rich says that he got into the high dollar tables quickly after getting the hit off winning a lower bet, and soon he was such a heavy-hitting gambler that when he would pull up to a hotel with a casino for a show, the concierge would meet him at his car with a paper to sign off on a $50,000 marker that was approved with chips waiting in his room. But one night after gambling in Mississippi, Rich claims he had an epiphany that led him to quit cold turkey. Rich recalls the moment as a conversation God was having with him, telling him that he was being foolish and disrespectful for spending his money in this way. “And then one day, I was in Tunica, Mississippi, played a concert, took $62,000 off a blackjack table in about an hour. I’m telling you, man, I was good at it, ’cause I could read, I knew what was happening. $62,000 in cash, flew back home, woke up the next morning looking at that money, and I realized… That is the most disrespectful thing you could possibly ever do. Like that’s how He (God) was making me feel about that. You grew up in Amarillo, Texas, with your dad working 100 hours a week, keeping everything going. Can you imagine? Like, this is Him putting this into my head. ‘Son, can you imagine what your dad could have done with $62,000? Where did you get the $62,000 to even gamble? I gave you the 62. I gave you the talent that would go out here and allow you to earn money like that. And this is what you’re going to do with it? Stick it on a stupid blackjack table? And risk it? Why don’t you take $62,000 and go help a bunch of old people eat lunch every day? Or why don’t you go help some kids get out of a bad situation?'” Rich continues that he felt God was talking to him, asking, ‘What is your problem?’ Rich says that after that moment, he went to get rid of this “blood money” of sorts and needed a new truck, so he figured this was the perfect way to spend his earnings and would keep him from gambling it away. Rich says he still owns the 2010 King Ranch pickup he bought that day, refusing to get rid of it as a reminder of where he was at that point in his life and how far he has come to who he is today. Fifteen years of no gambling, and John Rich is going strong, thankful for that wakeup call he got from the big man upstairs. Check out the entire interview while you’re here: The post John Rich Opens Up On Gambling Addiction & How God Convicted Him To Quit Cold Turkey: “I’d Play All 9 Seats, Me & A Dealer” first appeared on Whiskey Riff.