Comedian, producer, and talk show host Jon Stewart surprised his protege, comedian Trevor Noah, by revealing a history of substance abuse on the podcast, What Now? with Trevor Noah.

Almost 30 minutes into the 90-minute podcast, things take a dark turn when Stewart says, “Once you wake up in a crack house in East St. Louis at four in the morning and go, ‘Oh, I think I’m not making good decisions.'”

Noah, stunned, says, “Are you actually saying this is you? You woke up in a crack house? That’s correct?”

“This was obviously years ago,” Stewart replied.

“I knew you as a guy who smoked a lot,” Noah says, inferring the use of marijuana. At which point Stewart talks about how difficult it is for him to “quiet the mind.” In particular, he talks about the stress that comes from being an introvert by nature doing stand-up comedy in clubs and performing on TV:

It doesn’t take long for your mind to go from, you know, ‘Hey, that was a good set,’ to ‘You failed everyone you ever loved.’

This led Stewart down a road of bad decisions and substance abuse. As Noah noticed, however, Stewart was not like that when they met in 2014. Stewart said his wild days were behind him, “in the early 90s, mid-90s bad.” He said smoking (weed) helped with cravings and to quiet his mind.

The other thing Stewart pointed to was habit substitution, although he never used the term explicitly. “When I’m busy, I’m healthier. And when I’m not busy, I was very unhealthy,” Stewart told Noah. “I like purposeful interaction. I like intention. I like projects. I like making things, you know, woodworking and music.”

“You still make furniture?” Noah asked. Stewart then relates how the hobby quiets his mind, providing something he can immerse himself into for an extended period of time.

Readers of AddictionNews know we’re champions of habit substitution here. If you’re used to having a drink at a certain time of day, and you’re trying to give up drinking, it’s easier if you replace it with something you do every day at that very same time that you enjoy. Habit substitution is an essential component of cognitive behavioral therapy, training yourself to break bad habits by at least temporarily replacing them with non-harmful habits.

Running, jogging, bike riding, golfing, and any outdoor activity is an excellent substitution, and there are recovery groups devoted to drug-free meet-ups. Fishing is an excellent activity for quieting the mind, removing someone from an environment loaded with triggers. Working with horses has also proven to be rejuvenating. Playing a musical instrument or engaging in drawing, painting, collaging, or other hand crafts are also excellent substitute habits.

Stewart tells Noah about immersing himself in woodworking projects for hours, “and it was like, I think what you would imagine a deprivation tank [feels like].” Except when he came out, he had a piece of furniture, something to show for it. “I could just disappear in it and, and you would build something,” Stewart said, adding “the tangible part of having something that was the fruit of that labor was wonderful.”

Stewart no longer has a woodworking shop, but he found a substitute habit for his substitute habit. “I took up drums like eight years ago,” Stewart said, then explained at greater length his problem and how he deals with it:

My normal state of being vibrates too hot. It just does. I don’t know how to stop it. So these things the old interventions, as George Carlin said, like they work for a bit but after a while don’t work. But you find these other ways and as I’ve gotten older, I think the frequency vibrates at a slightly less intense frequency.

And there you have a perfect little formula for recovery from substance use disorders. An understanding that stress is leading to substance abuse, and at some point, one usually hits bottom — a crack house in East St. Louis. A medical intervention can help break the dependency, but the problem will come back without lifestyle changes. Those changes often involve healthy habit substitution. In time, the “frequency gets less intense” as people naturally age out of addiction.

Written by Steve O’Keefe. First published June 23, 2025.

Sources:

“Jon Stewart — One of My Favorite People,” What Now? with Trevor Noah, June 12, 2025.

Screen capture from What Now? with Trevor Noah used under Fair Use: Commentary.