In today's episode I will be sharing why I failed to quit drinking alcohol for 10 years... If you're on your journey to getting sober than this podcast is a must listen! https://www.soberclear.com/dark-control-now
🎥 100% FREE SHORT MOVIE: How To Make Controlling Alcohol 🍺 Feel Like A Flick Of A Switch In Your Brain: https://www.soberclear.com/dark-control-now
📞 Book a Roadmap Call to see if the Soberclear Program and First Principles Thinking could be a good match with you: https://soberclear.com/bookcall-ytd
🎭 SOBERCLEAR PROGRAM: See if our REFRAMING method is the right thing for you! (Spots are limited): https://www.soberclear.com/soberclearmethod
❌ MEN ONLY: Exclusive Free Video Training On “The Secret To Controlling Alcohol”: http://www.soberclear.com/dark-control-now
#sober #stopdrinking #alcoholfree
In today's episode I will be sharing why I failed to quit drinking alcohol for 10 years... If you're on your journey to getting sober than this podcast is a must listen! https://www.soberclear.com/dark-control-now
🎥 100% FREE SHORT MOVIE: How To Make Controlling Alcohol 🍺 Feel Like A Flick Of A Switch In Your Brain: https://www.soberclear.com/dark-control-now
📞 Book a Roadmap Call to see if the Soberclear Program and First Principles Thinking could be a good match with you: https://soberclear.com/bookcall-ytd
🎭 SOBERCLEAR PROGRAM: See if our REFRAMING method is the right thing for you! (Spots are limited): https://www.soberclear.com/soberclearmethod
❌ MEN ONLY: Exclusive Free Video Training On “The Secret To Controlling Alcohol”: http://www.soberclear.com/dark-control-now
#sober #stopdrinking #alcoholfree
Welcome to the Stop Drinking Podcast, where we help you make stopping drinking a simple, logical and easy decision. We help you with tips, tools and strategies to start living your best life when alcohol-free. If you want to learn more about stop drinking coaching, then head over to wwwsoberclearcom. Now.
Speaker 1:I've failed to stop drinking alcohol more times than I can count. It's been hundreds upon hundreds of failures. Stop drinking, last 24 hours drink again. Sometimes I might go a week, sometimes it might be a month, and I think the longest I went was seven or eight months I can't remember the exact dates, but I've tried to stop drinking so many times and I have been met with failure after failure after failure. And today I want to unpack what I've learned after 10 years of trial and error. I want to explain exactly why I failed to quit alcohol Because surely something worked. I've not drank for five and a half years, so I'm hoping that there's a lesson in here for you today to help you on your journey. Whether you're newly sober, still struggling or even one, two years into things, there'll be something for everybody in this video.
Speaker 1:See, every time that I tried to stop drinking alcohol, this is what I'd always missed out. See, I've used this example before, but I used to have a friend that was successful, right, he had multiple investment properties, he had this career, he was making loads of money and we drank before. In the past We'd gone out before, but then we'd also gone to restaurants where he'd drink you know one glass of wine and I'd be like, well, should we go and buy some more afterwards? And he'd be like no, and I was always like how, how can he do that? And I always held onto this idea of this friend. So every time I tried to stop drinking, I'd think in my head of this friend that had his life together. He was in shape, had a relationship, you know was killing it on the business side of things, and I always thought back to him and thought he could control his drinking. He appeared to be in control and I always thought back to this person.
Speaker 1:And a lot of the times when I did relapse from alcohol, I would think that that was possible for me as well. I had this ideal in my head that it was possible to live a great quality of life and then have a couple of drinks here and there. So every time that I tried to stop drinking alcohol, I had this belief that there was a benefit to drinking alcohol. I believed that there was something that I could gain from drinking the stuff. Otherwise I would never have drank it. If I had a friend in the exact same situation that was smoking crack at the weekend, but he only ever smoked one crack pipe a day or a week or whatever, I wouldn't feel like, oh, that's why he's successful. But I used to think, oh, maybe there's something in it, maybe there's a benefit he gets, maybe it's helped his career, maybe it's doing something. And I'd associate alcohol with a good quality, successful life.
Speaker 1:And this is the first mistake that I made. My belief system with alcohol was faulty. I bought into ideas that were totally untrue. How can consuming this poisonous, addictive, toxic substance add anything to your life? This guy didn't have his life together because he drank alcohol. He was operating at a lower frequency, he was operating at 90% and still held his life together. He was successful in spite of drinking alcohol.
Speaker 1:We don't look at people that smoke heroin once a week and think, well, man, I want to be just like them. We have this belief, this underlying belief in society that alcohol is a good thing. And that was my first mistake. I hadn't shifted that belief. So every single time that I tried to stop drinking alcohol, I had this voice in my head. I had these beliefs that were deep rooted, almost like it was in my subconscious mind, that alcohol is a good thing. So what do you think happened? Well, I mean, I might stop drinking for a few weeks, but then I never shifted that belief.
Speaker 1:So eventually, you know, when the hangover had worn off or when I'd lost a bit of weight, that belief that alcohol was a good thing would lead me to drink again. See, once I saw alcohol for what it actually was, something that didn't provide anything. All it did was take from me. Once I truly understood that, I never drank again. I didn't want to drink. I didn't think of that person and think, oh, that's a good, that's an ideal. I started to feel sorry for him. I started to think, man, if only you could see what I see, you'd just come to the same logical conclusion that I came to there is nothing in drinking alcohol, which leads me to the second mistake Now, because I had these faulty beliefs.
Speaker 1:How do you think it actually was? If I managed to go, I wouldn't go to bars, you know, if I walked past a pub and I knew some friends were in there. I'm probably going to skip the pub and if I ever wanted to drink, I would just be like right now, I can't drink, I can't drink. I told myself. I'm not drinking anymore, I'm not going to do this, I'm not going to do this. So when a craving would come up or a good thing, how would I need to use willpower to not drink? If I had to switch from brown bread to white bread for the rest of my life? I'm never going to miss the brown bread. If I had to change my suitcase brand and only use this suitcase for the rest of my life, I'm not going to think about the old suitcase and then walk past a suitcase store and be like man, I just wish I could have my old suitcase back. And even if I did have that thought, it would be a one second thought and I'd be well on my way.
Speaker 1:But with alcohol it was different, and this is actually ignoring the physical addiction side of things and the actual physical cravings. I'm purely talking about the mindset. But if I had shifted my belief to see alcohol as something that provided nothing to me? I don't need to avoid alcohol. I can go and sit in a bar, I can sit in a restaurant, I can be with somebody that sat opposite me drinking a pint of beer and feel no desire because I was using the wrong approach. I was always using my own willpower. I was just fighting the cravings because I hadn't shifted my beliefs. And we know what happens never works long term. Which leads me to the third and final mistake that I made.
Speaker 1:So the way that I stopped drinking was I changed my beliefs by using something called first principles thinking, which is a problem solving mental model, which is all about dissecting a problem into its component parts, studying the individual component parts, putting them back together and then creating a new worldview. But the most important thing that I did, once I had broken the problem down and studied the component parts and really started to see our goal for what it was, is, I then made a decision See, if you got new information tomorrow that proved your current worldview was wrong and you ignored it, then that's on you. And you know some people. They do want to live in denial. They hear a message like mine, they hear a video like mine. They're like nah, this doesn't apply to me. I'm not acting on this information. Yet most people are so unaware they don't know that it's a poisonous, toxic substance. They think it does something for them. Then, when they try and stop drinking alcohol, they wonder why it's so difficult. But what I did differently is, once I had that new information, I acted upon it. I knew that alcohol was the one thing in my life that if I fixed it, everything else would get better. I knew that it was the biggest problem that I had to solve.
Speaker 1:But just imagine for a second that you had an individual with an illness. They had like some knee problem and they could only ever sit down. And all the doctors had told them man, you're just going to have to sit down I'm pointing because there's a chair right next to me but you're going to have to sit down all day in that chair because your knees are done. You're never going to walk again. And that was like the general idea of what you should do with this specific knee problem.
Speaker 1:Now what happens if, a year later, new evidence came out? New research came out that showed that all that individual had to do was walk. If he could walk 500 steps a day, his knees would be totally fixed. It was very low effort. He could just walk around his home, walk in the garden, and it'd be done If he chose to get that information. And, by the way, let's just say the information was 100% factual. There was no questioning that information. That's just how it was. If he walked those 500 steps, it was a 100% success rate and he would be fine If he chose not to act on that information. That's on him. I mean, it would be crazy.
Speaker 1:But some people with alcohol I can give them this message. I can tell them that it's ethanol, that it's poison, that it does nothing for them, and they know in their heart that it's right. But they decide to not act upon it. They decide to just keep coasting, keep escaping, keep ignoring this message. But I did something different. I made a decision. I decided to not drink alcohol again. And when I say a decision, I mean it was so clear, there was no doubt in my mind that I would drink again.