Stop Drinking Podcast by Soberclear
The Stop Drinking Podcast by Soberclear is here to help you stop drinking alcohol and achieve the life of your dreams. We want to support people getting sober so they can get on with their life without feeling miserable. If you want to learn more about stop drinking coaching, head over to https://www.soberclear.com/
Stop Drinking Podcast by Soberclear
When quitting alcohol, do NOT do these 8 things
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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. The very first thing you need to avoid doing is using willpower to not drink. Why do I say this? Because you might be sat here thinking but Leon, I just need more willpower, I need to fight the urge. And that's the thing. It's just not that simple. See, when I drank for the best part of 10 years, every time I tried to stop I'd always use willpower. And what I mean by this is something bad would happen in my life. Right, I might get into a fight, I might fall out with a family member, maybe I'd break up with a girlfriend, maybe I'd run out of money, maybe I'd have a health problem. Alcohol would cause some amount of pain in my life. And then what I'd do is I'd just say, right, that's it, I'm done, I'm not going to drink again. Do you know how many times I've told myself this? I'm not going to drink again. And then, over the next few days, weeks, sometimes even months ahead anytime I thought about alcohol is I just resisted, right, I'm a strong man, right, I'm just not going to drink. And whilst I wish, I just wish it was that simple and that straightforward, with alcohol it just doesn't really work like that. See, there is a better way for you to do things, and I'll tell you that in a second. But if you are new here, good to meet you.
Speaker 1:My name is Leon Sylvester. I've not drank myself now for almost seven years, after a 10 year battle with alcohol. I tried everything AA meetings. You know all of this stuff that I'm going to unpack in this video today, but I just wanted to let you know that I've been in your shoes. But let me give you a quick reframe right now. Now let's say you loved fruit, right? Let's say you loved all different types of fruit. You love bananas, you love mango, you love kiwi, you love dragon fruit, you love pomegranate, and these are just things that you enjoy in your life.
Speaker 1:If I was to tell you right now that, all right, dave, john, whoever you are, you're no longer allowed to eat pomegranate, how much willpower would it take you to not eat pomegranate? Do you think that if you went into a pomegranate juice store. You'd go in there and you'd just have to be like oh, what am I going to do? I need to get out the store, or else I think I'm going to order a pomegranate juice. You wouldn't do that, would you? You'd just feel totally okay with the fact that you can't have pomegranate and you'd just go and have an alternative. You'd just have a banana.
Speaker 1:And this is why I say willpower and stopping drinking are unrelated. See, the problem with using willpower to not drink is drinking. Alcohol is not a drink like water or a food like a pomegranate. And this is the problem. It goes so much deeper. See, the reason why willpower and stopping drinking are unrelated is because alcohol is a drug, and I know there's a lot of people that are out there that say I've never touched a drug in my life. I just have a problem with drinking. I'm sorry to break it to you, but it is a drug.
Speaker 1:And when you use willpower to not do this drug that you're technically addicted to and I'm not here to belittle that, I've been in your shoes, I'm not here to knock you down in any way when you start using willpower, what do you think ends up happening? Well, in your mind. You're telling yourself this is something that's on a pedestal, so it's kind of like this forbidden fruit that you're not actually allowed to have, but it's not a fruit like I'm talking about earlier, it's this forbidden drug. And what ends up happening, and what ended up happening to me for almost 10 years in this stop-start cycle that I could just never end, is the more I use willpower, the more I wanted to drink, and what would happen is it would build up until this little voice in my head came in and it was like this hey, leon, just have one. Oh boy, here we go. Do you know how many times I've told myself this? Do you know how many times I've gone through this stop and start cycle, all because I'm using willpower?
Speaker 1:Now there is another solution to this and it's reframing the way that you view alcohol. See what I did and what finally fixed it for me, and what I've been teaching people and what I've helped people do in my coaching program at Sober Clear is I help them change the way that they view the drug. So then they start to see it more like pomegranate, right when it's like. Yeah, I mean I could have a bit of pomegranate if I want, but I told myself I'm not going to do it. So I'm just not going to do it. See, the solution is not to use willpower. It's to start it as a poison, right, it's to see it as ethanol. It's to start seeing it as something that does absolutely nothing for you.
Speaker 1:And there are different ways that you can get into this state of mind. You can study, you can do what I did where you know. I just consumed every piece of information I could find about this stuff and it was like a light bulb switch and I didn't need willpower anymore because it was pure logic. At this point, there was no emotional charge behind my addiction to this drug. It was just like I see it for what it is now. Now, this is exactly what my coaching company helps people do, and we've actually recently had this validated in a scientific report that was written by an academic psychologist that has peer-reviewed published addiction research, and he was formerly affiliated with the University of Oxford. I got the report printed out because I wanted to show you guys it is awesome, but he really goes into the science behind this reframing technique that we've been doing.
Speaker 1:Now, if you want to understand a little bit more about this and you want to actually get into the nitty gritty of how we do this and how we can help you do it, then just go ahead and click the link down below. Put your name and email address in A new video. Training will start playing and that will really break down the findings of this report, how this reframing process works. But the trick is is you need to stop using willpower. Now I have told you how to do it yourself. Right, you can study, you can get into that state of mind. I mean, there's thousands of people who do this. But if you want to just learn about my process, then just go ahead and click the link down below. Okay, so the second thing that you want to avoid doing and I need to give you a bit of a warning before I say this because if you're going to AA and you found success with this approach, then you might want to just either skip this one or pause the video now and really just consider whether or not you want to listen to what I'm about to say.
Speaker 1:But the second thing that you really want to avoid doing is calling yourself an alcoholic. See, when I started my business, when I started Sober Clear, when I started this YouTube channel, I had a conversation with my mum, so my own mother has been to AA for over 20 years Now. She got sober by calling herself an alcoholic. She truly believes that's what she is. She thinks that there's something different about her. There's nothing wrong with the drug as a thing. It's all about her as a person. And listen, it saved her life and it saved my life because she got sober when I was being raised by her, and without AA, I don't know what would have happened to me. So I'm so grateful for that program.
Speaker 1:But when I was trying to stop drinking alcohol, I actually tried it. I went for about 90 days. I fully involved myself. I did the 12 steps. I gave myself up to a higher power, which is a big problem a lot of people do have. I don't have a problem with that.
Speaker 1:But what I did have a problem with was this idea that I'm the problem, that I'm an alcoholic that can never be fixed, that has to go to meetings for the rest of their life. And I'm not saying that this can't work. I mean, of course it can. There's millions of people who get sober with that approach, and if that's you, then I'm sorry, like I'm not trying to belittle you in any way, but for me it just felt like I was almost carrying this self-defeating label. They say that I had to keep it for the rest of my life because there's no known cure for this disease.
Speaker 1:But things are starting to shift. See, doctors will no longer call you an alcoholic because it's technically a made-up, self-help term. The only people that call themselves alcoholics are people who go to Alcoholics Anonymous. Right, it's all a made-up term, but I didn't want to have to go to these meetings for the rest of my life. What I wanted to do was fix my problem once and for all and move on. I didn't want to label myself. I didn't want to have to just, you know, beg God every time I got a craving. I didn't want to have to go and call my sponsor. I didn't want to do any of that stuff. I wanted to fix the problem and move on with my life.
Speaker 1:And again, that's why I always talk on this channel, why I always tell people the solution is reframing how you view the drug. Not yourself, because you might never have heard this before, but if you're drinking too much, you've got nothing wrong with you as a person. It's the nature of the drug. The nature of alcohol is to be addictive, is to dehydrate you and it's to lower your inhibitions. It's this deadly combination. It's got nothing to do with you as a person, but anyway, let's get into number three. Now. This might sound a little bit counterintuitive because you might never have heard it put this way before, but so many people do this wrong.
Speaker 1:There are so many people out there that start their journey to not drink and feel this feeling of doom and gloom. They don't feel good about the decision. Right? They're not like all right, let's stop drinking. No, they approach it with this feeling of pessimism, and I say this to people who I work with. I say, right, if we're going to start working together, listen, those negative thoughts, that negative self-talk is got to go. Otherwise none of our stuff is going to matter. I say it to people I work with and I'm going to encourage you to do the same as well.
Speaker 1:If you check yourself into a rehab or if you go and sit with a therapist or if you go to an AA meeting, a lot of the times you're starting with your head down. You're like do I really need to do this? When I start working with people. I say, dude, don't do that. Whatever you do, don't do that. Start this with your head held high.
Speaker 1:See, the best way to stop drinking alcohol is to start it with a feeling of optimism, because you don't want to be, you know, three months sober, six months sober. You don't want to have to walk into a bar and then be like, oh, do I really need to not drink? No, you want to feel great about your decision. Now there are ways that you can reinforce this. Right, you can start journaling.
Speaker 1:It's actually something that I did, and it wasn't really related to, like, not drinking, but when I was in my first year of sobriety is I did spend a lot of time journaling and reflecting. I'd start looking at the wins I had that day right. I'd start writing things that I was grateful for. So I'd recommend doing the same. You know, maybe you get a week sober and then you start writing oh, wow, okay, so my kids wanted to spend a bit more time with me. I can feel like the bloating is just starting to reduce and start writing down these wins, and what you want to do is you want to create this positive feedback cycle rather than this negative feedback cycle. But whatever you do, just try your best not to get into those negative thought patterns of am I really doing this? Am I really listening to this guy on the internet talking about not drinking? Do I really Listen? Only good things happen when you stop drinking, I promise you.
Speaker 1:Now the fourth one is extremely important if you have relationships with people, which is everybody right. So it's going to sound weird again, but when I first stopped drinking alcohol, I remember having this conversation with somebody. So because I've stopped and started so many times in the past, like if I go and tell somebody I'm not going to drink again, they've seen me fail a hundred times already what do you think they're going to think? Oh, yeah, right, and I made that mistake. So when I stopped drinking just under seven years ago now, I had done what I help people do. I had literally done this Again. If you want to go and see how I did it the report, all that stuff just go and click the link in the description.
Speaker 1:But I got into this state of mind where it was like this flick of a switch and I knew with absolute certainty that I wasn't going to drink again. It felt completely different to every single time and like I destroyed my life. You know, I went to, I was working in a restaurant. I had no money, listen, I actually hit like rock bottom, you don't need to get there. But I had hit that place and I remember I told somebody that worked in the restaurant. I said I won't say his name, but hey, dude, listen, I'm not coming out tonight, I've stopped drinking. And he laughed me in the face. He's like yeah, right, here we go again. And I did something that I think was actually very wise. I want to give myself a bit of credit. I'm not trying to sound cocky, but I want to kind of teach you what I did that served me so well.
Speaker 1:So after I heard that, I thought, okay, let's just take a step back. Do I need to tell anybody about this? No, not really. Do I need to go and broadcast to the world that I'm not drinking? No, I don't. And then I really thought to myself do I owe anybody an explanation to why I'm doing this at all? And again the answer was no. So I just kept my mouth shut. I didn't tell anybody. I told my closest friends and I told some family members, but I told them after I got a bit of momentum, I didn't start broadcasting. Hey, I was day seven, I'm on day 14.
Speaker 1:And listen, for some people they want to do that. That's fine. I'm not saying that this is going to cause you to start drinking again, but I just thought do you know what? I don't want to have to sit and debate with people about my decision, because if that person has got a problem with alcohol, you are never going to change their mind. Right? If you've switched, if you've got into that place where you've reframed alcohol, you've made a logical decision to stop drinking alcohol.
Speaker 1:And then you tell somebody that's still drinking that you're not drinking and you're doing it because alcohol is a poison, it's ethanol, it does nothing for me. What do you think they're going to say? Just have one drink. What are you talking about? And I actually have this new client and he's really awesome. We've actually become friends, we're living in the same city and he told me this exact thing happened and when he came back from this night out that he'd been on.
Speaker 1:He told me this guy, you know, he was like pushing it on me and I said see, it's like you just don't need to explain yourself to people. Don't even go there. Don't get into a debate. Just keep it to yourself, and you know, a lot of the times I actually think this is wise to do with partners as well. You know when people are married, when they're in relationships. I think it can be a good idea to sometimes keep it to yourself, because it depends on the relationship, right, but a lot of the times spouses again, they've heard it a million times. So my recommendation is, when you do make that true decision is you don't need to tell anybody and please, please, don't start explaining yourself. You don't need to explain yourself to anybody. You owe nobody an explanation and I'm not being an a-hole when I say that, like I'm trying to help you. Just don't even go there, okay.
Speaker 1:Fifth thing to avoid this one is massive. So when I drank alcohol, I made so many mistakes Like man, if I had a list. In fact, this is actually something that they make you do in Alcoholics Anonymous, by the way, because they call it a spiritual program and what you do is you make this massive list and I had actually started doing this because I had a sponsor. I actually took that program quite seriously and you make this list of all the people and all the bad things that you've done. And what you do is you go and make amendments to them. Could that be a good thing? Yeah, sure, why not? But man, for me, that list. I can't even remember the damage I've done. I don't know who I upset. And again, same thing.
Speaker 1:You could go and sit with a therapist. Right, you could go back to the childhood, look at all the bad things that have happened. And I am not knocking therapy in any way. Right, there's a time and a place where that is so important. But when it comes to stopping drinking alcohol, I don't see the relation between these two things. Going and making amendments to people is amazing. Right, I'm not saying that's bad. Going and sitting with a therapist and working through some bad things that have happened, I mean fantastic, I've done it. I'm not saying it's a bad thing.
Speaker 1:But with alcohol, is it like thinking that that's going to help you stop drinking alcohol? I mean, could it? Yes, I guess, but I don't think it's that effective. And a lot of the times when I started going back and thinking, oh damn, remember that person that I never paid back and oh, you know that person who I? I'm not even going to tell you half the stuff that happened, right, yeah, let's not even go there. But when I start thinking about that stuff, you know if I was really struggling to stop drinking alcohol. That stuff doesn't make me feel good and happy. It makes me feel worse.
Speaker 1:See, what you want to do instead is make the future the focus. Now, what the psychologists actually found out is that one of the most effective ways to stop drinking alcohol in the scientific literature is something called motivational enhancement. This is something that I've designed into my program. You don't need to use my program to do this, it's pretty straightforward. But instead of making the past the focus, we want to make the future the focus. We want to start designing a vision for our life. Right, what do you want your relationship to look like? Right? How do you want your family life to look? What do you want your business, your career to look like? Your health? You know, do you want to be running 5Ks, running 10Ks, I don't know, deadlifting, doing CrossFit, doing some Muay Thai? I don't know. But instead of waking up in the morning and running away from all the bad things that you've done and all the stuff because, listen, we can do that it's so much more powerful for you to run towards something.
Speaker 1:This made such a big difference for me, and through doing this is I built the life of my dreams. I don't know what your dream is, but for me it was being able to make an impact on others. It was being able to have some sort of online business where I could travel the world. It was to help people. It was to become a husband. I'm about to get married, by the way. I think I've said that a few times. I think it's going to be about two more weeks or so and then, boom, paper's signed, I'm going to start wearing my nice good old wedding ring. This was my vision for my life when I stopped drinking alcohol. So if I were you, I'd sit down and really think, okay, what can I focus on instead? So let's get into number six Now. The sixth one may be hard for you, depending on where you live and whatever you're in, but I would really recommend not doing this totally alone.
Speaker 1:I was very lucky when I stopped drinking alcohol that my best friend also didn't drink and we actually lived in the same apartment. So when I just stopped drinking alcohol, right, I was maybe three, four, maybe four months sober. So what happened is is I stopped drinking alcohol and boom, the switch went off and I just felt like the old me came back out. Right, I felt confident, I felt happy, I felt motivated, I felt like I could do anything. I just felt on top of the world. So I immediately started a personal training business and, lo and behold, because I wasn't drinking alcohol, it immediately went well. I can't even remember how much I was in debt like maybe a couple of grand. I owed my grandma money. It was a disaster. I was working in this restaurant and as soon as I stopped drinking I was like the belief in myself came back.
Speaker 1:And after doing the personal training for a few months, I thought do you know what? I don't know if I want to do this career long term. I don't know if I want to own a gym. I don't know if I want to live in England. I kind of want to be remote, I want to be able to move around, and that was like the dream I had at the time. I'm a lot more settled now, but this was years ago and I was blessed that me and my best friend, we got an apartment and I was above and he was below and we were literally in the same building alife before.
Speaker 1:But my gosh, it's nuts. Everybody's drinking. It's just pure chaos and it is so much fun. And me and my friend we love playing pool. We're super competitive against each other. We'll make these pots that are just crazy and we'll burst into laughter. And then you can go to these tables where it's like the winner stays on, and then we'll go there and we'll try and like challenge the champion and you put your name on the board. Listen, we had a great time, but I was lucky to have some level of accountability to not drink. Now I knew I wasn't going to drink, so it wasn't that important, but it was helpful to have some element of community.
Speaker 1:Now, as my journey progressed, my pretty much entire social circle now just nobody really drinks. Some people do, but most of my friends we've built relationships around things that don't revolve around drinking. Maybe it's, you know, power lifting, maybe it's CrossFit, maybe it's business, maybe it's, you know, content creation. It could be something totally different, but the point of this is I'm trying to say is just don't do this alone. Find a community. For some people it is AA, smart recovery For people. In my program they join the Sober Clear program. That's where they get the community we really work with, like business owners, high-level professionals, so it's kind of like a community made for a specific kind of person. But there's a million things out there. I'm not saying you need to join my program. You might find a coach, you might find it in a church meeting. I don't know what it is for you Some men's group, it could be anything. But what I would just say is just don't do this alone. There's no need, especially not in this day and age.
Speaker 1:Now, the seventh thing that you want to avoid doing. This one is harsh. I don't care, I'm not here to sugarcoat things, and if you've made it this far into the video, you must be serious about change and you don't want to make these mistakes. Now, what you don't want to do is when you get a little bit further into your journey let's say month two, month three, month four this is when those thoughts can start creeping back in of having just one drink. And for the love of God, do not lie to yourself. Don't lie to yourself about the severity of what was happening. Listen, every relapse that happened is this is what I started doing? Is I just started lying to myself. It wasn't that bad. This time it can be different, boy, if I could only go back in time. Right, listen, every single time I did that, it always ended up in failure.
Speaker 1:There's a very famous book called the One Thing, and if you haven't read it, I'd recommend it. It is technically a business book, but it can definitely be 100% relevant to your personal life. But this big question is what is the one thing that I could do? And if I do it, everything else would become unnecessary. So it's how people make like very big business decisions. You know, for them it might be starting a YouTube channel, whatever, but when I drank alcohol, the answer to that question was always stop drinking alcohol. That's how I would get the life of my dreams.
Speaker 1:But you know, when we're three months sober, four months sober, we start forgetting about the pain. And listen, whatever you do, don't forget about the pain, don't lie to yourself. Sorry to sound harsh, but don't do it. And the final thing you want to avoid doing which, again, is something I have done a thousand times the final thing you want to do is avoid telling yourself that you'll do this tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow the best time to stop drinking alcohol and fix your life was yesterday. The next best time is now. Thanks for checking out the Stop Drinking Podcast by Sober Clear If you want to learn more about how we work with people to.
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