Stop Drinking Podcast by Soberclear

Alcohol cravings are NOT what you think

• Leon Sylvester

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Speaker 1:

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. I drank alcohol for almost 10 years and I suffered with so many alcohol cravings I lost count. And every single time that I would stop and start drinking, or every single time that I was drinking, it would always be a craving that would make me drink. I would very rarely just open up a beer out of just you know the habit. I would always want to do it. There'd be this desire inside of me that was almost uncontrollable, like this monster, like this beast. And when I stopped drinking alcohol with willpower, with AA meetings, again I would suffer with these cravings. But these cravings disappeared totally seven years ago, Like that was it. I just stopped craving alcohol. Now I'm here today to tell you some pretty strange stuff about alcohol and cravings, because they're not what you think, and I mean there's probably a medical doctor out there that will watch this video and think this guy's a lunatic. He's off his head. Of course people are going to suffer with alcohol cravings, no matter what. But I'm telling you, it's not just me. I've had many clients go through this process and they feel the exact same way. I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything. So it's become so easy, it's so different that I don't think about it. Well, I do think about it. Twice a day. I think about when I go to bed at night, how great I feel and how I'm sleepy, naturally, and that's the first thought I have in the morning is oh my gosh, what a good night's sleep I have and how good I feel. It's just zero obsession. I don't have those mad cravings, it's just not there. It's a mindset shift and that's been huge. So what I'm doing now is sharing what worked for me, what worked for the people that I work with. I'm not claiming that this is some medical cure and I'm not promising you that this is going to fix your alcohol craving issue forever, but I am going to show you an alternative way to look at things, a way that you've never heard before. No chance, because alcohol cravings are not what you think, and I'm hoping that this video gives you the shift that you need. It might be unconventional, but I think you're going to like it If we haven't met yet. My name is Leon Sylvester. I'm the founder of SoberClearcom, which is a coaching company that helps people stop drinking alcohol without AA meetings, without willpower, without therapy and without cravings and I really want to dive deep into the topic of cravings today. But if you want information on how I can help you, on how we can work together, on how I can take you through my totally new system that has had results in under 24 hours I know it sounds hard to believe. If you want information on it, you can either go to the website at SoberClearcom. You can read a bit more about the program. There'll be some videos on there or, if you want to go and click the link down below in the description, you'll be able to watch a video that explains the method, how it works and so on.

Speaker 1:

So what did I do to get rid of these alcohol cravings and why am I saying that they're not what you think? So I have to go back a little bit in time. So I struggled to stop drinking for 10 years, but I stopped and started all the time. I would have periods when I didn't drink, I'd have periods when I did drink and I'd have periods where I'd binge drink, I'd daily drink. You know it was just this absolute roller coaster. I wasn't one of those chronic drinkers that drank every single day for 20, 30, 40, 50 years. I've worked with plenty of people like that, but that wasn't my experience.

Speaker 1:

But there was one thing for sure I wanted to change. I didn't want alcohol to be part of my life. I knew that pretty early on and I also knew that if I kept drinking bad things were going to happen. So I really tried to change my relationship with alcohol very early on. But I just couldn't stop. I tried going to AA meetings for a period and I went for about 90 days and I did stop drinking. I stopped everything. I didn't touch a single substance. But it wasn't easy. It was still a challenge and I felt like every time I went to these meetings I had to reconfirm that I was this alcoholic right, that I had some problem.

Speaker 1:

And I believe so many of us do this. If we get an alcohol craving, we think that there's maybe something wrong with us. We've got less willpower than other people, especially if you give in to the cravings. Maybe we think that we're an alcoholic, We've got a disease. A lot of people that I talk to, they say that they're high-functioning alcoholics. But these cravings, I'm not denying that they exist, but I'm going to tell you a way around them, a way that you've not heard of yet.

Speaker 1:

So what's the problem here? Well, it all lies in one thing and it all lies in your paradigm. If you see alcohol as a good thing and if you see yourself as the problem, I promise you one thing no matter what you do in life, whether you stop drinking or not, you will suffer with cravings at some point. If you stop drinking with the same paradigm that you drank with, it is going to be a nightmare, I promise you, Because the paradigm that leads you to drink and the worldview that you have when it comes, If that doesn't change, then of course it's going to be hard to not drink, Because you still see alcohol the same way that you saw it when you drank. I don't know how more people don't realise this.

Speaker 1:

Let me give you an example. So I have this new client, this lady. She's awesome, awesome human and she's a Catholic, and she had a bit of a stumbling block during the work that we've been doing together. And I'm not going to get religious, don't worry, but I think that the example that she made was amazing. So, as a Catholic, the Bible is a big part of her life and there's a part of the Bible where Jesus turns water into wine and it was a massive stumbling block for her Because, as a Christian, you use Christ as the ultimate example. That's being a Christian right. It's trying to imitate Christ.

Speaker 1:

Now, that is a very deep paradigm that would be very difficult to fix. If she held on to that, that's going to be hard because when she started the process, that's how she felt. And if she's held on to that story, with that current paradigm and that current worldview, when she goes to a church, when they offer wine, she's probably going to feel a craving. Because she still has that kind of positive association with alcohol and because there's the link in the Bible to alcohol and Jesus, it became a problem. And then she told me something that I thought was awesome and it fixed her paradigm.

Speaker 1:

She told me that later on in life, as an adult, she developed this severe allergy to mushrooms. And this happened later on in life and it was all of a sudden I can't eat mushrooms anymore. Now does she have a desire to eat mushrooms? Of course not. But she said that I'm not a mushroomaholic. I don't label myself as this person that needs, you know, to pray to not eat mushrooms. It's just that, was it?

Speaker 1:

And then the big epiphany hit her. Where? Then she realised okay, well, hang on, Mushrooms aren't necessarily a bad thing. There are plenty of people out there that eat mushrooms and it doesn't cause problems in their life. And we can also have that paradigm with alcohol. Okay, you know what? Maybe alcohol for some people is fine, but the same way that mushrooms aren't fine for me is the same way that alcohol isn't fine with me as well. So she was evolving her worldview and her paradigm and starting to create a new paradigm.

Speaker 1:

Now listen, I know that was a bit of a crazy example, but if she had held on to that worldview and tried to stop drinking alcohol, it would have been brutal. And until she was able to change her worldview and to change that understanding, who knows what would have happened? See, the worldview that people have when they stop drinking alcohol is everything, and until you fix that, you're going to get cravings. So what I say to do is we don't think of ourselves as the problem. We don't have a lack of willpower. We're not alcoholics. There's nothing wrong with us. We don't need to go to the past and dig up all the bad things that have happened in our life. Sure, do you know what? If you want to do these things, I'm not here to tell you not to do them. But the most important thing that you can do if you want to eliminate cravings is to fix your paradigm. That is what I've been trying to help.

Speaker 1:

But you need to start seeing alcohol for what it truly is. See, we've been conditioned through sheer repetition, from day one of being born, to see alcohol as something that's beneficial. Even that story in the Bible it sounds like it was a good thing. The problem is is that there have been billions and billions of dollars spent on manipulating your worldview and how you see alcohol and how it's linked to you in your life. Billions, Some of the smartest minds in the world, are behind these campaigns, and they have been happening in the background from day one of you being born. We see it in TV shows right when we're kids, we see the grownups around us drinking it.

Speaker 1:

We think that it's a totally normal thing to do, but if you actually seriously look at it from a purely logical standpoint, if you could almost zoom out of earth and just look down at earth with no emotion, right? Just pure logic, and you saw people drinking alcohol. From a logical standpoint, it is madness. They are literally putting a poison in their body. What the heck is going on? It makes no sense logically.

Speaker 1:

But the problem is is that we can't do it unemotionally. We can't remove ourselves and look down at alcohol logically, and that's often why we need help. You need some lunatic like me that spent the past six and a half seven years just learning about this stuff and trying to teach people. Because once you do see it that way, it's like why would I drink it? See, here's what I'm getting at with the cravings. If you see alcohol as a good thing, here's what happens in your mind. Here's how the craving starts. You get a thought, right, you get a thought of alcohol, and this happens whether you've changed your paradigm or not. We live in a world that's dominated by alcohol and you will get thoughts of drinking. If you've read any popular stop drinking book Alan Carr's book, whatever they'll always talk about this, Whether you stop drinking or not, is you will get thoughts of drinking.

Speaker 1:

Now here's the problem that I faced during the 10 years of trying to stop, and here's how the cravings happened. I would get this thought oh, beer. And that thought would lead into another thought that's built around my current paradigm and understanding of alcohol oh, wouldn't a beer be nice? And then another thought would happen yeah, a beer would really relax me, A beer would really de-stress me, whatever. And because of my paradigm and I'd attached all of these beliefs to alcohol and how it would enhance my life. Of course, before you know it, those beliefs have led into a craving.

Speaker 1:

See, once I'd fixed my paradigm and I could see alcohol from a purely logical standpoint, with no emotional attachment whatsoever, and I could see like. It was almost like taking the red pill in the matrix. I could see the advertising for what it was. I could see the lies. Taking the red pill in the matrix, I could see the advertising for what it was. I could see the lies. I could just like almost zoom out in third person and just look down at earth and think why am I doing this? What the heck is going on? Now I get a thought about drinking and because listen, I'm telling you, no one's immune to it I get a thought about drinking now and I think oh, alcohol, and I'm so grateful that I don't drink, and that's it. The thought's gone. It's like this poof it's just disappeared.

Speaker 1:

See, the trick here is you need to reframe the way that you view alcohol and not reframe the way you view yourself. You have nothing wrong with you at all. The fact that you drink too much has got nothing to do with you. And the fact that you've got cravings and you succumb to cravings isn't some moral failing or anything like that. It all boils down to paradigms. I promise you one thing if you can change your paradigm and see alcohol exactly for what it is and completely ignore all the conditioning, all the marketing, all of the lies that you've been fed for years, stopping drinking will be the easiest thing you've ever done, because there's nothing to do. There is nothing hard about not doing something. Do you think it was hard for that lady to give up mushrooms? No, Because now she linked mushrooms to pain, Mushrooms to no, thank you. So how can you fix your paradigm? Well, there's so many ways, Because what I'm saying right now has been said a thousand times already. There's only so many ways you can say don't drink, alcohol is poison.

Speaker 1:

But you need to study. You really need to have other people who have other opinions, and you need to find somebody that you can buy into. For the people I work with, I was that person, but I might not be for you. Maybe for you you find somebody else. This might be some other coach, there might be some other person, some expert on this topic. You might find somebody totally different with a totally different angle and for you that's it. Maybe for you you find it in a book. You read a book and then you read some scientific literature and you're like oh, I don't want to drink. If you want to see if working together is a good fit, you can click the link down below. You can apply to join the Sober Clear program. Thanks for checking out the Stop Drinking podcast by Sober Clear If you want to learn more about how we work with people to help them stop drinking effortlessly.

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Leon Sylvester

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