Speaker 1: When I was living in actividication, I would nurture resentments.
Speaker 1: I would feed them, I would exercise them as if
Speaker 1: they were a dog. Welcome to the one you feed.
Speaker 1: Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance of the
Speaker 1: thoughts we have. Quotes like garbage in, garbage out, or
Speaker 1: you are what you think ring true, and yet for
Speaker 1: many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us.
Speaker 1: We tend toward negativity, self pity, jealousy, or fear. We
Speaker 1: see what we don't have instead of what we do.
Speaker 1: We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit.
Speaker 1: But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It
Speaker 1: takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life
Speaker 1: worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep
Speaker 1: themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their
Speaker 1: good wolf m Thanks for joining us. Our guest on
Speaker 1: this episode is Catherine Gray, an award winning writer and
Speaker 1: editor whose work has appeared in almost every newspaper and
Speaker 1: magazine you can think of, from The Guardian to Cosmopolitan,
Speaker 1: to The Daily Mail and short List to the Sun.
Speaker 1: Catherine also works as a travel writer for Google and
Speaker 1: as a contributing editor for the Lifestyle Library. Her book
Speaker 1: is The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober. Stress happens to everyone.
Speaker 1: It's one of those facts of life. I'm sure you
Speaker 1: can think of a time recently when you were very stressed.
Speaker 1: We're working on helping people to better manage their stress.
Speaker 1: If you're signed up for our email list already, you
Speaker 1: know that we recently sent something to you about stress
Speaker 1: in your life and we're going to be continuing on
Speaker 1: this topic. And we've got a new resource that's coming
Speaker 1: out soon called Eliminating Stress Too. Smart strategies to keep
Speaker 1: you calm and confident. If you're already on our email list,
Speaker 1: no need to do anything. The document will come your
Speaker 1: way this week. If you are not on our email list,
Speaker 1: go to one you feed dot net and sign up
Speaker 1: in the right hand column and you will get the
Speaker 1: next document about managing stress, and the main focus will
Speaker 1: be dealing with our thoughts and responsibilities. So if you're
Speaker 1: not on our email list one you feed dot net
Speaker 1: to get signed up for these free resources. And here's
Speaker 1: the interview with Catherine Gray. Hi Catherine, welcome to the show.
Speaker 1: Hi Eric lovely to be here. It's a pleasure to
Speaker 1: have you on You and I go back a little ways.
Speaker 1: I think you have written a piece for one of
Speaker 1: the papers in England about the show, and then I
Speaker 1: got an early copy of your book, The Unexpected Joy
Speaker 1: of Being Sober, which I really really liked and was
Speaker 1: really happy to be able to write a blurb for.
Speaker 1: So thanks for coming on. Well, I'm really happy to
Speaker 1: be here because I'm a big fan of the show
Speaker 1: I've been listening to for about three years. Is blurb?
Speaker 1: The right word? Is that what they call those things
Speaker 1: that you put on a book jacket? Yeah, Blood's right, perfect?
Speaker 1: All right, Well, we'll get into the book here in
Speaker 1: a second, but let's start like we always do with
Speaker 1: the parable. There is a grandmother who's talking with her
Speaker 1: granddaughter and she says, in life, there are two wolves
Speaker 1: inside of us that are always at battle. One is
Speaker 1: a good wolf, which represents things like kindness, bravery, love,
Speaker 1: and the other is a bad wolf, which represents things
Speaker 1: like greed and hatred and fear. And the granddaughter stops
Speaker 1: and thinks about it for a second, looks up at
Speaker 1: her grandmother and says, well, grandmother, which one wins? And
Speaker 1: the grandmother says, the one you feed, So I'd like
Speaker 1: to start off by asking you what that parable means
Speaker 1: to you in your life and in the work that
Speaker 1: you do well. I love this parable. I think it's
Speaker 1: just so perfect for me. The bad wolf represents resentment,
Speaker 1: and when I was living in active addiction, I would
Speaker 1: nurture resentments. I would feed them, I would exercise them
Speaker 1: as if they were a dog. I would take them
Speaker 1: for long runs and fatten them up, and feed grudges
Speaker 1: against people. And a really key mental shift for me
Speaker 1: was learning to feed my good wolf, which for me
Speaker 1: is gratitude. Um, So I had to retrain my brain. Really,
Speaker 1: my brain was so used to looking out for annoyances
Speaker 1: and grievances and resentments that it wasn't used to looking
Speaker 1: for good stuff. It wasn't used to looking for things
Speaker 1: to be grateful for. So and it's still something that
Speaker 1: I have to do on a conscious level every day
Speaker 1: because evolutionary speaking, we are trained to look for threats
Speaker 1: and bad things on the horizon. So it does take
Speaker 1: time for our brains to get used to looking for
Speaker 1: good things. And so I write a nightly gratitude list
Speaker 1: even now. Yeah, I think you're right. Our brains are
Speaker 1: wired to look for the bad and for those of
Speaker 1: us that descend into active alcoholism or addiction, I think
Speaker 1: there's an even more of an approach to that because
Speaker 1: we feel so bad about ourselves in a lot of cases. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I think when you're really in the duldrums, when
Speaker 1: you're really um depressed, it just infects everything you. You
Speaker 1: look for the bad um and it just takes time
Speaker 1: to get used to really looking for the helpers um
Speaker 1: and looking for the good things and seeking them out
Speaker 1: really like a lighthouse. Yeah. So I'd like to start
Speaker 1: by something that you say late in the book, but
Speaker 1: I think it's important to frame up the whole conversation,
Speaker 1: and you say, the question to ask yourself is not
Speaker 1: am I an alcoholic? Swivel that focus the question is
Speaker 1: would my life be better if I was sober? If
Speaker 1: the answer is yes, then shoot for sober. And I
Speaker 1: love that because it really gets us out of the
Speaker 1: discussion about my an alcoholic? Am I not an alcoholic?
Speaker 1: What does that even mean? And really gets it pretty
Speaker 1: much down to the very basics. And I love the
Speaker 1: way you frame that, and I think it's a great
Speaker 1: way to start this conversation for people who may not
Speaker 1: think of themselves as alcoholic, but may question their relationship
Speaker 1: with alcohol. Well, thank you. Yeah, I've read a lot
Speaker 1: about it, and the way that the experts are now
Speaker 1: thinking about alcoholism is that it's a spectrum of dependence.
Speaker 1: It's not black and white, normal drinker and alcoholic and
Speaker 1: somewhere you tip along from one to the other. It's
Speaker 1: a it's like a one to ten spectrum. And so
Speaker 1: therefore a lot of people will be googling am I
Speaker 1: an alcoholic? At two am when they've had three or
Speaker 1: four glasses of wine? And I don't really think that's
Speaker 1: what they should be asking themselves, because it's because it's
Speaker 1: a spectrum, you can get out earlier, right, you know,
Speaker 1: I didn't get out until I was at number nine
Speaker 1: on the spectrum. But if I hadn't been so hung
Speaker 1: up on I only the quick drinking if I'm an alcoholic,
Speaker 1: then I might have got a lot earlier, at six
Speaker 1: or seven, before things really got dark for me. So
Speaker 1: I think that's an important flip for people to do,
Speaker 1: which is I think more, you know, will my life
Speaker 1: be better if I'm sober? That's the only thing you
Speaker 1: really need to ask. Yeah, I think, as you and
Speaker 1: the UK would say, I think that's brilliant, um because
Speaker 1: because it is such a different way to look at
Speaker 1: it versus the concept of bottom. And I want to
Speaker 1: read something you wrote about bottom, because I just thought
Speaker 1: it was a great phrase. And you say, one person
Speaker 1: digs until they are just about losing the golden tops
Speaker 1: of autumnal trees. Another digs until they're nearing the Earth's
Speaker 1: core and are surrounded by skin melting lava. And I
Speaker 1: just think that is so true. Having been in a
Speaker 1: recovery sobriety for most of my adult life, I've just
Speaker 1: seen these staggering differences between people, and even in my
Speaker 1: own life. The first time I got so or when
Speaker 1: I was twenty four, I was much closer to the
Speaker 1: skin melting lava. When I got sober again, I was
Speaker 1: sober about ten years and I had a relapse and
Speaker 1: I went out for about three or four years. When
Speaker 1: I came back, I was certainly past the top of
Speaker 1: the trees, but I was nowhere near in the state
Speaker 1: of external consequence that I was the first time. And
Speaker 1: I really had to work with that idea of bottom
Speaker 1: for myself because I kept having to say to myself,
Speaker 1: do I really need to take it there? You know,
Speaker 1: I know where this elevator is going. Can I step
Speaker 1: off earlier? And I'm so glad I was able to
Speaker 1: do that, And I think to your point, lots of
Speaker 1: people can do that. Also. It doesn't have to be
Speaker 1: a question of disease of alcoholism. It's just a question
Speaker 1: of I love the way you put it. Is my
Speaker 1: life better this way? M M yeah, absolutely. I mean
Speaker 1: I think if people did approach it that way then
Speaker 1: and bottom, as you said, just it looks different for everyone.
Speaker 1: I know somebody that quit drinking after her first ever
Speaker 1: blackout and I had hundreds, maybe even thousands, and her
Speaker 1: first one that was it for her, that was her bottom.
Speaker 1: It just you know, different levels get off the higher
Speaker 1: floor than I did. You know. Um, So it's I
Speaker 1: think it's a very important flip for people to make.
Speaker 1: Just look at look at it more of a positive way.
Speaker 1: You don't have to wear a label, you don't have
Speaker 1: to look at it in a black and white way.
Speaker 1: You can just decide to quit drinking, and you know that,
Speaker 1: you don't have to call yourself an alcoholic. You can
Speaker 1: just call yourself teetotal or alcohol free. You know it.
Speaker 1: There's so many different options out there for people. Teetotal
Speaker 1: Is that a British phrase? I had never heard that
Speaker 1: till I read your book. I really yeah, I never
Speaker 1: heard it's maybe maybe it's because we love tea so much.
Speaker 1: I don't know. It starts with a double leaf. So
Speaker 1: but teetotal would be about right because I do drink
Speaker 1: a lot too. Yeah, I think the ideas as you
Speaker 1: were saying that, I was thinking, you know, you don't
Speaker 1: have to wait until you have a heart attack to
Speaker 1: start not eating as many French fries and jogging from
Speaker 1: time to time. Yeah, that's a really, really good parallel.
Speaker 1: It's just something you can make a decision about at
Speaker 1: any time. And as a result of me quitting, a
Speaker 1: couple of my friends, who I mean absolutely nobody in
Speaker 1: their lives would say they have a problem with drinking,
Speaker 1: they've decided to quit as well, and they just feel
Speaker 1: so amazing for it. I think sobriety gets such a
Speaker 1: bad rep It's seen as something that you only have
Speaker 1: to do if you become addicted, and that's not true.
Speaker 1: Anyone can make that lifestyle choice at any time, and
Speaker 1: even people that only drink two or three times a
Speaker 1: week may find that they feel vastly different and better,
Speaker 1: which has been the experience of my friends. Um, because
Speaker 1: it does affect our health. It doesn't affect our mental state.
Speaker 1: It makes a small ant, just it costs a lot
Speaker 1: of money, and if you do over drink, it ruins
Speaker 1: the entire next day and maybe even the day after,
Speaker 1: which is what started happening to me in my thirties,
Speaker 1: that hangovers became two day events, right, and there there
Speaker 1: are countless health implications to drinking alcohol. And again, this
Speaker 1: isn't a if you like to have a few drinks,
Speaker 1: you know you're a bad person parade we're having here
Speaker 1: right at all. I think it's just broadening the ability
Speaker 1: to think about your relationship with alcohol versus, like you said,
Speaker 1: this black or white. Either I'm an alcoholic or I'm not.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about moderation, because for those of us who
Speaker 1: are on the further end of that dependency spectrum, right,
Speaker 1: moderation is just, if not impossible, absolutely torturous, right. Um.
Speaker 1: But I do think that even for people who aren't
Speaker 1: quite that far along, moderation can be really challenging. And
Speaker 1: I have a saying I say to people when I'm
Speaker 1: talking to them about recovery and I A, you know,
Speaker 1: there is just a beautiful clarity to zero. Like it's
Speaker 1: just if you're always in that spot where you're like, well,
Speaker 1: should I shouldn't I have I had too many? While
Speaker 1: I had three last last night, so I only have
Speaker 1: one today. That spot is just exhausting, and there is
Speaker 1: just this clarity of like, I don't I don't do it.
Speaker 1: I think later in the book you quote Alex Corb,
Speaker 1: you quote him throughout the book, and and he was
Speaker 1: one of our earlier guests and great guy, and he
Speaker 1: talks about how when we're in that undecided state, our
Speaker 1: limbic system, our emotional center is a little bit worked up,
Speaker 1: and that by actually making the decision, by having a decision,
Speaker 1: it allows that to settle down. And that is one
Speaker 1: of the gifts of sobriety, is not being in that
Speaker 1: constant trying to decide should I, shouldnt I, how many,
Speaker 1: what's too much? Etcetera. Yeah, it's exhausting. It's like a
Speaker 1: mental spin cycle. Um, and I think you're absolutely right.
Speaker 1: Even even if you're on the lower ends of the spectrum,
Speaker 1: it's it's difficult to moderate. It's a tricky thing to do,
Speaker 1: purely because alcohol isn't built for using it moderately. Um,
Speaker 1: it's a disinhibitor. So once you have one or two,
Speaker 1: that erod your ability to say no to the third
Speaker 1: and fourth. Because it's a disinhibitor, it lowers our inhibitions.
Speaker 1: It causes us to make more reckless decisions, It causes
Speaker 1: us to behave more impulsively. So the very nature of
Speaker 1: it means that once you have one or two, you're
Speaker 1: probably going to have three or four. The innate nature
Speaker 1: of alcohol makes it difficult to moderate it. Um. And
Speaker 1: as you say, Alex Cord, he's a legend and he
Speaker 1: just summed it up so well, which is that the
Speaker 1: limit system is in a state of distress when we're
Speaker 1: caught between. It's similar to the you know, am I
Speaker 1: going to go to the gym? I don't want to
Speaker 1: go to the gym? Oh maybe I should. I'll do
Speaker 1: it tomorrow. You know. It's that sort of indecision. And
Speaker 1: if you just make a clear cut yes or no,
Speaker 1: then your brain does calm down dramasally. And like you
Speaker 1: say about the zero, the beauty of zero, once you
Speaker 1: take off the table completely, your brain is freed up
Speaker 1: to think about so much more interesting things. I find
Speaker 1: it really liberating not to have that constant ticket tape
Speaker 1: in my head anymore of Oh I need to only
Speaker 1: drink to drinks. I've got that thing to do tomorrow.
Speaker 1: How am I going to wear only drink to drinks? So, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's such a freeing thing to take that away. Yeah.
Speaker 1: There's a line in the a A big book that
Speaker 1: says the alcoholic is unable to control and enjoy his drinking.
Speaker 1: And I thought about that for a while and I
Speaker 1: realized what what that was really saying was you can't
Speaker 1: do the two at the same time. Control maybe right
Speaker 1: for very limited short stretches of time. When I came
Speaker 1: back to recovery this time, I went to moderation management
Speaker 1: because I knew, like, Okay, I'm gonna have to give
Speaker 1: this up entirely. And what person who loves drinking isn't
Speaker 1: terrified by the thought of giving it up. So I
Speaker 1: was like, I'm going to figure out how to moderate this.
Speaker 1: And so I, I mean, I did moderation recovery. I mean,
Speaker 1: I was probably the most hard working student ever because
Speaker 1: I was like, I want to make this work, and
Speaker 1: it was just miserable, and I remember so many nights.
Speaker 1: It's at like eleven at night. I'm standing by the
Speaker 1: sink in my kitchen. I know it's bedtime. There is
Speaker 1: no reason under God's green earth to take another shot
Speaker 1: of whiskey. And yet I sit there five fifteen minutes
Speaker 1: wrestling with it, and I lose, you know, three out
Speaker 1: of five times. But that control effort takes all the
Speaker 1: fun out of the drinking. You know, I could enjoy
Speaker 1: it if I just like let the rains loose, although
Speaker 1: by the end there wasn't much enjoyment. I want to
Speaker 1: talk about inhibitions because you've got a great line in
Speaker 1: the book that I wanted to make sure we got
Speaker 1: to at some point. So you say, inhibitions are great.
Speaker 1: They kill bad buzzes, not good buzzes. We should not
Speaker 1: want to turn them off. They protect us. Removing them
Speaker 1: before striding out into a night full of horny men
Speaker 1: is like disabling the automatic breaking system in a car
Speaker 1: and then driving straight into a wall. So good, it's
Speaker 1: so funny and so true. And yet there is that
Speaker 1: thing right where we do feel like we want to
Speaker 1: lose our inhibitions to some degree. I mean, I think
Speaker 1: I still wrestle with that sometimes, like I don't think
Speaker 1: I want to lose them with the extent that I
Speaker 1: used to lose them, but there's a part of me
Speaker 1: that's like, this would be easier. And you also reference
Speaker 1: that by talking about it being like a cheap code
Speaker 1: in a video game. Alcohol. Yeah, it enables us to
Speaker 1: zoom from sort of level two insecure to level seven,
Speaker 1: which is bouncing around a dance floor. And I think
Speaker 1: what people are seeking in alcohol, and I absolutely understand
Speaker 1: why they do, um, I did it for twenty one years,
Speaker 1: you know, is to take the edge off. They just
Speaker 1: want to take that nervous edge off when they go
Speaker 1: into a party, or go for dinner as somebody new,
Speaker 1: or go on a day. You know, it's it's there's
Speaker 1: a nerve racking things. Um. And then the nature of alcohol,
Speaker 1: as we've discussed, means that you go too far, you
Speaker 1: a road, too many inhibitions, and then end up doing
Speaker 1: things that you would never dream of doing. I mean,
Speaker 1: I once got into a hot tub topless and my
Speaker 1: work Christmas party. That's the insane thing to do. And
Speaker 1: you know, I did so many other crazy things that
Speaker 1: I would never do because my inhibitions were completely gone
Speaker 1: by the time that I drank a bottle and a
Speaker 1: half or two bottles of wine. So I think it's
Speaker 1: a natural instinct and urge to just feel instantly relaxed
Speaker 1: in a social situation, which is what we get from alcohol.
Speaker 1: It is a relax that you know, it does help
Speaker 1: us relax into a social situation. But it's something that
Speaker 1: comes back to bite us. It really does, and you
Speaker 1: can learn other methods of doing it. It takes a
Speaker 1: little bit longer. Um. I find that when I get
Speaker 1: to a party, especially if I don't know anyone, I'm
Speaker 1: on edge for maybe half an hour. But then you
Speaker 1: do settle into it. But people do that by chucking
Speaker 1: back a drink. Yep, yep, I agree. I mean it's
Speaker 1: great in that regard, it's useful in that regard. And
Speaker 1: you know, for me, I've said many times that two
Speaker 1: drinks of alcohol is the best antidepressant I've ever found,
Speaker 1: like still to this day. I mean, it was like
Speaker 1: if I could put that in an antidepressant pill and
Speaker 1: take it, I would. The problem is that it just
Speaker 1: it doesn't work. You know, it doesn't work. It doesn't
Speaker 1: keep working. It's the elusive to yeah, because then two
Speaker 1: is three and before I know it. It's it's ten
Speaker 1: And I mean my history is just so clear cut
Speaker 1: in my case. But there are those moments still where
Speaker 1: if I'm feeling depressed, or if I'm feeling particularly stressed,
Speaker 1: I have that moment of like, I wish I had
Speaker 1: the fast lane here, right, I wish I had the
Speaker 1: right I think, without a doubt, my life is so
Speaker 1: much better. And I think even if you take the
Speaker 1: really horrific pieces out, that my whole life is still
Speaker 1: much better. You know, even if it hadn't become the
Speaker 1: horror show it was. I think myself being sober is
Speaker 1: just a better way for me to be. You've got
Speaker 1: something you said later in the book somewhere that no
Speaker 1: one regrets getting sober. They really don't do They don't
Speaker 1: nobody ever does. Um, And yeah, I know what you mean.
Speaker 1: The fast lane. It's a quick fix. But then when
Speaker 1: you learn other tools, whether they're you know, say, for instance,
Speaker 1: I will always exercise before I go on a date,
Speaker 1: and I know that that flushes adrenaline and court dissolved
Speaker 1: from my system and I will be a lot more chilled. Um.
Speaker 1: I always meditate before a work meeting. I carry around
Speaker 1: essential oils basically the knee of five years ago would
Speaker 1: have hated me today. She would have thought she was
Speaker 1: a real hippie, very annoying. But I do all of
Speaker 1: these things and they work. And actually, my anxiety in
Speaker 1: the last maybe five years of my drinking just went
Speaker 1: up and up and up and up until I was
Speaker 1: basically agrophobic. I leaving the house freaked me out. I
Speaker 1: had to have a drink to leave the house and
Speaker 1: go to the step market to buy more drink. And
Speaker 1: now my anxiety has basically gone. Like I went on
Speaker 1: Live TV a couple of weeks ago, and I never
Speaker 1: ever could have done that in the last five years
Speaker 1: of my drinking, because they've shown that it does work.
Speaker 1: It's a short term solution that dampens down anxiety, but
Speaker 1: over time it makes us less able to deal with stress.
Speaker 1: So it's you know, it doesn't work long term. So
Speaker 1: we just need to remember that, right right. And when
Speaker 1: I say, you know, two drinks of alcohol being the
Speaker 1: best antidepressant I found, that's true in a very short
Speaker 1: term sense. But alcohol as a whole made me very depressed.
Speaker 1: You know, it made me made me more depressed overall.
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit more about sort
Speaker 1: of the front side of getting sober, you know, the decision,
Speaker 1: and then let's move into some of the ways that
Speaker 1: you did and some of the things that were helpful
Speaker 1: for you. You're describing how awful you felt when you
Speaker 1: were first getting sober, you know, the first week, and
Speaker 1: you said, but let's get one thing straight. This is
Speaker 1: not life without alcohol. This is not how you feel sober.
Speaker 1: This is how you feel because of the drinking. This too,
Speaker 1: shall pass after just ten days. Don't blame being sober,
Speaker 1: Blame the booze. That's the real villain of this piece.
Speaker 1: And that's one of those things that I say to
Speaker 1: people so often in early sobriety, is like, don't mistake
Speaker 1: what you're going through now, don't mistake the process of
Speaker 1: getting sober for what it's like to be sober, because
Speaker 1: they are very different. Yeah, that's so true. Um. And
Speaker 1: here in the UK we have something called dry January. UM,
Speaker 1: I don't know whether you have that in the States.
Speaker 1: Do you have dry January? Well, there may be some
Speaker 1: sort of um, small challenges, but I've not heard of
Speaker 1: it as a as a large thing. But again, I'm
Speaker 1: pretty removed from alcohol culture, so I don't know. Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: it's basically a thirty day thing that about five million
Speaker 1: Brits do every year, and they think that that's what
Speaker 1: it's like to be sober long term. And a lot
Speaker 1: of the time it takes two or three weeks for
Speaker 1: your body to actually detox from alcohol if you had
Speaker 1: a really boozy December. Um so, they'll only just be
Speaker 1: starting to feel normal before they start drinking again. Um
Speaker 1: So I always recommend, even if people don't want to
Speaker 1: go completely alcohol free, if they just want to take
Speaker 1: mini spells, for people to do at least ninety days,
Speaker 1: because you need to get past that withdrawal stage, which
Speaker 1: pretty much every drinker will go through, even if they're
Speaker 1: drinking low levels, and to start feeling your body start
Speaker 1: functioning properly, and your sleep start getting deeper and you know,
Speaker 1: sobersleep was such a revelation to me. I've always woken
Speaker 1: up five times a night when I was drinking, and
Speaker 1: now I can sleep right through for eight or nine hours.
Speaker 1: So those things only happen once you crossed the hurdle
Speaker 1: of the first couple of weeks or three weeks, when
Speaker 1: your body is just getting used to living without alcohol.
Speaker 1: So Yeah, yeah, I agree. And I think the other
Speaker 1: piece of that is that if it's a temporary thing,
Speaker 1: or or if it's just like I'm just not gonna
Speaker 1: drink for thirty days and see how I feel, that's
Speaker 1: different than saying I'm going to learn the skills to
Speaker 1: enjoy life sober, because it's one thing to be abstinent,
Speaker 1: and that's a great step, right, or can be a
Speaker 1: great step in a lot of ways. But my you know,
Speaker 1: I know for myself, if I had not changed, if
Speaker 1: I had not learned how to work with my patterns
Speaker 1: of thought and emotion and all that, I wouldn't have
Speaker 1: stayed sober. I wouldn't have been able to. So it
Speaker 1: was all that work that I did that allowed me
Speaker 1: to be not depressed. You know, that's so important. And
Speaker 1: I think that's what you miss if it's just like
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna take thirty days off because there's no investment.
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying again that's a bad thing, but
Speaker 1: I'm I'm I'm agreeing with you that it's the investment
Speaker 1: into what else do I do instead that can be
Speaker 1: so valuable or is so valuable. Yeah, it's kind of
Speaker 1: like um, having somebody tow your car off the road,
Speaker 1: but you're not actually fixing your car. It's it's you're
Speaker 1: not going down into the mental machinations of why you
Speaker 1: drank in the first place, which for me was social anxiety.
Speaker 1: And then I discovered I had raging love addiction, so
Speaker 1: I had to unravel all of that. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: it's it's digging deep and tinkering in the engine of
Speaker 1: why you're drinking became so run away and out of control,
Speaker 1: and fixing it at the source and continuing to maintain
Speaker 1: it just as you would a car. That's how I
Speaker 1: think of it. So you know, you have to make
Speaker 1: sure the oils tucked up for what have you, and
Speaker 1: take it for regular emot s because otherwise you'll find
Speaker 1: yourself broken down on the side of the road crying.
Speaker 1: You know, it's very much an under the herd thing
Speaker 1: that you too in order to maintain it long term.
Speaker 1: And one of the things you talked about that was
Speaker 1: so helpful for you early in sobriety and maintaining sobriety,
Speaker 1: and I think is you know, a theme of this
Speaker 1: show for everybody, whether they're in sobriety or not. But
Speaker 1: you talk about addictive voice recognition. Can you can you
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about what that is? Yeah? Sure.
Speaker 1: So I stumbled upon a blog called Tired of Thinking
Speaker 1: About Drinking in Early Recovery, and it was one of
Speaker 1: the things that was so such a seismic change for
Speaker 1: me Um. And she calls her addictive voice wolf ee,
Speaker 1: he's the big bad wolf, which is apt for the show.
Speaker 1: And it's based on this technique called addictive voice recognition,
Speaker 1: which was I believe it was in the nineties and fifties.
Speaker 1: It was created and it hasn't had that much recognition,
Speaker 1: but I just found it to be such a game
Speaker 1: changer for me Um. And it's about separating out the
Speaker 1: voice in your head that wants you to drink or
Speaker 1: use and seeing it as separate from your core self.
Speaker 1: Your courself wants the best for you. This voice doesn't.
Speaker 1: It wants you to go on a mass of vendor
Speaker 1: till four am and spent all your money on shots.
Speaker 1: So I ended up using this and I called my
Speaker 1: addictive voice valdemot from Harry Potter because that just that
Speaker 1: just seemed to some it up kind of evil but
Speaker 1: silken and persuasive. And now, I mean, it was something
Speaker 1: that I battled with all the time. You know, Valdemot
Speaker 1: was always in my head in early recovery, and now
Speaker 1: I barely hear him. It's barely a whisper. So it
Speaker 1: just fades and fade and fades and fades. But that
Speaker 1: technique was so key for me, So yeah, I really
Speaker 1: recommend it to everyone. Yeah, I think it's like I said,
Speaker 1: in cases of addiction, it's very critical. You know, I've
Speaker 1: often said that, you know, my my addictive bad Wolf
Speaker 1: was was a particularly you know, bad add case of
Speaker 1: a bad wolf, right, and and you talk about, you know, Voldemort.
Speaker 1: I think that's a that's another good example I've also found.
Speaker 1: And I think, like I said, a lot of this
Speaker 1: show I think has been about realizing that we all
Speaker 1: have those voices, even if it's not the voice of addiction,
Speaker 1: and that technique of giving it a name or personifying
Speaker 1: it is one of the techniques that comes out of
Speaker 1: acceptance and commitment therapy as as one example of it.
Speaker 1: It's about being conscious of it and personifying it. But
Speaker 1: you also talk about some other ways to work with
Speaker 1: that addictive voice or with negative thought patterns. Um I
Speaker 1: thought maybe we'd run through a couple of them, the
Speaker 1: first one you refer to as the B and B model.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I really like that. Um. So that is
Speaker 1: based on Oh no, is it is it? ROOMI? I'm
Speaker 1: not sure if I'm pronouncing anyway, Okay, great, Um it's
Speaker 1: a poem by Roomy and it's it's about treating thoughts
Speaker 1: that come into your head as if they're visitors and
Speaker 1: you're running a B and B. And so, if you're
Speaker 1: running a B and B, if somebody comes through the
Speaker 1: door and they're an unwelcome guest, like anger or annoyance
Speaker 1: or jealousy, you're still going to welcome them in and
Speaker 1: treat them nicely. And it just I think we tend
Speaker 1: to think that we're bad people if we have bad emotions,
Speaker 1: and that's not true. The human experience is it comes
Speaker 1: with a range of all the emotions, the good and
Speaker 1: the bad. Even Mother to Reason got really angry sometimes,
Speaker 1: you know, it's we're not robots, were not in ex Maconna.
Speaker 1: I don't that's a joke. I'm probably gonna lose like
Speaker 1: half of our subscribers for that, but I couldn't resist
Speaker 1: Mother to Reason. Yeah, so, I I think it's really
Speaker 1: important to recognize that you know, these thoughts and emotions,
Speaker 1: they might be unwelcome, but just just be like, oh, hi, anger,
Speaker 1: you know you're a bit annoying, but I guess you're here,
Speaker 1: so you know, just treat them with respect as you
Speaker 1: would a guess if you were a B and B owner.
Speaker 1: I think there's a phrase in Buddhism invite Mara to tea.
Speaker 1: You know, the embodiment of a lot of that negativity,
Speaker 1: and it's about well, just you know, apparently the Buddha
Speaker 1: would would used to you know, the stories would be
Speaker 1: he'd see Mara or his his attendant, and Anda would
Speaker 1: see Mara and be like, Buddha, you know he's here.
Speaker 1: It's you know, he's and Boodhill be like, we'll just
Speaker 1: invite him for tea, and so, you know, it's a
Speaker 1: it's a very similar idea. The next one was children
Speaker 1: in a car. So yeah, that's I love that. That one.
Speaker 1: That's from one of my sober friends who said that
Speaker 1: feelings are like children. You don't want them driving the car,
Speaker 1: but you shouldn't stuff them in the boot either. Um,
Speaker 1: so I assume that is the is the trunk for
Speaker 1: exactly you're not going to put the children in the trunk.
Speaker 1: That's downright child abuse. So let them chitch after away
Speaker 1: in the back and get on with your life, you know,
Speaker 1: drive away um and just let them get on with it.
Speaker 1: And I really loved that because feelings that they don't
Speaker 1: have to drive us. We can just let them exist.
Speaker 1: We don't have to shove them away, they can just
Speaker 1: be there um. And that's something that I really learned
Speaker 1: how to do through meditation, mindfulness, meditation. So and before that,
Speaker 1: I think I felt like I was just sort of
Speaker 1: kind of hostage to my feelings and emotions and they
Speaker 1: were driving the car and I had no choice as
Speaker 1: to where we go. If I was angry, then I
Speaker 1: was going to have a rant at somebody. And that's
Speaker 1: just not the case. You can observe these things and
Speaker 1: let them come and go. Ye. And then the next
Speaker 1: one was bird watching. Yeah, so that's something I got
Speaker 1: from a meditation out called Buddafi. And the idea is
Speaker 1: you pretend that you're a bird watcher and you're in
Speaker 1: a hide and you're just really quiet, and you're observing
Speaker 1: your thoughts and emotions just as you would birds, and
Speaker 1: just as you would name the birds. If you're a
Speaker 1: bird watching. You know, there's an eagle, there's a blue tit,
Speaker 1: there's a sparrow. Um, you name the emotions like jealousy, rage, discussed,
Speaker 1: what have you. But you don't disturb them. You just
Speaker 1: let them go about their way as you would birds. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a that's a great one. I think there's lots
Speaker 1: of variations on that theme. You can pretend you're watching
Speaker 1: them float by in a river, clouds in the sky.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I think all those are really useful ways
Speaker 1: to work with those negative thought patterns or those voices
Speaker 1: in our heads. So I want to talk about a
Speaker 1: couple other things here before we wrap up that I
Speaker 1: think are really useful. And one of them is a
Speaker 1: phrase that you've put in there called don't try harder
Speaker 1: try for it. If something's not getting you sober, keeping
Speaker 1: you sober, try something else. Your successful combination will be
Speaker 1: unique to you. There is no right way or only
Speaker 1: way to get sober. Yeah, and that that was something
Speaker 1: I feel strongly about. I'm very pro choice when it
Speaker 1: comes to recovery. I don't believe that there's only one
Speaker 1: way to get sober um, and I think it's a
Speaker 1: case of just trying absolutely everything that you can find.
Speaker 1: I mean, some of my friends use things like E F. T.
Speaker 1: Tapping or um you know, things that that I have
Speaker 1: tried and just don't work for me at all, but
Speaker 1: they work a treat for them. So that's brilliant. UM.
Speaker 1: And just finding your unique pattern that works for you
Speaker 1: and stick into it, because everyone is different, even if
Speaker 1: they're in the same program, they use it differently, and
Speaker 1: they have tools outside the program that you might not
Speaker 1: know about that they use. I think every recovery path
Speaker 1: is completely unique. UM. So I think it's important that
Speaker 1: people know that that they have choices, and there are
Speaker 1: so many different ways to do this. Some of my
Speaker 1: friends try zanex a day, but I don't think that's
Speaker 1: what you mean. That doesn't sound like a good idea
Speaker 1: recommend I'm exaggerating a little bit, no, but I think
Speaker 1: that is really true. And you know, I came up
Speaker 1: in twelve step traditions and that's where I got sober,
Speaker 1: and and I have lots of challenges with those today
Speaker 1: and things that I don't like. But I don't think
Speaker 1: I ever thought like this is the only way. A
Speaker 1: matter of fact, you know, it says right in the
Speaker 1: twelve step literature it is not the only way. Um.
Speaker 1: I find myself a little stuck because when people come
Speaker 1: to me about it, the only thing I can say is,
Speaker 1: here's what I did right. This was my plan. And
Speaker 1: I don't feel comfortable dispensing advice about well that might
Speaker 1: work or that might work, you know, But I agree
Speaker 1: with you try lots of different things because people are different,
Speaker 1: and we respond really differently, and our degrees of of
Speaker 1: um dependence are different, and our social support situations are different,
Speaker 1: in our lifestyles are I mean, there's so many factors
Speaker 1: that they're just simply isn't a this is the only
Speaker 1: way to do it. What I think is interesting in
Speaker 1: looking at at a A or twelve step programs is
Speaker 1: I sometimes marvel at how brilliantly designed they were in
Speaker 1: certain ways, you know, now recovery. You know, people in
Speaker 1: twelve step programs, the idea is that it's a higher
Speaker 1: power or God that gets you sober, and I actually
Speaker 1: don't think that's what it is at all, unless you
Speaker 1: want to consider the group your higher power. But they
Speaker 1: built in so many of the things that we would
Speaker 1: recognize in different recovery approaches, you know, social support, not
Speaker 1: doing it alone some way that via the steps, but
Speaker 1: can be lots of different ways to actually start to
Speaker 1: change the way you look at and you view the
Speaker 1: world dealing with resentment, right, That's something that's right in
Speaker 1: the middle of the steps that you talked about. One
Speaker 1: of the things we talk a lot about with with
Speaker 1: changing habits and and recovery is accountability. You know, it's
Speaker 1: built right into the twelve step programs because you've got
Speaker 1: those little chips. I mean, there's so many the things
Speaker 1: there that again I think are very brilliantly designed for
Speaker 1: something that was figured out in in you know, essentially
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty nine. But it has right right, it's but
Speaker 1: it has a lot of baggage with it too, and
Speaker 1: I think that's unfortunate for you know, from my perspective,
Speaker 1: that's the unfortunate part, because I think there's so much
Speaker 1: good in twelve step programs and the thing that I
Speaker 1: think is so useful about them is they're just absolute ubiquity,
Speaker 1: right like they are everywhere and for some people that
Speaker 1: having somewhere to go every day and have people to
Speaker 1: talk to at any time can can be really helpful.
Speaker 1: But my point being that I think there are some
Speaker 1: principles we can look at that are useful in making
Speaker 1: changuring getting sober. But we can find lots of different
Speaker 1: ways to fulfill those principles or those needs. Yeah, sure, absolutely,
Speaker 1: I mean I learned a lot. I went for I
Speaker 1: was in twelve step recovery for six months and I
Speaker 1: took a lot of lessons from that. As you say,
Speaker 1: I mean, that's where I learned about resentments. That's where
Speaker 1: I heard expectations are resentments under construction for the first time,
Speaker 1: and a light bulb turned into my arm in my head.
Speaker 1: I had such high expectations for people, and that's why
Speaker 1: I was frequently disappointed and frequently resentful. So it was
Speaker 1: about undoing the foundation, which was building the expectation um
Speaker 1: And you know, I met so many wonderful people. And
Speaker 1: social support is so crucial building a tribe, and I
Speaker 1: ended up moving away from a a and finding that elsewhere.
Speaker 1: But you know, it doesn't matter how you do it,
Speaker 1: as long as you find these things which are social support.
Speaker 1: As you mentioned, accounted ability, that's really important. I think
Speaker 1: I personally think day counting is really important and now
Speaker 1: I do that viron app and if I have a
Speaker 1: drunk I would obviously tell people um. And you know,
Speaker 1: undoing the ways that we think about the world and
Speaker 1: rebuilding them. Um. Talking to other people going through the
Speaker 1: same thing so important. Yeah, there's so much there to
Speaker 1: be mind, but there's also other ways to create it.
Speaker 1: So it's just about what works for you. Whatever works.
Speaker 1: So the last thing I want to cover here is
Speaker 1: you just mentioned a little bit with day counting, and
Speaker 1: I've been having this conversation with a friend recently who's
Speaker 1: relatively new on the recovery journey, doing it his own way,
Speaker 1: which is great, But we talked about this idea of
Speaker 1: one day as a one day at a time or
Speaker 1: you know, forever, because you know, forever freaks a lot
Speaker 1: of people out. And and I love what you said.
Speaker 1: You said I needed something larger than a day, but
Speaker 1: smaller than forever as far as your time frame. So
Speaker 1: you say, choose your own time frame, find the one
Speaker 1: that works for you. Yeah. Yeah, I think that's I mean,
Speaker 1: the one day at a time. I definitely did it
Speaker 1: one day at a time in the beginning, one hour
Speaker 1: at a time. At the time, it was it was
Speaker 1: just you know, hanging onto my sobriety by a thread.
Speaker 1: But later on I think I was maybe a month
Speaker 1: or two in I started looking for a bigger time frame,
Speaker 1: and that for me was a hundred days. I signed
Speaker 1: up to a hundred day challenge. And now I actually
Speaker 1: find it really comforting to say forever, because I don't know.
Speaker 1: That doesn't scare me. The thought of drinking scares me.
Speaker 1: Brings sober forever. It's lovely and comforting. It's like a duvet. Um. So,
Speaker 1: I think it just depends on you and how you
Speaker 1: approached the one day at a time thing. I would
Speaker 1: see more relationships as one day at a time, you know,
Speaker 1: take it a day at a time by other than
Speaker 1: looking at a big scary picture. Um. So I use
Speaker 1: that for relationships. But for sobriety, I'm happy with forever.
Speaker 1: I never want to drink again. So for those of
Speaker 1: you who are recently engaged, I think she's saying you
Speaker 1: might want to rethink that. No, I know, I'm kidding.
Speaker 1: Um No, I think. And I also think that the
Speaker 1: time frame that's right for us can often change for
Speaker 1: for our own selves. I mean there are times, you know,
Speaker 1: there were certainly times for me, you know, where one
Speaker 1: day at a time was really what it was like. Okay,
Speaker 1: just get through today, and then there's other times where
Speaker 1: you know, I think the idea forever is very comforting,
Speaker 1: and then there's other times where you know, I have
Speaker 1: a little bit of like well, and and that leads
Speaker 1: into the last thing that you say. And I think
Speaker 1: this is really so powerful with drinking, and I've talked
Speaker 1: about it on the show. With everything you say, choosing
Speaker 1: not to drink rather than being forced into it is
Speaker 1: a subtle but powerful and off shift I don't versus
Speaker 1: I can't. And I think that that feeds into the
Speaker 1: one day at a time or the time frame, because
Speaker 1: if it's an I can't, then we start negotiating with
Speaker 1: that can it be then, you know versus I don't
Speaker 1: is really our choice. And I just think remembering that
Speaker 1: we have choices one of the most free things we
Speaker 1: can do. Yeah, definitely, um And they've shown that in studies.
Speaker 1: What if you say I can't eat chocolate, then you
Speaker 1: feel deprived, you feel angry about not being able to
Speaker 1: eat chocolate, Whereas if you say I don't eat chocolate,
Speaker 1: then that's liberating. It makes you feel empowered, it makes
Speaker 1: you feel like you've really chosen that path. And that's
Speaker 1: how I approach sobriety, I choose not to drink and
Speaker 1: I really never want to do it again. Um. So
Speaker 1: I think it's it's how you approach it, whether you
Speaker 1: see it's being caged in, you know, not being able
Speaker 1: to drink, or being free of having to drink. So
Speaker 1: it's it's yeah, definitely for me, it's more of a
Speaker 1: freedom than a cage. Excellent. Well, I think that is
Speaker 1: the perfect place to wrap up. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for a your support of the show over the years
Speaker 1: and be taking the time to come on and writing
Speaker 1: a wonderful book. Thank you, it's been a real pleasure. Okay,
Speaker 1: take care by Okay, okay bye. If what you just
Speaker 1: heard was helpful to you, please consider making a donation
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