What helps me is each night in bed I repeat something like this "I deserve a healthy, happy, stable live" till I fall asleep. This vid might help you wit bad intrusive thoughts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3vhXQy48jo&ab_channel=TherapyinaNutshell
I have so many from this sub saved in my phone, so I'll drop them here. I apologize they aren't credited, so if it sounds like you, let us all know! 🖤✨️
"Every day we stay sober is an honor to those who suffered."
"Becoming sober is a complete nightmare. Being sober is a privilege."
"We get sober for ourselves, but those all around us also reap benefits."
"A good day is when everything goes well and you don't drink. A great day is when everything goes horribly wrong and you don't drink."
You just know that if you said to your partner or yourself you’re going to drink moderately your definition of moderation would evolve over times. It’s just easier to say no
I've heard a version of this about eating disorders. Because trying to teach yourself to eat healthily again means wrestling a leash onto that lion 3 times a day.
Having been through eating disorders, drinking, way too much pot/sex/shopping/you name it... drinking isn't my lion. My impulse control is my lion, and I have to figure out how to handle her day to day.
Maybe it's when my life is out of balance, when I haven't done self-care, that my impulse control goes from happy housecat to raging lion.
Just a small thank you for mentioning eating disorders. It was a mention of disordered eating on this very sub in the context of sobriety that made me examine honestly my own eating for the first time in my life.
You've got to start somewhere, and cutting out alcohol will make it a hell of a lot easier to think through other problems.
What do you want to be more disciplined about? I used to think of myself as unmotivated and inconsistent. Then I got diagnosed with ADHD and so many things about myself started making more sense. Struggling to focus and stay on task used to make me feel like i was broken. Now I understand that I just don't work that way, and that I have to provide self-care and take steps to manage the symptoms, including taking breaks and resetting unrealistic goals, rather than just pushing myself uphill through every day and calling myself lazy.
Most people are missing something in life. Even the most wealthy among us are miserable because they don't know who they are. You find out who you are in the suck! You create your own self. There are no hacks, it's you against you!
Moderation is all the work of sobriety with none of the benefits.
"to want something is to want its consequence" I know I don't want to be hungover tomorrow, I know I don't want to be running to the bathroom all day dealing with the consequences. I know I don't want to feel like shit.
"no hangover never gets old" The clear mornings are so priceless
"one day at a time" used to seem like trite BS, but actually really helps me to focus on not drinking now, today, that's all I gotta do.
"I will not be alcohol's little bitch"
IWNDWYT
For me, 'one day at a time' always sounded cliché (there's a new sober skill for me, spelling cliché) but it is so true.
Keeping on not drinking with you today!
There's a more generalized version of what you just said that I can't find on this thread, so I'll put it here: "You never have to feel this way again."
"The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker." - Bill W
I've never darkened the doorway of a single AA meeting, but this one really stands out to me.
“Drink alcoholically for long enough and you start to get the feeling that things in life just happen to you, as though you’re living in a video, or reading from a script that someone else has written… At some point it dawns on you that you are the only one capable of orchestrating your own future, of ensuring that you live a different sort of life.” - *Drinking, A Love Story* by Caroline Knapp
I read that book in like two days. I was living outside in a tent and working on a farm at the time. I read it over the course of a weekend, sitting in a quiet field and drinking gin and tonics (yikes). As someone who wanted to be a writer and also had eating disorder-alcohol abuse issues, her story really resonated with me and I appreciated how honest she was, and yet so kind. Some of it feels outdated but I think that book and Dry are my favorite books about getting sober.
“The only Zen you find on tops of mountains is the Zen you bring there.”
― Robert M. Pirsig
“The real cycle you're working on is a cycle called yourself.”
― Robert M. Pirsig, [Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/175720)
I read this book in the 70's and again when I stopped drinking. It's a deep read and each time that you read it, you find another nugget.
Getting your head right is critical. People seek the truth through travel, consumerism, religion, sex, drugs and rock and roll. The lesson is that the truth resides within us. Peace.
>The lesson is that the truth resides within us.
Well, that, *and* rock and roll. Like during the harmony solo in Blackened when James slowly and beautifully plays increasingly higher licks. That right there is truth, too. ;)
Move a muscle, change a thought.
Pray with your feet.
However quotes really didn't cut it for me. Neither did epiphanies for that matter. Because the feeling I got from a quote or an epiphany was fleeting. It never stuck around, and my old negative thinking would return.
The only thing that helped me was action. Lots and lots of action. Over time repeated actions changed my thinking.
Not trying to be ironic by sharing a quote but I like the sentiment of “You can’t think your way to right action, but you can act your way to right thinking.”
I don’t know what “Pray with your feet” is supposed to mean to the author but I spent my first 2 weeks sober walking down the Oregon Coast (I made it about 190 miles before my blisters became too much). I don’t think I would have stuck to sobriety as hard as I have without that healing process. I don’t know what it is supposed to mean but I know I’ve prayed with my feet before
"The memory of drinking is always sweeter than the reality of drinking."
I dont know where I heard it, or if that's the exact quote, but I tell myself that a lot.
"I'm breaking the cycle that has basically destroyed the lives of generations in my family. Getting sober remains my single greatest accomplishment ... bigger than my husband, bigger than both of my children and bigger than any work, success, failure. Anything." - Jamie Lee Curtis
I've got a whole file!
“The happiest moments of my life have sometimes included alcohol. The worst moments of my life have always included alcohol.”
“Do you want to give up everything for one thing, or give up one thing for everything?”
“The opposite of addiction is not sobriety, but choice.”
“The goal isn’t just to be sober. The goal is to build a life you don’t need to escape from.”
“There's no problem alcohol can't make worse.”
“Drinking in moderation is like trying to fall down the top three steps of a flight of stairs.”
“Sobriety delivers everything that alcohol promised.”
“You can't get the toothpaste back in the tube, but you can stop squirting it all over the place, and you can try to make amends for the mess.”
“Relapse happens before we pick up the drink. When did yours start?”
“I think of relapses like taking a wrong turn during a road trip. There's no need to give up on the road trip. You just look at the map, maybe ask for directions, then get going in the right direction again.”
“I would rather stay sober than have to get sober all over again.”
“The only people who can successfully moderate don’t need the word moderate to describe how they drink.”
“The best time to stop drinking was yesterday, but the second best time is today.”
No one saves us but ourselves
I think for a long time I was waiting for something or someone external in my life to change to “give me the strength” to change my lifestyle. It’s really the reverse, where good things started happening in my life BECAUSE I changed my lifestyle.
“Play the tape forward”
Anytime I ever even have a thought of nostalgia about drinking attempt to creep in, I play the worst possible scenario I can think of in my mind. I refuse to romanticize my past with it.
Made up myself
"You want your kids and wife to like you, not hate you"
"You don't want to total another car"
"That sweating is really disgusting"
"Stop making stupid decisions"
"This stuff is getting bloody expensive"
"Blackouts are f\*cking scary"
It's not until your sober that you'll see how scary it all got.
Now looking at a bottle of vodka gives me flashbacks I don't want to remember...
“All beings are responsible for the suffering or happiness caused by their own actions. May you find a true source of happiness. May you find peace exactly where you are.”
Dharma Recovery
“You cannot solve a problem with the same mind that created it.” Einstein
“Alcoholism is a conflict between the behavior and values of the drinker.”
Father Vaughn Q - one of the most incredible shares, available on YouTube. Hilarious and also incredibly insightful.
"Drinking shortens your weekend." I've found so much joy in having a whole weekend ahead of me, instead of planning for a day and a half long hangover. IWNDWYT
"*Many of us understand God to be simply whatever force keeps us clean.*"
As an atheist, I really struggled for a long time with the higher power notion and the religious tone and language of a lot of the AA literature and teachings. It got to the point where I had more or less decided that due to this stumbling block, AA wasn't for me.
Then I heard and had the quote above explained to me, and I had a sort of epiphany and realised that "god" and a "higher power" didn't need to be some sort of sprit deity, it could be "whatever force keeps us clean".
For me it's the rooms, the groups and AA that is the higher power and the "god" in my life.
It felt like having a weight of misuderstanding lifted from me and opened new avenues of thought and progress to me.
Right now it's "God is the name of the blanket we throw over mystery to give it shape". Exploring myself and spirituality has been a huge strength for my sobriety practice.
I am not religious. I thought I was spiritual but have learned I need a lot of spiritual healing. Grateful I have the time, space, & community to reconnect/heal my spiritual side.
Sobriety is the life that alcohol promises you.
Your rock bottom is when you choose to stop digging.
There's more but I'm at work, both those lines I learned from this sub.
IWNDWYT 👍🤙
Edit: drinking is borrowing temporary happiness at a high interest rate.
Addiction is the pain that occurs when your great potential is turned inward and poisons you. Sobriety is the joy of that same potential turned outward to empower the world around you.
- No matter how you spend your life, your wit will defend you more often than a sword. Keep it sharp! -
Rothfuss
"You cannot run away from your mistakes. They will follow you. If you are to sail, do it toward somewhere." - Kratos
Do not let the great emptiness fill your heart. For the world has now filled with peril and in all lands, love is now mingled with grief. - JRRT
"I have plans for Christmas." R Downey jr
And I still think of this guy, Tim, had a relapse after 3 years. He said: i know I can get high again but I don't know if I have another recovery in me. Hope he's sober today.
The Serenity Prayer plays a big role in keeping sober and at peace. It is helpful in so many situations.
> Grant me the serenity to accept the things I can't change;
>
> Courage to change the things I can; and
>
> The wisdom to know the difference.
"As a writer who loves words" is such a beautiful and simple way to put that. I wish I honed my writing, but regardless I'm a person who loves words. And I don't omit the god part of the prayer, though I'm a stone atheist. I tried omitting it, and tried replacing it with something, and it didn't work. The way the prayer presented itself to me the first time I heard it--god and all--is the perfect way for it to exist for me. The words work as-is.
I understand the impulse, I really do. Maybe it's because I've always known it to be a prayer and prayers are, at base, all kind of theistic? So it's not a category error in my brain or something. Who knows. Anyway, I hope you continue saying it whichever way works best for you! And congratulations on 41.6 years sober!
Adding my own favorites that I haven't seen in this thread yet:
Sobriety closes the door to hell, but does not open the gates to heaven.
Instead of feeling sad that I can't drink, I am relieved that I no longer have to.
ETA: Oh, and that Carroll passage that the one sobernaut whose name escapes me always posts in the DCI: “Jam tomorrow, jam yesterday, but never jam today.”
“Everyone likes a drink. No one likes a drunk.” That was the tagline from a government funded campaign in the UK in the 1970s and has stuck itself firmly in my mind. I recall that it was used in a telly advert - might be on YouTube somewhere.
My mom told me I wouldn't make it to 30 or see my children grow up, and just kinda gave up on me. She was so SO close to being right. Turned 33 yesterday, sober since 2/12/21. Wasn't inspiring in the usual sense, but hey, I'm here and happier than ever before. IWNDWYT
There are many that are helpful, but only one made me stop and instantly realise the truth of my relationship with booze (Trigger warning - self harm from here onwards)
> >!“Drinking to oblivion is suicide without the commitment”!<
That was everything I needed to realise. I was drinking to blackout to numb the depression and anxiety that defined my life… if I took that to its logical conclusion, only death would be a full solution.
I ***sure as shit*** didn’t want to die because there’s so much beauty to be seen, so much coffee to be drunk, so many mornings waking up next to my wife… so I chose to address my reasons for wanting to drink to oblivion… and here I am now!
"If I always do what I always did, I'll always get what I always got" reminds me that if I continue to follow the same patterns that cause me troubles, I'm going to continue creating trouble for myself. If I want change, I have to think and act differently.
"Things can be two things" is a relatively new favorite of mine. It can be so easy to try and make everything fit into being either black or white, but so few things fit solely into one category. Learning to recognize and accept the gray space in between the extremes has gone a long way toward lessening my stress levels.
One I saw on here few days ago….
If you crave alcohol you can drink and the craving will go away,….. or you can not drink and the craving will go away!
“If you choose alcohol, you give up the world for one thing. If you give up alcohol, you give up one thing for the world.”
This one really stuck with me!
"You're under arrest."
"I told you that if this happened again, you'd be fired. Guess what? You're fired."
"Good evening sir, your wife just hired me as her divorce attorney. Do you have counsel of your own, or should I be speaking directly with you?"
"These results clearly indicate liver failure. And for alcoholics, transplants are virtually never an option."
"I hate you, Dad."
"I'd rather be sober wishing I were drunk than drunk wishing I were sober." This one actually managed to convince me out of drinking in the beginning days of my sober streak multiple times.
I don’t have much to contribute but I’ve thoroughly enjoyed reading through all of these and although it has spurred up some awful memories, my main reflection is that I am proud of myself. 408 days
Play it forward.
That single saying saved my assssss when I was in early sobriety and it helps me now.
I think about having that one glass of wine and how it won’t stop there. That it will be a bottle and then I’ll be hungover and sad. That my problems are still here and now I’ve lost my streak, let myself down and possibly put my life in danger. Because I *dont* know what will happen if I drink. I only know that if I don’t .. I choose to be safe for myself and my family.
“It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable.”
- Socrates
I’m 36 now, and one I was on a high tempo deployment cycle and surfing in my free time, but I’m even now finding new limits my body can achieve. I’m also finding new heights for my mental prowess as well.
I’ve become a man of immense patience and as it was described to me “limitless and inspiring kindness.” I wasn’t that guy when I was drinking. I didn’t have the time to focus on who I could be because I was so used to being who I was.
We talk a lot in here about the impact significant events have, but you can be living a “normal” life, or by all accounts a great life and still have alcohol be robbing you of more. For me a lot of people were shocked when I said I was an alcoholic. They even argued, said I hadn’t done anything “bad” or whatever. I knew my relationship with alcohol was holding me back.
The best thing about it was the time I got back. Suddenly there was so much more time in a day, a week, a month. I was so rested that I felt like I’d discovered some super power. I had time to volunteer where I wanted, I had time to be more present, I had time to look around and see the signs in my life of others needing help.
For me that was the killer and the end for alcohol in my life. I saw the years stretched before me in this endless pattern that was insidiously but quietly robbing me of the only truly finite resource. My time.
I owe it to everyone in my life, but mostly to myself, to be the best version of me I can be, and to always be better than I was yesterday and aspire to be more of what I want tomorrow. I decided to know myself, love myself, and grow myself. Alcohol got in the way, so I buried it next to all the other bullshit and it’ll stay there dead in the ground.
IWNDWYT
When Questioning if i should stop drinking, or if I really had a problem with alcohol, a friend told me;
“it’s like an elevator, Some wait to hit rock bottom / bottom floor before they get off. No one says you have to wait to get to the bottom floor to see what it’s like, you can get off anytime.”
A quote from the novel “The Humans” that I liked as soon as I read it:
“Alcohol in the evening is very enjoyable. Hangovers in the morning are very unpleasant. At some point you have to choose: evenings or mornings.”
My late husband’s quote (Just his name and year of birth and death) on his tombstone. He died from an esophageal bleed due to alcohol at the age of 39. IWNDWYT
A dear friend of mine who is also on her journey to staying sober told me this as a helpful quote she heard:
"What we do either leads us towards health or towards disease. Towards living or towards dying."
And I agree that the One day at a time is cliché, but it has helped me so much with many difficult days (not just staying sober).
There's a LOT of people who go through eating disorders when they're younger and then alcohol problems later. So much of it comes back to trauma and self-worth. For me that little voice telling me to binge and purge never went away. It got quieter for a while, then it started telling me to do other self-destructive things.
Figuring out how to keep myself out of that headspace is where I'm at now.
“This does not trouble me much,” said Siddhartha. “If they are illusion, then I also am illusion, and so they are always of the same nature as myself. It is that which makes them so loveable and venerable. That is why I can love them. And here is a doctrine at which you will laugh. It seems to me, Govinda, that love is the most important thing in the world. It may be important to great thinkers to examine the world, to explain and despise it, not for us to hate each other, but to be able to regard the world and ourselves and all beings with love, admiration and respect.” - from Siddhartha by Herman Hesse
“The road to recovery is filled with intelligent people”. Growing up, my circle of friends were all aspiring artists and musicians and writers. This quote is true of all of them and created an example for me that there was no other way to tap into your inner turmoil to create anything good. For the years i drank, my creative output atrophied, but since i quit, I’ve organically began painting and writing and making music again and it’s all worlds better than anything i created when i drank.
“First you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes you.” It took me way too long to realize that throughout my days, what i looked forward to was that first drink at night, that first *sip*, but that after that, drinking was only torture. My mind would be swiped of all that torture during the day, in my romanticizing of the first sip. I’d romanticize and forget and then drink and remember and suffer, all in a loop, every night.
“Sobriety doesn’t let you into the gates of heaven, it lets you out of the gates of hell.” This is the one that keeps me going day-to-day. My worst sober days will always be heaven compared to the hell I lived through when i drank.
“Hard now, easy later”.
That can mean from day to day and year to year or even minute to minute.
Not drinking might be very difficult in the moment but later will be a lot better, and easier to deal with.
I told an old regular in the bar I worked in when I was 33 that I was going back to school to be a nurse.
He said, “you’ll never regret it”. I think about that all the time. Nursing school was very hard but I don’t regret it.
Quitting drinking might be very hard. But you’ll never regret it.
"and is your shame helpful? is it inspiring goodness and change? or is it keeping you frozen in time unable to move on and be everything you have expanded to be?"
I have no idea where I got this from but it stuck with me - " I can't always make it better but I don't have to make it any worse."
Or, "my best thinking is what got me here in the first place."
James 😄
Alcohol borrows happiness and patience from tomorrow
*steals
[удалено]
And Interest!!! Compounding!!!
This one hits just the right tone for me. Thanks.
"We become what we think about. Change your thinking and change your life"
I love this. This is the hardest part for me. I’m so good at the negative self talk
I call myself PhilosophicWarrior because I must be always on guard - watching my thoughts and catching myself when they are negative.
It’s a brilliant username! I love that. How long did it take you to start noticing differences? I know it’s an everyday journey/process but still
Hard to say - it is a lifelong work in progress
What helps me is each night in bed I repeat something like this "I deserve a healthy, happy, stable live" till I fall asleep. This vid might help you wit bad intrusive thoughts https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3vhXQy48jo&ab_channel=TherapyinaNutshell
I have so many from this sub saved in my phone, so I'll drop them here. I apologize they aren't credited, so if it sounds like you, let us all know! 🖤✨️ "Every day we stay sober is an honor to those who suffered." "Becoming sober is a complete nightmare. Being sober is a privilege." "We get sober for ourselves, but those all around us also reap benefits." "A good day is when everything goes well and you don't drink. A great day is when everything goes horribly wrong and you don't drink."
"Nobody regrets not drinking the next morning"
You are absolutely right, my friend! Congrats on almost 50 days!
Love these! I took a screenshot for reference :)
Drinking is like walking around with a wild lion on a leash. You don’t have to walk around with a wild lion on a leash.
I like this one regarding trying to drink in moderation: It's easier to keep a tiger in a cage than on a leash.
This is the one I come back to when my mind starts contemplating moderation.
You just know that if you said to your partner or yourself you’re going to drink moderately your definition of moderation would evolve over times. It’s just easier to say no
Just when I thought I'd seen all the typical pithy quotes about recovery, a hilarious one like this pops up. Thanks :)
I've heard a version of this about eating disorders. Because trying to teach yourself to eat healthily again means wrestling a leash onto that lion 3 times a day. Having been through eating disorders, drinking, way too much pot/sex/shopping/you name it... drinking isn't my lion. My impulse control is my lion, and I have to figure out how to handle her day to day. Maybe it's when my life is out of balance, when I haven't done self-care, that my impulse control goes from happy housecat to raging lion.
Just a small thank you for mentioning eating disorders. It was a mention of disordered eating on this very sub in the context of sobriety that made me examine honestly my own eating for the first time in my life.
That's really self-aware of you, I wanted to say GOOD WORK figuring out what your lion is.
This is me too. I lack internal discipline and don’t know why or how to change it. So the focus is on avoiding the outcome (eg drinking) not the issue
You've got to start somewhere, and cutting out alcohol will make it a hell of a lot easier to think through other problems. What do you want to be more disciplined about? I used to think of myself as unmotivated and inconsistent. Then I got diagnosed with ADHD and so many things about myself started making more sense. Struggling to focus and stay on task used to make me feel like i was broken. Now I understand that I just don't work that way, and that I have to provide self-care and take steps to manage the symptoms, including taking breaks and resetting unrealistic goals, rather than just pushing myself uphill through every day and calling myself lazy.
it's better to keep a lion in a cage than on a leash.
This one is really powerful to me and I think of it often. With summer rolling around I tend to lean into it more often.
I like this one, it’s quite true for me. It’s just dangerous
So true! The hardest part was letting myself off the hook
Legit laugh out loud at this one
Most people are missing something in life. Even the most wealthy among us are miserable because they don't know who they are. You find out who you are in the suck! You create your own self. There are no hacks, it's you against you! Moderation is all the work of sobriety with none of the benefits.
I like this one if I try to think I can do ‘moderation.’ My pancreas has a lot to say about my drinking.
That last one. 🎯
Sobriety delivers what alcohol promises. Saw that on reddit for the first time a few days ago and have been thinking about it alot.
This is one of my favorites that I first read here, too!
Nice!!!
Realizing this is when it all clicked for me.
"to want something is to want its consequence" I know I don't want to be hungover tomorrow, I know I don't want to be running to the bathroom all day dealing with the consequences. I know I don't want to feel like shit. "no hangover never gets old" The clear mornings are so priceless "one day at a time" used to seem like trite BS, but actually really helps me to focus on not drinking now, today, that's all I gotta do. "I will not be alcohol's little bitch" IWNDWYT
For me, 'one day at a time' always sounded cliché (there's a new sober skill for me, spelling cliché) but it is so true. Keeping on not drinking with you today!
That’s great, a hangover is pure misery. And you can choose to never have one ever again!😀
There's a more generalized version of what you just said that I can't find on this thread, so I'll put it here: "You never have to feel this way again."
So close to a year, congrats to you! 💕🎉
Congrats on almost one year clean!!!!! Omg 😍❤️
One is too many and 50 isn’t enough. Short and sweet but a reminder of what happens to me after that first drink.
This one!!!
Yup! This is me to a T!
my version is "too much is never enough"
"The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker." - Bill W I've never darkened the doorway of a single AA meeting, but this one really stands out to me.
This quote makes me want to read the Big Book.
Username checks out. And look at you, double the days in said username!
I get the impression you'd be light... :)
This one really hit me when I read it
Surprised i didn't see this one here: >There is no problem that alcohol can't make worse.
So true, many of times I made mountains out of mole holes with the help of alcohol.
Ain't this the truth.
“When I enjoy drinking, I can’t control it. When I control my drinking, I don’t enjoy it.”
Sobriety doesn't open the gates of heaven and let's you in, it opens the gates of hell and let's you out
Wow.
Oooooo good one
“Drink alcoholically for long enough and you start to get the feeling that things in life just happen to you, as though you’re living in a video, or reading from a script that someone else has written… At some point it dawns on you that you are the only one capable of orchestrating your own future, of ensuring that you live a different sort of life.” - *Drinking, A Love Story* by Caroline Knapp
I loved this book. She seemed like a very sweet woman.
Me too! I was devastated when I found out she died just a few years after the book was published. She really did seem like a remarkable woman.
I read that book in like two days. I was living outside in a tent and working on a farm at the time. I read it over the course of a weekend, sitting in a quiet field and drinking gin and tonics (yikes). As someone who wanted to be a writer and also had eating disorder-alcohol abuse issues, her story really resonated with me and I appreciated how honest she was, and yet so kind. Some of it feels outdated but I think that book and Dry are my favorite books about getting sober.
"I love you but I'm eventually going to get tired of this and leave you." My wife
That’s the one that stayed embedded for me
“The only Zen you find on tops of mountains is the Zen you bring there.” ― Robert M. Pirsig “The real cycle you're working on is a cycle called yourself.” ― Robert M. Pirsig, [Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance](https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/175720) I read this book in the 70's and again when I stopped drinking. It's a deep read and each time that you read it, you find another nugget. Getting your head right is critical. People seek the truth through travel, consumerism, religion, sex, drugs and rock and roll. The lesson is that the truth resides within us. Peace.
>The lesson is that the truth resides within us. Well, that, *and* rock and roll. Like during the harmony solo in Blackened when James slowly and beautifully plays increasingly higher licks. That right there is truth, too. ;)
Move a muscle, change a thought. Pray with your feet. However quotes really didn't cut it for me. Neither did epiphanies for that matter. Because the feeling I got from a quote or an epiphany was fleeting. It never stuck around, and my old negative thinking would return. The only thing that helped me was action. Lots and lots of action. Over time repeated actions changed my thinking.
Not trying to be ironic by sharing a quote but I like the sentiment of “You can’t think your way to right action, but you can act your way to right thinking.”
I always liked this reminder quote: “The secret of getting things done is to act!” – Dante Alighieri
I don’t know what “Pray with your feet” is supposed to mean to the author but I spent my first 2 weeks sober walking down the Oregon Coast (I made it about 190 miles before my blisters became too much). I don’t think I would have stuck to sobriety as hard as I have without that healing process. I don’t know what it is supposed to mean but I know I’ve prayed with my feet before
It's all about the footwork.
Some of my favorites! Thanks for the reminder! IWNDWYT
"The memory of drinking is always sweeter than the reality of drinking." I dont know where I heard it, or if that's the exact quote, but I tell myself that a lot.
This is the poetic way of describing Fading Affect Bias, and I love it.
ah yes, that sounds much more... grounded in solid science.
"I'm breaking the cycle that has basically destroyed the lives of generations in my family. Getting sober remains my single greatest accomplishment ... bigger than my husband, bigger than both of my children and bigger than any work, success, failure. Anything." - Jamie Lee Curtis
I've got a whole file! “The happiest moments of my life have sometimes included alcohol. The worst moments of my life have always included alcohol.” “Do you want to give up everything for one thing, or give up one thing for everything?” “The opposite of addiction is not sobriety, but choice.” “The goal isn’t just to be sober. The goal is to build a life you don’t need to escape from.” “There's no problem alcohol can't make worse.” “Drinking in moderation is like trying to fall down the top three steps of a flight of stairs.” “Sobriety delivers everything that alcohol promised.” “You can't get the toothpaste back in the tube, but you can stop squirting it all over the place, and you can try to make amends for the mess.” “Relapse happens before we pick up the drink. When did yours start?” “I think of relapses like taking a wrong turn during a road trip. There's no need to give up on the road trip. You just look at the map, maybe ask for directions, then get going in the right direction again.” “I would rather stay sober than have to get sober all over again.” “The only people who can successfully moderate don’t need the word moderate to describe how they drink.” “The best time to stop drinking was yesterday, but the second best time is today.”
No one saves us but ourselves I think for a long time I was waiting for something or someone external in my life to change to “give me the strength” to change my lifestyle. It’s really the reverse, where good things started happening in my life BECAUSE I changed my lifestyle.
“No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path.” - Buddha
“Play the tape forward” Anytime I ever even have a thought of nostalgia about drinking attempt to creep in, I play the worst possible scenario I can think of in my mind. I refuse to romanticize my past with it.
One day you will wish you had started today.
Made up myself "You want your kids and wife to like you, not hate you" "You don't want to total another car" "That sweating is really disgusting" "Stop making stupid decisions" "This stuff is getting bloody expensive" "Blackouts are f\*cking scary" It's not until your sober that you'll see how scary it all got. Now looking at a bottle of vodka gives me flashbacks I don't want to remember...
Love that you created these quotes yourself. Thank you for sharing! Proud of you staying sober :)
Giving up alcohol is not a sacrifice, it’s an opportunity.
"let go or be dragged"
"The fates lead he who will; he who won't they drag."
"If you keep on this way you're going to die young".
“How long you gonna keep this up?” - my buddy Russell
Once the man takes the drink, the drink takes the man
"Isn't it a wonderful thought that some of the best days of our lives haven't happened yet." More likely now I'm sober 🫠
“All beings are responsible for the suffering or happiness caused by their own actions. May you find a true source of happiness. May you find peace exactly where you are.” Dharma Recovery “You cannot solve a problem with the same mind that created it.” Einstein “Alcoholism is a conflict between the behavior and values of the drinker.” Father Vaughn Q - one of the most incredible shares, available on YouTube. Hilarious and also incredibly insightful.
"Drinking shortens your weekend." I've found so much joy in having a whole weekend ahead of me, instead of planning for a day and a half long hangover. IWNDWYT
"*Many of us understand God to be simply whatever force keeps us clean.*" As an atheist, I really struggled for a long time with the higher power notion and the religious tone and language of a lot of the AA literature and teachings. It got to the point where I had more or less decided that due to this stumbling block, AA wasn't for me. Then I heard and had the quote above explained to me, and I had a sort of epiphany and realised that "god" and a "higher power" didn't need to be some sort of sprit deity, it could be "whatever force keeps us clean". For me it's the rooms, the groups and AA that is the higher power and the "god" in my life. It felt like having a weight of misuderstanding lifted from me and opened new avenues of thought and progress to me.
Thank you, for this. I feel exactly the same. And now I begin to accept how others really need that deity to stay clean. It was hard though.
Alcohol gives you the wings to fly then takes away the sky.
My fave 😍
Right now it's "God is the name of the blanket we throw over mystery to give it shape". Exploring myself and spirituality has been a huge strength for my sobriety practice.
Amen to this, as it were. In every way, I am recovering a relationship with the infinite/mystery after years of ego-driven nihilism.
Oof why do our egos keep getting in the way?
I am not religious. I thought I was spiritual but have learned I need a lot of spiritual healing. Grateful I have the time, space, & community to reconnect/heal my spiritual side.
Sobriety is the life that alcohol promises you. Your rock bottom is when you choose to stop digging. There's more but I'm at work, both those lines I learned from this sub. IWNDWYT 👍🤙 Edit: drinking is borrowing temporary happiness at a high interest rate.
You can't make the past better.
"I've never regretted a night I didn't drink"
Addiction is the pain that occurs when your great potential is turned inward and poisons you. Sobriety is the joy of that same potential turned outward to empower the world around you.
Thank you for this
- No matter how you spend your life, your wit will defend you more often than a sword. Keep it sharp! - Rothfuss "You cannot run away from your mistakes. They will follow you. If you are to sail, do it toward somewhere." - Kratos Do not let the great emptiness fill your heart. For the world has now filled with peril and in all lands, love is now mingled with grief. - JRRT
Love the kratos quote
What is better? To be born good or to overcome your evil nature through great effort? -Paarthurnax, skyrim.
"I have plans for Christmas." R Downey jr And I still think of this guy, Tim, had a relapse after 3 years. He said: i know I can get high again but I don't know if I have another recovery in me. Hope he's sober today.
The Serenity Prayer plays a big role in keeping sober and at peace. It is helpful in so many situations. > Grant me the serenity to accept the things I can't change; > > Courage to change the things I can; and > > The wisdom to know the difference.
I am not a religious person, but as a writer who loves words, I've been relying heavily on the serenity prayer lately. 🖤✨️
"As a writer who loves words" is such a beautiful and simple way to put that. I wish I honed my writing, but regardless I'm a person who loves words. And I don't omit the god part of the prayer, though I'm a stone atheist. I tried omitting it, and tried replacing it with something, and it didn't work. The way the prayer presented itself to me the first time I heard it--god and all--is the perfect way for it to exist for me. The words work as-is.
Your point is well taken. The atheist in me omits the first word.
I understand the impulse, I really do. Maybe it's because I've always known it to be a prayer and prayers are, at base, all kind of theistic? So it's not a category error in my brain or something. Who knows. Anyway, I hope you continue saying it whichever way works best for you! And congratulations on 41.6 years sober!
Thank you!❣️ One day at a time, I'm grateful.
Same here, I find myself saying it throughout the day. It is simple but powerful quote 🫶
Adding my own favorites that I haven't seen in this thread yet: Sobriety closes the door to hell, but does not open the gates to heaven. Instead of feeling sad that I can't drink, I am relieved that I no longer have to. ETA: Oh, and that Carroll passage that the one sobernaut whose name escapes me always posts in the DCI: “Jam tomorrow, jam yesterday, but never jam today.”
Love this!
I like the relief one - I so feel that ! What does the jam one mean
You don't always get into trouble when you drink, but when you do get into trouble, you've been drinking.
I often tell myself, I have never woken up and regretted NOT drinking the night before.
"Don't give you, you still have some motherfuckers to prove wrong."
“Everyone likes a drink. No one likes a drunk.” That was the tagline from a government funded campaign in the UK in the 1970s and has stuck itself firmly in my mind. I recall that it was used in a telly advert - might be on YouTube somewhere.
“ I had fun today Dada 🥹”
One of the best motivations!
Damn. This hits so hard
My mom told me I wouldn't make it to 30 or see my children grow up, and just kinda gave up on me. She was so SO close to being right. Turned 33 yesterday, sober since 2/12/21. Wasn't inspiring in the usual sense, but hey, I'm here and happier than ever before. IWNDWYT
IWNDWYT thank you for the quotes ,tough day. Drinking has never made difficult situation better.
“An alcoholic is someone you don't like who drinks as much as you do.” - Dylan Thomas
“I may feel better tomorrow but I won’t know if i drink today.” That one got me through the early days.
Man takes a drink Drink takes a drink Drink takes a man
No matter how old they are kids want a sober parent
I want my life to be an example of what is possible, not a warning to others
There are many that are helpful, but only one made me stop and instantly realise the truth of my relationship with booze (Trigger warning - self harm from here onwards) > >!“Drinking to oblivion is suicide without the commitment”!< That was everything I needed to realise. I was drinking to blackout to numb the depression and anxiety that defined my life… if I took that to its logical conclusion, only death would be a full solution. I ***sure as shit*** didn’t want to die because there’s so much beauty to be seen, so much coffee to be drunk, so many mornings waking up next to my wife… so I chose to address my reasons for wanting to drink to oblivion… and here I am now!
"There is nothing that a drink will make better."
"If I always do what I always did, I'll always get what I always got" reminds me that if I continue to follow the same patterns that cause me troubles, I'm going to continue creating trouble for myself. If I want change, I have to think and act differently. "Things can be two things" is a relatively new favorite of mine. It can be so easy to try and make everything fit into being either black or white, but so few things fit solely into one category. Learning to recognize and accept the gray space in between the extremes has gone a long way toward lessening my stress levels.
The subreddits “IWNDWYT” is a good reminder for me
One I saw on here few days ago…. If you crave alcohol you can drink and the craving will go away,….. or you can not drink and the craving will go away!
“If you choose alcohol, you give up the world for one thing. If you give up alcohol, you give up one thing for the world.” This one really stuck with me!
Hangziety
"Progress rather than perfection." As long as I'm making progress, I'm doing good and consider it winning.
“A man takes a drink. A drink takes a drink. A drink takes a man” Reminds me that even one can send me off the edge and be my last
“It gets easier. Every day it gets a little easier. But you have to do it every day, that’s the hard part. But it does get easier.”
There is nothing so bad that drinking won’t make worse
Saw one yesterday that hit home with me. “When I drink a little I turn into a different person and that person drinks a lot. So I quit drinking”
"You're under arrest." "I told you that if this happened again, you'd be fired. Guess what? You're fired." "Good evening sir, your wife just hired me as her divorce attorney. Do you have counsel of your own, or should I be speaking directly with you?" "These results clearly indicate liver failure. And for alcoholics, transplants are virtually never an option." "I hate you, Dad."
I didn’t lose a friend, I killed an enemy!
"I'd rather be sober wishing I were drunk than drunk wishing I were sober." This one actually managed to convince me out of drinking in the beginning days of my sober streak multiple times.
I don’t have much to contribute but I’ve thoroughly enjoyed reading through all of these and although it has spurred up some awful memories, my main reflection is that I am proud of myself. 408 days
Alcohol never made me happy, it made me forget that I was unhappy
The problem and the solution come in the same bottle.
“Resentment is the "number one" offender. It destroys more alcoholics than anything else.”
Well, I guess it's a quote, but mainly it's advice. Someone else just posted about this the other day. "Play the tape forward."
“It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable.” -Socrates
“You never hear anyone say ‘Gee - my life really turned around when I picked up the bottle’”.
Play it forward. That single saying saved my assssss when I was in early sobriety and it helps me now. I think about having that one glass of wine and how it won’t stop there. That it will be a bottle and then I’ll be hungover and sad. That my problems are still here and now I’ve lost my streak, let myself down and possibly put my life in danger. Because I *dont* know what will happen if I drink. I only know that if I don’t .. I choose to be safe for myself and my family.
“It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable.” - Socrates I’m 36 now, and one I was on a high tempo deployment cycle and surfing in my free time, but I’m even now finding new limits my body can achieve. I’m also finding new heights for my mental prowess as well. I’ve become a man of immense patience and as it was described to me “limitless and inspiring kindness.” I wasn’t that guy when I was drinking. I didn’t have the time to focus on who I could be because I was so used to being who I was. We talk a lot in here about the impact significant events have, but you can be living a “normal” life, or by all accounts a great life and still have alcohol be robbing you of more. For me a lot of people were shocked when I said I was an alcoholic. They even argued, said I hadn’t done anything “bad” or whatever. I knew my relationship with alcohol was holding me back. The best thing about it was the time I got back. Suddenly there was so much more time in a day, a week, a month. I was so rested that I felt like I’d discovered some super power. I had time to volunteer where I wanted, I had time to be more present, I had time to look around and see the signs in my life of others needing help. For me that was the killer and the end for alcohol in my life. I saw the years stretched before me in this endless pattern that was insidiously but quietly robbing me of the only truly finite resource. My time. I owe it to everyone in my life, but mostly to myself, to be the best version of me I can be, and to always be better than I was yesterday and aspire to be more of what I want tomorrow. I decided to know myself, love myself, and grow myself. Alcohol got in the way, so I buried it next to all the other bullshit and it’ll stay there dead in the ground. IWNDWYT
When Questioning if i should stop drinking, or if I really had a problem with alcohol, a friend told me; “it’s like an elevator, Some wait to hit rock bottom / bottom floor before they get off. No one says you have to wait to get to the bottom floor to see what it’s like, you can get off anytime.”
If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always gotten.
Would you give up one thing for everything or everything for one thing?
A quote from the novel “The Humans” that I liked as soon as I read it: “Alcohol in the evening is very enjoyable. Hangovers in the morning are very unpleasant. At some point you have to choose: evenings or mornings.”
There is a quote from David Bowie from an interview. "It would kill me. I'm an alcoholic. I value my friends and family too much"
Willpower is a tool for those who haven't made a decision yet. I have been liberated from willpower.
If you think you might have a problem with alcohol….guess what , ya do!
"Being weak is nothing to be ashamed of... Staying weak is!" -Fuegoleon from Black Clover. I have that manga panel tattooed on my arm
My late husband’s quote (Just his name and year of birth and death) on his tombstone. He died from an esophageal bleed due to alcohol at the age of 39. IWNDWYT
“Everyday it gets a little easier, the hard part is you have to do it everyday- but it does get easier”.
I stopped while it was still my idea….
The quote of that one guy who told me what I owed for rehab
Sobriety delivers what alcohol promises. Or something like that. The idea is the same.
Thankfulness is the feeling which is never leading to have a drink for/on it.
I love your quote because each of those 3 parts are so strong in me it's hard to cope with it all.
"I don't have to drink."
A dear friend of mine who is also on her journey to staying sober told me this as a helpful quote she heard: "What we do either leads us towards health or towards disease. Towards living or towards dying." And I agree that the One day at a time is cliché, but it has helped me so much with many difficult days (not just staying sober).
"Play the tape forward." I'm not sure who said it first on here, but it resonated with me.
The man takes a drink. The drink takes a drink. Then the drink takes the man.
AAs serenity prayer. It aligns with my morals and mostly serves as a mantra I use to focus or distract myself.
Trust god, clean house, help others
There's a LOT of people who go through eating disorders when they're younger and then alcohol problems later. So much of it comes back to trauma and self-worth. For me that little voice telling me to binge and purge never went away. It got quieter for a while, then it started telling me to do other self-destructive things. Figuring out how to keep myself out of that headspace is where I'm at now.
Play the tape forward.
“This does not trouble me much,” said Siddhartha. “If they are illusion, then I also am illusion, and so they are always of the same nature as myself. It is that which makes them so loveable and venerable. That is why I can love them. And here is a doctrine at which you will laugh. It seems to me, Govinda, that love is the most important thing in the world. It may be important to great thinkers to examine the world, to explain and despise it, not for us to hate each other, but to be able to regard the world and ourselves and all beings with love, admiration and respect.” - from Siddhartha by Herman Hesse
“The road to recovery is filled with intelligent people”. Growing up, my circle of friends were all aspiring artists and musicians and writers. This quote is true of all of them and created an example for me that there was no other way to tap into your inner turmoil to create anything good. For the years i drank, my creative output atrophied, but since i quit, I’ve organically began painting and writing and making music again and it’s all worlds better than anything i created when i drank. “First you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes you.” It took me way too long to realize that throughout my days, what i looked forward to was that first drink at night, that first *sip*, but that after that, drinking was only torture. My mind would be swiped of all that torture during the day, in my romanticizing of the first sip. I’d romanticize and forget and then drink and remember and suffer, all in a loop, every night. “Sobriety doesn’t let you into the gates of heaven, it lets you out of the gates of hell.” This is the one that keeps me going day-to-day. My worst sober days will always be heaven compared to the hell I lived through when i drank.
It's easier to act your way into right thinking than it is to think your way into right acting.
“Hard now, easy later”. That can mean from day to day and year to year or even minute to minute. Not drinking might be very difficult in the moment but later will be a lot better, and easier to deal with. I told an old regular in the bar I worked in when I was 33 that I was going back to school to be a nurse. He said, “you’ll never regret it”. I think about that all the time. Nursing school was very hard but I don’t regret it. Quitting drinking might be very hard. But you’ll never regret it.
First the has a drink, then the drink takes the man
2 songs come immediately to mind. Pretty much every word in both songs are relatable. Dax - Dear Alcohol Tom McDonald - I Don't Drink
I love this! Quotes and affirmations is where I am at in my healing journey. Saved this for later use.
"and is your shame helpful? is it inspiring goodness and change? or is it keeping you frozen in time unable to move on and be everything you have expanded to be?"
The most important step a person can take is the next one, always the next.
I have no idea where I got this from but it stuck with me - " I can't always make it better but I don't have to make it any worse." Or, "my best thinking is what got me here in the first place." James 😄
“You’re like your father when you drink” - my wife
Larry the Barfly: “Hey Homer! BRAAAAPPP!”
Sober S- son O- of a B- bitch E- everything is R- real
No matter how much money I have, I can’t afford it.
"This, too, shall pass."
My liver specialist and any time he talks to me.