Stop Drinking Podcast by Soberclear
The Stop Drinking Podcast by Soberclear is here to help you stop drinking alcohol and achieve the life of your dreams. We want to support people getting sober so they can get on with their life without feeling miserable. If you want to learn more about stop drinking coaching, head over to https://www.soberclear.com/
Stop Drinking Podcast by Soberclear
I failed to quit alcohol 100+ times. This is why…
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Welcome to the Stop Drinking Podcast, where we help you make stopping drinking a simple, logical and easy decision. We help you with tips, tools and strategies to start living your best life when alcohol-free. If you want to learn more about stop drinking coaching, then head over to wwwsoberclearcom. So the very first reason why I failed to stop drinking alcohol more times than I can count was this idea that I'll just have one drink. See, I failed to stop drinking alcohol more times than I can count. I am not exaggerating. I have got no idea how many times I've failed, but it has been over a hundred for sure because there were so many days where I'd wake up and just promise myself that's it, no more, I'm never drinking again, that I've just lost count. I do not know how many times that I've done that. If we've not met yet, my name is Leon Sylvester. It's great to meet you. I am the founder of SoberClearcom, which is a coaching company that helps business owners and professionals get control of their drinking in as little as 24 hours. Now, I know that sounds hard to believe, so if you click the link down below, there's a free video training that you can access. It will explain the method. It will explain the scientific rationale behind it. It talks about a scientific report that my company's commissioned that's written by an academic psychologist. You can also find that on Google Scholar. We get a 96% success rate. But if you want information on that, go to SoberClear rehab click the link down below. But I just want you to know that I've been in your shoes.
Speaker 1:I struggled for close to 10 years and I've not drank now for pretty much seven years. I can't even remember when I stopped drinking, if it was June, july, august. I've got my date in some old phone that's like put away. I can't even remember because I don't care. I don't look at the days, I'm not counting the days. All I did was about seven years ago is I made a decision and I stuck with the decision.
Speaker 1:However, during the 10 years that I did drink, this idea of having just one drink came up so many times. A friend gives me a text Leon want to go out for a beer. I think, yeah, sure, a beer sounds great and that is truly what I thought I was going to do. I'll go and drink a beer. I think if I did that 100 times, maybe 95 times, I would have continued drinking, maybe five times out of 100, I would stop at one beer, but justifying this thing of having just one drink, that was my go-to. It was really rare that I'd planned to go on a big binge. It would just happen, and it would all start with this idea of having just a drink.
Speaker 1:It caused many relapses. You know, if I'd stopped drinking for a few weeks, a few months, a few days, whatever this idea of having just one drink would bring me back. But also when I wasn't so bothered about stopping drinking and I was just drinking, this idea of having just a drink would then lead to more and it would snowball. And I really wasn't that guy that planned his entire life around alcohol. I know I've worked with people that are like that. I know, for people that might be a bit older than me, that's what they do is. They do plan their life around alcohol. I didn't. I always planned to have just one drink.
Speaker 1:Anyway, let me get into the second reason. The second reason why I failed to stop drinking more times than I can count is that I used to tell myself that this time, this time of all times, is going to be different. This time something will change. So what would happen is maybe, you know, I would have got three months of not drinking, you know, life would be going well again. And then this amazing idea would just be given to me. It would just come out of the blue oh, leon, maybe this time is going to be different. Maybe this time, of all the other times, the hundred other times that you've drank and effed your life up, maybe this time will be different. I'm mocking myself here, right? I'm not trying to belittle you if you've gone through this as well. That's not my intention. It was just this. If I look back, like what was I thinking? This time is going to be different. The drug's not changed. My perception's not changed. It's still the same highly, highly addictive drug that most of the adult population are addicted to. That kills 95,000 Americans each year. Millions of people die from it globally. The drug's not changed, but this time is going to be different.
Speaker 1:I mean, it was a lie, right, and I probably knew in my heart that it was an excuse, it wasn't a reason to drink. I don't know, I can't remember. Maybe at the time I did believe it and that would just give me that little push over the edge to actually drink again. But oh my gosh, that little push over the edge to actually drink again. But oh my gosh, I'm under no illusion these days. If I drink again, it ain't going to be different. It's history repeats. So I am so glad that I got over that hurdle, because I've not drank for seven years and guess what? There ain't no going back now. It ain't going to be different if I drink again. But the good thing about now is that I feel more like I have a choice. I don't feel like I'm resisting or fighting the urge to not drink anymore, because I've reframed how I view alcohol, which is what I help people do in my coaching company with this YouTube channel. It feels like a choice. I don't resist, I don't fight. There's no willpower, there are no cravings, I just don't want to drink, which has completely evaporated this idea that this time is going to be different.
Speaker 1:Anyway, number three, the third reason. This one is huge, this one is going to be relevant to everybody, but the sixth one, please stay. Stick around to the very end of the video, because the sixth one, that's one that most people are going to miss. But the third thing that would bring me back to drinking was this feeling of missing out. What I mean by this is this always wouldn't be acute. There was one time that I relapsed at a New Year's Eve party and that was when I felt an acute feeling of missing out. So what I mean is that I was at a social event. It was a New Year's Eve party.
Speaker 1:I was in some private members club in London. I'm not from London, I'm not from the city. I was like 20 something at the time. I was not a member of this club or anything like that, but I went to this party because my friend was a member. He was doing much better in life than I was and I felt like what the heck am I doing here? Right, I was just like some young university student that was doing a personal training business.
Speaker 1:And I'm from a small town in the north of England. I'm from a place called Kirkham Very small town, maybe it has, I think it's like the population might be 7,000,. Right, I'm from a pretty small place. A lot of people ask, ask where am I from? Where is this accent from? Well, I'm a Northerner, from Lancashire.
Speaker 1:Anyway, back to the point. I'm with this friend in London. I go to this private members club. It's a New Year's Eve party. Everybody's dressed so extravagantly, everyone's having a good time. Of course they're having a good time. It's New Year. You're in the middle of London, in the middle of a city.
Speaker 1:It was a blast, but I wasn't drinking. But what? I would look at everybody having this good time. I'd look around me. You know, this table here, that table here, this person stood up dancing and what did they all have in their hand? They didn't have a bottle of water. They all had alcohol in their hand Champagne. You see that table all laughing and joking. There'd be a bottle of champagne in the middle and then glasses all around and I got this acute feeling that I was missing out on something.
Speaker 1:So, even though I hadn't drank for six, seven, eight months, however long it had been, life was going well. I got this huge feeling of missing out. Boom, I'll just have one drink. This time's going to be different, but it came from this feeling of missing out and if you can relate to that, I want you to realize something that you are not missing out on anything. In hindsight, I was having a good time without it and they were having a good time because it was New Year's and they're with all their friends. Who's not going to have a good time? The alcohol added nothing to it. But this FOMO, right? This fear of missing out it's not always acute, right? It's not always like these massive moments of like.
Speaker 1:I'm surrounded by alcohol. Oh my gosh, why aren't I drinking? It doesn't usually go that way. More often than not it can happen while you're watching a movie. Right, you're sat there, you see your favorite character pour a drink. There. You see your favorite character pour a drink and you're like I stopped drinking, why can't I do that? Maybe you just see an advertisement.
Speaker 1:You walk past alcohol in the aisle in the store and you see the alcohol and you're like I don't drink, but I want to. You ain't missing out on anything when you stop drinking alcohol. You have got nothing to miss out on. It is a poison, it is ethanol and it does nothing for you at all. And I'm not over-exaggerating when I say this, I'm not saying it like alcohol does give you 5% and is 95% bad. No, it gives you nothing. It's a poison, it is ethanol. There is no advantage to drinking that drug.
Speaker 1:But that feeling was so strong because I had never fixed the way I viewed alcohol. I still saw it as a good thing. So I always felt like I was missing out. That is a fixable problem. If you can change the way you view alcohol, that feeling goes away.
Speaker 1:Anyway, number four, the fourth reason. So this one came up, but not too many times. But another thing that would cause me to fail was some sort of emotional pain, maybe grief, maybe anger, maybe loneliness. But one of the problems I had was that I wasn't sure how to deal with negative emotions without turning to alcohol. Now I say that alcohol has got no benefits to it. There is no question about it. But if I was feeling lonely and I went to a bar and had a drink and spoke to the waiter or whatever, or the server or the bartender, then it would alleviate some loneliness, but not necessarily because I was drinking alcohol, but more because I was going out. If I was sat in a room on my own and just opened up a can of beer and drank it, that's not going to alleviate loneliness. But what it would have done is given me a moment of relief. But that doesn't fix the emotion right. That's not fixing any loneliness that I would have felt in that moment.
Speaker 1:What was happening is this might be a little bit deep for this video. If you've read any stop drinking books, this will make sense to you, but that feeling of ah was actually the relieval of withdrawal, and drinking alcohol is a way to escape. It gives you these moments of relief that last for a few minutes, but isn't it crazy that we would exchange a few minutes of relief to put us in an early grave, to drink a known carcinogen, to drink the biggest source of pain in our life, or at least that's what I was doing, because it was the biggest source of pain in my life? We're doing something that we don't want our children to do. We don't want the people around us to do this. Yet there we are doing it, and it just makes no sense.
Speaker 1:It's a highly addictive drug that does nothing for you. It doesn't fix any problems. If you're feeling negative, if you're feeling some emotional pain, drinking alcohol is not going to fix that. Now, I'll often talk on this thing about how stopping drinking in therapy there can be a link, but for most people there's not really a link. There's no need to see a therapist, there's no need to go to the past, but in this instance, I see the value. What I think is better, though, is that you fix your relationship with alcohol. First, you change the way that you view the drug and then, if you've got things that you need to go and deal with and sit with a therapist and get it out there, you do it after you've stopped drinking. I don't see the link between the two, but, anyway, maybe a lot of people disagree with me on that. Whatever, I'm just sharing what worked for me, what's worked for the people I've helped. Let's get into number five.
Speaker 1:The fifth reason was it was like this feeling of just like. Do you know what? I don't give a, but I'd get this feeling of just like. I just don't care anymore. What's the point? And the reason why I would feel this way is because I would always struggle to not drink. It would always be this fight and this battle right. So when I felt that way, eventually it would be like the willpower would just run out. I'd be gritting through it, fighting this urge to not drink alcohol, and eventually I'd just be like do you know what? I'm just throwing in the towel. I'm giving up on giving up, I'm drinking. Who cares? But that was always because I was taking the wrong approach to not drink.
Speaker 1:I was mostly using willpower, tried AA, tried the religious approach, but most of the time when I'd stop drinking alcohol is I would just resist it. I would fight the urge. That's what we all do. We're strong people. You're a strong man, you're a strong lady. You've built a good life, you've got a career, a family. You've done a lot of things in your life that have taken willpower, maybe a degree, maybe when you were younger, maybe you were playing sport. So surely I can apply the same logic to my drinking problem. Right, I'll just fight it, but I promise you one day the willpower will run out, and that's when we get this idea of like oh do you know what? Who cares?
Speaker 1:The sixth reason why I failed to stop drinking alcohol more times than I can count was not because life was going bad. When I stopped drinking alcohol, life would start going in the direction that I wanted it to go in. Things would start improving and the drinking wouldn't necessarily come from a place of pain. More often than not, it would come from a place of celebration, of success, of ha, things are going well again, and that's the one that we've got to look out for, especially if you're doing what I recommend on this channel, which is changing how you view alcohol and then going towards a better quality of life. Because if you're doing that, if you are going towards a better quality of life, then you'll get to a place where things are going well. You'll look at yourself in the mirror, you know you'll have lost some weight, your bank balance will be looking much more healthy, your relationships will be going better. And listen, you just got to be careful of this because you've got to remember this crucial fact Alcohol doesn't change.
Speaker 1:It is the same drug that it was before. Nothing has changed about it. It's got the same addictive properties. And the most important thing to realise is that you will gain nothing if you drink it Nothing. If life is in a good place, then go and take your family out for a meal. Whatever you do, don't try and celebrate with alcohol, because if life is going well and you've not been drinking alcohol, guess what's to blame? You not drinking, so don't screw it up. Sorry to sound condescending, but I just want to look out for you. Thanks for checking out the Stop Drinking Podcast by Sober Clear. If you want to learn more about how we work with people to help them stop drinking effortlessly, then make sure to visit wwwsoberclearcom.
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