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You Can Feel Sorry for Alcohol Loss and Feel Good About Quitting

by | Stop Drinking Alcohol | 4 comments

Can you feel sorry for the alcohol loss while you feel great about the actual quitting?

So can you feel sorry about losing the alcohol from your life, but still feel really good about the fact that you’re on a new journey?

One of the things that people sort of find difficulty in getting over – when they stop drinking or smoking or taking any drug, or when they’re losing weight, or they’re trying to get exercise into their lives – all these kind of changes that people make.

Is that, there is a need to focus only on the quitting and that you can’t have any doubts about what you’re doing that you can’t miss what you’re leaving behind you.

I still miss certain aspects of drinking – of the drinking life.

I don’t miss the alcohol.

There’s when I smell wine now, you know a lot of people will tell you this.

That it smells like what it is – it smells like Vinegar.

When I smell Beer with alcohol in it – it’s not as bad as the wine, but it’s getting up close there.

I can just about take, just about take – I enjoy having the odd alcohol free beer – as a celebration.

But I think it’s more the celebration and being included and that’s sort of the mental block that I am trying to get myself out of.

The same with Whisky or Gin.

I was never a bit spirits person, but Jesus, when I smell that stuff now, it just, it nearly turns my stomach.

So, but for me the whole thing was, it was all psychological withdrawal.

It’s always been psychological for me and it’s mostly what most people miss about the drinking

So it’s the times when I would go down to the Pub.

Meet up with my mates and we’d sit there and gradually get drunk and drunker, you know.

The perception is that every night is fun.

I know now that, that’s just not the case.

The two things are not mutually exclusive.

You can accept that you’re on this new journey now – be excited about the new journey – but still miss certain aspects of the old alcohol life.

And that’s exactly what it is.

I still feel sorry as I say, you have to accept that sometimes when you were drinking, you were actually having a good time or you wouldn’t have been doing it. You know?

What we are trying to aim towards now, is to have as good as time, if not better – without the alcohol

And I’m talking about – when you don’t drink alcohol – and you go to these situations.

You’ve no fear of a hangover; you’ve no fear of getting stopped drinking and driving; you’ve no fear of forgetting everything that you remember or forgetting everything that’s going on as it’s going on and the day after and never remembering it again.

You know when you don’t drink alcohol and you are in these situations, you are completely present.

You’re in the moment, you are enjoying the situation for the situation, not for the alcohol.

That’s what I always did.

That’s what most people do when they drink.

They do enjoy the situation.

They do enjoy the people that are around them.

But the alcohol is the front and centre.

The alcohol is there as the focus of their attention.

This is the thing that you have to withdraw from and you know, this is the bull-shit part of it that you’ve got to come to terms with.

Is that the old you, the old situations that you were in, the old having a laugh, were not because of the alcohol, it was because of the situations that you were in.

Because if you put yourself into a room, on your own, with no entertainments whatsoever.

Just sat there drinking.

it would be as boring as fuck!

Think about it.

So it’s actually the entertainment of even watching TV and watching a programme that you like to watch or listening to music that you like to listen to.

When you’re drinking it’s an accompaniment to whatever else you are doing.

But what I’m saying is that those things – maybe not watching TV.

Sitting down and doing nothing in the evenings but watching boring TV programmes – that’s probably why you’re drinking in the first place.

So you’ve got to try and get yourself out of that.

You know so; all I’m trying to say with this is that when you don’t drink alcohol everything else matters.

Everything else becomes front and centre.

Especially the people in your life.

They become the focus of your life.

Of your entertainment, of your pleasure.

And they always were you know.

These are the people, these are the things that were always there, except you were focusing more on the alcohol because alcohol is a drug. Right?

Alcohol has got that effect.

You know none of the adverts are going to tell you this.

None of the adverts say that – without the alcohol in your life – your life becomes front and centre.

Not the alcohol any more.

So that’s it for today.

I’m closing it off there.

I’m just going to say that there is no reason why you can’t actually miss the times that went on before while you were drinking, because those times are still going to carry on.

Those times are going to be better than what went on before, because alcohol is not there.

Alcohol is not there to take off the sheen anymore.

It’s not there to, you know, once it’s given you a little bit of pleasure, it starts punching you in the gut the next day.

Think about that.

“The secret to change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but building on the new”

Until next time…
Stay safe.
Keep the alcohol out of your mouth.
Take Care.
Onwards and Upwards!

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4 Comments

  1. Peter Keithly

    Yes, stopping the ingestion of alcohol is the start of a new journey. More accurately, it is a return to the more natural life journey that you were on before alcohol became in integral part of your life. I am discovering what it means to feel more natural again and I really like the feeling. Clear headed and more productive. I think a nicer person too. I had some good times when under the influence, but the good feelings were artificially induced. I much prefer feeling good naturally.

    Reply
  2. Mick

    Thanks for the video. When I first stop drinking, I would have avoided the pub, too many triggers in one go is how I viewed it. (I learned about triggers from your book Kevin, so I always tried to anticipate and even mentally rehears dealing with them. This was a great technique when I first committed to be alcohol free.

    But now I go to the pub, I will have a pint of orange or a coffee. When I look around there is often a lot of people drinking soft drinks I just I didn’t see them when I was an alcohol user. Recently out walking with a mate we saw an interesting looking pub so we called in and had a coffee and very nice it was to. The pub has no triggers for me anymore. While I wouldn’t sit in the pub hour after hour because I would get bored. I have just discovered when I visit a new place I can call in a few pubs and enjoy a bit of banter with the locals (obviously not pissed up people)
    just the same as I did before. I am missing out on nothing. I wouldn’t recommend this until you 100% confident your relationship with alcohol is over and obviously I wouldn’t want to sit around with a load of people getting stupid drunk. But once you have put to bed your addiction there is no need to avoid anything.

    Most of my friends still drink and some are probably not happy that I drink orange, until very recently at gatherings, I would be unsure how to tell them I don’t want a drink, also I hated the idea that they thought I was somehow running on will power and at some stage give in.

    Christmas has given many opportunities to deal with such situations. I think I now have a solution. Its usually the same people who come with the question still not drinking etc then proceed to tell me how they love the different grapes and tannings and how life with a certain wine of beer would be unbearable. Basically saying I am a twat and giving up is stupid.

    Answer I now give is long, I explain how many people alcohol kills, 3.5 million a year, it causes 15% of cancer etc etc etc how even if you drink, even only at weekends, which they all do!! the fact that there telling me this on Wednesday poring wine down there throat seems to have escaped them. Anyway the fact that they only drink at weekends means that there body permanently has a chemical in it designed to turn down the artificial pleasure generated by the alcohol means they scientifically proven have to be more miserable than a none drinker.

    This response seams to have stopped the repeat offenders ha ha I love it, Alcohol free and proud, fuck em they want to take drugs let them, but I don’t have to listen in silence to there bollocks.

    Reply
  3. Sanne

    Thank you Kevin. Your videos really resonate with me, and so does your overall approach on quitting alcohol. I am also listening to ‘Alcohol Freedom’ on audio book. I have been thinking about quitting for a while now, and did take breaks. I finally had a real reality check with alcohol a week ago and decided to stop for good. You don’t know this, but thanks for all your help!

    Reply
    • Kevin O'Hara

      I appreciate you letting me know… 🙂

      Reply

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