Inspiration!!

[NEOMARXIST]

I need some inspiration from some people on SR as I am trying to gain some inspiration about sobriety by reading my previous posts etc and my diaries of my early days but I am struggling to really buyinto it all at the moment. Don't worry I ain't considering drinking but I recognise my thoughts and mood radically changing so i need to get onto it pronto.

I am not looking for "go to AA and do the steps" replies tbh as I am already fully aware of what the AA route entails very well and don't need to have it spelled out to me.

I am writing on SR, so some inspiration to kick me up the backside so to speak!haha!

I am feeling agitated and narked again. I have just looked and I am 4 calendar months to the day sober exactly. It would be pretty stupid to go back to my old ways TBH what with having made it this far. I don't want to deep-down but my mood is a little strange to say the least at the moment and I am becoming a little depressed with life and wondering if I have over reacted to my past behaviours and I know I could not control it but maybe I never really tried hard enough? I know I am starting to sound like all the 1000's of others who have been and gone over the months on SR!!hahaha.

Listening to Bob Marley at the moment to try to get some inspiration!

Thanks for letting me post and I apologise if my posts aren't all super-duper life is so great sober and I am so grateful for the fact I am an alcoholic/addict.

xxx

[Anna]

Hi,

I'm glad you posted about this.

Recognize the addict voice for what it is. When you hear it, recognize it, let it go and move on. Remember it's not you. You've worked for 4 months to be where you are today, and it's likely that the addict voice is picking up strength as this 4 months anniversary arrived.

Go out for a walk, keep listening to good music, call someone, do whatever it takes to get through this funk. You can do this!

[mariechi]

Who led you to believe that life was fairy-tale perfect sober?? Bad days happen to sober people.

How quickly we forget pain. That's why women will have more than one child. Do you really have to experience again that which made you quit drinking in the first place? Can't you just take your own word for it? That's what I have to do these days. Was it really so bad? Well, apparently I thought so. If I can't learn from my own history, I'm bound to repeat it.

Aren't there at least 10 things about being sober that outweigh what you think you'll get from the drink?

I don't know. Be well.

[NEOMARXIST]

The type of alcoholic I was is that I don't really have a probolem with life per se and I was not drinking everyday to block out life but instead I used my drinking binges as a recreational activity. The activity of listening to my music whils't just geting smashed without a care in the world for those few hours is what I am craving the most and I miss it because although it sounds such a simple pleasure, i8t is one I used to love. It is just the aftermath and the spilling over of the drinking into benders which affect every aspect of my life and other peoples life is what made them a very self-harming activity.

I guess because I have such a deep, deep connection to my music and the bands I love that I cannot help feeling I am missing "something" that I used to get. I guess maybe many people just won't understand what I mean but that in a nutshell is what I miss the most. I used to love the deeper connection I could "feel" with music and drinking/drugging. The funny thing is though I actually know I can connect with it and have been listening to music 1000* more since I have gotten sober as when i was drinking I couldn't listen to music when sober as I just didn't want to know if I couldn;t drink.

Anyone else relate to this?

[mmeat]

Hey NEO...I'm sitting here with a huge hangover because I have to self control when it comes to alcohol. I thought I deserved a night out with the boys, so I started pre drinking right after supper. I didn't even get to the bar until almost 11.
I was hammered and basically blacked out. All I remember is getting escorted out and getting into a cab. Anyway woke up today feeling horrible, tried to clean the house and all that jazz while kids are running around everywhere and I'm cranky as hell. Not good.
Its 5PM and I still don't feel like myself, and now the shakes are starting. I guess what I'm getting at is that I would love to be in your shoes right now with four months sober!!
Steve

[NEOMARXIST]

It has nothing to do with having a bad day or anything. My day has been fine and my life is relatively confortable compared to many.

I guess I could either not write on SR in fear of sounding like my sobriety is not all rosy and grateful and all the other stuff... But that would be false and false is what I ain't. I say what I am feeling and I guess thats why I have made it as far in my sobriety as I have.

I would say all this has more to do with my mood/midset than actually drinking. Drinking is not the issue, I know i will not do that, but instead my mood, which I notice gets pretty low generally around the winter/christmas period.

[mariechi]

You don't have to pretend that your life is all rosy and grateful. We're all trying to work through our stuff and help each other do the same. I can't really speak to the music connection.

Do you have Seasonal Affective Disorder, SAD? I have a friend who starts to feel down when the days get shorter. She uses some kind of light therapy. Or is it more of a holiday blues thing. That gets people sometimes.

[firestorm090]

Hi Neo,

I welcome you to read some of my past posts, because drinking litereally made me insane, I didn't think right and still have trouble sometimes putting my thoughts into words that don't sound like total gibberish, lol.

It sounds like you miss the mellowness that we first obtained when we started drinking. It's a tantalizing escape into a world where we feel at ease with ourselves, and we go back to the bottle repeatedly to try to capture the ease we felt the first time. That's where it gets ugly, because the ease turns into disease, and we're stuck. We're not happy when we don't drink and we're not happy when we do. It's easy, all too easy, to think, "Hey, it used to work, think I'll give it one more go to see if I can recapture the feelings (or lack of) that I used to experience with the first drink". We minimize the pain, chaos, losses and despair that result from overindulgence and in time we drink again.

I can't count all the many times I've felt just like you. And I can't tell you how much I wish I could stop the inner discontentment that I feel most days, even or especially when not drinking. But my drinking has brought me to my knees literally and that's why I'm here, trying to learn how to get four months, four years, four decades without a drink, one day at a time, because the last three decades of boozing has literally made my life a mess. My feelings swing like Tarzan in the jungle, from vine to vine, and sometimes I hit a tree and it's a bi!ch, but I know it will get better if I keep doing whatever it takes not to drink today.

I hope you can find different ways to recapture the sense of ease and comfort you miss. They are available, sometimes it starts just by helping someone else, and it feels good. It's a sense of peace that I've never found in any bottle of booze. It's fleeting, so I have to keep doing it to get that feeling back, but that's ok. Hang in there.

[NEOMARXIST]

I think I am going through the "transition" period for real now. I think that's why I am feeling a little strange with things at the moment. I recognise the alcoholic voice for what it is and I find that reading some really good posts/shares from people who are being open andf honest about life and their situation helps to sort of quiten that devious alcoholic voice up and puts things into perspective.

Thanks alot to you Firestorm090 for that reply as I could relate to you and that helps to quiten things down in my mind and focus things to the realities of what drinking will really bring to me.

I think it becomes easy to forget that drinking for an alcoholic ain't gonna turn out brilliantly but it beomes easy to forget the feelings of pain, suffering, humilation, shame, guilt, anxity, paranoia to name a few when you ain't suffered them for 4 months.

I am gratefull for the things that soberness brings me such as non of the above feelings/emotions I have mentioned and I think that I have a very self-destructive personality hence why I am like I am. But at least i recognise that and I ain't gonna give into it "One day at a time"!!!!!


peace and love xxx

[grrrr]

Hey NEO, I also had no big consequences from my drinking/using. I kept a good job, good friends, and most people I wanted support from had to be convinced that I had any kind of problem. I enjoyed the challenge of smoking pot every morning before work and having a secret. I was very functional, but I wasn't really participating in life. Today, I am enjoying emotions and being present in my life rather than just getting by. I kept up all the outside appearances to prove that I didn't have a problem, but it was basically impossible to enjoy the facade.

For me it is about doing what I enjoy and actually enjoying it now that I am sober. Like you said, connecting with music sober can probably be deeper than when you were messed up. I understand the habit of my head telling me how I would think clearer or have a more intense experience if I were high. I don't believe it anymore though because I am more connected to my life/soul sober than I ever was drunk/high.

Take care.

[firestorm090]

Hey Neo,

I've got the same kind of self-destructive personality and it's damn near killed me, so I'm trying now to change it, for fear of allowing it to ultimately put me in a pine box buried in pauper's field.

I think you've hit on a solution that helps me alot and that's when I can get out of myself just enough to feel a little gratitude for the gifts I have in life. Being thankful for what I do have takes my mind off stressing over the things I don't. Once again, it's fleeting, so I need constant reminders, my short-term memory must've been fried years ago, lol.

Also, it doesn't hurt to start planning the next big outing to have some fun. Me, I'm literally going to Disneyland for the Holiday Spectacular, (as they call it, lol). It's only a couple hours drive for me, and since I'm still a kid a heart, it seems like the perfect place to celebrate a day of rides, food and fun. No booze allowed!! I'm taking my brother, who doesn't drink, just to help me learn how to have some fun sober. Planning fun is something I have to work at, cause I substituted booze for fun for years and now wouldn't know a good time sober if it snuck up on me and slapped me silly, lol.

[vegibean]

Hey again NEO, lol!!! You know I really don't have anything inspiring for you. I hear ya on not wanting to hear the "same ol' some ol'" though..........so NONE OF THAT!!!!

I know when I've been where you're at I've just had to tell myself that at this moment I need to just accept that I'm feeling complacent and that it will pass. I would also remind myself that while I might be "bored" at the moment, life would be sure to change that to where I may want boredom or prefer it.

Like the roller coaster and how life can be compared, there will be moments of ups and downs and then those moments where it's in between.

I'm sure if you hang in there long enough you'll be out of the funk. You're doing great!!

[NEOMARXIST]

Thanks again firestorm for your posts and you too VB. I am feeling a lot better now, my moods are going from one extreme to the other recently!haha.

It has really helped get me "grounded" again by reading your posts as it is amazing how the clarity to my thinking returns by reading how other people who have been through/going through it phrase things and word things in a way which will make me see the light again.

I can really relate to what you say about not knowing how to have fun without booze being involved Firestorm. I think that is one of the things for me as being a male englishmen I certainly grew up and was proud to drink booze when i was in my teens as I felt like a proper man! haha. kind of hard maybe for the Americans to understand the working-class, masculine associations with drink in the UK.

I guess it's because I struggle to really recognise/know what fun is as for years I have always associated fun as being drunk. Like I say I feel like i am going through a transition period where I am saying goodbye to my old habits/lifestyle/fun and trying to leave it behind. of course it isn't easy leaving something which you have shaped your whole persona/character/ideas around. But i am getting there.

Thanks for the replies. xxx

[Mark75]

Originally Posted by NEOMARXIST

I guess because I have such a deep, deep connection to my music and the bands I love that I cannot help feeling I am missing "something" that I used to get. I guess maybe many people just won't understand what I mean but that in a nutshell is what I miss the most. I used to love the deeper connection I could "feel" with music and drinking/drugging.

Anyone else relate to this?

Yes, I am a music lover too.

I rotated my tires and changed the oil in my truck today. It was a beautiful warm sunny day.

I have a killer sound system in my garage... home built subs, 4 100 watt PA amps I bought off ebay for basically postage and 10 satellite speakers, with upgraded drivers, crossovers, EQ... it rocks.

1976 Ithica NY... Grateful Dead at Barton Hall... killer Scarlet Bagonias, Estimated Prophet.... I live in the country... the music echoed through the trees...

I can still soar with the music, Jerry's noodling, Phil's bass rattles the siding... sunshine (the real stuff, not Owsley's... )... It was awesome. Didn't miss anything and I got some work done at the same time. Now the sun is down and I feel fine, no dirty leftover buzz or need to sleep anything off.

I'll grill some pork chops in the porch light... Tonight I'll watch the Eagles destroy ... well, I hope so.... the Cowboys with my youngest, 15 yo son....

It took me a year to get here.

I can only tell you what my experience is... That was mine today.... Music is huge in my life and has been at the center of much of my 52 years on the planet.... Is it the same now? not always.... is it better now? it's not worse... is it still real?.... oohhh yea!!!

So, if I can pass on some hope, then I achieved the purpose of my post...

Congrats on your 4 months neo... Way to go!!

Mark

[Ninsuna]

Bob Marley, hmm? "...Emancipate yourself from mental slavery, none but oursleves can free our minds..."

There is a Joe Strummer (of The Clash) version of Redemption Song, and the way he does that line you know he has fought addiction.

[Threshold]

I relate to the music thing, to the using as part of getting into a full intense mindstate experience. I miss that, but know that I can't use because of the other ways it messes with my life.

I haven't got a lot of clean time so I haven't found a way to replace that. I have things I do that I can totally get into, and that I love, but there do seem to be some aspects of that high that are gone from my life and I may just have to get over.

I'm a bit older than you, 43, and I've had this experience repeatedly in my life, having to accept that a certain ability or experience is no longer available to me, for any number of reasons. It is scary, and there is a grieving process, but there are new areas of life and full rich experiences to be had.

That's not a band aid, I mean it. Yes, real doors have closed to me. I literally can never eat onion rings again. and that seems small, but it's something I miss. But there are other things I know and have discovered that are awesome, that have come into my life. I don't constantly have to make do or settle for a lesser experience.

But yeah, there are things that I've had to leave behind that I really just miss and mourn and get melancholy over. Some things simply won't have a replacement or substitute.

Sex is something that has gotten better over time, that was a wonderful surprise. I have really been able to get into hiking, driving, laying out for meteor showers, those are really amazing intense experiences for me, that I didn't get that kind of reaction to when I was younger.

And certain foods..I've become a pepper and chocolate afficianado, I collect them and try all different types and it's been really interesting to me.

concerts..even if I don't use, sometimes they can mess me up.

In June I went to see NIN with my sons, and I hadn't used for a while, and didn't use that night, but I got SO into it, that same feeling,. it brought it all back, even without using, that it actually gave me the hunger again, and a few nights later, remembering how awesome I'd felt at the concert I started using again to recapture that...because I don't have the luxury of being able to afford a concert experience all that regularly.

So, I really appreciate what you are going through, and I haven't got an answer except to say that there are other varieties of amazing experiences to be had, but no, they don't seem to make me miss some of the genuinely good experiences that unfortunately were attached to using for me.

[firestorm090]

Hey Neo,

That masculine thing, yea, we got it; "work hard, don't cry, have a beer and watch the game, pound a few after work and don't belch in public, lol" Regardless of where we are, it seems the booze companies are always playing the "Be a Man!" angle, and we buy into it when we're young, and it sets the course for our perceptions of "real men" that persist till we run full speed smack into a twelve foot wall with the booze. Here in the US, it's hard to watch any sporting event without all the beer commercials, whiskey, Jack D.... on and on they roll. Be a Man, pound a shot and you're really cool now....not, lol.

It's hard to reshape our perceptions of what a real man is, so it helps me to visualize the real story of when I drink, in order to differentiate that from my false perceptions. I recall the attitude of superiority I often had while drinking, the false sense of bravado, the real fears of losing valued relationships, friendships, the loss of respect from others, the loss of self-respect, and ultimately the loss of any sane thinking on my part. It's insane to think my local favorite bar is like family to me, when no one there really cares if I show up at all, except the owner and bartenders who want me to spend every dime I have. It's insane to tell people I'm sick, when I'm really just hungover and feel like garbage, because once again I drank too much. It's insane to think my checks are made of rubber, they're not, but I sure tried to bounce as many of them as possible when I really needed a drink and didn't have any money left, because once again I'd blown it all at the bar. These are just a few of the ways my drinking took my "manhood" and made me into a drunk ahole with a ton of self-pity instead of self-respect. I think my perception of manhood was definitely a little off, lol.

I know how it feels to be lost, I've been there thousands of times, but it's easier to read a map when you're not stoned out of your mind, lol.

[NEOMARXIST]

Off to an AA meeting now. Hopefully get some inspiration. Feeling a lot better today though TBH.


peace xxx

[joedris]

Neo, I think what you're trying to come to terms with here is that you can no longer live the life of music, mellow, and addiction. Together they were a beautifiul thing in their own warped way, and that was the life you loved. Sorry guy, but you can't have that anymore. Deep down you know that and you miss it. But it's something you have to learn to deal with. Keep the music and mellow. Find something to replace the booze and drugs. It's the music that's important to the mood, not the other stuff.

And remember the miracle stuff? Little baby steps? Let the miracle happen here, too. The miracle's not just about sobriety. It's about the whole life thing.

[Jomey]

Hey Neo, glad to hear you are feeling better today. I can relate to what you are saying in that I went through a couple of "funks" during my two+ years sober. Not a bad day, not related to wanting to drink, per se, but just "down" times when nothing seemed all that bright and rosy. The first time or two I experienced this, I was filled with panic. What's going wrong? I'm sober, I'm working on my recovery, what's up with this? Since, I have learned that sitting with the feelings, letting them come, and exist in me without paying too much attention to them takes away a lot of their "power" over me. Not an easy skill to learn, at least not for me, but training myself to think this way has drastically improved my life.

Also, I have had a lot of things that I enjoyed throughout my life taken away from me recently by illness. Man was I mad! So unfair! Here, I am still struggling somewhat, but making progress in counting my blessings instead of my losses and trying to find compromises that are close as I can get to what I would like to do without my body giving out. For me, it was a shock to my instant gratification seeking addict self that I can't get what I want - a return to health and full level of participation in my life- NOW! Or maybe even yesterday would be good! I hope you can find some compromise in enjoying your music without the attached "lifestyle". Let me know if you figure anything out...I'd be interested to hear your thoughts.

Good luck!
Jomey

[coming_clean]

life is awsome...

how´s that for inspiration

[keithj]

Originally Posted by NEOMARXIST

I am not looking for "go to AA and do the steps" replies tbh as I am already fully aware of what the AA route entails very well and don't need to have it spelled out to me.

I can respect that Neo, and wouldn't try to convince you otherwise. I will, however, note an observation that I see around this forum. The people that have remained sober for an extended period of time (years not months) seem to have in common the willingness to do anything to stay sober. It doesn't matter how they work their recovery, be it AA or something else. The common factor is that they are willing to go to any length. And they work hard at it and make it their top priority.

When I got sober, I would have done anything. I still will. If someone had told me that a bunch of people were having success with sacrificing chickens and eating their entrails, I probably would have tried it.

The point I'm making is that ruling out anything strikes me as a reservation. I don't think having reservations works very well. The mindset of, "I'm willing to do this and this for sobriety, but not this other thing," is somewhat limiting. You know what I'm saying? I'm willing to recover, as long as I can recover the way I want to kind of thinking.

For me, it was the willingness to do exactly the things I didn't want to do that led me to real happiness with sobriety.

[NEOMARXIST]

Joedris thanks for that post...you speak with much wisdom and knowledge. Thankyou. You are spot-on in what you say. I recognise what you say and I am learning to deal with it and to grow through it. Thankyou. What is gone is gone and I know deep-down in my heart that the mellow goodtimes are long since passed and that addict part of me gets sad and pines for them when given the strength too ie- lack of gratitute, acceptance, honesty, projecting out of the present day etcetc.

Also thanks Jomey too. I like what you say about sitting with the "uncomfortable" thoughts/feelings and not letting them gain too much of my time and just letting them come and go without making anything out of them diminishes their power/influence. I can relate to that and will be a technique I will apply to my recovery from now on.

I gained great inspiration from the AA meeting I attended tonight. There were some good shares and I shared about where i am currently at. AA for me personally needs to be a take what I want and leave the rest as when anything starts to become "forced" upon me that is where the addict in me reacts and thoughts of anti-establishment, authority show up and the F*ck-it and F*ck-them mentality arrises in me. I am learning to recognise what works for me and to understand my mind more and more.


Thanks again to all of you from whom I gained inspiration.

peace xxx