Howdy Dave,
Originally Posted by
Dave520 
Any advice on staying sober for good?
Yes. Find somebody in AA who has had a spiritual awakening as the result of taking the 12 Steps and have him walk you through that process. I have never seen this fail. Dr. Bob, one of the cofounders of AA had this to say after he had worked with a few hundred hopeless drunks:
Originally Posted by AA BB 1st Ed
But if you really and truly want to quit drinking liquor for good and all, and sincerely feel that you must have some help, we know that we have an answer for you. It never fails if you go about it with one half the zeal you have been in the habit of showing when getting another drink.
Originally Posted by
Dave520 I find that I drink out of boredom and the fact that I'm lonely. I find that I drink also to shut off my mind. Sometimes my mind just won't stop racing.
That's what I thought as well. I drank because I was bored, anxious, couldn't sleep, excited, needed to celebrate, deserved to relax, was angry, somebody wronged me, the world wasn't fair. I drank for any number of seemingly good reasons. But none of them made a whole lot of sense given the consequences of my drinking. I came to learn that I drank because I was powerless not to. I had a mental obsession with it. As the result of the Steps, that obsession has been gone for a long time.
Let me ask you, if being bored is a good reason to drink, given the almost certain consequences of what happens when you drink. Maybe there is something else going on.