StewartUK

I wasn't even thinking of slipping up but I was just cleaning out a few things in my room and I found a note i wrote to myself during a real bad time basically pleading with myself not to drink, anyone else do this? it's odd getting advice from yourself!

sleepie

No, I haven't- are you currently drinking? Maybe that note is your instinct toward life, living and all you have to offer, and all that life has to offer you! I have written a few things while inebriated that I had no recollection of putting on paper- maybe you can think of it as a lotus (your thought at the time) growing out of the swamp (your drinking)- go with it!

sleepie

Sorry- the lotus is a Buddhist reference... if it seems esoteric, I apologize. I only want the best for you

StewartUK

I think thats a good way of looking at it Nah im not currently drinking, been 2 weeks. Im usually really good then i hit 4/5 weeks and well slip, maybe i need to hold onto this note in my pocket. The note was written with a hangover i think

sleepie

Hold on to that note! A sober being is a conscious being- and I hear that you want to be conscious. It can be scary to "be in the moment"- but we are, regardless of intoxicants or not... We are always here, for now- in my humble observations. I think you found a valuable item- a reminder of where not to be- a reminder of what prevents living to the fullest. Wishing you the best

NEOMARXIST

Hi mate, Yer I relate exactly to that. I would write myself a note pleading with myself not to drink when hungover and feeling demoralised yet again. 2/3 weeks later I would be back drinking again. Gagging to get wrecked and telling myself to not over-dramatise things next time. I stopped bothering with notes.

I also used to write on the calendar and sign my name that I was never drinking again. I stopped bothering doing that too.

I finally was ready to do whatever it took to stay stopped and recovery from my alcoholism. I don't regret it at all. 11+ motnhs later and I am so glad I didn't keep drinking. I am glad to be out of that mental obsession and turmoil.

Toronto68

I've found journal entries, poems, epistolary stuff, and general ramblings and gibberish, in varying states of legibility before. Some of it mildly enlightening, some tiresome for me to look at, and some of it crud - but instructive, ha ha.

From what I recall, I don't think I asked myself not to drink anymore, but there was calling for help all over the place.

I have the date I stopped drinking and a list of things I was looking forward to and had been changing in different areas of my life on a few slips of paper, and they're folded up and tucked in a place I can pull them out of anytime. Since the time my posting on soberrecovery.com became pretty much an everyday thing, I notice I seldom reach for those papers, but they're like gold to me.