MrGhost

I read this a while back (I forgot where), but it can perfectly go to all of us alcoholics and substance abusers in general. It describes the rationality of reaching our goals Vs running away from the life we want. Anyways, I figured I'd pass it down since it helped opened up a lot of new positive perspectives for me when it came to the drink and my life, being scared, and having courage.

People not taking caculated risks, designed to persue their Dream, sometimes take foolish risks. They drive too fast, drink too much, abuse drugs, or engage in some other reckless behavior. "Take caculated risks", George Patton advised, "That is quite different from being rash."

Maybe the risk-taking mechanism in these rash individuals needs to be excercised- or maybe they want to prove (to themselves as much as to others) that they're not so cowardly after all. If they really wanted to display their courage, all they'd have to do is persue there dreams.

The reverse of that is more often true. Having given up on their dreams, many give up on life, and die a little more each day. As Benjamin Franklin wrote, "Some people die at twenty-five and aren't buried until they are seventy-five." Or, to quote Auntie Mame's famous line, "Life is a banquet, and some poor sons-of-bitches are starving to death."

The thing we fear: all you have to do is walk right up and confront it. It's among the hardest things to do, but it's the only thing to be done. If you turn from it, it will bite you in the butt. The farther you run from it, the farther you run from your Dreams. "Do the thing you fear," wrote Emerson, "and the death of fear is certain."

"Often the difference between a successful man and a failure is not one's better abilities or ideas," Maxwell Maltz observed, "but the courage that one has to bet on his ideas, to take a caculated risk- and to act."

bigsombrero

Good one.

I saw a lot of myself in the "given up on life" portion of that statement. At age 35, I was making good money - but I hated my job. I didn't like my relationship, I didn't like my place in the world...I didn't like MYSELF. I think at some point I said, "well, I might as well drink my way through the rest of this ride".

This year of sobriety has helped me realize that I should take calculated risks. And really get up and pursue the life I want. There's no point in accepting unhappiness. With proper planning, hard work, and a step-by-step approach, we can indeed accomplish our goals.

Thanks and have a great day!

MrGhost

Me too! I use to feel unworthy as Hell, and I knew what I wanted... I wanted to die. So all I cared about was my next drink. My fridge had all and only alcohol. Anyways, I am glad you made your way through ! as a lot of us..don't. Well, I am also glad you learned about leaving the comfort zone, that what we want isn't on our front couch, and that initially, one should not seek out comfort in life upon follow our golden path, that one should rather seek out enthusiasm. Which too, reminds me of how... just by reaching whatever want it makes us worthy enough for what we want, given it takes a great deal of all we got to reach a real goal.

Anyways, keep it up, I'm right behind you with the alcohol absence, and all though it's happened by default I feel a longer lasting change this time, because this past drinking sessions I did... was an honest mistake and before when I didn't care about living, I didn't see drinking as a mistake... at all. Now a days I walk by the alcohol isle flicking off all the booze..literally (people are like What the hell's this guys problem? little do they know the middlefingers going towards the devil). Anyways, thanks for reading and have a good day yourself!


Btw, sorry about the spelling I need a new keyboard, too much alcohol secretly found it's way INTO my keyboard, hmmmm I wonder
how that happened? who knows. I don't want to know.

EndGameNYC

Hold onto the fear, and your nightmares will come true.

MrGhost

^^^ Haha, hell yeah..that reminds me, I like what another thing said that I read, "Fear is like putting money down on a debt you may not owe". And it's both funny and crazy to see how many quotes there are dedicating to saying fear is the only thing one should watch for when it comes to fear. But I understand, there is a lot of things I was scared to face and when they happened... I was like "F***! NO WONDER I WAS F****** SCARED". But still what was more scary, was living the other way, when I wasn't up to facing anything at all. It reminds me of social anxiety... what's more scarier than social anxiety is Not being yourself..even though particular social events can be quite frightening, it doesn't compare to the fear of running all your life.