karate

I find staying busy , very effective to stay off the beer.

I think about getting a 6 pack , but always clients to meet

Two jobs . Keeps me sober .

Bilr44

I think you need to learn how to deal with your addictions other than keeping busy. What happens when there are not clients to meet and you have 4 hours to kill? Proper sobriety management tools are vital for long term sobriety. Just white knuckling it and keeping yourself busy will just lead you back to the bottle eventually.

Dee74

Noone works 24/7...I think you have to deal with not being busy sooner or later.

I find having a sense of purpose in my life really helps tho...maybe thats what you meant tho, Karate?

D

Boleo

As long as you need "stuff" to keep you from drinking, you run the risk of running out of stuff.

"A man should measure his wealth by that which he does not need".
(Kong Qiu Confucius)

LadyBlue0527

Staying busy was monumental for me in the beginning. Still, something became pretty clear.

In the beginning, sobriety is like a big, gaping hole in the ground that you have to erect barriers around to avoid falling into. Every day you'll pass by that hole and those barriers will help you to avoid it. However, you're going to spend the rest of your life having to think about it and avoid it daily if you don't find ways to fill it. Everything that you do to work on recovery is a shovelful of material that will help. Eventually, the hole will be filled in and the barriers are no longer needed. You can walk right over that puppy.

Newatthis34

I like that analogy Ladyblue!

tomsteve

"Two jobs . Keeps me sober . "
sober as in "without drink."

wouldn't ya like to be sober is in "of sound mind?"

IMO, this statement tells me it really doesn't work too good:
"I think about getting a 6 pack."

LadyBlue0527

Thanks

I wanted to add too that once that hole is filled we still have to remember there are excavators galore who would like to dig in at any time! You can fill the hole but there always needs to be an awareness that it did exist.

karate

When I run out of things to do , I take a nap

I normally need one pretty bad .

karate

I'm thinking most think about getting a 6 pack ?

Just like doing other things we should not

foolsgold66

You run out of things to do?

jkb

Hey I am with you on this one Karate. I cant say having 2 jobs keeps me sober but, being busy is nice. And when I do get "off time" I really appreciate it now.

Jess

Mags1

I feel sometimes Karate speaks with tongue in cheek lol

Boleo

Recovering is needing to think about not drinking.

Recovered is not needing to think about drinking.

caboblanco

i found ways to work hard and drink when i was working and going to school at the same time...burning the candle at both ends so to speak...i needed my boozin..i thought it was the only thing keeping me sane..lol

cocopuff3315

So much more fun stuff to do then sitting around drinking these days

karate

Left the house at 5 am this morning , just drove up at 7pm

I do about 50-55 hours in 4 days at regular job , work weekends for the differential pay .

Have another business also .

Almost totally debt free , and I mean not owe anyone a dime .

It's been a rough go , but almost done now .

Life is not too bad , IMO

Tiptree

We're rooting for you karate, just hope you're not burning your candle at both ends.

courage2

Maybe one way of looking at staying busy is to reverse Karate's saying to its logical equivalent (the contrapositive, to any geeks):

Statement: If I stay busy, then I stay off the beer.
Contrapositive: If I don't stay off the beer, then I don't stay busy.

If he uses, he doesn't work. His statement does NOT imply that if he stops working, he'll use.

Just sayin'

Dee74

No I agree - that implication came from me, and others.

Just sharing my experience, Courage.
I thought if I kept busy I'd stay sober...and I did...

but when downtime came, I had no defence.

D