Toffee1

Hi everyone I don't post much but do read here daily. I wanted to post today so that I could feel I was contributing a little something to this fantastic site. I am 78 days sober and feeling pretty good. I feel this time that lifetime sobriety is within my grasp. I have had very few cravings so maybe had it easier than most.

Apart from using this site, what is different this time is my state of mind. Previously it was a case of always focusing on what I was giving up. Beer was such a part of my life, and to give it up was always such a wrench. How could I do it? But in changing my mindset to focus SOLELY on the positives of sobriety I feel totally different. I don't want to go back to any form of alcohol. There is nothing there for me any more.

I love waking in the morning with a clear positive happy confident state of mind. I am comfortable with my decision,whereas previously it felt like a prison sentence. Now I am free and it feels like a weight has been taken off my shoulders. On the occasions I have had cravings I play the tape to the end and try to compare how I might feel hungover as opposed to sober. I don't want to wake up hungover anymore.

Anyway I hope someone somewhere may get something out of this and here's to another sober and positive weekend.

ClearMind

Hi Toffee,

I feel as though I could have written what you wrote word for word! I feel that focusing on what you get from being/staying sober is far more effective than focusing on what you are giving up. Human nature, I believe, is to want something they can't have, so I think it's natural to find it more difficult when you approach it this way. The benefits I get from being/staying sober are great, and I don't feel I am missing anything positive, at all, from my decision to stop drinking.

Leshar

Nice post, thanks, it resonated with me.
You're right, it pays to harness the power of positive thinking. It's an exercise, like any other, I think, sometimes hard to do, but the payoff is worth it!

PurpleKnight

Great stuff on 78 days!!

Oldselfagain

Toffee great post and what you say is sooo true. Once I switched my thinking from "I can't drink" to "I don't want to drink" it all became so much easier.

freshstart57

Since we get to view this for ourselves in any way we choose, I like to say I don't want to drink AND that I have chosen not to drink. I can only affect my actions in the present moment, so my statement then is that, I will never drink in the present moment. Or I will never now drink.

I think anyone can choose not to drink for an instant.

Bird800

Congrats on 78 days Toffee! I have also been approaching my quitting drinking this time in a positive way and it's been going very well. That's how I quit smoking several years ago and I've had no desire to smoke since I quit. I think there really is something to this approach.