Freedom from Alcohol (my roadmap)
Here is my roadmap for those struggling with alcohol or another addiction:
I can’t free you. That’s the thing. It’s you: you have to free yourself.
And if you’re reading this, you’ve already taken the first step. More likely than not, you’ve taken many steps.
One of the keys is acceptance.
For me, once I start drinking, I know the visceral anxiety, guilt, shame, and embarrassment are all on the other side. Usually the next day. But if I don’t overdo it tonight, I will tomorrow night. Or next weekend. And then: the shame. It fills my whole body. It makes me want to die.
Alcohol = anxiety. Pain.
If that’s you too, then that’s what you need to accept.
When I drink, I feel shitty.
Say it out loud: Alcohol makes me feel awful. When I drink, I feel awful.
Use whatever words work for you. The words need to land in your body.
Feeling Stuck?
Your heart always knows what you are living with that does not align.
Repeat the following with your hand on your heart:
Heavy heart, please
tell me everything.
I am so tired of not loving you
the way you need.
I will listen.
THEN: Take one breath + notice how your heart feels.
Repeat it:
Heavy heart, please
tell me everything.
I am so tired of not loving you
the way you need.
I will listen.
(Take one breath + listen to your heart space)
Heavy heart, please
tell me everything.
I am so tired of not loving you
the way you need.
I will listen.
I will love you.
And I will keep listening.
(Breathe. Listen to your heart.)
What is it saying? Write it down.
Little Love Notes
Little love notes are anything that warms your heart space. The space right in the middle of your chest.
For me, it’s words of affirmation. A client telling me how well they’re doing because of the work we’ve done. An invite to coffee from a new friend. A thoughtful, specific compliment.
These things fly right into my heart space like a bright gold rose and sit there, glowing. Warming me up from the inside out.
It didn’t always happen this way. I had to practice accepting the positive. Practice feeling worthy. I had to allow the positive to flow in. This starts with setting an intention: I want to feel it, the good that people try to give me.
Then, the next time someone compliments me, I check in with my heart:
Can I feel that?
And even if I don’t feel it, I try to. I imagine what it would feel like to feel it, and that normally does the trick. Yes, heart, we are doing this therapy thing well. That session was good. I am doing something well.
Oh, by the way, I work as a psychotherapist.
Usually, we have to affirm ourselves after the compliment to accept it. Try it next time you receive something positive.
May I be open to receiving this. May I receive it.
Let the Love Fill you Up from the Inside Out
This makes space to let the toxic stuff go.
When I first quit drinking, my mentor and teacher, Holly, said to me: You are magic. You have been numbing all of your magic, but you are messy and big and wonderful and it’s all right here. Not once you quit for good, or once you do service work or help others, but RIGHT NOW. You are magic.
Those were not her exact words. But what she said to me over the course of her Sobriety School was exactly that: I am magic, and I am worthy of my magic right now. Not tomorrow, not when I finally quit for good, but right now.
I had been hiding from myself. So many of us do this when we drink every weekend (or every night, or every few days). We silence our magic, our aliveness.
Stop drinking for just two days, and you will feel it: your energy.
That energy is not a mistake. Someone or Something out there needs You. You. Not someone else.
You were given this energy for a purpose. You have gifts that only you have, that only you can bring to your part of the world, to your people.
But the trick is this: before you can bring them to someone else, you have to use them on yourself. That is how you heal.
Use Your Gifts
Your gifts are right here,
right next to your pain and your deepest fears.
Right next to the toxic BS
that we let take up days, nights, and even our rest,
The Fear is the key
to using those gifts,
We have to go through it to access a shift,
a shift that brings in the Light
(the Light we once knew
as children, as babies, when all of this was new)
and we couldn’t be Bad
or Good or Perfect.
We just played and loved
and wondered and
explored.
Adventured and toured and we should have been adored.
Remember that child? The child inside.
Your aliveness is still there, and that is the essence of who you are. But of course, the World has brought you pain, complications, and drama. All of it.
You have to sort through that, feel it, and let it go in order to get to the gifts. The good news is that the gifts are accessible even as you feel the pain, deal with the chaos, and move forward. They are right there, underneath all of it, hovering. Waiting for you to tap into them.
The way to do this is to be with the pain. Stay with it when you feel like running, numbing, screaming. Observe it. Feel it. Write about it. Sing. Cry.
Tell yourself you won’t die (you won’t). Get a good therapist.
Talk with them about this. Cry there. Cry alone. Let your heart be weepy and broken, or fiery and furious.
Stay with it. Listen to the anger. Feel it. Hear its wisdom. Let it protect you.
Cry more. Feel the pain.
Observe it. Eventually, drop the stories about it. Just witness it, the emotions, moving through.
The aliveness is on the other side. Your energy, your magic.
Truly, the pain is part of the aliveness. But the positive feelings, and huge ones that will wash over your whole being, those are on the other side of the pain. I promise. Just keep going. Even if that looks like sitting in a bathtub and crying, just keep going.
Where do I start? Let’s start with How We Change
To change an addiction, we first have to break up the drivers beneath it. Usually, one of those drivers is how cruel we are to ourselves -- about the habit, and other things. Changing the words we say to ourselves is the first step.
Is your inner monologue mean? Cruel? Shaming? It needs to be gentle.
Start here.
Talk to yourself the way you would speak to your best friend. You’ve got this, sweetie. You are doing it.
This is huge, and hard, and you are doing it. YES you stayed sober at that party.
YES you went outside today.
YES, you need a nap, so nap. Rest.
Drink lots of water. Reflect. Sit with yourself. Eat some good food. You deserve this. This is big for you!
And when you mess up:
It’s okay. This happens. This is what addiction IS. I had four months, and that is amazing. That means I can do this. These few weeks were just a blip, and it was hard, and I am moving through it.
I’m not joking. The words above are the words that I say to myself and have said to myself.
It wasn’t easy. It felt fake and stupid and useless. But with enough time, enough repetition, enough catching myself being mean and stopping it, then restarting -- Okay, that’s not where we’re going to day, Emily. Let’s get back on my own side here – I began to be kind to myself.
I had to practice talking to myself the way I would speak to my closest friend. Every day.
Only you can do this. I cannot do this for you. Only you can free yourself from the mean voice in your head.
And We Add in Loving Actions
And, we add in loving actions. Naps, comfort food, therapy, dentist or doctor’s appointments, vitamins, working out, stretching the body, and getting good sleep.
Taking care of our physical bodies is so important when we are letting go of a toxic habit.
Drink lots of water. Rest as much as you need, even when it feels ridiculous. The truth is that you are saving your own life here. No matter how far down the rabbit hole you went, even if it feels like you didn’t really have a problem with that substance, there is a part of you that wanted to stop – badly. So this is important.
This is saving that part of you that is hopeful that there is something other than waking up with horrible anxiety and depression. That part needs you to rest, to drink water, to listen to your body and do what it says it needs. Deep breath.
Give yourself permission. Permission to sleep 10 hours some nights. Or every night for as long as you need. Permission to cancel plans that feel like too much.
I teach my clients (because it worked for me) to ask themselves, their Inner Wise Self, Can I say yes to this? And if their body (their Inner Wise Self) says, “No!” even just quietly, then it is a No.
Ask yourself, your Wise Self, is this opportunity (this dinner, this class, this client, this X), a Yes for me, or a No? And then truly listen.