The Truth About Alcohol (Why Quitting Feels So Hard)

Chubby

Those toes will never know the feel of a ballet shoe. The sunlight that scorches through the clouds; she will eat that too. One year old, barely two, the gatekeepers of her stomach keep shovelling it through. Cannonballs of sugar fired into her veins - parents holding the wick, preparing to flicker. How long will it linger? It’s a forever thing; you don’t know that; I want to call you a silly twat, take you to town with ball and bat. But here’s the thing. It’s a lack of education. Your daughter is a bull, and if you keep feeding her like that, if you do not teach her the wisdom of a healthy life, then every single Starbucks and McDonalds will look like a matador’s muleta. And she will charge straight into the gates of hell. And you will lose her, and she will lose herself. Use your lightsaber, not as a way to cut her dreams in two, but to illuminate her chances of getting through this life without being broken into a million different pieces by all those sticks and stones. The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, And We Refuse to be Anonymous I wrote that little ditty after seeing parents shovelling a dessert down the throat of an obese child barely older than one, and in today’s podcast episode I wonder if that parental act of abuse is any different than drinking alcohol? Join Us & Our Community TTAA Taster: http://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster TTAA Intensive: https://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive Strive Community: https://strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/

Exhaustion

Another fantastic poem by Rupi Kaur in her collection The Sun and Her Flowers. "This place makes me the kind of exhausted that has nothing to do with sleep and everything to do with the people around me." Quiz question: What places and people exhaust you? Please share with me at thetruthaboutalcohol@gmail.com The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, and We Refuse to Be Anonymous Join Us & Our Community TTAA Taster: http://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster TTAA Intensive: https://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive Strive Community: https://strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/

Are Your GPS Co-ordinates Set? Do You Know The Way to an Alcohol-Free Life?

Outside the town is a sign. “Population: a million people that don’t drink alcohol.” I’ve ripped the thorn from the rose, stuck it on the bridge of my nose, and I'm dragging my feet in the dirt, snorting. Wave the red flag. I dare you. I double fucking dare you. That’s where I’m going, and nothing’s going to stop me. I locked the GPS coordinates in back in 2009 when I took the vow. Then she left me. I felt like the rind stuck in a world of sweet marmalade. Who would want to taste me, now? One day, as the man beside me, went searching for the smell under his fingernails with a knife, and the woman in stockings gyrated in front of me to the beat of the thin white duke, I asked for a Sambuca. And another. And another. A month went by. Lost. Confused. Unsure. Values and virtues scattered to the wind like dandelion seeds held in the magnificently manicured mitten of the monster. Moon. Mars. Nowhere was far enough for me. Then, my son pushed the bottle aside, reached into my heart, and switched my GPS back on. A light flickered. I heard the voice in my head tell me to turn right. Then, in the distance, I saw the sign. “Population: a million people that don’t drink alcohol.” I put my foot down, and I’ve been kicking up a fuss ever since. Once you take the vow, it’s not a question of IF you’ll become someone that doesn’t drink alcohol, it’s WHEN, and that’s what we talk about in today’s episode. The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, and We Refuse to Be Anonymous Join Us & Our Community TTAA Taster: http://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster TTAA Intensive: https://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive Strive Community: https://strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/

The NY Times Best-Selling Author Maria Konnikova on Connection; Authenticity and More

Here is the first of a series of interviews I did with poker players during the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) in the Bahamas in the mid-January. The content has a poker flavour to it, but I try to keep my interview questions more related to life, and each one that I post contains some element of wisdom that we can learn from, and apply to our journey in becoming someone that doesn’t drink alcohol. Maria Konnikova is a writer, psychologist, and poker player from New York. Maria's two books: The Confidence Game and Mastermind: How to Think Like Sherlock Holmes are New York Times bestsellers. I met her last year in the Bahamas after she’d convinced the poker legend, Erik Seidel, to teach her to be a poker player for her new book The Biggest Bluff, and went on to win a quarter of a million dollars under Erik’s tutelage. In this discussion, we talk about inauthenticity, status, and feeling awkward in social situations, before finishing with a little game I like to call Projection. Enjoy. The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, and We Refuse to Be Anonymous Join Us & Our Community TTAA Taster: http://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster TTAA Intensive: https://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive Strive Community: https://strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/

How to End the Feeling That You're 'Missing Out' When You Stop Drinking Alcohol

I feel like the plane crashed, and as I walk through the wreckage, I realise that I am the only person left on this earth. I try to talk to the puffins, and the seagulls, but they don’t even know my name. The bars are wet, but I am dry. I can feel the emptiness rising. My collarbone is the lip from whence the world quenches their thirst. A slight ache below the neck. Beats swirling around my mind reminding me of another alone time, only that time, the butterflies played hopscotch in my belly, and oil rockers tickled my ribs. Louise, a Striver, says - I know I am happier when I don’t drink, but I feel like I miss out if I don’t. Missing out. Missing out on what? That’s what we talk about in today’s episode of The Alcohol & Addiction podcast. The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, and We Refuse to Be Anonymous Join Us & Our Community TTAA Taster: http://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster TTAA Intensive: https://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive Strive Community: https://strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/

Alcoholic Drinks Are Nothing But Delivery Systems For Alcohol

I can feel the roar. Somewhere between the gut and the throat, there is a cork. I want to walk into the woods and pop it, but I am afraid that I will flatten all of the surrounding trees, and people will see the real me. I don’t go to the woods. I go to the pub. People think they go to the pub to socialise, but that’s not why people go to the pub. People go to the pub to drink alcohol because drinking alcohol means they don’t have to go to the woods. The pathetic mess you see in the mirror is the scream because they have forgotten how to scream - they have forgotten how to do everything, except order another drink. So many options. The same purpose. Alcoholic drinks are nothing but a delivery system for alcohol, and that’s what we talk about in today’s podcast. The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, and We Refuse to Be Anonymous Join Us & Our Community TTAA Taster: http://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster TTAA Intensive: https://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive Strive Community: https://strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/

The Great Real Ale and Gin Hoax: Why Taste Has Nothing to Do With It

Our distinctive blend marries the crisp, honeyed citrus fruit of Chenin Blanc with the plush body, soft floral and juicy peach notes of Viognier for a lush, versatile and delicious wine. What does that even mean? Here’s another one. Barefoot Cabernet Sauvignon is a jammy wine with robust flavours of wild berries and currants. Hints of toasted oak and clove enhance the velvety smooth finish. It sounds like something I would use to paint the walls or wash my hair. I grew up on a council estate in Reddish Stockport called Poets Corner and then moved to a working-class mining community called Ogmore Vale. You don’t drink wine in these places. Posh people drink wine. People like us do things like this. There is a story in the fabulous book Mindful Eating by Brian Wansink, where a WWII cook on board a naval vessel told the crew he was going to pick up some strawberry jello the next time they were in port because they were fed up with eating lemon jello. Upon arrival at the harbour there was no strawberry jello, so the chef adding red food colouring to the lemon jello and placed it on the menu as strawberry jello. The sailors thanked him for picking up the strawberry jello. There are many reasons we eat and drink the things we do, and ‘taste’ is a minimal part of the equation. In the same Wansink classic, he demonstrated if you gave cheap wine, an expensive label, and placed it on a fancy looking menu, in an expensive restaurant, people would rate the quality higher than expensive wine, with a cheap label, on an affordable menu, in a dive of a restaurant. Drinking wine is a status gig, and marketers of wine know this. The rituals of swilling and spitting, the wine rack at home, the hobby of collecting expensive bottles, the trips to Napa Valley - it’s all geared up to say one thing to your friends - I am a person who knows my wine, and that means I am a sophisticated human being (more sophisticated than you). But it’s difficult for the wine industry to impregnate the working class structure. The only wine we drink is three bottles for a tenner down the off because of the price. Step forward and take a bow the real ale and gin industries. These geniuses have tapped into the smarts of the wine industry to create two ranges of products that the working class can act all cool and hard while drinking. The same rules apply. People like us do things like this. The same illusion exists. It’s all a lie. We don’t drink alcohol because we like the taste of real ale or one of a thousand flavoured gins that light up the bar like an acid trip, and that’s the topic of today’s podcast. The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, and We Refuse to Be Anonymous Join Us & Our Community TTAA Taster: http://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster TTAA Intensive: https://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive Strive Community: https://strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/

The Shocking Truth About Life: We Are Going to Die And We Don’t Know When...

... So Develop a Sense of Urgency And Stop Drinking Alcohol Now In the BBC documentary, Drinkers Like Me, the British TV and radio presenter, Adrian Chiles, discovers that his consumption of alcohol is physically damaging his liver after undergoing a scan. If you watch the documentary, you will see that Chiles is wracked with cognitive dissonance over his decision to continually drink more than the government health guidelines. Did the trip to the doctors help him stop drinking? No. He still drinks, today. I remember the first time I told my son that one day he would die. To say it was a lot to take in is an understatement. I believe from that moment his subconscious buried any thought of death, because, emotionally, it’s too painful. We become immortal. I will spend most of the day sitting on my arse, writing. Last night, I slept less than six hours. I have not come out of the house prepared, so I may eat something that’s not optimal for my health. I skipped my meditation so I could get to work quicker. All of these choices are negative towards my health, and accumulatively they become a problem over time, but it’s not enough to change my behaviour. If a doctor told me tomorrow that I would die if I didn’t run two miles a day for the rest of my life, then two miles I would run. Jen Sincero says a sense of urgency is important, and when someone tells you that you’re going to die, then that’s urgency. But why are we waiting? We know we are going to die. Why isn’t that sense of urgency here now? That’s the topic of today’s podcast discussion. The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, and We Refuse to Be Anonymous Join Us & Our Community TTAA Taster: http://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster TTAA Intensive: https://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive Strive Community: https://strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/

Can We Really Trust Our Belief That We Drink Alcohol Because We Like The Taste?

There is a strange looking device in my room. It says to pour the water into ‘here’, and then somehow, the water heats up and drips out of ‘there.’ My choices: Pike Place Roast - A smooth blended Latin American beans with subtly rich flavours of cocoa and toasted nuts. Tazo’s Awake - English Breakfast - A breakfast-style black tea of malty boldness & bright flavour, invigorating any time of day. I choose the tea, not because I believe the narrative of the malty boldness and bright flavour, and I know it’s not going to invigorate me, but I choose it because people like us do things like this. People who grew up on a council estate in Reddish, Stockport in the 1970s/80s drank tea. It began as a yearning. As a child, you weren't trusted to drink tea because it was too hot. When you were, you felt terrific. You filled the cup with plenty of milk, emptied two, maybe three sugars into the cup, and voila. You were an adult. As you got older, you stopped having the sugar and the milk, for the same reasons you took them when you were a child. People like us do things like this. People like us don’t eat sugar because it fucks you up, as does cow’s milk. So you end up drinking black tea. A malty boldness & bright flavour? Don’t make me laugh. So, why am I drinking it? And that’s the topic of today’s podcast. The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, and We Refuse to Be Anonymous Join Us & Our Community TTAA Taster: http://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster TTAA Intensive: https://www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive Strive Community: https://strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/

The Evaporating Thought

It’s 7.30 am, a blink ago it was 4.01 am. Walkie-talkies crackle into life. Someone pounds on the breastplate of a beaten door. A can hear a frog leaving a lily pad a mile away. A thought appears. “Don’t they know it’s 7.30 am!” The drilling begins. “Don’t they know it’s 7.30 am!” And. Now. The. Thought. Is. In. My. Head! It's handcuffed to my limbic system; it’s elbow leaning on the valve labelled anger. It pours into my mind. I can’t stop it. It’s on a loop. “Don’t they know it’s 7.30 am!” The noise outside stops. The noise inside doesn’t. And that’s what we talk about in today’s episode. The Truth About Alcohol We Are Not Alcoholics, and We Refuse to Be Anonymous Join our community at strive.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/ Join our Taster course at www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAA%20Taster Join our Intensive course at www.thetruthaboutalcohol.co.uk/p/TTAAIntensive