The Sober Lens - Discoveries of Dry January

[00:00:02] What you want, when you want it, where you want it. This is The MESH. Hey, I'm Amy Chang. I'm a nationally board-certified health and wellness coach and this is Healthy AF. In this podcast, I'll be bringing you all things health, from the newest health strategies to how to tackle those personal roadblocks that just will not let you move forward.

[00:00:27] So buckle in. We're going to be inspired and instructed and dadgum, we're going to have a little fun on Healthy AF. Hey everybody and welcome to another episode of Healthy AF. This episode came from a conversation that I had with a good friend of mine. You know, so many of us are doing Dry January, which is a great tool to use for your health.

[00:00:53] I think the studies show that people who do Dry January actually drink less during the year. A lot of people who do Dry January figure out like, oh, I might have a problem with alcohol. You know, that's always better to find out sooner than later, right? And so we're sitting chatting at breakfast the other day. We've both been sober for quite some time. And she said to me, you know, sobriety is looking at it.

[00:01:23] And I was like, oh, say more about that. And she went on to explain that in her job, she deals with people, families who are suffering a loss and making decisions about health care.

[00:01:43] And she said, you know, being sober in any way from alcohol, from drugs, from food, from people, sugar, you know, anything that can be addictive.

[00:02:07] And I wanted to pop this podcast in for anyone doing Dry January who might be coming to the realization that their lack of sobriety has,

[00:02:39] actually kept them from looking at quite a few things. And now that they're sober, those things are inviting them to look. You know, when I got sober, it's been 18 months or so, I think for me, I was never a heavy drinker.

[00:03:12] And I was amazed at how many times at night when I was, you know, had a full day and I wanted to relax that I wanted a glass of wine. Now, literally for me, you need to understand that I always drank my glass of wine in a juice glass that was like three ounces. So when I say I wasn't a heavy drinker, I really do mean it. Like that's all I could take.

[00:03:43] But I missed it. I missed that three ounce glass of wine in the evening after a busy day. I also really missed a margarita. Basically, anytime.

[00:04:02] I missed a margarita after spending a day on the beach and riding my bike to the local, well, we have a place called Tower 7. And they do great things there with some Tex-Mex stuff and make a heck of a margarita. And it's the kind of place, since it's on the beach, that you can walk right in there with, you know, sand on your feet. You may or may not have a top on, you know. Or you could be dressed for dinner.

[00:04:31] You know, you never can tell. It's that kind of place. And I love it. And I missed having a margarita there after being at the beach. I missed having a margarita when I was pissed. Like over it, a little bit irritated with people. There were lots of things I missed about having that alcohol. And it was like a good indicator light for me. Like, oh, wow.

[00:05:01] I've been using this to cope with something that I just didn't want to look at. You know, I'll never forget. I had been sober for about three months, I guess. And I had a group of people come to my house. And they were friends of a friend. And my friend had said, hey, can I bring a group of girls down to the beach and, you know, have a weekend? And I'm like, yeah, sure, that'd be fun. Sounds like fun.

[00:05:31] But it wasn't. And I was really irritable and standoffish. And in general, just not me. It was weird. And I wanted a margarita so bad, I could barely stand myself. And it was that moment that was like, huh. All right, Amy. Something's got you.

[00:05:59] Some thought pattern. Some pain point. Some self-righteousness. Something's got you all tore up so that you want alcohol. You got some work to do, girl. And I did my work. And actually, I changed my attitude around in about, oh, I don't know, a 12-hour time.

[00:06:25] I took some time to do some self-care, had a meeting with some friends, got on my bike, listened to some good music, and frankly, held myself responsible for looking at it. Amy, what is it about this situation that has you so torn up? Let's look. Let's be compassionate. Why did you sign up to do this anyway?

[00:06:53] Reconnect to like, why would you have them down in the first place? When I got back that morning from applying some serious self-compassion and some honesty and some looking at it, the whole house was like, what happened to you? You completely changed your mood. Well, yeah, I took responsibility for it and I looked at it. And that's what my sobriety has given me.

[00:07:20] An opportunity to look at who I'm being, how I'm being, what reality is, and what a gift looking at it has been. But I know sometimes we look at it and it's too much. We look at it when we first start looking at it.

[00:07:48] We might not have the tools, the coping strategies to look at it.

[00:07:54] And I wonder how many people right now in dry January are discovering for themselves that maybe they're missing that alcohol and they don't know how or don't have the honesty to look at whatever is popping up for them.

[00:08:24] So I want to share a little bit about getting good at looking at it.

[00:08:38] Because if you are going to commit yourself to a life of sobriety or a month of sobriety, you're going to need some tools to take the place of all the numbing that the alcohol gives you. And when I say alcohol, I want you guys to understand that it really could be anything.

[00:09:06] For me, it's been sugar for a long time, a long time. It could be people. It could be sex. It could be pornography. It could be pornography. Really, it could even be working out. Those things that we use both as healthy coping strategies and unhealthy coping strategies.

[00:09:39] And you'll know when you're, you'll know eventually when you're in an unhealthy coping strategy because you won't ever look at it. Whatever that is, you won't ever look at it.

[00:09:55] So when we begin to get honest with ourselves and really start taking responsibility for who we are and how we are, if we do that without grace and love and compassion, which is like really, I'm going to say divine.

[00:10:23] Without divine grace, love and compassion. Because that is not human. This is like human compassion times a million, right? Especially for those of us who have made enough mistakes. Well, I'm just strike that from the record. Have had enough learning opportunities. Let's call a spade a spade. It's a learning opportunity.

[00:10:52] Especially for those of us who have had enough learning opportunities to have boatloads of shame rolling around. You start really looking at it through a sober lens. And that can be a painful spot to be. When I first started taking responsibility for my life and who I had been in my life, there were a lot of tears.

[00:11:23] Thankfully, one thing that got me through was a lot of support. I was in a group of basically coaches who coached me to not tie my morality with the learning opportunities I had.

[00:11:49] Well, let me say that again in a way that's easier. Not to collapse. I did something I'm not proud of or didn't work well or hurt someone or hurt myself with, I have no worth and I'm a bad person.

[00:12:19] Those are not collapsed. We got to pull those apart. For my whole life, before I went through that transformation, I collapsed every mistake, every learning opportunity, every ugliness with, I'm a bad person.

[00:12:49] That's a lot. That's a lot of mistakes in 45 years. Every bad grade, every time I wasn't perfect. And the big ones too. We're not going to go into that. But the big ones.

[00:13:15] When you collapse that with your morality, there's no getting out of that. There's no forgiveness there. There's no compassion. And frankly, there's no forward moving. You just trap yourself. You may as well just put those little prison bars up because you've already said, oh, bad person. Hi, my name is. Bad person. Because 15 years ago, I cheated on that boyfriend. Well, done, done. I mean, she's going to be a bad person.

[00:13:44] I'm 25 on. So if you really want to be able to look at what you need to look at and do it through a lens of sobriety, you're going to have to pull on some divine grace, love, and compassion. For me, that came through a team of supported coaches.

[00:14:09] When I really started looking at myself, it was about eight months of the hardest work I've ever done in my life. And I cried and cried and cried. And I'd get into a shame hole, but I had coaches right beside me. And they didn't, for one moment, talk to me like I was small.

[00:14:38] Not one moment. Not one time did they say like, oh, Amy, you're a good person. No. No. They asked me how long I wanted to be disempowered. What story are you making up, Amy? Is it an empowering one? Is it a disempowering one? Okay. How long would you like to believe that disempowering story?

[00:15:09] And it was the best gift they could ever give me. None of them ever said to me, oh, my God, you did what? No. But they said an awful lot. What are you making up about that? What's your experience of yourself when you think about that? Is that true? They gave me so many tools to look at it.

[00:15:39] To look at everything. You know, when I started that journey, my husband had moved on from our marriage, oh, seven months before. It's hard. There was a lot I needed to take responsibility for. And it was hard. And it was so worth it. All that work. All that looking at it. All that learning to love me, regardless of the fact that sometimes I was a crazy wife.

[00:16:09] Oh, yeah. Regardless of the fact that sometimes I put up with stuff that was not okay. Yeah. Yeah. I got to learn to love me because I got to learn to look at it. And that's the privilege. That is the privilege of looking at it. Because all of a sudden you value it.

[00:16:37] We don't spend our time looking at stuff we don't value. And if sobriety is looking at it, looking at yourself, valuing yourself enough to look. Valuing your relationships enough to look.

[00:17:06] Valuing your people, your pets, your classmates at the CrossFit, your community. Valuing it enough to look with grace and compassion and love. What a gift. I don't know what you're discovering in your dry January.

[00:17:37] But I hope you are peeling back the joy of looking at it. Even when it is a real tough look. Because this is where life happens. Life does not happen with the Oreo roll.

[00:18:06] And I do mean the entire roll of your Oreo. Y'all know that's where I go. Like, I just want the whole row of Oreos. Don't be giving me one. Life doesn't happen at the bottom of the bottle. Life doesn't happen with another toke. Life doesn't happen with any of the things. The Netflix that we numb out with.

[00:18:27] Life happens here looking at it and being connected divinely to other people, to nature, to a higher power if you have one. So that you can value looking at it and give it the respect that it deserves. It's just some learning opportunities. It's just some things to be with.

[00:18:59] Gosh, I love y'all so much. And I really hope that you're discovering what you need to discover. And I also hope that if you do not have the support it takes to look at it and you're trying to be committed to sobriety, get some help. There are plenty of 12-step meetings you can go to. You can sign on for a consultation with me. I'll be happy to talk to you about that journey.

[00:19:29] I'm sure there are people who are also learning to look. Find those people. Take care of yourselves. And I will talk to y'all next time on Healthy AF. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Healthy AF Podcast. I hope that it has helped you create a new possibility for your health and sets you into action to go get it.

[00:19:59] If you want more information or if you want to connect with me, visit my website at myhealthylife.coach. And don't forget to hit the subscribe button so that each new Healthy AF episode will be sent directly to you. Let's take you from where you are to where you want to go.

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