What "One Day at a Time" Really Means

Hey, I'm Barti Arez and I'm the Stop Drinking Coach. Welcome to my podcast where I teach you how to stop drinking, how to quit craving, and how to begin the journey back to yourself so that you can transform your life. After a 14-year binge drinking career, starting and stopping dozens of times and trying everything in the book from AA to therapy, I finally discovered the key to sustainable sobriety. And on this podcast, you're going to learn practical tips, tools, and strategies to help you quit drinking alcohol the easy way so you can finally step into the next chapter of your life and begin fulfilling your potential. For private one-on-one or group coaching, visit www.TheStopDrinkingCoach.com and book a call with me. Hey, welcome back to another episode. My name is Barti Arez. I'm your host, I'm the Stop Drinking Coach and I'm super excited to be digging into another episode with you today. And in today's episode, I really want to dig in and explore and help you understand what the term or concept one day at a time really means. Now, if you've been trying to quit drinking or get sober for any period of time, maybe you've gone to AA or you've gone to other forms of traditional recovery, you may have heard the term one day at a time. And I remember when I was first trying to quit drinking, I heard that a bunch, but I didn't really understand it. It just kind of, it didn't really seem that important. It just kind of sounded like this thing that people said. It kind of went in one year and out the other. And it wasn't until I really committed to this process and began like doing the things necessary to actually change from the inside out, the process of learning how to manage my mind, the process of learning how to manage my emotional state, the process of learning how to self-regulate when I got triggered, or there was something overwhelming that happened that would have normally driven me to drink. It wasn't until I really dug in and began doing the inner work. It wasn't until that time that I truly began to understand what one day at a time really means. And so, before I dig in, I kind of want to preface this off by saying like the number one fear that almost every single one of us have as we embark on this journey is imagining a life without alcohol. Every single person I talk to on the phone, I ask him a question, do you have any reservations moving forward? Do you have anything stopping you or holding you back? And every single one of them, without question, without, I mean, every single person says, yeah, I mean, like the thought and idea of just giving this up forever is just, I don't know, I don't know if I can do it. And you know, what's so interesting about this deal, in fact, a gentleman I got off the phone with today, like, he shared with me his story and his background and what his relationship looks like with alcohol and, you know, I don't wake up and drink at 7 a.m. and I, you know, I start at 5 and I'm pretty high functioning and it's like, man, every single person has like the same story. It's maybe there's some nuances that are different, you know, I know that I hate alcohol. I know that this thing is really damaging to me. It's preventing me from being my best self. It's getting in the way of my relationships, my marriage. I'm not expressing myself that I want in the way that I want to as a parent to my kids. I'm providing a poor example. You know, it's keeping me in this anxious, you know, roller coaster, but it's like, you know, a couple days goes by, a week goes by and all of a sudden, I just, I don't know what happens. I find myself pouring another drink and it's dude, it's the familiar cycle. It's like we're all the same. Alcohol doesn't judge based on your background, how old you are, your socioeconomic status, like it is a even playing field, you know? And it's so, it's so crazy how all of us have such a similar story, you know? And so the thing that I tell everybody, right? And what I'm encouraging you to really take some time to reflect on and explore is that, listen, when we begin this journey, we do not think about never drinking again. Okay? The thought and idea of never drinking again is way too emotionally overwhelming for everybody. Still to this day, I'm the stop drinking coach, everything that I do, everything that I say, I still don't, I haven't, I haven't told myself that I'm never drinking again. I just know there's no way in hell I'm drinking today. And when you work a good proactive system that optimizes my and body spirit neurochemistry, helps you heal from the inside out, helps you gain a greater degree of mental and emotional control and flexibility and regulation over your operating system, and you begin to wake up to the truth around what alcohol actually is, to what it represents in our society, physically, spiritually, right? When you begin to expand your map of understanding of what actually is going on here, the thought and idea of going back at one point really just becomes disgusting and ridiculous and undesirable, you know? And so like the thing you have to understand here is that the way that anybody gets sober, the way that I got sober, the way that anybody you know who has any significant amount of time living alcohol free, the way that we do it is we take it one day at a time, meaning the only commitment you ever have to make is that you're just not going to drink today. If at any point your mind starts worrying about tomorrow, how you're going to get through Friday, how you're going to get through this weekend, next month's vacation, summer coming around the corner, some wedding that you have planned, you know, your anniversary coming up, your kids graduation, whatever it is, right? There's a million and a half things that your mind could potentially try to cling on to about the future as to why it's not a good time to get started now. When you start future tripping, you have to immediately notice that you're future tripping and you have to bring yourself back to the present moment and remind yourself that hey, I'm not quitting drinking forever. I'm just figuring out what I have to do to stay sober today. And that is really the million, trillion, billion, bajillion dollar Elon Musk, you know, give me the Albert Einstein secret, the Nikola Tesla, the like, you know, the Jeff Bezos, the smartest, most whatever, like you get the point, right? Like whatever that secret is, that's it is that you don't make a commitment to never drink again. It's still overwhelmingly, emotionally overwhelming for me. I'm two and a half years sober and done a ton of healing and growth and in every capacity. You know, it's just not necessary. And so really as you dig deeper, the reason we take it one day at a time really goes into more of like a philosophical or spiritual reasoning. And the reason is is that like, dude, you don't even know if you're going to be alive next week, right? Like life is not guaranteed, right? And this goes deeper and I talk about mortality a lot in the philosophy of memento mori, the stoke philosophy of reflecting on your own mortality. Like all of us are just continually living as if we have an infinite amount of time, as if we're going to be the lucky one that dies of old age. But each of our lives in a way is the ticking time clock. You don't know when you're going to like, dude, some millions of people, tens of thousands, I'm probably not millions, but thousands of people wake up every day, drive to work and don't realize when they're putting on their pants in the morning that that is going to be the last day that they wake up. Because of some accident that's outside of their control, right? So if we sit here and we just try to constantly, you know, steep an anxiety and worry about how we're going to get through next month, when we don't even know if we're going to be alive next month, you know, God, God forbid, nothing happens. But like, you know, there's an unlikely chance that a plane crashes into my house when I'm asleep tonight. So if I'm wasting time thinking about how I'm going to handle the wedding six months from now, I'm doing myself a disservice. It is an error code in my conscious processing. And this is what's really important to understand is that tripping about the future that hasn't happened yet is an error code. Your system is producing an error. You're not thinking in an accurate way that is going to allow you to problem solve what is going on in front of you so that you can move forward effectively, right? Like all you ever have is the present moment. And that's a big thing that we discover through this journey, through this way of waking up of all of it, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. You know, I remember in early sobriety, one of the most profound quotes that I ever heard, you know, and I've heard a million and a half quotes as I'm sure you have. I heard this from my coach and he said, you know, life is one long experience of the present moment. So if you want to live a good life, you have to learn how to make peace with the present moment because you can't escape it. It's the infinite moment of now. And dude, that quote, it hit me like a fucking truck and it rocked my world because in that moment as I was getting sober and I really reflected and I realized like Jesus Christ, like, dude, I am infinitely attached to this moment wherever I go, there I am. It doesn't matter if I'm at home or at Starbucks or if I go on a vacation and I'm on the other side. side of the world wherever I go there I am and it's always now. And that's what's real. We are literally from the moment we're born to the moment we die we are living in the infinite present moment of now. You can't escape it. It's always now. Tomorrow is an illusion. It is a fabrication. It is a projection in your conscious mind. It is neurons firing. It is an abstraction in your imagination. What is real is this present moment and what creates, indicates your life and the results that you experience in your life is how you handle and manage and process the present moment. Everything else is a story. It is an illusion. It is a fabrication in thought which is an abstraction. We can't define consciousness. We can't define thought. We can't locate it in your brain. We don't know where the mind exists. So worrying about the future is an error code. It is an error code. The only thing that you have to focus on in manage and work through is now. And that is why getting sober or learning how to live alcohol free is the most profound journey that you can embark upon because what it's finally doing is it's clearing space. It is clearing the poison that is diluting your mental, emotional, energetic, spiritual, physical operating system. The now that you inhabit in this present moment is dysregulated to some degree. Psychologically, via your thought patterns, emotionally via your dysregulated nervous system because of trauma from the past that you haven't processed, reprocessed, regulated, integrated. So the present moment, there's all these things happening inside of you that you do not know how to manage and so you numb it out with alcohol. So you can begin to see here as you have been consuming all of my content like, "Dude, quitting drinking has nothing to do with alcohol." It is the journey home to yourself. So you can begin expanding your map of understanding the totality of your understanding of the human experience so that you can better understand your mind. You can better understand this vehicle that you inhabit, this vehicle that you're sitting behind like a car that's driving you forward through time but infinitely connected to the present moment. You're learning how to manage it. And that's why I say alcohol is procrastination against your personal evolution because the things that you want to do, the things that you care about, like those are going to be sacrificed. Those are going to be sacrificed as you continue to drink alcohol. Your relationship with your partner, your marriage is going to be sacrificed because you are unwilling to make the sacrifice of letting go of some abnormal dopamine response, which you were never meant to feel in the first place. You're unwilling to turn towards some of the discomfort inside you so that you as an adult, as a wise mature adult, can learn to self-regulate. You have to understand and remember that like, yes, while we experience adverse childhood experiences and we have trauma as a kid, in that emotionally stunts our growth, you're probably 35, 40, 50, 60 years old. You have the capacity, you have the cognition, you have the intellect, you have the wisdom, you have the strength, you have the maturity to be able to work through and reprocess these things and to finally get a grasp on this operating system. But when we're operating out of our trauma, when we are fully identified and connected to these old wounds, like we feel like we can't, we feel like we're uncapable, but you are capable. And that's why this process is it's so multifaceted and that's why working a program, having system, having support, having accountability, having structure, taking a proactive approach, having a map in front of you and knowing where to go and how to traverse it is so important. Because it's not just putting the bottle down. We can put the bottle down for a week, two weeks a month, six months, maybe a year. But if we do not learn what we need to, in terms of expanding our map of reality, shifting our perspectives and our paradigms and our relationship to alcohol as a poison and what it represents to the spiritual evolution of our species, if we do not begin to learn how to manage the two filters for all experiences of reality, our mind and our emotional system, if we do not learn these things, then we're basically just grinding through white knuckling, right? And if we don't learn how to self-regulate, if we don't learn how to cope, if we don't integrate these things into our being, then we can go a period of time, but when the system starts to redline again and it becomes too overwhelming, we're going to go back to the alcohol. And so you can see that this is a evolution and growth process. Because to the degree that you learn these things and integrate these things is to the degree that you will no longer go out and continue to make the same mistakes. This is about understanding the fabric of who and what you are and what this liquid, this poison is doing to your operating system. And what it represents to your personal growth and evolution. So going back to the concept of one day at a time, it's like the only commitment you ever have to make is that you're just not going to drink today. You do not think about tomorrow. And if you start thinking about tomorrow in next week, you are running an error code. You have to bring yourself back to the present moment and say, okay, how do I get through the next 30 minutes? How do I get through the next hour? How do I get through the next hour and a half of craving? Knowing that within about 30 minutes or an hour, that craving is going to fade. It is going to go back to its neutral baseline because that's what sensations do in this fluctuating vehicle. The only constant is change. We wake up in the morning and we're well rested or in this case, maybe pretty hungover. And then we start to feel a little bit better and then we get hungry and then we eat some food and then we're tired. And then we get a pick me up at two and we drink some coffee and then we're energized and then we get kind of tired from working all day and then we come back home. And then we go and we sit on the couch and we relax and then we get a little thirsty and then we get like the nature of the human experience is just fluctuations of sensation and energy in our body. And this is a major point of understanding when it comes to our healing and our growth is learning how to reinterpret these sensations and data signals that the command center of our body produces our nervous system. Right? This is where we're never taught what feelings and emotions are. This is where we're never taught how to process the sensations that we recognize in our body. You know, like, dude, there is a profound expanding of your total understanding of who and what you are as you dig in and learn this stuff. If you really want to become successful and overcome it for the long term to reclaim personal power and sovereignty over your life and not feel like you're missing out, you know, there's information which you need to adapt and acquire. Like just because how old you are, whatever experience or success you've had in your life, like understand there's more to the story. There's more to the story. There's more map to discover. Doesn't matter where you're at or how much money you make. Like you can't think you've got it all figured out. And if you do, like, dude, that's a tricky place to be. It's not a good place to be because when you get, when you, like, when your ego starts driving here and you think you've got it all figured out, like, that's when shit gets real slippery, dude. You know, you got to play the tape forward with this stuff. Yeah, things are maybe okay and you're doing all right now and money's good or whatever. Like, you haven't blown your life up. But dude, you got to play the tape forward and you got to be willing to choose your sacrifice or the sacrifices get chosen for you, you know, your marriage. Every single time your kids see you with alcohol when they're between the ages of zero and 14, you are sending a signal that this is how we handle free time. This is how we chill. This is how we relax. This is what we do after work. This is how we celebrate. They don't know. They don't understand what alcohol is, what's good or bad. They're just modeling. This is what human beings do. It's monkey sea monkey do. It's very simple. We're just modelers of our environment. You know, you're making sacrifices towards your health towards the future version of you, the 60 year old, the 70 year old, the 80 year old version of you, right? With how they feel, their energy levels, the state of their organs and health, right? Like their movement, their flexibility. Because if you're drinking, you're probably not going to the gym, you're gaining all this weight. You're probably not eating good food. And it's like, dude, you realize these things. As you get older, all of your actions today, they compound and you really start to feel them as time goes on. And the thing is, dude, this stuff happens so fast. Five years, 10 years goes by in an instant, goes by in an instant. So to just say like, You know, things aren't that bad, you know, constantly trying to find ways to justify it because you think that your buddies are worse. You think that, you know, John down the street is worse or you're angry because John down the street happens to be financially successful and he seems to be enjoying his alcohol and it pisses you off that you can't like, dude, you got to let go of all that shit. That's your growth process. We all had to do it. We all had to do it. And that's why I say this is such an even playing field. You know, you just take it one day at a time. If you start future tripping and thinking, hey, I am going to work this program and I'm never drinking again, dude, it's going to, it's going to immobilize you. You're going to get frozen. You're not going to take action. And so I encourage you to reflect on that and understand that like the way that I did it, the way that my clients do it, the way that anybody and a other traditional recovery program or anywhere else does it is we just take it one day at a time, meaning the only commitment that you ever have to make is that you're just not going to drink today. You don't even think about tomorrow. The future you tomorrow, if you wake up and have the blessing to do so, we'll handle it in that moment. But if you take today and you do your absolute best today and you begin applying the right ways of thinking and perceiving reality today and you begin applying the tools and strategies today, leaning into the discomfort, working through the things that you need to work through, you are going to develop the character so that when the version of you tomorrow wakes up and is connected to the present moment, they then will have the tools that you would apply from yesterday. They'd have the bricks that you have laid from yesterday. In every single day that you make 1% improvement in lay bricks, it gets easier. You have to understand, like, dude, we are just bundles of synaptic neural pathways in our brain. Who you think you are, your illusion of identity, this is my name, this is where I grew up, these are my tendencies, these are just reinforced, reprogrammed and conditioned neural pathways that you've unconsciously practiced for decades. And they become unconscious and automatic. And so you say, this is who I am, this is just the way I am. No, that's not it. You can be anything, you can choose anything. But the reason you feel resistance in the moment is because you haven't developed the synaptic pathways in your brain, you have not developed the neural pathways in your brain for it to become a predominant superhighway that just is natural. It's like driving a car, right? The five levels of learning apply to overcoming an addiction, apply to you stepping into a new version of yourself. You go from unconscious, incompetence, you don't know what you don't know, which many of us are starting this at. We don't know what we don't know. There's an entire expanded map of reality in terms of our internal operating system, in terms of things we need to understand about this journey. Then we move up to conscious incompetence. Now, maybe as you're listening to this podcast and you're taking in this data, you're like, "Okay, well, it sounds like there's things that I don't know that I need to learn." That's conscious incompetence. Then we get to conscious competence. You know what you know, but you kind of have to focus at it. You have to stay zoned in for you to be able to perform that thing. Many of us in sobriety, at least the first year, for six to twelve months. Then we get to unconscious competence where you've practiced it so much that it's just the new norm. It's automatic and it's pretty effortless. Then you get to conscious, unconscious competence. You get to the place where you are so good at the thing that you can then teach it to others with ease. Learning how to live alcohol-free is you're going to traverse that learning process. It's the same with driving a car or learning an instrument or learning any skill that you probably have in your job. When you first sat down at the computer or desk and you were presented with how to perform a specific function, you probably didn't know what to do and you didn't know what you didn't know. Somebody sat you down and they're like, "Okay, here's the standard operating procedure from A to Z, just like getting into a car." You didn't know what the buttons did, how hard to press on the gas, and somebody guided you through it. As you placed your attention and focus on it and you applied repetition, dozens or hundreds, sometimes thousands of times, it gets to the point where it wires into your system. The expression of driving a car becomes absolutely effortless. If you play an instrument, the expression of the way that you maneuver strings on a guitar or the keyboard becomes effortless. It becomes an extension of who you are because you develop the neural pathways in your brain. Much of this stuff is that. It's like, if you think that quitting drinking is just putting the bottle down, you're sorely mistaken, my friend, and it's going to be impossible and you're going to keep getting a week and a month and you're going to be caught in the same cycle over and over and over and over again. We just take it one day at a time. You're listening to my podcast and you've thought about maybe working with me, but the thought and idea is like, "Jesus, but I don't know if I'm ready to take this step. I can't imagine a life without alcohol. You're running the error code, my friend. You're running the error code. You have to bring yourself back and say, "Okay, if I'm going to work this program, I'm just going to take it one day at a time." Meaning, "I'm not even going to think about tomorrow. I'm just going to listen to Bardia, what he lays out for me. I'm going to do exactly what he says and I'm just going to focus on today." Then you just take it a single day at a time. Man, it's like that philosophy, when you really understand it, helps you become a more elite human being, not elite like you're better than people. Elite in the sense that you have more sovereignty over your consciousness, over your reality. Because dude, it's like all we ever have is the present moment. When we're thinking about the past, when we're thinking about the future, these are projections of the mind. These are projections of the mind. They're not real. I mean, maybe they're real to our subjective perception. But what's real is now and what produces the tangible outcomes of your life is how you handle the present moment, what you do, what you say, what you do with your hands. Like in this moment, that is what lays the infinite foundation for the trajectory of your life. We have to take it one day at a time. One day at a time really begins to apply as you stay sober for longer and longer periods of time. Because the dichotomy of all this stuff, the things that we have to manage simultaneously is this. In the beginning, what's hard about staying sober and living alcohol free is leaning into all the discomfort and working through that. The withdrawal, the anxiety, the craving, being in a dopamine deficit and having maybe our mood being unstable or feeling like a little bit bored on the weekends and that we have to fill our time. The pain is high when we first quit drinking. But the longer that we stay sober and work a proactive system to optimize mind, body, spirit and neurochemistry, which I lay out for you, the easier it becomes. In fact, I have dozens of clients who are waiting for the shoot to drop. They're like, this is so much easier than I thought and it's because I provide that system to follow. Now the longer that you stay sober, the pain starts to become a distant memory and you start to physically feel better, emotionally better, mentally better. Because now you're not pouring alcohol down your system and you're more regulated and you're more balanced and you have more energy and your brain isn't foggy and disrupted from all the mud and shit that you're pouring into it and your mind is clear and you're more productive, right? You're feeling like yourself again, right? But as life continues to get better, the pain starts to become a distant memory and this is where the voice starts to kick in. Bariya, look how good you're doing, man. It's been two weeks. It's been a month. Like, look, probably wasn't even that bad. You can just have one, you're probably making a mountain out of a mole hill. Things weren't that bad. You can just control it now. Listen, you've been meditating, man. You're good, right? One or two won't hurt just for today. You're at a special celebration and that voice will begin to rationalize with you. And what one day to time means is that throughout this journey, that voice is going to pop up from time to time. It might pop up every day for a little while. It might disappear for a week and a half and then randomly it pops up. The most random time, you're like, what the hell? Have any thought about alcohol, haven't craved alcohol, life's been going good. All of a sudden this voice comes up and as I drive to the fucking store, do it. Do it. Nobody's going to know. It's going to be fine. You know that voice? I know that fucking voice. You used to pop up all the time. But your ability to recognize it in the moment to recognize that was the same shisty motherfucking voice that was driving you into the ground. It hasn't changed. That voice is the same little devil. It has not changed. So. Where one day at a time really begins to apply is in those moments as you continue to transform your life and things get better and the pain is a distant memory. And you really get into that talk with yourself. You really get into that battle of like shit man like. Maybe tonight we'll just have one maybe nobody will know you start planning this elaborate thing. You know if I could if I go okay it's five o'clock I can probably go get a bottle of wine I can come home I can probably down it real quick just have that one. It's a special thing I just got to raise at work you know probably be done by 6 6 30 also brought up fuck it all even go hit the gym right you start getting into these stories and narratives this is where one day to climb one day at a time especially applies. Is you recognize what's happening you take a step back you observe right which I teach the three layers of reality and how to become the observer and witness of your life which is just absolutely paradigm shifting. You know people spend 10 years in therapy to try to understand one fundamental concept which I break down in a way most people have never considered before. And you just say okay one more day one more day okay I really want to drink today I fucking the compulsion and craving is crazier than it's ever been I'm just not going to do it today I'll make the sacrifice and if I feel the same tomorrow fuck it I'll drink tomorrow. Just delay it one more day and do it I promise you when you when you get through that and you go to sleep and you wake up tomorrow you're going to be like holy fucking shit am I grateful that I didn't have a drink I didn't give in and by the time you wake up the thought idea of going back to drinking is is going to be disgusting you're going to be so grateful you didn't give in you know there's a quote you're never going to wake up wishing you you drink the night before. So one day to time and like that is what you have to you have to accept that you have to accept that you just take it one day to time and it's hard for people because we've been living in our minds so much we've been living through the past we've been anxious about the future right our nervous system is dysregulated so the thought and idea of even trying to be present and trying to get through the present moment when we feel bored or anxious or whatever else is seems daunting. But I promise you one day to time is the philosophy it is the tool is the strategy that is going to help you win this thing and regain your personal power and sovereignty and ownership over your life. You know it's how everybody does it it's how I do it tell everybody does it but what I will assure you also is that you don't have to wake up and do this one day the time thing in terms of consciously wake up and say okay here's another day i'm just focusing on today at some point through your journey you're going to wake up one day it's just going to click it's going to become the unconscious automatic thing you're going to become unconsciously competent. You're not living alcohol free it's going to become the new default but in order to get there like you have to put in the work and it just starts with step one it just starts with committing to only the first day that's it you don't even need to commit to a year you don't even need to commit to a full 90 day program in a way like you really just go one day at a time right and one day you wake up and it becomes unconscious and automatic. And you don't have to think about it anymore it's just the new norm your identity as a non drinker really begins to etch into stone and establish and then at that point once you get to that point like you really have to go out of your way to drink it would take a tremendous amount of effort and at that point you know that you are nuking your life. You just know it you know at that point you've escaped the dopamine feeding cycle right like you are making a conscious decision at that point and at that point if you do decide to drink again because you think it's going to be different then you have to take full ownership of the consequences and take responsibility for it and everything that comes from that on the other side were adults were not children anymore you know and do that that can be scary you know because what we do what. Addicts do what people have problematic relationships with drugs do is is they make up for lost time so they end up on a vendor and fucking who knows what could happen when you start consuming that much alcohol that fast that rapidly in such a short period of time real irreversible consequences could be could be in store. You fucking get behind the car you know you just I don't even want to go there you know but it's like do this is a serious deal and you have to take it seriously like I've said it before this is your hero's journey. Who you become on the other side of this is more profound than you can begin to imagine learning how to make that sacrifice learning how to reorganize your value system learning how to delay gratification learning how to mentally and emotionally regulate learning how to turn inward and begin the process of developing sovereignty and personal power over your system learning how to reframe yourself talk learning how to regulate your nervous system do these are these are things that transform you that transform your earning capacity that transform your capacity to lead people that transform your leadership in your marriage that transform the way that you raise children and their futures isn't light stuff okay like learning how to regulate your nervous system learning how to manage your mind learning yourself talk learning how to be a healthy sovereign human being like that's why you need coaching like you know I'm here to pick up the slack where your parents came short I'm here to reintroduce this reality to you in a way where you have a sense of sovereignty you know and that's how you got to look at this thing man like go back and listen to that that episode I have it's like the mindset is you got to be willing to go to war but understand that at the end of this war on the other side of this thing is the sweetest victory the sweetest glory that is only reserved for people who put in the work and earn it. And that's the game that's the game you either want it or you don't you don't want it fucking keep drinking but if you want it bad enough you can do it and there's help and support and systems and accountability and tools to help you do it but you have to decide you have to get honest with yourself you have to hold the mirror and look at the implications and consequences of what you're doing and to some degree you have to stop being selfish because drinking is a selfish act okay you have to understand that you're drinking impacts more than just you especially if you have a family if you have other people around you who depend on you and and and are looking to you for guidance and leadership I get it you've got pain inside you we all do addict or not drinker or not welcome to being a human we've all got things that we have to work through but alcohol is not the play my friend it is not the play there's so many different ways to regulate and work through things and alcohol is a trap it is the thing used by humans at large to stay stuck in lower vibrations of energy perpetuating trauma perpetuating pain understand that every time you choose alcohol unconsciously you're actually choosing your pain I know on the surface level itself soothing on the surface it's helping you escape anxiety on the surface it's making your life more fun giving you the illusion of that but what you're actually doing is you are staying committed to an old version of you you're staying committed to the pain and do it I get it it's scary I remember how terrified I was of stepping into the person that I am now talking to you what's it mean what about the responsibility what am I going to have to learn am I smart enough can I do it am I capable I've tried I failed who am I to do it is my life worth it does it have meaning dude I get it all those things that's why community is important that's why doing this with other people who are on the same wavelength who will support you is important that's why working with a coach or somebody you trust who's been down the path and can support you and guide you is important because dude put the put the ego aside put the pride aside like there's nothing wrong with reaching out and asking for help I would not have been able to do this alone and if you to any degree admire my ability to communicate and articulate like I do I couldn't have done it alone despite my background and the things I learned and studied like all of that I needed outside support I needed a system to follow and a lot of the stuff out there doesn't really give you a system you know I've heard from the grapevine and a few people I've talked with like some of the other programs and stuff out there they just have you do a lot of journaling and it's like yeah journaling is like one piece of the puzzle but it's like not everything like dude you got to have a system so you know one day of time in. That's all I really encourage you to like think about. You don't have to make the commitment that you're never drinking again. If you start going there in your mind, it's going to be way too emotionally overwhelming and you're going to stay stock. You're going to freeze. You're going to take another drink. You just take it one day at a time. You learn to take it one day at a time and that philosophy, man, it applies to so many more things. And that's why this is such a profound journey of personal evolution. I was listening to this podcast with Jay Shetty and the guy who built and sold GoDaddy for like $100 million the domain registrar. And Jay Shetty asked him, he was like, what are one of your philosophies that you've learned in business? And it's just crazy. I randomly pulled up that episode and that just like I'd like fast-forwarded it. And that was the part that just started playing. He's like one day at a time. He's like, it applies to so many things. It applies to so many things in the game of life and business. As you just take things one day at a time, you know? And the way that we climb a mountain, the way that Mount Everest is climbed 27,000 plus feet in the air is one step at a time. And that's it, you know? We can all close our eyes and put one foot in front of the other, not knowing how many stairs there are in the staircase. But we can do that. It doesn't matter who we are, how deep we're in it. It doesn't matter where we're at. You can just take one step forward. And then you can take another one. And if as long as you stay here, stay here and now, and stay as present as possible, and have tools on your tool belt to get through the next step, you can do it. That is how Mount Everest is climbed. That's how a billion dollar business is made. One step one day at a time. So I really wanted to dig in and extrapolate further on this philosophy and really hammer in drilling like, dude, if you have been wanting to get started on this journey, but you've been scared, you've been immobilized by the thought and idea of how am I going to socialize? What's going to happen in the future with my friend group? What's going to happen, you know, on the vacation that I already put in my calendar, like, dude, he just worry about today. Do you have to let go of all your friends today and reorganize your entire social circle today? No. You just have to not drink today and figure out how to do that. Do you have to get a new job and reorganize and find a new marriage and like all those things? No. You just have to stay sober today. And then tomorrow when we wake up, if life presents a challenge or an obstacle or a conversation point with our friend, with a family member, with somebody that we're in a relationship with, we handle that communication in that moment and do our best in that moment to optimize for a better future. We just take it one day, one step at a time. And when you break reality down into bite-sized chunks, the power of one man, anything can be accomplished with the power of one. I'm telling you, everything, if you reverse engineer a trillion dollar company, trillion, something super complex and crazy, you can break it down into steps of one. And if you can just develop the courage to take that first step and focus in on that first step and learn everything you need to about that first step, master that first step. That's it. Tomorrow you can wake up and you can do the next thing and just place your attention and focus on that. And if you live life that way, if you reverse engineer it and break it down into bite-sized chunks, dude, you extrapolate over 90 days, six months, a year, you're going to be an entirely different person. But most people don't think that way. They don't operate that way. They're not following that chis and philosophy of 1% better every day. The lack accountability, they lack structure, they lack time management, they lack routine. They're flying by the sea to their pants. They're driven by programs and patterns and conditioning from their past. Trust the process. Trust that this universe, this thing that birthed you, that gave you the blessing of life, that you did not ask for in which you just appeared conscious 30, 40, 50, 60, 70 years ago, that this thing wants the best for you. It loves you. It cares for you. It wants the expression of your potential to manifest. But I get that because of our traumas and pains and dysregulations inside of us, we think that this universe is hostile, that it's out to get us, that people can't be trusted, that this thing is just trying to destroy us. But I assure you, my friend, it's not. Nature is life-producing. It is life-adapting. Just look out into nature. Look at what it does. Look at how it heals. Look at how we have already built in us, healing tools, healing mechanisms. Look at how your system is working 24/7 tirelessly to clean yourselves to digest your food, to move your bowels, to signal when it's hungry, to signal when it's thirsty, to, when you get a cut, it mends the wound. It creates a scar, it thickens the skin so it's stronger. You hurt yourself. It mends, it sends your immune system kicks in. Dude, this thing, all it's trying to do is keep you alive. All it's trying to do is serve you. Think about it. Think you've got 80, 50 or 80 trillion cells inside of you. And think about them like little slaves, like little worker bees, looking up to you, your conscious, godlike consciousness, the part of you that's awake and aware. And each one of those cells is working tirelessly to serve you and keep you alive and heal you. And you're just, you're like, you're nuking it. You're pouring this alcohol into its system and it's just, it's lighting them on fire. It's killing them. It's a genocide. You know, it's like, what are we doing here, man? Why are we poisoning the system? I get it. You pour the poison in and it makes you feel good. I get it. You pour the poison in and it relieves you of some tension that you haven't learned how to process. But I assure you this system that that you have inhabited that you are a conscious witness to this observer of, dude, it's got all the tools inside it to self-regulate. It comes hard wired and equipped to feel as much love and gratitude and connection and compassion and joy and and ecstasy. Built in, built in. You don't need anything outside of yourself. But we think we do when we get caught in the trap in the hooks in the claws of this poison. It creates this illusion because of the way that it interacts with our neurochemistry and it taps the reward center. Gives you the illusion that you're doing something right, sending a reinforced signal to all processes in the body to repeat the behavior, putting you in this perpetual pain and pleasure cycle, keeping you trapped, making you afraid of letting go of that pleasure. Dude, you don't need it. Trust me. You got to work a program and a system to reharmonize, to rebalance out. You're an alien sitting behind a profound supercomputer and it's time to learn how to manage this thing. So you just have to take it one day at a time and trust that this process and journey will unfold in a way that is more beautiful than you can begin to imagine. As you commit, this is your spiritual evolution. This is your soul's curriculum. This is your soul's syllabus to learn how to commit to your personal growth. So I hope this episode was helpful for you. I hope it expanded your understanding of what one day at a time really means. And I hope it instilled in you a sense of courage and light and hope that you can do this thing. You don't need to solve the whole thing. You don't need to traverse the whole mountain overnight. We just take it one step one day at a time. If you want to work with me one on one, go to my website www.TheStopDrinkingCoach.com. Scroll down to the bottom. There's probably like 40 screenshots there of people who have worked with me. What they have to say about my program and their experience in it. These are just things I screenshot for my community. They're not. I didn't ask them to write this. This is just what people share. So check that out. If this episode was impactful for you, reach out to me and let me know. But go ahead and fill out an application. I will see you. By the way, too, if you've been listening to my podcast for a little while and you haven't left a five-star review, I'd really appreciate it if you did. That way, you can just bump it up in the rankings and help it reach more people who need this source of inspiration and understanding and insight about this journey so that they can get their lives and families together. So I appreciate you listening and I'll see you in the next video. If you feel like you're ready to finally transform your relationship with alcohol, visit www.thisstopdrinkingcoach.com and book a call with me. I offer private one-on-one and group coaching to make letting go of alcohol easier and more sustainable than you ever thought possible. Thanks again for listening, and I'll see you in the next episode.