Yesterday's alcohol intake: zero.
Started drinking: N/A
Finished drinking: n/a
etc.
Bren came home. We read gardening books together and I sat and listened to her talk about her holiday. She had a big smile on her face. She looked lovely. She liked the flowers.
Just a thought about stopping doing things...
Stopping is negative. Slowing down is negative accelleration. Stopping means no. Not. Don't.
Stopping is a real fucking downer, and I've seen, both in my self and in certain significant others that trying to stop, rather than trying to change, is expressed only as "I will not do X".
I'm not trying to stop using the internet, or to quit drinking. Well, I am trying to quit drinking, but I'm not thinking of it in those terms.
Instead, I have many things I can do instead. I know this sounds like a load of little mr sunshine pollyanna self help bollocks, but instead of the thought process being, "today I will not X", I'm waking up and trying to say to myself, "Today I can/will/have this to do/etc".
And it works. So far. I know it's only been a couple of days.
What time I have spent on the internet has been mainly a) doing these blog posts, b) trying to promote my driving school website, c) a tiny amount of time on places like head heritage and dailygammon. And I've been doing it on my laptop, in a light bright spacious living room, not in a pokey gloomy cell.
Today I have six driving lessons, from 12 until 8. This evening I shall have a long luxurious soak in a deep hot bath. As far as the rest of the time between then and sleeping goes, I don't yet know.
3 comments:
I know this sounds like a load of little mr sunshine pollyanna self help bollocks, but instead of the thought process being, "today I will not X", I'm waking up and trying to say to myself, "Today I can/will/have this to do/etc".
You're right, it does sound like bollocks. Thing is, it really isn't.
I'm not going to discuss your recent decisions and attempts to change your life here. You have my email address... if you ever want my advice or want to bounce any ideas off me, please drop me a line.
What I will say here is that your idea about phrasing the changes you want to make in a positive, rather than negative, context is exactly the right thing to do. It's at the heart of both NLP (controversial, yes, but not without merit) and CBT (also controversial, but demonstrably effective for a lot of people). And with good reason... though as I say, I'm not going to foist a bunch of psychodynamic theory onto your blog. But for what it's worth, it sounds like you're on the right track to me. And I'm pretty sure the longer you stick to that path, the better you'll feel about yourself and your life.
And whatever you do, don't let individual setbacks, should they happen, knock you off the path you're on.
I'll leave the technical stuff to the experts like Jim, but you seem to be heading in the right direction, good luck with it all, if it's of any use I used to regard a night sober as a night wasted, now I sometimes have a beer or two and think 'damn now I've limited options for the night'all the best for the future
Jim, a lot of my thoughts about this stem from a hypnotherapy session a couple of years ago. The practitioner was very much coming from an NLP/CBT angle. She planted seeds that are fruitful now.
One alcohol worker, a few years back, questioned me extensively about exactly how I drank. Rather than trying to get me to stop or cut down, he got me to drink from a baby cup, instead of necking it from the bottle. Very much a CBT idea. Change the context. Break the chain of thought.
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