Courage Under Fire

A recovery podcast I've been working on for almost 5 months is launching next week Wednesday on Sober Soapbox and I am feeling all kinds of big emotions about it.

As someone who doesn't like sharing too much personal realism of myself, but on my journey, learning this hiding was caused through trauma, and learning to work through it, I feel like this really puts me out there on another level. But it almost feels like its now the other end of the spectrum, from nothing to everything.

There's a certain realness that comes with baring your soul to yourself. Picking yourself apart bit by bit. Having to face the beginning of your own darkness and the pain you tried to cover that caused your eventual demise. In turn then seeing the pain you caused. The countless dark days that stretched into nights of crying alone and not wanting to leave a dark room or even peer out from under the covers because you hated who you were so much and you couldn't believe how far you had fallen and you didn't know how or if you were ever going to get up again.

Something happened to me. There was this massive shift in how I saw things. As the sober months wore on, the clarity that came with it started opening things to me that I had either completely overlooked or didn't see because I chose not to. The gruelling work I was doing on myself was a kind of difficult I had never experienced in my life. There were bad habits engrained in me that needed unlearning, so I worked on them. There were amends that needed to be made, I did them. For the first time in my life, I did exactly as I was told, because I had been to rockbottom and I was clawing my way out from a relentless cycle that had held me in its grip for 28 years, knowing it was my final hurrah and I had no more time to waste. It was pure desperation and I was fighting the fight of my life.

With these clear eyes, I look back and I can pinpoint every red flag that led to my downfall that I didn't see. I have to remind myself that there were peoples journeys that I followed and they will never know, but they were motivation and inspiration for me in my darkest time and because I have a voice, I am paying that forward and I know I will be the light for someone, even if I never know. I remind myself, with me sharing my journey, it may hit home with someone on the same course, before they need to hit their rockbottom and it may change their path for them. I know it takes courage to do what Im doing and I cant ignore the pressing voice inside me, telling to push ahead. No procrastination, no self doubt, just a solid vote of confidence to walk this path. This path that is bigger than just me and who I am.

Intuition doesn't lie, but alcohol removes the penchant to follow your intuition. I will never allow my intuition to be taken from me again. I go into this new part of my sober journey, thinking more clear than I ever have and although I'm nervous, I am confident about sharing how life changing sober has been.

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