10 Months In… Today I am celebrating 10 months of alcohol-free living; the longest stretch of sobriety I’ve had since booze and I hooked up over 25 years ago. To be fair, our relationship wasn’t always constant or consistent, and for the past three years it was “on-again, off-again.” Yet, I finally feel like I’ve Read More
Author: gr8ful_collette
The Thing I Have
When I consider the before and after, I can readily see the depth and dimension that sobriety brings to my life. It opens my ears to listen to God and others around me. Ears to hear the need (not so much to listen to the book my daughter is learning to read but to give Read More
Quitting
In March 2016, I earnestly decided to quit drinking for the first time. I read Annie Grace’s This Naked Mind: Control Alcohol and it completely changed the way I viewed alcohol and the role it played in my life. I felt like I had been duped for the last 25 years: by society, by the Read More
A Small, Good Thing
When I think back to where I was this time a year ago, I am overwhelmed with gratitude at how far I’ve come, and awash in hope for the journey that continues. Last year, the pause between Christmas and the new year–the space that doesn’t serve much of a purpose except to catch your breath Read More
The Gift
It is amazing how cutting one thing out of your life–alcohol–can change it completely. And if you’re caught up in drinking, a changed life is a blessing. It’s not only changed in the sense that it’s different. Much of how you experience your life sober is the exact opposite of what you are used to. Read More
Time Flies
“The bad news is time flies. The good news is you’re the pilot.” —Michael Altshuler I visited my hometown last weekend when I took my son to his volleyball tournament. I did not grow up in a what you would call a good city. The crime rate is greater than 89% of all U.S. cities. Read More
Choosing Grace
“Grace means that all your mistakes now serve a purpose instead of serving shame.” Brene Brown In America, the idea of making a mistake is frowned upon. We are a society that celebrates the strong, beautiful and perfect. Winning is the object of this game we call life, and shame on you if you can’t Read More
Don’t Control…Create!
This is the time of year where, as I like to put it, “something’s got to give.” With the busy-ness of the holidays, calorie-dense food and drink everywhere I look, the cold and dark creating an unfriendly environment for exercising, a variety of illnesses infecting my household, and this year my husband being away, I Read More
It’s Your Choice
The Bad News The bad news is that we underestimate the power of our own choices and our role in creating our lives. We make hundreds of choices a day: many small, some more significant and others habitual, which we don’t give any thought to at all. When choices become habits, just “something we do,” Read More