Category: Practical tips

Top tips to enjoy holiday drinking

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Practical tips, Social Life

Have you ever thought of actually going on that “trip of a lifetime”. The one you’ve been dreaming about since you saw it on a holiday show on TV ? Where you’re lying on a  sun drenched  beach with a Pina Colada in your hand? Or at the ski resort after a long day skiing.  You’re with your group in a log cabin, the fire is roaring, and ye are all sipping hot whiskeys and telling stories. Holiday drinking is so  normal.

Whatever your dream holiday is you can be sure alcohol comes up in your mind on more than one occasion. That’s mainly because alcohol is marketed as relaxing and having fun. Sure isn’t that what a holiday is all about, resting, recharging your batteries, drinking  and reflecting on the beauty of life. Forgot about last’s year’s holiday when the arguments never stopped and  you came back a stone heavier.  All  caused by  a little too much holiday drinking.

 

My suggestions for holiday drinking

If you are worried that you will overdo  holiday drinking then plan, plan, plan. It’s not as easy to plan holiday drinking, but it isn’t impossible.

 

Pick a time

Pick a time  never to drink before (I will never drink before …o clock any day)

 

Clear out the minibar

If staying in a hotel, ask the hotel to clear out alcohol from the minibar before you arrive and not refill with alcohol while you are there.

 

Know your alcohol strength

Make sure to know your alcohol strength of foreign drinks (cocktails, local alcoholic beverages, etc…) This can range from 2% to 40% depending on the drink.

 

Sangria anyone?

Find out if there any nice local  non alcoholic drinks you can enjoy. For example a non alcoholic sangria can be made with black tea and pomegranate juice. (Sounds horrible, but I’m told it’s delicious)

 

Always eat before drinking

Never drink on an empty stomach.  Also try to avoid those peanuts and spicy snacks, they make you thirsty and you drink more.

 

Fill a wine glass with water

Fill a wine glass with ice water.  Sometimes I just like holding the wine glass while out for dinner.  It doesn’t matter to me what’s in it!

 

Jugs of iced water

Make sure to have plenty of jugs of iced water at the dinner table. Keep your water glass topped up so you don’t keep reaching for your wine glass.

 

Plan some active activities

Plan to do some active activities you enjoy, that mean you need a clear head  e.g an early morning walk to the local market. A paddle boat excursion on the sea.

 

Tell your friends

Inform a friend or your entire holiday  group that you don’t intend to get very drunk any night.

 

Have a drink buddy

If you have a friend who also wants to manage their drinking, become “drink buddies” You  agree with each other the maximum number of drinks you will each  have and help each other to stick to  this.

 

Agree plans with your drink buddy

Agree with your “drink buddy” tactics for making sure you each stick to your targets. E.g never accepting free shots if the restaurant offer them. Reminding each other of the drink  calories – find some suggestions that works for each of you.

 

Limit your cash

When leaving your hotel or holiday home only bring enough money for that night. It’s easy to spend on a card when you’ve had alcohol, and you’re on holidays. However, think about the next day. Leave the card behind!

 

For more top tips on reducing alcohol harm, try out our free mini course here.

Controlling drinking with 3 small actions

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Personal stories, Practical tips

Worried about controlling drinking?

Someone asked me “how to make a  towards  controlling drinking”  recently during a conversation  about making the transition from dependent drinker. I believe you only have to make three small changes in the first instance if you want to improve your life by permanently quitting drinking. And these changes are as follows:

 

Tell someone

If you decide to stop drinking but tell nobody, it remains very easy to give into temptation further down the line when you experience a major craving. Because who will pull you up on it? Who is going to remind you of all your good intentions for resolving your booze problem? Making yourself accountable is incredibly effective for keeping you on track – and you can do this by using an app on your phone, by joining an online community like Soberistas or just by telling a couple of close friends and asking them to encourage you to stay sober when you have a wobble.

 

Promise yourself you’ll not drink for one month only

Habits only take a few weeks to break so rather than committing to a lifetime of sobriety, just earmark the next month as an alcohol-free period. By the end of it you will almost certainly feel differently about booze, and you’ll probably have noticed some or all of the many positives that arise from sobriety: weight loss, clearer skin, improved sleep, more money in the bank and a more level mood. Once you have proved to yourself that you can manage to stay sober for four weeks and you have experienced the advantages of sobriety for yourself, you’re much more likely to want to stick with it.

 

Brainwash your thinking

We live in a very boozy society and right from the moment we’re born we are subjected to glamorous, exciting imagery and messages relating to drinking alcohol. By the time we reach adulthood we tend to be hardwired in our thinking about booze, believing that we need it in order to have fun, we need it to celebrate, and that without it life will be dull. One of the best ways to counteract this overwhelming mental conditioning about alcohol is to read, read, and read some more books on becoming sober. There are loads of titles on this subject – if you need some inspiration then have a look at the Books section of Soberistas where you’ll find numerous reviews written by our members on the books that have helped them kick the booze.

 

Editor’s Note

It can be difficult to get started on controlling  drinking but every little action you take will help you towards your goal of getting your drinking under control. Don’t worry if at first you don’t succeed because once you keep trying you will eventually get your drinking under control.

 

Missing out on a simple way to control your drinking?

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Physical health, Practical tips, Professional help

A great way to control your drinking is to understand your reasons for drinking. Yet, this can be confusing as everybody’s reasons for drinking are different.  Some people drink because they’re depressed, for others drinking makes them depressed.

Some people drink too much  at the end of a long hard day to relax, others drink because drinking gives them energy to get through all they need to do in our modern hectic lives.

 

Drinking has two faces.

So like the Roman God, Janus, drinking has two faces. There’s the upsides or pro’s  where drinking helps you feel better and then there’s the downsides or con’s where drinking is making your life worse.

Marketing and advertising  makes drinking seems so normal and essential to a happy life, we’re often unaware of the downsides or the con’s If everybody around us is drinking, it can’t be that bad can it?

 

What are your pro’s and con’s of drinking?

So there’s lots of pro’s to drinking but also lot’s of con’s. Do you know what your pro’s and con’s of drinking are? Even if you’re not misusing alcohol, understanding the reasons why you drink is really important because then you’re much less likely to develop a drinking problem. Research shows that people who know their pro’s and con’s of drinking are likely to be more successful in keeping their drinking under control.

 

Control your drinking

So we’ve made it easier for you to understand your pros and cons and control your drinking. We’ve put together a short course called Janus,  My drinking pro’s and con’s

It contains

  1. An introduction,

2. An  audio from Valerie  explaining pro’s and cons.

3. A multiple choice quiz with a complete listing of pro’s and con’s  so you just have to tick the ones that apply to you

4. Suggested ways you can use your personal pros and cons to control your drinking.

The course will take no more than an hour to complete. You can start it  straight away, and if you’re under time pressure, save it and finish it another time.  Then you’ll have a great way to control your drinking.

So start right away  by clicking here

As always you remain anonymous.

 

Getting back on the wagon after an alcohol blow out

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Personal stories, Practical tips

Lots of people announce their intention to quit drinking.  Then, a few days, weeks, or even months later, they fall off the sober bus with a resounding crash and a major alcohol blow out.  Why does this happen, and how can we resume an alcohol-free life once we’ve caved into temptation?

 

It’s a dead cert for an alcohol blow out

There are lots of reasons why people will pick up a drink again after stoically declaring,

‘No more!’

Peer pressure is a major one, as is being unprepared, not sure what to ask for in a pub round or how to answer questions about why you’re suddenly teetotal. Boredom is another very common reason behind resuming one’s alcohol habit – if the drinking hours are not replaced with alternative and fulfilling activities, it is almost a dead cert that temptation will eventually prove too difficult to resist and you’ll have an alcohol blow out.

 

Is a full on binge inevitable?

And when we do cave in and drink, it’s very probable that it won’t comprise of just a couple of drinks but will be a major blowout, one that will be regretted enormously the next day. If you decided to quit drinking permanently,  it was more than likely down to your inability to control your intake, so after a dry period, a full on binge seems almost inevitable.

 

Can lessons be learnt?

A blowout can be perceived as a good thing if lessons are learnt. Many people will indulge in a drinking session just to test the water – to find out if somehow they’ve been ‘cured’ of their inability to control their drinking as a result of being completely sober for a length of time. Experience would suggest, however, that this will not be the case with exactly the same problems arising from having that initial drink (i.e. a crazed desire to go on drinking until blind drunk) as have always done.

 

You are human

Firstly then, a blowout is a great opportunity to be reminded of the fact that no, you can’t drink in moderation. Secondly, your wretched state the following morning should be noted to remind you of why exactly you hated drinking so much last time you decided to quit. Thirdly, it’s important to remember that you’re human and it takes a while for the brain to rewire itself after years of perpetually drinking heavily. If you’ve been a big boozer for twenty years, (like I was) it will take more than a couple of weeks to rewrite your neurology. I found that the cravings and triggers disappeared fully after about two years of constant sobriety, and now, five years on I never, ever feel compelled to drink.

 

Write down your feelings

Finally, it can be helpful following a blowout to write down your feelings about the incident: why did you decide to drink? What was the trigger? Did you feel good about any of it or was it all just a horrible mistake? How do you feel now – is there anything you can learn from the experience? And keep these notes to go over the next time you feel a wobble coming on. In this way, you are making yourself accountable to yourself, and recording the thought processes surrounding your fall off the wagon so that next time, your urge to drink won’t take you quite so much by surprise.

 

 Don’t feel ashamed

Stopping drinking is for lots of people a two-step-forward-and-one-step-back process, so there’s nothing to feel ashamed off if you don’t succeed in becoming sober straightaway. Be kind to yourself and use the experience positively. You will get there in the end!

 

 Editor’s Note

If you’re suffering from the effects of an alcohol blow out  and  trying to decide whether to just reduce your drinking or stay off drink all together you might find  our  short online course  makes your decision easier. Click here for details.

 

 

 

Top 4 reasons people fail to stay sober

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Personal stories, Practical tips

It’s relatively easy to decide to quit drinking – not so easy to stay sober and stick with it. We’ve all been there. The morning after a heavy night, feeling dreadful and absolutely determined that this will be the last time we’ll ever drink alcohol.  Only to return to the demon drink a few days or weeks later, rose-tinted glasses disguising exactly how bad we felt after our last boozy session.

There are several common reasons for this tendency to resume a drinking habit after a short break. The pitfalls I see most frequently on Soberistas.com are outlined below – but remember, once you’re aware of them, it becomes easier to avoid them!

 

1.Boredom

If you don’t find something else to do to fill up all those boozing hours, you will get bored. And when you’re bored, the desire to drink is likely to be very difficult to resist. The key to overcoming this obstacle is to get busy – find a new hobby, clear out your wardrobe, paint the spare bedroom, start running, learn a language…whatever it is, just make sure you’re not sitting there twiddling those thumbs!

 

2.Loss of self

Lots of people use alcohol to help lift them out of the humdrum. Drinking can inject excitement into your life. It can  also become an integral part of your identity – once it’s gone, it’s easy to feel a little lost. Self-esteem is key here.  If you think you are using booze to help you feel confident/sexy/funny/sociable perhaps you need to consider building your self-esteem in other ways (counselling, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, exercise and mindfulness are all good methods of achieving this).

 

3.Impatience

It’s very common to expect the tricky phase of adjusting to staying sober to be over and done with really quickly. This, however, tends not to be the case. When people expect that within a month of quitting the booze they’ll have shed all their excess weight, be sleeping like a log and have battled all their internal demons, they are bound to be hugely disappointed when reality hits. Things may take quite a long time to settle down. I estimate that it took me about 18 months before I felt properly adjusted to my new alcohol-free life. The weight didn’t come off until I wrapped my head around my unhealthy eating habits (a good 3-4 years after quitting drinking!).  My self-confidence was only restored after a couple of years. So, patience and realistic expectations are vital. The magic won’t happen overnight…but it WILL happen!

 

4.Alternative strategies

Many people use alcohol as a way to combat stress together with a whole host of other emotions they don’t want to feel: anger, jealousy, sadness, and bereavement. When you stop drinking, you MUST seek out alternative strategies for coping with emotional struggles – exercise works wonders, and having a warm bubble bath in candlelight can be an effective solution for stress management. Talking to friends and sharing the weight of your anxieties or keeping a journal and getting everything off your chest via writing are both helpful in this respect.  Whatever works for you, be sure to turn to that as a strategy instead of hitting the bottle.

 

Believe in yourself and stay sober

It is doable to stop drinking permanently and stay sober. However  once the initial excitement of embarking on this new chapter of your life has faded, it’s essential to put in place practical solutions to stay sober. Look at it as a long-term plan and have realistic expectations in terms of time scales.  Don’t forget to believe in yourself. You can do this!

 

Editor’s note

If you’re finding it difficult not to drink too much, you might find our course on deciding whether to stop drinking altogether or reduce your  drinking useful. Click here to find out more

Staying sober by moving the couch

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Personal stories, Practical tips

 

Staying sober by moving the couch ?

Sounds strange I know, I mean come on what’s your couch or any other furniture in your house got to do with staying sober or  drinking too much alcohol?

But I found moving furniture and changing around my home one of the best little secrets to staying sober. Many people say things like

“get a new hobby,

go back to school or

start playing an instrument”

now all these things are fantastic ideas and should definitely be looked into.

The reality is though that if looking after children or caring for an elderly parent we spend a lot of time in our homes.

 

You do the same thing every day

Where ever you spend a lot of time, you tend to develop regular habits and a routine.

Every morning after you wake up you probably do the same thing every day for at least the first hour. For me the, alarm goes off, I have a flick through Facebook, loo, medication, shower, dressed, teeth, breakfast, coffee, get my son off to school. As I start working from home I hope my husband (who’s a farmer) doesn’t keep coming in and out and annoying me!

Now almost all of this is done, by my subconscious. I just do it out of habit and routine, it probably wouldn’t matter if I wasn’t properly awake, I would still follow the same pattern.

 

What if you tried backways?

Certain routines are done in the same way.  Even cleaning the house….just take a look at your own routines…say cleaning your kitchen. Do you clear the table, wipe the counters, load the dishwasher then sweep the floor? What do you think would happen if you tried to do it backways? It would probably drive you crazy and you would have to use a lot of energy to keep focused on doing it backways.

 

Use your knife and fork in opposite hands

I often suggest to people to  try using their knife and fork in the opposite hands for one month to see how hard it is to break a habit  I get lots of texts a few days after they start doing this saying things like

“I keep forgetting to do it!” and

“OMG this is harder than it sounded!”

These types of patterns are also true when it comes to drinking. Very often drinking too much is a habit, so staying sober or reducing your drinking means creating new habits

 

I always drank at home

I always drank at home.  My routine included my fix of alcohol to get me through the day.  I didn’t drink every day but when I drank….I drank to get drunk. So when it came to getting off the drink I was in trouble.

I began attending a mental health group with trained facilitators.  So I started to learn coping skills from other people and the facilitators about how to alter your thought patterns and change habits. It was suggested I take my drinking problem and “put it away” for a while, it was also recommended that I stop calling myself an alcoholic as I was a person, not a symptom.

 

I had to relearn habits

So I had to relearn habits, I had developed over the 10 years of my alcohol rehab treatments.   I realised getting up in the morning and getting on my knees to pray did not work for me, despite what I had been told. The Mental Health group suggested that I get up and take control of my own day. To start the day in a positive empowering way by repeating

“today is my day and I’m going to make it a great one”.

This was really hard to believe at first but as time went on it got better and more believable.

They also suggested that I move things around in my home so I would be “forced” to look at things in a different way.

 

Out went sitting at the table

So out went sitting at the table, looking out  the window with a drink.  I sat on a different soft chair, at the coffee table and a pile of books near the window.   I made sure I was comfortable and had something to read.

I also rearranged my countertops, microwave, kettle and other appliances putting them into different places. So when I went into “subconscious mode” I had no choice but to “reboot my thinking” and to do things differently. This in turn reminded me that I was changing my patterns and developing new habits.

 

 

I never got a compulsion to drink while sitting there

I never sat on the soft chair with a book when I was drinking.  So I never got a compulsion to drink while sitting there.  I started to realise that if I did things in a different way it blocked old habits and then dampened compulsions to drink.

I didn’t have to do anything drastic like build an extension on the house, it was very subtle changes. Things like moving our bed around, painting the room and adding nice things.  This changed the “mood” in the room as previously I was often drunk or hungover in the bedroom.

So you know when we say things like

“if I didn’t live here I would be able to stop drinking”.

Don’t move home, try changing your environment first!

If you’d like more help on staying sober, you might find this helpful

What is your safe drinking limit?

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Physical health, Practical tips, The big picture

Would n’t it  be lovely to know just how much drinking is safe drinking.   There’s  plenty of debate around this. Some of which we’ve found  very confusing.
To make matters worse, the language is all really technical from safe drinking, low risk, units to standard drinks. So we did some international research and spoke to the HSE, the Irish Government Health care provider to try and make it simple. This is what they all said.

 

There is no safe drinking

The latest evidence says there is no safe drinking. Earlier studies showing there are health benefits from a glass of wine a day have been reviewed and some of the results are now seen as wrong.  Also the health benefits found  can be obtained in less risky ways by changing your diet.  So leading experts are  saying there is no safe drinking limit.  So now it’s all about “low risk” drinking using  “standard drinks”.

 

What are standard drinks?

Different drinks have different levels of alcohol or ethanol to give the proper name. This can range from 5% in  some beers or 40% in some vodkas.  So to avoid comparing apples with oranges, drinks are now  described as standard drinks measured using ethanol per 10 grams.  I’ll come back to this in a future post. So now standard drinks are used to explain low risk drinking.

 

What is low risk drinking?

Low risk drinking for women is 11 standard drinks per week.  This is roughly about a large bottle of wine plus one of the quarter bottles you buy in the pub per week. (See picture below.)  For men low risk drinking is 17 units per week.

safe drinking
A low risk drinking week for women

 

 

We nearly had to be picked up off the floor

When we learned this, we nearly had to be picked off the floor. It seems so low.
Many women drink their weekly limit in a day or two.
You’re probably thinking sure everybody’s misusing alcohol at that rate.  And you’re absolutely right. According to the Health Research Board, more than half of us are misusing alcohol.

 

Why are these drinking limits so low?

You’re probably thinking if drinking is so dangerous it would n’t be such a big part of our lives, would it?
Well in the 1960’s, drinking was not such a big part of our lives.  On average every person drank around 5 litres. Now we drink around 11 litres per person. (See Alcohol Action Ireland website  here for details)  The really serious harm from this is now becoming  clearer.  However attitudes are changing and the majority of Irish people believe we need to reduce our drinking and change our attitudes.(See report here)

 

So you’re not alone

If you think you’re drinking too much and want to change your drinking, you’re not alone.  Why not check out our new video where Valerie explains how to drink in a way that reduces your risk of future harm and set your personal drinking limit.

 

PS Don’t give up, there’s good news!

Before you give up and run away, because this seems totally off the wall, there is some good news. Once you start reducing your drinking you start reducing the risks straight away. So you might not feel able for “low risk” drinking  but  there’s lots of little actions you can take to reduce possible harm.  Our free mini course with practical tips can help. Click here to start right away

Can an alcohol counsellor help you?

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Mental health, Practical tips, Professional help

 I talked in this post about  rehabs and promised to come back to how an alcohol counsellor may help. So first to explain some terms.

 

What is counselling & psychotherapy?

Counselling & Psychotherapy are words used to  describe  a range of talking therapies which is when you meet with a health care professional  (often known as therapist) who is specially trained to  help. Counselling usually involves committing to a series of regular sessions of about an hour in length over a period of time.

 

Is it easier to talk to a stranger?

Sometimes it is easier to talk to a stranger than to relatives or friends.  During counselling the therapist listens to you and helps you find your own answers to problems without judging you. The counsellor will give you time to talk, cry or just think without judging you.

 

You do not need to be in a crisis

You do not need to be in crisis to go to counselling, in the same way you might do a course to get a promotion or better job, counselling can be a form of self-development in order to lead a happier more productive life.  It can also help to maintain a sense of well-being whilst facing challenges in your life.  For example, caring for an elderly parent with Alzheimer’s can be very stressful. I’m in this situation and even though I have very supportive friends I find it really helpful to talk to a counsellor on a regular basis.

 

There are many different types of counsellors

There are many different types of counsellors/therapists with psychological training from clinical psychologists, occupational psychologists, to counselling psychologists, psychothera­pists to CBT counsellors and creative art therapists. Each of these is trained to treat your mental health problems in a different way and there is much discussion about which way is best. Some of these professionals will have gone through their own personal psychological therapy as part of their training, but others do not.

 

Do all counsellors treat alcohol misuse?

Because of the different types of training they receive alcohol and mental health issues are seen as two different problems. So many counsellors treat mental health issues only and not alcohol abuse issues. This does seem a little crazy as the research shows many people misusing alcohol have an underlying health problem such as anxiety or depression. You can find out more about this issue on this website here. (Note: Angela and I helped to co-found this website)

 

Do all alcohol counsellors help with mental health problems?

It depends on when and where they trained. Some alcohol counsellor training  courses follow the Alcohol Anonymous 12 step model and the alcohol counsellors are not trained to deal with other  mental health issues. Ideally it is best to choose a counsellor who is trained to treat both alcohol misuse and mental health issues.

 

Which alcohol counsellor is best for me?

Research shows  a good relationship with your psychologist or counsellor is the most important part of solving your problem.

You should make sure you feel comfortable and safe with your counsellor and you choose a therapist that supports you in setting your own treatment goals and uses a therapy that suits you.

 

Try to understand what you need

For example, you may have experienced bullying in school but never abused alcohol until you started experiencing anxiety as a result of a stressful work situation. So you may decide you wish to learn to manage your anxiety better, but do not wish to re-open the issue of your childhood bullying. A professional and ethical therapist will accept your decision and work with you on your anxiety only without passing judgement or attempting to re -open the childhood bullying issue as they will know this could be very damaging to you.

 

CBT therapy

CBT therapy can be very effective for anxiety and alcohol misuse and does not generally have to look at childhood issues. A therapist who uses only psychoanalytic therapies may tend to help by examining childhood issues. They may tend to focus on your childhood. So it is useful to know what type of approach the counsellor will use. A highly trained alcohol counsellor will use a mix of  therapy approaches as that way they are more likely to find an approach that suits you.

We’ll have a course on CBT soon, so if you’d like to know when it becomes available please click here.

In a future post, I’ll deal with selecting the right counsellor for you.

 

 

 

 

 

Meditation helped my sober mind

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Mental health, Personal stories, Practical tips

I began meditating a couple of years ago in an effort to try and calm my busy mind, as it has a habit of rattling out a constant internal dialogue during each and every waking moment of my life. I had an idea that this restless mind of mine could perhaps be one of the reasons why I loved a glass of wine so much, as excessive alcohol has the power to switch things off mentally for a while. I needed to create a sober mind.

 

Creating a sober mind

Quietening the mind through imbibing alcohol to the point of slipping into an unconscious heap on the settee is not the goal that your average Buddhist monk is aiming for!  I came to this realisation around the time I knocked drinking on the head. Meditation, however, offers a mind-calming solution minus the coma, so I went along to my local Buddhist centre for a few sessions. To see whether it would help create a sober mind.

I surprised myself with the ease that I relaxed into such a peaceful state, especially given that I was sitting amongst a room full of people I had never met, all sitting with their eyes closed and feet resting atop small red cushions on the floor. However, I struggled to prevent wild thoughts (or monkey mind) from periodically posing a threat to the inner peace I was experiencing fleetingly (but which felt just wonderful when it happened).

 

Would I ever shut my monkey mind up?

After a few weeks of attending the meditation class I spoke to someone who I gathered was a long time meditator, and asked her if I would ever be able to shut my monkey mind up. What she told me was very interesting, and should be borne in mind if you have experienced the same difficulties in maintaining a true silencing of the mind. The goal of meditation, she said, was to develop a greater awareness of the mind and how it operates, and whilst sometimes it is possible to quiet the raging flow of ideas and thoughts that insist on popping up out of nowhere when you are trying to visualise a blue sky and nothing else, quite often those who are meditating (even people with vast experience of the practice) do not succeed in completely closing down their thought process.

 

Don’t view a  busy mind as failure

Rather than view this as a failure, the woman informed me that if I was meditating (monkey mind being awake or not) then I was meditating – with or without the restful, thought-free headspace. Becoming more in tune with your mind allows you to view it as a separate entity that will constantly produce random thoughts – some right and others wrong, some representative of you and others not – beyond your control.

 

Learn to create space from your thoughts

This perception of the mind as almost a living thing in its own right helped me immeasurably to deal with my alcohol issues. Aided by meditation, I have developed the ability to recognise my monkey mind, bad voice, devil on my shoulder, wine witch, call it what you will, and to distance myself from the thoughts which are counter-intuitive to the person I think I am and who I strive to be in the future. Rather than interacting with this negative voice, I am now able to observe it objectively, giving me the power to deal with it as I see fit.

 

Editor’s note.

You might find our course which includes a mediation on cravings helpful. Click here