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staying sober is always the first thing

“Then I realized that I had to separate my sobriety from everything else that was going on in my life. No matter what happened or didn’t happen, I couldn’t drink. In fact, none of these things that I was going through had anything to do with my sobriety; the tides of life flow endlessly for better or worse, both good and bad, and I cannot allow my sobriety to become dependent on these ups and downs of living. Sobriety must live a life of its own”
Quoted from the Big Book of AA, He Lived Only to Drink chapter, pp. 450-451.

During a recent recovery group that I co-lead we had quite a few newcomers who had been sober 3 days, 5 days, and 2 weeks. As I listened to their stories my heart went out to them and when my opportunity to share in our group circle came up, I encouraged them to “just stay sober”. Don’t worry about anything else or even try to figure anything else out, just stay sober and let all the other stuff come up later.


In our recovery group we focus on the following priorities:

  1. Get sober first

  2. Love the person, not their beliefs

  3. Help people discover the source of their pain

Although we are a Christ-centered recovery group, you don’t have to believe to belong. You just have to be on a path of recovery. Whether that’s 1-hour or 10+ years, getting sober and staying sober is the top priority. Then, we love you as another human being on this journey of life. You don’t have to believe in Jesus or share our spiritual beliefs, we love you as another human. And our group would be remiss if we didn’t in some way help you discover there is more to your addiction than using. All addiction, specifically destructive addictions, begin with pain. Somewhere along the path of your life your addiction became a way to cope with not facing the hurt that you experienced.


So how do you stay sober?

It’s all choice really. But, at the beginning stage it’s about refocusing your mind. An addicted mind is a busy mind, so you have to find something to occupy your thoughts. Preferably, something positive that distracts you from wanting to use again.


There are as many positive activities to choose from as there are drugs or drinks of choice. You may already have a hobby. Or you’ve thought of taking one up for years, but never have because you were too busy planning your next fix. Well, you take that same mental energy that you used to get high or drunk and focus it on a new sober activity or hobby.


Start with listing some things out that you’ve always thought of doing. Here’s a brief list of things you might do to refocus your mind:

  • Get a job. If you already have a job, start a hobby.

  • Attend daily recovery meetings.

  • Start a Bible study or join a local spiritual group.

  • Exercise. Could be as simple as walking or hiking trails.

  • Take up a martial art.

  • Take an art class.

  • Ride a bike, skate, swim.

  • Learn to knit or paint.

  • Start gardening.

  • Raising chickens.

  • Skeet shooting.

  • Do something with your hands: build something, craft something.

There are an endless amount of positive, sober things you can do with your time and energy. It all comes down to flipping your addictive energy into something positive versus destructive. There really is a way out of your addiction if you just live for the moment, day by day, and let all the days add up to weeks, months, and years. Just stay sober. You got this!





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