March 15, 2023 • 28 mins
You want to feel confident walking down the wine isle.
You want alcohol to be unimportant. You don’t want to make it a big deal and have to explain it or talk about it.
YOU can't make it unimportant in your life until you make it unimportant to yourself.
So you’ve try avoiding it or accepting you fate.
But it because the pink elephant and that's all you can think about.
Start by learning to see your thoughts and observe them, rather than fumbling around in the dark.
1:1 Coaching with Mary is the next best step to practice these tools, so they can become your new habit. Apply today!
You’ve tried to cut back on drinking but nothing sticks, you're stuck in the cycle of confusion and convincing. One day you're motivated, the next you're telling yourself it's not that bad. What makes the difference isn’t more information—it’s having a new way to apply it. Click HERE to schedule your free consult to uncover the one thought that will change everything.
There Is A Life Beyond Moderation & Deprivation.
We Focus On What You Are Moving Towards, Not What You Are Moving Away From.
The Exhausting Trap Of Moderation Ends Now With My No Shame Approach Using The Proven Five Shifts Process. Follow the path of 100's of Women, Click HERE to join today!
DISCLAIMER: This podcast and its contents are not a substitute for rehabilitation, medical treatment or advice. It is for educational and inspirational purposes. I am not a therapist or doctor. The views here are expressed a personal opinion and based on first hand experience. Please consult a doctor if your mental or physical health is at risk.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Mary Wagstaff (00:01):
Do you ever feel like you're outgrowing alcohol,
that you are longing for adeeper connection to life? If
alcohol is keeping you playingsmall and feels like the one
area, you just can't figure outyou are in the right place. Hi,
my name is Mary Wagstaff. I'm aHolistic alcohol coach who ended
a 20 year relationship toalcohol without labels, counting
(00:23):
days or ever making excuses. NowI help powerful women just like
you eliminate their desire todrink on their own terms. In
this podcast, we will explorethe revolutionary approach of my
proven five shifts process thatgets alcohol out of your way by
breaking all of the rules, andthe profound experience that it
(00:43):
is to rediscover who you are onthe other side of alcohol. I am
so thrilled to be your guide.
Welcome to your journey ofawakening. Welcome back to the
show my beautiful listeners,thank you for being here. So how
did it go with looking at yourexpectations last week did you
do that did you notice were yourthoughts of the way things
(01:09):
should be we're creating morepain for you, your thoughts, not
the thing. Then the thingitself. And if you tap back into
your intention, and yourintuition and your values and
your wisdom, like you take thatstep back, you have access to
seeing that we all get to be whowe want to be right. It's so
(01:31):
much of the time in relation toother people. And I mean, even
after seven years of being amother, and not like I can see
where I have expectations of myson, my seven year old son where
you know, and then when I digdeeper, and I do this work, it's
it's because of a lack of my ownneeds being met. And the reason
(01:55):
this is so important when itcomes to alcohol is because when
you have expectations, and youdon't take a step back and
understand what your intentionis and what you actually need.
That is the trigger to drink.
And then everything outside ofyou is a problem. And so when
(02:16):
you solve for those things, thenthe desire to drink becomes less
than need to drink becomes lessyour confidence goes up. Because
it's not just the urge foralcohol. I had someone recently
say to me, you know, noteveryone wants to quit drinking,
some people just want to drinkless. And that is true. That's
(02:40):
what you think you want is oh, Ijust wish I could just have one.
But what you really want is tobe able to meet your own needs.
Because as long as alcohol isstill at the center of
importance in any area, and Itouched on this last week, it is
still you will still have tomanage your mind around it. I
could probably say this on everysingle episode for every single
(03:03):
show because I can't drive ithome enough. And if that's okay
with you, then we're having adifferent conversation like I'm
totally okay, with having twodrinks, feeling the urge to have
more and learning how to allowthat urge to stop. There are
people that teach on moderation.
And you can go and listen tothem too. But if you learn to
eliminate your desire for thatfirst drink, then you don't ever
(03:28):
have to allow an urge. And to melike alcohol is had enough of my
time. To illustrate this point.
I wanted to read you an excerptfrom Michael singers latest book
Living untethered, he is theauthor of The Untethered Soul,
which I've talked about inseveral episodes, I like this
book. Well, he's obviouslydeveloped his concepts even more
(03:50):
because it's more concise. Andif you want a deeper dive into
someone who has studied thewitness consciousness for much
longer than I have, and justit's that is his work. I mean,
he's brilliant. And so livinguntethered, this is the chapter
neither suppression norexpression, I won't read the
whole thing. But just thinkabout your relationship to
(04:13):
alcohol and how you do you know,to say forever, just like freaks
you out. I mean, it's such a redflag to when you just take a
step back and even just look outyour window. And how much of
your mind is consumed byalcohol. Of course, like, that's
not the way you want to live therest of your life, which is, you
(04:34):
know, why you're here. So hesays, the only data the mind
currently has is based upon itspast experiences. So the mind
thinks it's right. And thisactually will tie into our
conversation about expectationsand versus intentions. Because
when you've thought anexpectation over and over and
(04:55):
over again or when it's beenmodeled to you, and it's been
reinforced thing like your momtold you, then of course, it's
going to be you think you'reright. This is part of the
predicament, please understandthat your mind will always think
it's right. The mind is notdumb. It knows what it
experienced. But it does notknow what it's didn't
(05:18):
experience, which is aninfinitely larger body of
knowledge and mean listen,infinitely larger body of
knowledge. This is why the wisesage, Lao Tzu reflected that a
wise man does not argue for whatpurpose. You have your mindset
and another person has theirmindset, all their lifelong data
(05:42):
says one thing, and you'retotally different lifelong data
sees it differently. There'snothing you're going to do about
that, except be humble enough torealize that in any given
moment, the data you are takingin is less than point 0000 1% of
(06:03):
what's going on everywhere. It'smeaningless. It rounds to zero.
In essence, you had a wholebunch of zero breath experience
that adds up to zero, thepersonal mind is so caught up in
itself, it will never want tolook at that truth. deep
spiritual teachings embrace thattruth. They ask you to look at
(06:26):
the world in front of you, andrealize it took billions of
yours for that exact moment tomanifest before you accept that
honor that surrender to thatthis begins by first accepting
reality, not resisting it, likeaccepting what is right, just
that it is it's neutralizing it.
It's not about doing or notdoing anything. It's about
(06:49):
surrendering your initialresistance to what is you see
what's there, and then you letgo of all the stuff that comes
up due to your stored samskaras.
Inevitably, your mind is goingto start talking about likes and
dislikes. Just don't listen tothem. Why would you listen to
that? It's just your personalblockages super imposed on
(07:13):
reality. So there's reality. Andthen samskaara is a Sanskrit
term used in like yogictradition, which is basically
the grooves in our brain, it'sthe impressions or the imprints.
And so there's reality, right,and like, it's getting even
scarier out there, because thatwe're not kind of sure of what
reality is. But there's like thething that happened, that your
(07:36):
husband yelled at the kids. Andthen there's your impression
layered over that, right. Butevery person's perspective is
going to see that differently.
And obviously, he sees thatdifferently. And the kids see it
differently. And like I justlove thinking about the billions
of years it took to create thismoment, the billions of people
on the planet, and how stuck weare with this one little
(08:00):
chemical, this one littlebeverage choice called alcohol,
and all of the other things thatlead us there and then all of
our beliefs and our BS aroundlike the story that we've
created about quitting drinkingand drinking and not drinking on
all those things. And that isthe segue into the very first
shift of the five shiftsprocess, which is to move from
(08:24):
avoidance to acceptance, right?
Because intentionally orunintentionally, you are
avoiding the samskaras you areavoiding these imprints and we
cannot get anywhere you cannotcreate lasting change in your
(08:45):
life.
Until you become aware of whereyou are starting from and that
takes just honesty. It takes awillingness to be wrong to be
humbled, like he said, becauseour experiences are so little
they're so limiting when Ichange my relationship to
alcohol like oh, you're I justlike everyone's right everyone
(09:08):
is right from their their ownexperiences. In the book The
Four Agreements by Don MiguelRuiz, that is like one of the
agreements is to never takeanything personally because
people's reactions and responsesto you. And of course, we're
going to someone yells at you,it's gonna You're no you're
gonna have a reaction. But it'slike if someone doesn't have
(09:29):
time for you, right? Likethey're putting up this just
happened to me where I was likereally needing a friend and I
reached out to someone, and thatperson is super busy and they're
such a lover and I love thisperson so much. But like I was
totally but her I called Matthewand I'm like, I need friends who
make me important. Like listento that my ego, right? And so
(09:52):
it'd be like, this person'sbusy, like let me call someone
else right? And just know justtrusting that they're in their
own experience but What do wedo? We mate we, we suffer more
for it. Okay? So the way thatthis shows up for you is, is
(10:16):
your desire, your deep desire isyou want alcohol to be
unimportant, you don't want tomake it a big deal anymore,
right? You don't want to have toexplain or talk about it, you
want to feel confident, walkingdown the wine aisle, you don't
want to wake up with regret anymore. And the reason that it
continues to act, those thingsactually seem to be growing,
(10:40):
like your thoughts about it areactually compounding and
creating even more regret evenmore shame, even more
nervousness about talking abouteven less confidence is because
you haven't yet neutralized ituntil you neutralize alcohol and
start to shift into your ownawareness about your thinking,
(11:04):
your awareness about thereactions, your all of your
judgments and yourinterpretations. It is never
going to change, you're going tobe married to it, it's going to
be personal, you are going to bein it. As it's 100% of
existence, instead of that, it'sthat your, that your thoughts
about it. And all of your brainis really just 00 0.0001% of
(11:29):
everything that actually exists.
You've tried avoiding it. Right?
You've tried to run past thewine aisle, not go to parties,
schedule everything around it.
But all the while your brain isthinking about oh my god, what
about summer? Oh, my God, whatabout spring break? Oh, my God,
(11:51):
what about that wedding? Right?
You're actually planning thefuture also of hypothetical
scenarios that actually don'texist? How could I ever go to a
concert and never drink again?
And you have like, don't evenhave concert tickets, right? And
the reason that avoiding itdoesn't work, whether it's
conscious or unconscious, right?
(12:12):
Whether you're, you're avoidingyour subconscious thinking,
because you don't actually youdon't have the skill yet of
learning how to look at yourmind. Or when you've tried to
quit drinking, or you have justsaid, Fuck it enough. And you're
like this. It's not a problemlike this is fine. I'm just this
is just the way that it isright? I'm always just going to
be a drinker. I'm just going toalways want it. I would say that
(12:35):
that's also that, that peace ofaccepting what you don't want is
also avoiding the thoughts thatjust aren't true. Avoiding
having a new conversation, a newperspective, a new dialogue. And
the reason that this doesn'twork is because it's the pink
(12:57):
elephant in the room. So I saypink elephant, can you think
about anything less than a pinkelephant, purple dog, pink
elephant? Blue turtle, right?
Like, that's all you can thinkabout when I'm blue by the blue
turtle. So you are constantlythinking about it, it's not
going anywhere you don't buy,even if you think this is just
(13:20):
the way it always this is how italways is like that perspective
doesn't stick. It doesn't lastbecause of the impact that it's
having on your life. It's hadyou giving up on your dreams.
It's had you thinking thateverything that you wanted is
over, right? And then afteryou've had kids or gotten
(13:44):
married or started a career,you've put everything else on
the backburner that's about you.
And this is the pivotal time forthe women that are consciously
awakening and wanting to gobeyond alcohol. They have put
their desires and their dreamson the backburner for long
(14:07):
enough and they regret not doingit. But they also think you also
think that that's not possible.
And the reason that you thinkthat is because alcohol keeps
telling you, it's not right andkeeps lowering your confidence.
And every time you gain a littlebit of headway. Something
happens with alcohol to give youa step back, right? Whether it's
(14:28):
showing up at work with theMonday blues and having the
Sunday scaries or it's like Iremember one time there was a
studio I had applied at I hadreached out to the owner. I
wanted to teach there. And thiswas even before Emmett and I had
canceled the first interview Iwas gonna go to this woman's
(14:50):
house, have an interview where Iactually have to perform as a
yoga instructor meet herpersonally the first time it was
both time cuz I was definitelyhungover, but I had made an
excuse. And I typically likethis was not really my MO. But I
had made an excuse that therewas a snow storm. And then, like
the second time I had everycanceled then she just was like,
(15:12):
no, because of course, like youneed someone that's responsible
to show up. And there was stufflike that you're even like
showing up to teach a yoga classand feeling hungover and feeling
so out of alignment with myvalues. And that happened to me
all the time. I used to go tothis one yoga studio there was
like, this yoga studio was onone corner, and then the dive
(15:35):
bar that I would go to this wasback in my heyday before Matthew
even. So it was like, you know,however, long ago, 12 years ago
or something? Gosh, that seemsso long ago. Oh, my God. No, it
had to be maybe like 10 years?
Well, no, my gosh, I'm have abirthday coming up you guys. So
(15:59):
yeah, anyway, and, and thenlike, I would go to yoga go and
change or sometimes not even.
And then they go to the divebar, and smoke and hide out and
hope that the instructor didn'tsee me walking by. And it was
like for what? Literally forwhat those relationships that I
(16:20):
made at that place? No. Did theygo anywhere? It was shitty food,
it was a whole mess. It was awhole mess. And I was lying to
myself. Right. And, you know,had I known.
(16:41):
Had I known that this deepWellspring inside of me that was
just waiting to come out. And itwas so much about confidence.
Right? It was so much aboutsharing and vulnerability until
I put myself in the opportunityto share my truth about what was
going on with me in a space thatwas free of judgment until I
(17:05):
took that step to say, to ripthe band aid off and saying, I
need something different. AndI've told the story about going
on this goddess retreat, where Imet my mentor, my spiritual
mentor. And then everythingchanged. It was like I could see
myself, you know, inrelationship to other women. And
(17:25):
it wasn't about alcohol. But itwas about knowing that we have
these unmet needs as women thatwe're putting on the backburner.
And then the only time that itlike comes out is when we're
drinking a few glasses of wine.
And then you're able to expressyourself. But there are very
safe containers like the one Icreate, that are safe and
(17:46):
sacred, and created for thisopportunity for you to express
yourself and then so everythingthat's been lying dormant and
shoved down and stuffed downstarts to come out. And you no
different than therapy. It'slike we're taking it, we're
putting it right on the table.
(18:08):
And we're going to examine itand ask why that's, first, we're
going to give you a bunch ofcompassion and validation,
right? And say, of course youfeel this way. Of course you
feel this way. Let's let'spresents that let's really honor
that. Right? And that is, thatis the first step of without the
awareness. There is no gettingto that second step that is this
(18:32):
true, that third step? How doesthis feel right? And so we're
gonna get into that in thesubsequent episodes. But without
the first step of awareness,where you and this is how
Michael singer puts it, you haveto become the subject and you
have to let your thoughts becomethe object. So we examine we
(18:53):
explore your mind and thethoughts that have been hidden
are running the show. Andthey've been running the show
very efficiently. Like that'swhy our brain is amazing, right?
It's your habitual mind. Ourmind habituate so easy, it
doesn't like pain, which itthinks thinking new thoughts in
general and changing, quittingdrinking drinking less, it
(19:16):
thinks that's going to cause itpain only because it's something
new, right? So it has to do somemore work and that's why when
you actually have a process anda strategy that takes you step
by step through it it's there'sit has that that accountability
locked in so you know, whenyou've decided to quit on
(19:40):
yourself because you can'tcontrol your thinking. And you
might be thinking that right nowlike I can't control my thinking
my mind takes over. I'mcompletely in spirals all the
time. I can't think I can'tthink straight right like Jill
that was on the show. That washer. That was her thing. She was
just constantly in this mindspiral. have just, I'm doing it
(20:01):
wrong. What am I supposed to bedoing? I'm supposed to be doing
it next, like never givingyourself permission to rest and
like alcohol was the only thingthat could quiet it. And if you
go listen to Jill, her firstthing, I'll never forget her
saying this because I was like,hell yeah. She said, I didn't
have a drinking problem, I had athinking and feeling problem.
And that's what it boils downto. And I was like, I love that
(20:23):
so much. And that is all of it.
And like in, you know, lastweek, when I talked about that
problem spectrum, it's like, theproblem spectrum is the problem
of how much you believe yourthoughts. That's the problem,
right? That is the problem. Andif you, if you allow yourself to
change, if you believe, and youwant to no longer want it, you
(20:45):
can do that. And I am livingproof and all my guests, and my
clients are living proof. So ifyou're married to your mind, and
when it's inside, like when it'slike digging around inside of an
M, a bag in the dark, right?
(21:06):
It's like you go in there tofind something. And instead of
just dumping everything out,that takes you two seconds to
see what's in there. You justcontinue to like, close your
eyes and search around for yourcar keys, and it takes you
forever to find them, right. Butyou can expedite that result by
dumping it all out, siftingthrough it and seeing what the
(21:26):
garbage that's not serving you,even if it is true, like why do
you want to focus on it right,and we're not bypassing it,
we're just deciding, like,there's more important things
for my mind to focus on. And thestuff that you want to keep,
like all of the amazing waysthat you are able to show up for
yourself all of the planning,the preparation that you do the
(21:48):
big the way, you can see the bigpicture, the way that you get,
like, you know, a million tasksdone in a day, even if right now
your brain tells you I didn't doenough, right? Like I guarantee
you, when we go to look at itand write it down, you've done
so much. So instead of diggingaround in the dark, we're going
(22:09):
to dump it out and look at itand sift through it. And you'll
have help with someone sayinglike, let's keep this let's go
here. And then like, you're notyou might not even notice that
you got like 100 bucks, and it'scrumpled up into a little ball.
Right, but I might but but Imight find that for you. You're
sweet. So that is the firstshift moving from avoidance to
(22:37):
awareness, let's jump out thebag that is your mind and look
at it in the light. Because Iknow you can do this. And the
very next step for you, is tobook a call right now. So
together that I can help youbring awareness into the areas
of your mind that aresubconsciously running the show.
(23:00):
It's a one on one session withjust you and me. And we will
clear them up and get you movingalong. So that you can actually
know and start to see thedifference between fiction and
fact. And the more you know thatfor yourself, then you can start
to discern it in the outerworlds. Because there's a lot of
(23:21):
fiction out there being sold asfact. And I want you to have the
most amazing life where you canjust like laugh it off, and move
on. And we're going to need thatwe're going to need that skill
for our survival more thananything, right? And the impact
that it has on generations tocome and even think about in 10
(23:43):
years from now. Right? Theimpact that having that
discernment of the mind is goingto have in all the ways that
alcohol doesn't help you todiscern the mind. Like Laura
said in her letter. I had lousytaste in men, I spent more than
I needed to I didn't take mymedication when I needed to like
(24:05):
alcohol has terriblediscernment. Right? So but you
don't because you've created youknow, you've created and done so
many amazing things in yourlife. You've made a lot of
awesome decisions in your life,based on intuition based on your
intention. So let's keep thatball rolling. All we have to do
is just clear up a little bit ofclutter. And the change happens
(24:28):
very quickly. Especially whenyou come and talk to me because
we have so much fun and we'llcatch you on your way. No
problem. That's how it goes. Ican't wait to talk to you next
week. Stay tuned for shifts 234And five. Okay, talk to you
soon. Have a great day. Okayladies, so the fun does not have
to end here. This is actuallywhere it begins. It is time for
(24:51):
you to take the next best stepto start applying these tools
and these principles into yourlife and I have made it
extremely seamless and superEasy for you to get the support
that you need in a one on onepersonalized setting, so that I
can really see specificallywhere you're at. And that
together we can create apersonalized three step strategy
(25:12):
process that's in alignment withyour intentions, your values,
your lifestyles. And it givesyou that one on one face time
and space that you need totransform to be seen to be heard
and to be validated. So all youhave to do is follow the link in
the show notes or go to mywebsite Mary Wagstaff coach.com
to pick your best time and datefor your free one on one
(25:35):
alignment session with me. Icannot wait to meet you and I'll
see you soon.
Do you ever feel like you're outgrowing alcohol,
that you are longing for adeeper connection to life? If
alcohol is keeping you playingsmall and feels like the one
area, you just can't figure outyou are in the right place. Hi,
my name is Mary Wagstaff. I'm aHolistic alcohol coach who ended
a 20 year relationship toalcohol without labels, counting
(00:23):
days or ever making excuses. NowI help powerful women just like
you eliminate their desire todrink on their own terms. In
this podcast, we will explorethe revolutionary approach of my
proven five shifts process thatgets alcohol out of your way by
breaking all of the rules, andthe profound experience that it
(00:43):
is to rediscover who you are onthe other side of alcohol. I am
so thrilled to be your guide.
Welcome to your journey ofawakening. Welcome back to the
show my beautiful listeners,thank you for being here. So how
did it go with looking at yourexpectations last week did you
do that did you notice were yourthoughts of the way things
(01:09):
should be we're creating morepain for you, your thoughts, not
the thing. Then the thingitself. And if you tap back into
your intention, and yourintuition and your values and
your wisdom, like you take thatstep back, you have access to
seeing that we all get to be whowe want to be right. It's so
(01:31):
much of the time in relation toother people. And I mean, even
after seven years of being amother, and not like I can see
where I have expectations of myson, my seven year old son where
you know, and then when I digdeeper, and I do this work, it's
it's because of a lack of my ownneeds being met. And the reason
(01:55):
this is so important when itcomes to alcohol is because when
you have expectations, and youdon't take a step back and
understand what your intentionis and what you actually need.
That is the trigger to drink.
And then everything outside ofyou is a problem. And so when
(02:16):
you solve for those things, thenthe desire to drink becomes less
than need to drink becomes lessyour confidence goes up. Because
it's not just the urge foralcohol. I had someone recently
say to me, you know, noteveryone wants to quit drinking,
some people just want to drinkless. And that is true. That's
(02:40):
what you think you want is oh, Ijust wish I could just have one.
But what you really want is tobe able to meet your own needs.
Because as long as alcohol isstill at the center of
importance in any area, and Itouched on this last week, it is
still you will still have tomanage your mind around it. I
could probably say this on everysingle episode for every single
(03:03):
show because I can't drive ithome enough. And if that's okay
with you, then we're having adifferent conversation like I'm
totally okay, with having twodrinks, feeling the urge to have
more and learning how to allowthat urge to stop. There are
people that teach on moderation.
And you can go and listen tothem too. But if you learn to
eliminate your desire for thatfirst drink, then you don't ever
(03:28):
have to allow an urge. And to melike alcohol is had enough of my
time. To illustrate this point.
I wanted to read you an excerptfrom Michael singers latest book
Living untethered, he is theauthor of The Untethered Soul,
which I've talked about inseveral episodes, I like this
book. Well, he's obviouslydeveloped his concepts even more
(03:50):
because it's more concise. Andif you want a deeper dive into
someone who has studied thewitness consciousness for much
longer than I have, and justit's that is his work. I mean,
he's brilliant. And so livinguntethered, this is the chapter
neither suppression norexpression, I won't read the
whole thing. But just thinkabout your relationship to
(04:13):
alcohol and how you do you know,to say forever, just like freaks
you out. I mean, it's such a redflag to when you just take a
step back and even just look outyour window. And how much of
your mind is consumed byalcohol. Of course, like, that's
not the way you want to live therest of your life, which is, you
(04:34):
know, why you're here. So hesays, the only data the mind
currently has is based upon itspast experiences. So the mind
thinks it's right. And thisactually will tie into our
conversation about expectationsand versus intentions. Because
when you've thought anexpectation over and over and
(04:55):
over again or when it's beenmodeled to you, and it's been
reinforced thing like your momtold you, then of course, it's
going to be you think you'reright. This is part of the
predicament, please understandthat your mind will always think
it's right. The mind is notdumb. It knows what it
experienced. But it does notknow what it's didn't
(05:18):
experience, which is aninfinitely larger body of
knowledge and mean listen,infinitely larger body of
knowledge. This is why the wisesage, Lao Tzu reflected that a
wise man does not argue for whatpurpose. You have your mindset
and another person has theirmindset, all their lifelong data
(05:42):
says one thing, and you'retotally different lifelong data
sees it differently. There'snothing you're going to do about
that, except be humble enough torealize that in any given
moment, the data you are takingin is less than point 0000 1% of
(06:03):
what's going on everywhere. It'smeaningless. It rounds to zero.
In essence, you had a wholebunch of zero breath experience
that adds up to zero, thepersonal mind is so caught up in
itself, it will never want tolook at that truth. deep
spiritual teachings embrace thattruth. They ask you to look at
(06:26):
the world in front of you, andrealize it took billions of
yours for that exact moment tomanifest before you accept that
honor that surrender to thatthis begins by first accepting
reality, not resisting it, likeaccepting what is right, just
that it is it's neutralizing it.
It's not about doing or notdoing anything. It's about
(06:49):
surrendering your initialresistance to what is you see
what's there, and then you letgo of all the stuff that comes
up due to your stored samskaras.
Inevitably, your mind is goingto start talking about likes and
dislikes. Just don't listen tothem. Why would you listen to
that? It's just your personalblockages super imposed on
(07:13):
reality. So there's reality. Andthen samskaara is a Sanskrit
term used in like yogictradition, which is basically
the grooves in our brain, it'sthe impressions or the imprints.
And so there's reality, right,and like, it's getting even
scarier out there, because thatwe're not kind of sure of what
reality is. But there's like thething that happened, that your
(07:36):
husband yelled at the kids. Andthen there's your impression
layered over that, right. Butevery person's perspective is
going to see that differently.
And obviously, he sees thatdifferently. And the kids see it
differently. And like I justlove thinking about the billions
of years it took to create thismoment, the billions of people
on the planet, and how stuck weare with this one little
(08:00):
chemical, this one littlebeverage choice called alcohol,
and all of the other things thatlead us there and then all of
our beliefs and our BS aroundlike the story that we've
created about quitting drinkingand drinking and not drinking on
all those things. And that isthe segue into the very first
shift of the five shiftsprocess, which is to move from
(08:24):
avoidance to acceptance, right?
Because intentionally orunintentionally, you are
avoiding the samskaras you areavoiding these imprints and we
cannot get anywhere you cannotcreate lasting change in your
(08:45):
life.
Until you become aware of whereyou are starting from and that
takes just honesty. It takes awillingness to be wrong to be
humbled, like he said, becauseour experiences are so little
they're so limiting when Ichange my relationship to
alcohol like oh, you're I justlike everyone's right everyone
(09:08):
is right from their their ownexperiences. In the book The
Four Agreements by Don MiguelRuiz, that is like one of the
agreements is to never takeanything personally because
people's reactions and responsesto you. And of course, we're
going to someone yells at you,it's gonna You're no you're
gonna have a reaction. But it'slike if someone doesn't have
(09:29):
time for you, right? Likethey're putting up this just
happened to me where I was likereally needing a friend and I
reached out to someone, and thatperson is super busy and they're
such a lover and I love thisperson so much. But like I was
totally but her I called Matthewand I'm like, I need friends who
make me important. Like listento that my ego, right? And so
(09:52):
it'd be like, this person'sbusy, like let me call someone
else right? And just know justtrusting that they're in their
own experience but What do wedo? We mate we, we suffer more
for it. Okay? So the way thatthis shows up for you is, is
(10:16):
your desire, your deep desire isyou want alcohol to be
unimportant, you don't want tomake it a big deal anymore,
right? You don't want to have toexplain or talk about it, you
want to feel confident, walkingdown the wine aisle, you don't
want to wake up with regret anymore. And the reason that it
continues to act, those thingsactually seem to be growing,
(10:40):
like your thoughts about it areactually compounding and
creating even more regret evenmore shame, even more
nervousness about talking abouteven less confidence is because
you haven't yet neutralized ituntil you neutralize alcohol and
start to shift into your ownawareness about your thinking,
(11:04):
your awareness about thereactions, your all of your
judgments and yourinterpretations. It is never
going to change, you're going tobe married to it, it's going to
be personal, you are going to bein it. As it's 100% of
existence, instead of that, it'sthat your, that your thoughts
about it. And all of your brainis really just 00 0.0001% of
(11:29):
everything that actually exists.
You've tried avoiding it. Right?
You've tried to run past thewine aisle, not go to parties,
schedule everything around it.
But all the while your brain isthinking about oh my god, what
about summer? Oh, my God, whatabout spring break? Oh, my God,
(11:51):
what about that wedding? Right?
You're actually planning thefuture also of hypothetical
scenarios that actually don'texist? How could I ever go to a
concert and never drink again?
And you have like, don't evenhave concert tickets, right? And
the reason that avoiding itdoesn't work, whether it's
conscious or unconscious, right?
(12:12):
Whether you're, you're avoidingyour subconscious thinking,
because you don't actually youdon't have the skill yet of
learning how to look at yourmind. Or when you've tried to
quit drinking, or you have justsaid, Fuck it enough. And you're
like this. It's not a problemlike this is fine. I'm just this
is just the way that it isright? I'm always just going to
be a drinker. I'm just going toalways want it. I would say that
(12:35):
that's also that, that peace ofaccepting what you don't want is
also avoiding the thoughts thatjust aren't true. Avoiding
having a new conversation, a newperspective, a new dialogue. And
the reason that this doesn'twork is because it's the pink
(12:57):
elephant in the room. So I saypink elephant, can you think
about anything less than a pinkelephant, purple dog, pink
elephant? Blue turtle, right?
Like, that's all you can thinkabout when I'm blue by the blue
turtle. So you are constantlythinking about it, it's not
going anywhere you don't buy,even if you think this is just
(13:20):
the way it always this is how italways is like that perspective
doesn't stick. It doesn't lastbecause of the impact that it's
having on your life. It's hadyou giving up on your dreams.
It's had you thinking thateverything that you wanted is
over, right? And then afteryou've had kids or gotten
(13:44):
married or started a career,you've put everything else on
the backburner that's about you.
And this is the pivotal time forthe women that are consciously
awakening and wanting to gobeyond alcohol. They have put
their desires and their dreamson the backburner for long
(14:07):
enough and they regret not doingit. But they also think you also
think that that's not possible.
And the reason that you thinkthat is because alcohol keeps
telling you, it's not right andkeeps lowering your confidence.
And every time you gain a littlebit of headway. Something
happens with alcohol to give youa step back, right? Whether it's
(14:28):
showing up at work with theMonday blues and having the
Sunday scaries or it's like Iremember one time there was a
studio I had applied at I hadreached out to the owner. I
wanted to teach there. And thiswas even before Emmett and I had
canceled the first interview Iwas gonna go to this woman's
(14:50):
house, have an interview where Iactually have to perform as a
yoga instructor meet herpersonally the first time it was
both time cuz I was definitelyhungover, but I had made an
excuse. And I typically likethis was not really my MO. But I
had made an excuse that therewas a snow storm. And then, like
the second time I had everycanceled then she just was like,
(15:12):
no, because of course, like youneed someone that's responsible
to show up. And there was stufflike that you're even like
showing up to teach a yoga classand feeling hungover and feeling
so out of alignment with myvalues. And that happened to me
all the time. I used to go tothis one yoga studio there was
like, this yoga studio was onone corner, and then the dive
(15:35):
bar that I would go to this wasback in my heyday before Matthew
even. So it was like, you know,however, long ago, 12 years ago
or something? Gosh, that seemsso long ago. Oh, my God. No, it
had to be maybe like 10 years?
Well, no, my gosh, I'm have abirthday coming up you guys. So
(15:59):
yeah, anyway, and, and thenlike, I would go to yoga go and
change or sometimes not even.
And then they go to the divebar, and smoke and hide out and
hope that the instructor didn'tsee me walking by. And it was
like for what? Literally forwhat those relationships that I
(16:20):
made at that place? No. Did theygo anywhere? It was shitty food,
it was a whole mess. It was awhole mess. And I was lying to
myself. Right. And, you know,had I known.
(16:41):
Had I known that this deepWellspring inside of me that was
just waiting to come out. And itwas so much about confidence.
Right? It was so much aboutsharing and vulnerability until
I put myself in the opportunityto share my truth about what was
going on with me in a space thatwas free of judgment until I
(17:05):
took that step to say, to ripthe band aid off and saying, I
need something different. AndI've told the story about going
on this goddess retreat, where Imet my mentor, my spiritual
mentor. And then everythingchanged. It was like I could see
myself, you know, inrelationship to other women. And
(17:25):
it wasn't about alcohol. But itwas about knowing that we have
these unmet needs as women thatwe're putting on the backburner.
And then the only time that itlike comes out is when we're
drinking a few glasses of wine.
And then you're able to expressyourself. But there are very
safe containers like the one Icreate, that are safe and
(17:46):
sacred, and created for thisopportunity for you to express
yourself and then so everythingthat's been lying dormant and
shoved down and stuffed downstarts to come out. And you no
different than therapy. It'slike we're taking it, we're
putting it right on the table.
(18:08):
And we're going to examine itand ask why that's, first, we're
going to give you a bunch ofcompassion and validation,
right? And say, of course youfeel this way. Of course you
feel this way. Let's let'spresents that let's really honor
that. Right? And that is, thatis the first step of without the
awareness. There is no gettingto that second step that is this
(18:32):
true, that third step? How doesthis feel right? And so we're
gonna get into that in thesubsequent episodes. But without
the first step of awareness,where you and this is how
Michael singer puts it, you haveto become the subject and you
have to let your thoughts becomethe object. So we examine we
(18:53):
explore your mind and thethoughts that have been hidden
are running the show. Andthey've been running the show
very efficiently. Like that'swhy our brain is amazing, right?
It's your habitual mind. Ourmind habituate so easy, it
doesn't like pain, which itthinks thinking new thoughts in
general and changing, quittingdrinking drinking less, it
(19:16):
thinks that's going to cause itpain only because it's something
new, right? So it has to do somemore work and that's why when
you actually have a process anda strategy that takes you step
by step through it it's there'sit has that that accountability
locked in so you know, whenyou've decided to quit on
(19:40):
yourself because you can'tcontrol your thinking. And you
might be thinking that right nowlike I can't control my thinking
my mind takes over. I'mcompletely in spirals all the
time. I can't think I can'tthink straight right like Jill
that was on the show. That washer. That was her thing. She was
just constantly in this mindspiral. have just, I'm doing it
(20:01):
wrong. What am I supposed to bedoing? I'm supposed to be doing
it next, like never givingyourself permission to rest and
like alcohol was the only thingthat could quiet it. And if you
go listen to Jill, her firstthing, I'll never forget her
saying this because I was like,hell yeah. She said, I didn't
have a drinking problem, I had athinking and feeling problem.
And that's what it boils downto. And I was like, I love that
(20:23):
so much. And that is all of it.
And like in, you know, lastweek, when I talked about that
problem spectrum, it's like, theproblem spectrum is the problem
of how much you believe yourthoughts. That's the problem,
right? That is the problem. Andif you, if you allow yourself to
change, if you believe, and youwant to no longer want it, you
(20:45):
can do that. And I am livingproof and all my guests, and my
clients are living proof. So ifyou're married to your mind, and
when it's inside, like when it'slike digging around inside of an
M, a bag in the dark, right?
(21:06):
It's like you go in there tofind something. And instead of
just dumping everything out,that takes you two seconds to
see what's in there. You justcontinue to like, close your
eyes and search around for yourcar keys, and it takes you
forever to find them, right. Butyou can expedite that result by
dumping it all out, siftingthrough it and seeing what the
(21:26):
garbage that's not serving you,even if it is true, like why do
you want to focus on it right,and we're not bypassing it,
we're just deciding, like,there's more important things
for my mind to focus on. And thestuff that you want to keep,
like all of the amazing waysthat you are able to show up for
yourself all of the planning,the preparation that you do the
(21:48):
big the way, you can see the bigpicture, the way that you get,
like, you know, a million tasksdone in a day, even if right now
your brain tells you I didn't doenough, right? Like I guarantee
you, when we go to look at itand write it down, you've done
so much. So instead of diggingaround in the dark, we're going
(22:09):
to dump it out and look at itand sift through it. And you'll
have help with someone sayinglike, let's keep this let's go
here. And then like, you're notyou might not even notice that
you got like 100 bucks, and it'scrumpled up into a little ball.
Right, but I might but but Imight find that for you. You're
sweet. So that is the firstshift moving from avoidance to
(22:37):
awareness, let's jump out thebag that is your mind and look
at it in the light. Because Iknow you can do this. And the
very next step for you, is tobook a call right now. So
together that I can help youbring awareness into the areas
of your mind that aresubconsciously running the show.
(23:00):
It's a one on one session withjust you and me. And we will
clear them up and get you movingalong. So that you can actually
know and start to see thedifference between fiction and
fact. And the more you know thatfor yourself, then you can start
to discern it in the outerworlds. Because there's a lot of
(23:21):
fiction out there being sold asfact. And I want you to have the
most amazing life where you canjust like laugh it off, and move
on. And we're going to need thatwe're going to need that skill
for our survival more thananything, right? And the impact
that it has on generations tocome and even think about in 10
(23:43):
years from now. Right? Theimpact that having that
discernment of the mind is goingto have in all the ways that
alcohol doesn't help you todiscern the mind. Like Laura
said in her letter. I had lousytaste in men, I spent more than
I needed to I didn't take mymedication when I needed to like
(24:05):
alcohol has terriblediscernment. Right? So but you
don't because you've created youknow, you've created and done so
many amazing things in yourlife. You've made a lot of
awesome decisions in your life,based on intuition based on your
intention. So let's keep thatball rolling. All we have to do
is just clear up a little bit ofclutter. And the change happens
(24:28):
very quickly. Especially whenyou come and talk to me because
we have so much fun and we'llcatch you on your way. No
problem. That's how it goes. Ican't wait to talk to you next
week. Stay tuned for shifts 234And five. Okay, talk to you
soon. Have a great day. Okayladies, so the fun does not have
to end here. This is actuallywhere it begins. It is time for
(24:51):
you to take the next best stepto start applying these tools
and these principles into yourlife and I have made it
extremely seamless and superEasy for you to get the support
that you need in a one on onepersonalized setting, so that I
can really see specificallywhere you're at. And that
together we can create apersonalized three step strategy
(25:12):
process that's in alignment withyour intentions, your values,
your lifestyles. And it givesyou that one on one face time
and space that you need totransform to be seen to be heard
and to be validated. So all youhave to do is follow the link in
the show notes or go to mywebsite Mary Wagstaff coach.com
to pick your best time and datefor your free one on one
(25:35):
alignment session with me. Icannot wait to meet you and I'll
see you soon.
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