November 5, 2025 • 26 mins
If you’re waiting for sobriety to be easy, you’ll be waiting forever.
I say that not to discourage you — but because the moment you stop chasing the quick fix is the moment real freedom begins. There’s always a cost: either the short-term comfort that keeps you small, or the long-term peace that expands every part of your life.
In this episode, I’m breaking down the three brutal — but liberating — truths that changed everything for me and every woman I’ve coached
If you’ve ever thought:
- “I just wish this were easier.”
- “My partner still drinks — how can I do this alone?”
- “I’ve tried everything, what if I fail again?”
Then this episode is for you. I’ll show you why the “other side” of drinking isn’t unknown — it’s the most familiar place you’ve simply forgotten how to access.
2026 is the year you stop making rules to break, and finally get to work. Join me in 90 Days To Alcohol-Free Freedom In 2026 - Get a once in a life time bonus when you sign up before 2026 Click HERE to Book Your Clarity Call Today!
Download The Permission Protocol — my free 5-part mini-course — and start practicing the skills that make alcohol irrelevant on your terms.
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.
SPEAKER_00 (02:27):
Wild sobriety is for the woman who has outgrown
alcohol and was never meant tofollow the script.
I'm Mary Wagstaff, a holisticalcohol coach, and after 20
years of daily drinking, Ifinally made alcohol irrelevant
in my life.
And now I help women just likeyou do the same through my
proven five chips process.
(02:48):
Welcome to Wild Sobriety,feminine freedom beyond alcohol.
If you are waiting for sobrietyto be easy, you are going to be
waiting forever.
And this message is not todiscourage you, but freedom from
instant gratification for aquick fix and a short-term
(03:12):
reward versus long-termsustainability.
There is always a price to pay.
And this is not to discourageyou because the cost of what
it's going to take for you tocreate simple and sustainable
sobriety that actually expandsyour pleasure field are the
skills that you're going to needto achieve and reach your
(03:36):
potential and your goals andreally have the life that you've
been dreaming of that you thinkalcohol is going to keep giving
you in every other area of yourlife.
So the cost of staying the samefor you right now is outweighing
the cost of change.
So truly, what do you have tolose?
(03:58):
Most people aren't willing topay these costs because it
requires change.
It requires actually having tolook at what we're doing and
step into the unknown.
Or so youth.
The truth is that the other sideof the fence from drinking to
sobriety really isn't theunknown.
And I'm going to teach you whytoday.
But these are the three brutaland honest truths that are going
(04:21):
to be required of you that aregoing to be different than what
you've been doing, because tochange, change.
And you have to be willing tostep into the unknown.
And the reason that you keepstaying stuck, even to your
detriment, even though it'scausing you so much pain, is
simply because it's comfortable,is simply because it's unknown.
(04:44):
And unfortunately, it feelssafe.
But that, my friend, is adistortion.
The safety that you are findingin drinking, in that comfort of
the daily habit, of the dailyroutine, is actually limiting
you and creating a lot of painand a lot of long-term
suffering.
And the good news is it does nottake you nearly a fraction of
(05:08):
the time to shift to the otherside of that mindset, feeling
safe on the other side of thefence compared to how long it
took you in the years thatyou've been drinking.
For me, I drank for 20 years ofmy life.
And once I started to applythese brutal and honest truths
and to get real with myself andto wake up, it was a much
(05:32):
shorter time where the switchflipped.
And this is what happens to myclients within a month or two.
They really start seeing thereality of what they were being
blinded by for so long.
Today I'm going to share withyou the three costs of lasting
sobriety.
And I wanted to share with you amessage that I just received
from one of my clients who I'vebeen working with for about four
(05:56):
months now.
And we had a back and forth inan email.
And I said to her, because she'slike, I'm feeling so solid right
now.
What is available to you now atthis stage that was never even
available to you before?
Before drinking ever reallybecame an issue.
And this is what she saidverbatim.
(06:17):
She said, Oh man, everything isbetter.
I'm waking up at five.
I'm going to the gym beforeeveryone wakes up and I'm in a
capital good mood.
My headspace feels free of otherthings.
I'm reading books again.
I have patience.
And I realized it wasn't myrelationship that was an issue.
(06:37):
It was my attitude as a resultof drinking.
She had all this narrow thinkingwhere she couldn't see outside
of her own perspective and theresidue of drinking the night
before.
The few times I've thought aboutalcohol, I asked myself why.
And there literally is no goodanswer.
And this is what we do duringprivate coaching is we ask the
question why?
And we go deep until you reallyget an answer.
(06:59):
Because a lot of times in yourattempts to quit drinking,
you're not actually answeringyour own questions.
You're you're taking your ownbeliefs and your own thoughts as
truth.
And that is where you get stuckwhen you want to create any
change because what you've beenthinking in your mindset that
has gotten you into thissituation is not the mindset
that's going to get you out ofit.
(07:20):
And so today we're going tochange that for you.
The number one cost of sobrietyis radical honesty.
You can anywhere in your lifeand to change, and especially to
the other side of alcohol byignoring it, by distracting
yourself, or by pretending likeit's not happened.
(07:40):
The opposite of isolation isconnection.
Alcohol has kept you extremelyisolated.
And it is in this radicalhonesty by asking yourself the
question what am I have I beenunwilling to say?
What is the truth about me andabout alcohol that I haven't
been willing to say?
(08:01):
Because until you actually saythat thing out loud, writing it
down, admitting it to yourself,it is going to continue to run
the show.
It is a thought or a belief inyour brain that is keeping you
playing small.
And it's not allowing you toreally look at the truth of
(08:23):
what's going on.
So when you constantly tellyourself, I'm fine, what's
actually happening is the thingthat you variety starts when you
stop lying to yourself.
This is where so many people getit wrong.
And I have to say, this isprobably what makes my approach
so much different.
(08:43):
You don't start the process justby never drinking again.
That doesn't even make sense.
You don't just go to the gym oneday and now you're competing in
a bodybuilding competition.
That's not how it works.
You are practicing, you arebuilding a muscle.
And if you don't go to the gymfor a few days and you go and
have a cheeseburger or whatever,you don't disqualify yourself
(09:07):
from the competition.
You go back and you get back onthe wagon.
You don't lose all of thatmuscle tone that you gained, but
it only counts if you'reactually being honest.
If you're digging in, if you'reimplementing and you are
evaluating.
None of the work is going tocount.
I don't care how many days soberyou have in a row, if you aren't
(09:28):
looking at it from the mosthonest, radically, brutally
honest perspective that youabsolutely can.
And this doesn't mean exclaimingand declaring yourself an
alcoholic.
It means really understandingwhat do I really believe about
alcohol?
What do I really believe aboutmyself and alcohol?
What's the truth about medrinking?
(09:48):
I didn't want to be a drinkeranymore.
And I was afraid to say thatbecause when I did say it, I
felt like there were people thattold me that I was fine, or
there's social stigmas aroundit, or that might mean that I
don't actually want to hang outwith the people that I'm hanging
out with anymore because Ireally don't like them when I'm
sober.
And this might be something thatfeels scary for you, but you
(10:11):
have to be willing to admit it.
And like you heard in myclient's testimonial, she said
that there were issues in herrelationship, but it actually
wasn't the relationship.
She was able to see the issuesthat came up as part of her
being having the effects and theimprint of alcohol from the day
(10:32):
before, but also that imprint isyour unwillingness to be
flexible.
That imprint is yourunwillingness to have empathy,
compassion, validation, patiencefor everyone around you.
So the impact of you not beinghonest is showing up in every
other area of your life.
When you say I'm fine, what areyou saying I'm really fine with?
(10:55):
Because you wouldn't be hereright now listening to this
conversation if part of youdidn't believe and desire for
your relationship to alcohol tochange.
So when you say I'm fine, you'resaying I'm fine with altering my
experience.
I'm fine with feeling less thanamazing in the morning, I'm fine
with having a drink when I don'treally want to.
(11:15):
I'm fine with limiting mypotential for my relationship,
for my career, for the presencethat I have with my children.
And none of those things areactually true.
You are not fine with any ofthose things.
So when you become brutallyhonest about your relationship
to alcohol and what you've beenunwilling to say, is that you
(11:37):
are exposing your values.
And that is what you have tolook at.
So when we say I'm lying tomyself, well, that doesn't feel
really good.
But the opposite of that, that'sgonna feel better, is when you
say, I'm not living in alignmentwith my values, and these are my
values, and that's one of thethings that we work on right
away in my private coachingprogram.
(12:01):
So number one, radical honesty.
The second cost of sustainableand simple sobriety that no one
is going to tell you is radicalresponsibility.
When you have to be willing totake responsibility for the life
(12:21):
that you have, for the resultsthat you have.
And when we drink, A, we kind ofjust ignore the truth of what it
is that we really want and whywe don't have that thing.
We're not really willing to saywhere we're not working.
We're often looking outside ofourselves and creating excuses
of why right now I can't startthis process.
(12:45):
Why because I'm in thisrelationship with someone that
drinks, why because I live in adrinking culture, because I'm
too stressed out at work,because of my kids.
We have to claim the choicesthat we make in our free will in
every single moment.
Because even though it soundsextreme and you could get
(13:05):
arrested for not doing it,feeding your kids is a choice,
getting up and going to workevery day is a choice.
We do it because we don't wantthe consequences of not doing
it.
Paying your taxes is a choice.
All of these things are choices.
And when we realize that they'rechoices that we want to make
(13:26):
because we don't want theconsequences or the results of
them, we take our power back.
When you are focused on whateveryone else is doing and not
doing and how it's impactingyou, you are giving your power
away.
And that is not what wildsobriety is all about.
Wild sobriety is all aboutradical permission to step into
(13:50):
a place of full personalresponsibility and where you
need to clean up your side ofthe street so that you can be in
luxury in your achievements andin your setbacks.
And you get to be in thepleasure of doing all of it or
none of it.
Because one of the things thatreally flipped the script for me
when I took full responsibilityfor my drinking, and I said, I
(14:15):
am a grown-ass woman and I'mdrinking.
Clearly, this is what I want todo.
I can drink, I can make thatchoice, and I am making that
choice every single day.
And when I started this processof the five shifts and the
permission protocol, I toldmyself, Mary, if you drink
tonight, you need to drink andtake every single consequence
(14:37):
that comes with it.
But know that right now.
Know that you're not how you'regonna feel tomorrow.
There's not gonna becomplaining, there's not gonna
be blaming, there's not gonna beshaming, there's not gonna be
regret, there's not gonna be anyof it.
And as soon as I did that and Ireally claimed my full
sovereignty, my full embodiedfree, everything changed.
And sometimes we don't even knowwhere we're giving our power
(14:59):
away.
But when we make excuses for whywe can't start the process of
examining our relationship toalcohol, that's the moment we
give it away.
Because when we say it'sinconvenient to start now, we
tell ourselves that we don'thave the capacity to handle it.
But what this process is gonnarequire of you is to always be
(15:20):
in a time of inconvenience anddo it anyway.
I've got three dogs here rightnow I need to take care of
morning, noon, and night.
It's inconvenient for me torecord this, but I'm gonna do it
anyway.
But anything can be inconvenientif you decide it is, but you can
also decide in this moment, Ihave the capacity for that.
And that's just gonna be part ofwhat it is.
(15:42):
When you have another child, youdon't say that's inconvenient
and I can't go to work anymore.
You figure it out.
When you have an extra billadded to your monthly budget,
you don't say that'sinconvenient and I'm gonna sleep
all day.
You figure it out.
We figure things out, but forsome reason, because this is
requiring you and you alone, andthere's really no one else to
(16:05):
blame.
We check out and we stop takingpersonal responsibility for the
choices that we have, andeverything becomes an
inconvenience, but not this timebecause you can handle it.
I know and I see you do it inevery other area of your life.
And that is why in privatecoaching, it is a strength.
We look at the areas of yourlife where you are doing it
(16:25):
effortlessly, and then we applythat same skill set and that
same principle to alcohol.
And it becomes so much moreclear and so much more simple.
But right now, that is the blindspot that you can't see.
Here's something that happenswith responsibility.
So, this is just an example ofsay your partner is bringing
(16:48):
wine home every night andthey're not gonna stop, and
you've asked them and you're andyou're furious and you're
blaming them.
And I've have most of myclients, their partners drink,
and their partners continue todrink, and they have to become
okay with that and choose totake another path for themselves
(17:09):
because it is your life that youare living, not someone else's.
And the moment that my clientstake personal responsibility for
their drinking, regardless ofwhat anyone else is doing, they
stop being furious and thatstops fueling their resentment,
which also stops fueling theirdesire to drink.
So look at your life and whereyou're blaming external sources
(17:33):
for why this is an inconvenienttime for you to start the
process of radical personalresponsibility around your
relationship to alcohol.
And once you see this, you can'tunsee it.
And that is why the honestypiece is so important.
And they use this term in thelegal system called it's like
(17:55):
ringing a bell.
So even though you knowsomething might get objected to
in the courtroom, once you sayit, the whole courtroom has
heard it.
The judges heard it, the juriesheard it, you know, the other
side has heard it.
And even if it might get theobjection, the words are out
there.
So it's still going to influencewhat people are thinking.
(18:15):
Now, it's not supposed to, butthis is radical honesty.
Once you say the words out loudto someone else, you're no
longer isolated in your ownlittle belief cave.
You are trying starting to makespace for why this potentially
isn't even true, and how yourperspective is simply limiting.
(18:38):
The third cost of sobriety thatno one wants to talk about is
radical self-acceptance.
And this actually may be thehardest one of them all.
We have to be willing to look atourselves, to look at what we've
been covering up, the problemsthat we've been solving with
(18:59):
alcohol, the things that wehaven't been willing to say, the
grief that we haven't processed,the shadows of our past, of our
trauma.
Now, I don't think you have todig up everything and solve that
in order to get to the otherside.
I think we get to the other sidefrom the present moment life you
(19:19):
have, and it makes lookingbackwards much, much easier.
But there is this radicalacceptance of the present
moment.
Maybe you're not in a greatmood.
Maybe you don't want to playwith your kids, maybe you're not
turned on by your husband.
And that is your authentic self.
When we drink, whether it's oneor 20, you are altering your
(19:41):
authentic experience inside andin the world.
You are putting a veil overreality.
You're dulling your senses,you're inhibiting your thoughts,
and you are acceptingbreadcrumbs, essentially, of
life, because you're saying thisthing that's not really that fun
(20:02):
that I'm doing, or this way thatI feel, I'm just going to mask
it.
I'm just going to put this balmover it so that I can just be
okay with it.
That's just like running aroundsaying, I'm fine, when none of
the things that you're doingaround alcohol are actually in
alignment with your values orthe life that you want to live.
And we have to be radicallyhonest.
(20:24):
When we are in a state ofdiscomfort or resistance or
anger or frustration, there isso much more pleasure available
in those circumstances becausewe actually have an opportunity
to find release, to find reliefnaturally, to find catharsis, to
solve the problem versus buryingit, masking it and numbing it
(20:47):
and just pushing it back to theside for it inevitably to come
back and probably even stronger.
And for many people, there arethings that we don't want to
look at.
There are ways that we peopleplease or we don't have a sense
of self-worth in certain areas,but we cannot solve those with
new beliefs and newunderstanding and taking massive
(21:11):
action if we aren't willing toconfront that, if we aren't
willing to have radicalacceptance of our authentic
experience right now.
And a way that I really like tolook at this is think about what
you would tell your daughter,your son, your sister, your best
friend, that she is whole andholy in this moment, that there
is nothing about her that needsto be healed, that there is only
(21:35):
moving forward, that she is aperfect expression.
We are perfectly imperfect,which is just perfect.
We are miracles.
The miracle of life isawe-inspiring.
And if you don't feel like that,if you're like, wow, that
person's a hot mess, and wecan't take a step back and
really honor someone's humanity,then that's an that is a
(21:57):
reflection of ourself when we'rejudging other people.
And of course, we do itnaturally, but typically it's
because there's something aboutourselves that we're not willing
to accept.
And one of my teachers, KellyBrogan, she says, the most, the
highest form of feminineempowerment is never judging
another woman's process.
And I think the highest form ofjust respect, mutual respect, is
(22:21):
never judging another person'sprocess because we just don't
know.
And I've just been through areally devastating, kind of
eye-opening experience in mylife and my own personal
intimate relationship thatreally impacted me on a personal
level.
And I was actually the target ofa lot of anger and resentment
for something that I didn'tactually do.
(22:43):
And I held space so radicallyand honestly and accepting of
myself, of what I was goingthrough, that when I was able to
move through that withoutnumbing it, without even
thinking about changing it, whathappened was so beautiful and so
miraculous is that I was able tohold this detached,
compassionate space for theother person that had actually
(23:06):
treated me.
It's not from a place ofrighteousness or martyrdom, but
it's really a place of divineexpression.
It's like, how do I want to seethis through the eyes of
divinity for the complexity andthe frailty that is our own
human experience?
And in the end, it just feels somuch better to be able to say,
(23:29):
wow, I can see you and yoursuffering.
Now I get to hold my ownboundaries and how I want to
participate in that, instead ofblaming and saying, How could
you do this to me?
And from that perspective,there's just so much more room
and space for everyone to grow,for everyone to feel safe enough
to feel, to be honest, to acceptthese radical truths of honesty,
(23:54):
of personal responsibility, andof full self-acceptance.
And when we do this, this iswhat creates the container of
safety.
And that is why the container ofa coaching program or a coaching
community that is going to holdthis for you is going to help
you find your footing and thebelief in yourself until you
feel really good about doing iton your own.
(24:16):
It's the practicing.
I worked with a personal trainerfor three months before I
started going and really doingall of the things on my own.
And now I go and I make up allof my own routines at the gym.
So it's the same thing, it's nodifferent.
But we have to be willing tolook and be brutally honest
about our beliefs and what we'vebeen making alcohol mean about
(24:38):
us so that we can drop the storyI shouldn't have known.
How are you gonna know to dosomething that you've never done
before?
You have to be willing to dosomething new.
And I would love to be theperson to help support you do
that.
I have opened up some space inmy calendar for a free private
coaching strategy session foryou.
(25:00):
And we're gonna explore theseplaces in your life where they
feel really challenging.
Because the first thing thateveryone says to me when they
come into these containers andeven into a consultation is I've
never said this out loud.
I've never shared this withanyone.
And this is what a coach does.
A coach is in their ownexperience, not judging you,
(25:22):
holding a hundred percent belieffor your ability to change, to
transform, to grow, and seeingyou from that detached
compassion.
No matter what you do or don'tdo, I'm good.
I've got me.
So this is all for you.
This is someone holding yourhand in the darkness, building
that bridge with you every stepof the way.
(25:43):
So everything you need to knowis in the description below.
I am so thrilled that you arehere, and I will see you next
time.
As a thank you for being such animportant part of this podcast,
I want to gift you my brand newfree mini course, The Permission
Protocol.
It is a five-part journey tohelp you rethink everything you
believe about the pleasure thatis possible in sobriety and the
(26:05):
radical freedom that is requiredto get to the other side.
And it's available for you rightnow inside of my free wild
sobriety community where we canhang out, support one another,
and grow by honoring ourauthentic expression as women.
Everything you need is righthere in the description.
I will see you inside of thecommunity.
Wild sobriety is for the woman who has outgrown
alcohol and was never meant tofollow the script.
I'm Mary Wagstaff, a holisticalcohol coach, and after 20
years of daily drinking, Ifinally made alcohol irrelevant
in my life.
And now I help women just likeyou do the same through my
proven five chips process.
(02:48):
Welcome to Wild Sobriety,feminine freedom beyond alcohol.
If you are waiting for sobrietyto be easy, you are going to be
waiting forever.
And this message is not todiscourage you, but freedom from
instant gratification for aquick fix and a short-term
(03:12):
reward versus long-termsustainability.
There is always a price to pay.
And this is not to discourageyou because the cost of what
it's going to take for you tocreate simple and sustainable
sobriety that actually expandsyour pleasure field are the
skills that you're going to needto achieve and reach your
(03:36):
potential and your goals andreally have the life that you've
been dreaming of that you thinkalcohol is going to keep giving
you in every other area of yourlife.
So the cost of staying the samefor you right now is outweighing
the cost of change.
So truly, what do you have tolose?
(03:58):
Most people aren't willing topay these costs because it
requires change.
It requires actually having tolook at what we're doing and
step into the unknown.
Or so youth.
The truth is that the other sideof the fence from drinking to
sobriety really isn't theunknown.
And I'm going to teach you whytoday.
But these are the three brutaland honest truths that are going
(04:21):
to be required of you that aregoing to be different than what
you've been doing, because tochange, change.
And you have to be willing tostep into the unknown.
And the reason that you keepstaying stuck, even to your
detriment, even though it'scausing you so much pain, is
simply because it's comfortable,is simply because it's unknown.
(04:44):
And unfortunately, it feelssafe.
But that, my friend, is adistortion.
The safety that you are findingin drinking, in that comfort of
the daily habit, of the dailyroutine, is actually limiting
you and creating a lot of painand a lot of long-term
suffering.
And the good news is it does nottake you nearly a fraction of
(05:08):
the time to shift to the otherside of that mindset, feeling
safe on the other side of thefence compared to how long it
took you in the years thatyou've been drinking.
For me, I drank for 20 years ofmy life.
And once I started to applythese brutal and honest truths
and to get real with myself andto wake up, it was a much
(05:32):
shorter time where the switchflipped.
And this is what happens to myclients within a month or two.
They really start seeing thereality of what they were being
blinded by for so long.
Today I'm going to share withyou the three costs of lasting
sobriety.
And I wanted to share with you amessage that I just received
from one of my clients who I'vebeen working with for about four
(05:56):
months now.
And we had a back and forth inan email.
And I said to her, because she'slike, I'm feeling so solid right
now.
What is available to you now atthis stage that was never even
available to you before?
Before drinking ever reallybecame an issue.
And this is what she saidverbatim.
(06:17):
She said, Oh man, everything isbetter.
I'm waking up at five.
I'm going to the gym beforeeveryone wakes up and I'm in a
capital good mood.
My headspace feels free of otherthings.
I'm reading books again.
I have patience.
And I realized it wasn't myrelationship that was an issue.
(06:37):
It was my attitude as a resultof drinking.
She had all this narrow thinkingwhere she couldn't see outside
of her own perspective and theresidue of drinking the night
before.
The few times I've thought aboutalcohol, I asked myself why.
And there literally is no goodanswer.
And this is what we do duringprivate coaching is we ask the
question why?
And we go deep until you reallyget an answer.
(06:59):
Because a lot of times in yourattempts to quit drinking,
you're not actually answeringyour own questions.
You're you're taking your ownbeliefs and your own thoughts as
truth.
And that is where you get stuckwhen you want to create any
change because what you've beenthinking in your mindset that
has gotten you into thissituation is not the mindset
that's going to get you out ofit.
(07:20):
And so today we're going tochange that for you.
The number one cost of sobrietyis radical honesty.
You can anywhere in your lifeand to change, and especially to
the other side of alcohol byignoring it, by distracting
yourself, or by pretending likeit's not happened.
(07:40):
The opposite of isolation isconnection.
Alcohol has kept you extremelyisolated.
And it is in this radicalhonesty by asking yourself the
question what am I have I beenunwilling to say?
What is the truth about me andabout alcohol that I haven't
been willing to say?
(08:01):
Because until you actually saythat thing out loud, writing it
down, admitting it to yourself,it is going to continue to run
the show.
It is a thought or a belief inyour brain that is keeping you
playing small.
And it's not allowing you toreally look at the truth of
(08:23):
what's going on.
So when you constantly tellyourself, I'm fine, what's
actually happening is the thingthat you variety starts when you
stop lying to yourself.
This is where so many people getit wrong.
And I have to say, this isprobably what makes my approach
so much different.
(08:43):
You don't start the process justby never drinking again.
That doesn't even make sense.
You don't just go to the gym oneday and now you're competing in
a bodybuilding competition.
That's not how it works.
You are practicing, you arebuilding a muscle.
And if you don't go to the gymfor a few days and you go and
have a cheeseburger or whatever,you don't disqualify yourself
(09:07):
from the competition.
You go back and you get back onthe wagon.
You don't lose all of thatmuscle tone that you gained, but
it only counts if you'reactually being honest.
If you're digging in, if you'reimplementing and you are
evaluating.
None of the work is going tocount.
I don't care how many days soberyou have in a row, if you aren't
(09:28):
looking at it from the mosthonest, radically, brutally
honest perspective that youabsolutely can.
And this doesn't mean exclaimingand declaring yourself an
alcoholic.
It means really understandingwhat do I really believe about
alcohol?
What do I really believe aboutmyself and alcohol?
What's the truth about medrinking?
(09:48):
I didn't want to be a drinkeranymore.
And I was afraid to say thatbecause when I did say it, I
felt like there were people thattold me that I was fine, or
there's social stigmas aroundit, or that might mean that I
don't actually want to hang outwith the people that I'm hanging
out with anymore because Ireally don't like them when I'm
sober.
And this might be something thatfeels scary for you, but you
(10:11):
have to be willing to admit it.
And like you heard in myclient's testimonial, she said
that there were issues in herrelationship, but it actually
wasn't the relationship.
She was able to see the issuesthat came up as part of her
being having the effects and theimprint of alcohol from the day
(10:32):
before, but also that imprint isyour unwillingness to be
flexible.
That imprint is yourunwillingness to have empathy,
compassion, validation, patiencefor everyone around you.
So the impact of you not beinghonest is showing up in every
other area of your life.
When you say I'm fine, what areyou saying I'm really fine with?
(10:55):
Because you wouldn't be hereright now listening to this
conversation if part of youdidn't believe and desire for
your relationship to alcohol tochange.
So when you say I'm fine, you'resaying I'm fine with altering my
experience.
I'm fine with feeling less thanamazing in the morning, I'm fine
with having a drink when I don'treally want to.
(11:15):
I'm fine with limiting mypotential for my relationship,
for my career, for the presencethat I have with my children.
And none of those things areactually true.
You are not fine with any ofthose things.
So when you become brutallyhonest about your relationship
to alcohol and what you've beenunwilling to say, is that you
(11:37):
are exposing your values.
And that is what you have tolook at.
So when we say I'm lying tomyself, well, that doesn't feel
really good.
But the opposite of that, that'sgonna feel better, is when you
say, I'm not living in alignmentwith my values, and these are my
values, and that's one of thethings that we work on right
away in my private coachingprogram.
(12:01):
So number one, radical honesty.
The second cost of sustainableand simple sobriety that no one
is going to tell you is radicalresponsibility.
When you have to be willing totake responsibility for the life
(12:21):
that you have, for the resultsthat you have.
And when we drink, A, we kind ofjust ignore the truth of what it
is that we really want and whywe don't have that thing.
We're not really willing to saywhere we're not working.
We're often looking outside ofourselves and creating excuses
of why right now I can't startthis process.
(12:45):
Why because I'm in thisrelationship with someone that
drinks, why because I live in adrinking culture, because I'm
too stressed out at work,because of my kids.
We have to claim the choicesthat we make in our free will in
every single moment.
Because even though it soundsextreme and you could get
(13:05):
arrested for not doing it,feeding your kids is a choice,
getting up and going to workevery day is a choice.
We do it because we don't wantthe consequences of not doing
it.
Paying your taxes is a choice.
All of these things are choices.
And when we realize that they'rechoices that we want to make
(13:26):
because we don't want theconsequences or the results of
them, we take our power back.
When you are focused on whateveryone else is doing and not
doing and how it's impactingyou, you are giving your power
away.
And that is not what wildsobriety is all about.
Wild sobriety is all aboutradical permission to step into
(13:50):
a place of full personalresponsibility and where you
need to clean up your side ofthe street so that you can be in
luxury in your achievements andin your setbacks.
And you get to be in thepleasure of doing all of it or
none of it.
Because one of the things thatreally flipped the script for me
when I took full responsibilityfor my drinking, and I said, I
(14:15):
am a grown-ass woman and I'mdrinking.
Clearly, this is what I want todo.
I can drink, I can make thatchoice, and I am making that
choice every single day.
And when I started this processof the five shifts and the
permission protocol, I toldmyself, Mary, if you drink
tonight, you need to drink andtake every single consequence
(14:37):
that comes with it.
But know that right now.
Know that you're not how you'regonna feel tomorrow.
There's not gonna becomplaining, there's not gonna
be blaming, there's not gonna beshaming, there's not gonna be
regret, there's not gonna be anyof it.
And as soon as I did that and Ireally claimed my full
sovereignty, my full embodiedfree, everything changed.
And sometimes we don't even knowwhere we're giving our power
(14:59):
away.
But when we make excuses for whywe can't start the process of
examining our relationship toalcohol, that's the moment we
give it away.
Because when we say it'sinconvenient to start now, we
tell ourselves that we don'thave the capacity to handle it.
But what this process is gonnarequire of you is to always be
(15:20):
in a time of inconvenience anddo it anyway.
I've got three dogs here rightnow I need to take care of
morning, noon, and night.
It's inconvenient for me torecord this, but I'm gonna do it
anyway.
But anything can be inconvenientif you decide it is, but you can
also decide in this moment, Ihave the capacity for that.
And that's just gonna be part ofwhat it is.
(15:42):
When you have another child, youdon't say that's inconvenient
and I can't go to work anymore.
You figure it out.
When you have an extra billadded to your monthly budget,
you don't say that'sinconvenient and I'm gonna sleep
all day.
You figure it out.
We figure things out, but forsome reason, because this is
requiring you and you alone, andthere's really no one else to
(16:05):
blame.
We check out and we stop takingpersonal responsibility for the
choices that we have, andeverything becomes an
inconvenience, but not this timebecause you can handle it.
I know and I see you do it inevery other area of your life.
And that is why in privatecoaching, it is a strength.
We look at the areas of yourlife where you are doing it
(16:25):
effortlessly, and then we applythat same skill set and that
same principle to alcohol.
And it becomes so much moreclear and so much more simple.
But right now, that is the blindspot that you can't see.
Here's something that happenswith responsibility.
So, this is just an example ofsay your partner is bringing
(16:48):
wine home every night andthey're not gonna stop, and
you've asked them and you're andyou're furious and you're
blaming them.
And I've have most of myclients, their partners drink,
and their partners continue todrink, and they have to become
okay with that and choose totake another path for themselves
(17:09):
because it is your life that youare living, not someone else's.
And the moment that my clientstake personal responsibility for
their drinking, regardless ofwhat anyone else is doing, they
stop being furious and thatstops fueling their resentment,
which also stops fueling theirdesire to drink.
So look at your life and whereyou're blaming external sources
(17:33):
for why this is an inconvenienttime for you to start the
process of radical personalresponsibility around your
relationship to alcohol.
And once you see this, you can'tunsee it.
And that is why the honestypiece is so important.
And they use this term in thelegal system called it's like
(17:55):
ringing a bell.
So even though you knowsomething might get objected to
in the courtroom, once you sayit, the whole courtroom has
heard it.
The judges heard it, the juriesheard it, you know, the other
side has heard it.
And even if it might get theobjection, the words are out
there.
So it's still going to influencewhat people are thinking.
(18:15):
Now, it's not supposed to, butthis is radical honesty.
Once you say the words out loudto someone else, you're no
longer isolated in your ownlittle belief cave.
You are trying starting to makespace for why this potentially
isn't even true, and how yourperspective is simply limiting.
(18:38):
The third cost of sobriety thatno one wants to talk about is
radical self-acceptance.
And this actually may be thehardest one of them all.
We have to be willing to look atourselves, to look at what we've
been covering up, the problemsthat we've been solving with
(18:59):
alcohol, the things that wehaven't been willing to say, the
grief that we haven't processed,the shadows of our past, of our
trauma.
Now, I don't think you have todig up everything and solve that
in order to get to the otherside.
I think we get to the other sidefrom the present moment life you
(19:19):
have, and it makes lookingbackwards much, much easier.
But there is this radicalacceptance of the present
moment.
Maybe you're not in a greatmood.
Maybe you don't want to playwith your kids, maybe you're not
turned on by your husband.
And that is your authentic self.
When we drink, whether it's oneor 20, you are altering your
(19:41):
authentic experience inside andin the world.
You are putting a veil overreality.
You're dulling your senses,you're inhibiting your thoughts,
and you are acceptingbreadcrumbs, essentially, of
life, because you're saying thisthing that's not really that fun
(20:02):
that I'm doing, or this way thatI feel, I'm just going to mask
it.
I'm just going to put this balmover it so that I can just be
okay with it.
That's just like running aroundsaying, I'm fine, when none of
the things that you're doingaround alcohol are actually in
alignment with your values orthe life that you want to live.
And we have to be radicallyhonest.
(20:24):
When we are in a state ofdiscomfort or resistance or
anger or frustration, there isso much more pleasure available
in those circumstances becausewe actually have an opportunity
to find release, to find reliefnaturally, to find catharsis, to
solve the problem versus buryingit, masking it and numbing it
(20:47):
and just pushing it back to theside for it inevitably to come
back and probably even stronger.
And for many people, there arethings that we don't want to
look at.
There are ways that we peopleplease or we don't have a sense
of self-worth in certain areas,but we cannot solve those with
new beliefs and newunderstanding and taking massive
(21:11):
action if we aren't willing toconfront that, if we aren't
willing to have radicalacceptance of our authentic
experience right now.
And a way that I really like tolook at this is think about what
you would tell your daughter,your son, your sister, your best
friend, that she is whole andholy in this moment, that there
is nothing about her that needsto be healed, that there is only
(21:35):
moving forward, that she is aperfect expression.
We are perfectly imperfect,which is just perfect.
We are miracles.
The miracle of life isawe-inspiring.
And if you don't feel like that,if you're like, wow, that
person's a hot mess, and wecan't take a step back and
really honor someone's humanity,then that's an that is a
(21:57):
reflection of ourself when we'rejudging other people.
And of course, we do itnaturally, but typically it's
because there's something aboutourselves that we're not willing
to accept.
And one of my teachers, KellyBrogan, she says, the most, the
highest form of feminineempowerment is never judging
another woman's process.
And I think the highest form ofjust respect, mutual respect, is
(22:21):
never judging another person'sprocess because we just don't
know.
And I've just been through areally devastating, kind of
eye-opening experience in mylife and my own personal
intimate relationship thatreally impacted me on a personal
level.
And I was actually the target ofa lot of anger and resentment
for something that I didn'tactually do.
(22:43):
And I held space so radicallyand honestly and accepting of
myself, of what I was goingthrough, that when I was able to
move through that withoutnumbing it, without even
thinking about changing it, whathappened was so beautiful and so
miraculous is that I was able tohold this detached,
compassionate space for theother person that had actually
(23:06):
treated me.
It's not from a place ofrighteousness or martyrdom, but
it's really a place of divineexpression.
It's like, how do I want to seethis through the eyes of
divinity for the complexity andthe frailty that is our own
human experience?
And in the end, it just feels somuch better to be able to say,
(23:29):
wow, I can see you and yoursuffering.
Now I get to hold my ownboundaries and how I want to
participate in that, instead ofblaming and saying, How could
you do this to me?
And from that perspective,there's just so much more room
and space for everyone to grow,for everyone to feel safe enough
to feel, to be honest, to acceptthese radical truths of honesty,
(23:54):
of personal responsibility, andof full self-acceptance.
And when we do this, this iswhat creates the container of
safety.
And that is why the container ofa coaching program or a coaching
community that is going to holdthis for you is going to help
you find your footing and thebelief in yourself until you
feel really good about doing iton your own.
(24:16):
It's the practicing.
I worked with a personal trainerfor three months before I
started going and really doingall of the things on my own.
And now I go and I make up allof my own routines at the gym.
So it's the same thing, it's nodifferent.
But we have to be willing tolook and be brutally honest
about our beliefs and what we'vebeen making alcohol mean about
(24:38):
us so that we can drop the storyI shouldn't have known.
How are you gonna know to dosomething that you've never done
before?
You have to be willing to dosomething new.
And I would love to be theperson to help support you do
that.
I have opened up some space inmy calendar for a free private
coaching strategy session foryou.
(25:00):
And we're gonna explore theseplaces in your life where they
feel really challenging.
Because the first thing thateveryone says to me when they
come into these containers andeven into a consultation is I've
never said this out loud.
I've never shared this withanyone.
And this is what a coach does.
A coach is in their ownexperience, not judging you,
(25:22):
holding a hundred percent belieffor your ability to change, to
transform, to grow, and seeingyou from that detached
compassion.
No matter what you do or don'tdo, I'm good.
I've got me.
So this is all for you.
This is someone holding yourhand in the darkness, building
that bridge with you every stepof the way.
(25:43):
So everything you need to knowis in the description below.
I am so thrilled that you arehere, and I will see you next
time.
As a thank you for being such animportant part of this podcast,
I want to gift you my brand newfree mini course, The Permission
Protocol.
It is a five-part journey tohelp you rethink everything you
believe about the pleasure thatis possible in sobriety and the
(26:05):
radical freedom that is requiredto get to the other side.
And it's available for you rightnow inside of my free wild
sobriety community where we canhang out, support one another,
and grow by honoring ourauthentic expression as women.
Everything you need is righthere in the description.
I will see you inside of thecommunity.
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