In this episode:
This episode is a testament to the fact that the stories we tell ourselves are not just stories; they’re the foundations of our reality. As I share my experiences of transition from heavy drinking to sobriety, you’ll learn how storytelling can be the key to unlocking the chains of addiction and setting you on a course toward self-discovery and true connection.
Through my experiences and a powerful excerpt from Brianna Weiss’s The Pivot Year, we navigate the complex terrain of asking for help, the fear of being a burden, and the importance of reaching out.
Resources:
Book Mentioned – The Pivot Year, by Brianna Wiest
Bottomless to Sober – Coaching, Classes, and Workshops
Transcript:
00:18 – Jessica Dueñas (Host)
Hey, everyone, for today’s episode I wanted to talk about storytelling. It is a subject that is near and dear to my heart. I would not be alive and sober today if it weren’t for the fact that I decided to open up. Of course, my version of opening up is an extreme version of opening up. I don’t expect anyone to dive into storytelling by telling their story in a newspaper, right. But connecting to our stories, even if it’s just on the basic level of identifying what is real and what is not real, can be really, really helpful in terms of just navigating decision-making and also freeing ourselves from a lot of painful shit that we put ourselves through. We’ve been talking about it a lot as well in our work in the Luckiest Club. I’m currently teaching I’m not teaching it, my bad I am helping with facilitating small group conversations in the sober life course happening at the luckiest club and we’ve been talking about storytelling. So it’s just, it’s really fresh on my mind, like, obviously, in my bottomless sober offerings, right, like, we can write our story. We can dive into books to make sense of our stories, or we can go through life coaching and one-on-one and talk about our stories Right, and so I just wanted to talk about it in this episode. So I’m going to open it up with a quick reading from Brianna Weiss, the Pivot Year.
01:37
I highly recommend this book. If you have not picked it up, please do. She is wise beyond her years and really just every page has a really, really powerful reflection. So this is from entry 208, and this is what she wrote. You either see endings or, within them, new beginnings. You either see that you’re living the days your younger self once dreamt of, or you’re still waiting on something more. You either see a storm that disrupts your path or one that corrects your course. You either see the hours as long and thankless, or life is brief and precious. You either see the mysterious unknown or an endless realm of possibility. There is what you experience and then there is the story you tell yourself about it. Over time, that story becomes the truth you carry and the other details fade in the distance Over time.
02:38
How you write the narrative determines how you experience reality, and that’s huge, right, like that is heavy and huge and powerful, and I wanted to talk about that, especially with regard to the idea of asking for help and connecting with other people, because one of the things that I feel like I’ve noticed a lot of folks talking about lately is that they really feel like they’re a burden when they’re struggling with something and they need to ask for help Right. And there’s just so many stories that we tell ourselves to block us from contacting somebody, from picking up the damn phone and either sending a text message or just calling or sending a voice note Right. Like there’s so many things that we tell ourselves to keep us isolated and alone and continuing to use maladaptive strategies to cope with the feelings and half the time it’s probably alcohol, but other things too right. And so the next time that you tell yourself, oh, I’m bothering them, I want you to think about maybe, maybe you’re not right, like. I’ll give an example I have a childhood best friend and you know when I was struggling in my addiction, when I got to a really hard point of struggling, you know I don’t even know what the hell was happening half the time. I’ll be honest with you, but you know there were years before my drinking got to the point of me drinking a fifth a night when I could have reached out to her. Right, I could have said hey, I’m feeling lonely, hey, I am feeling frustrated as hell at something going on here. There are so many times that I could have just reached out and been like, hey, do you have some space to talk to me? And I didn’t do that, right? And so if that’s you right, like, instead of telling yourself that by calling, you’re inconveniencing someone, right? Especially if this is a someone who knows that you are on a healing journey, right, if this is someone that you have told that you are working on your sobriety, why wouldn’t you reach out to them? They’re probably hoping that you do so before you tell yourself that you. But they can’t help you if you don’t tell them that you need support. The people that love us. They are not mind readers and they don’t have these tracking devices on them that notify them when you are having a hard time. That’s not their job to figure out. It’s their job to be there for you if you give them the opportunity to do so, right? So again, let’s remember that nobody here is a mind reader. You are not a mind reader and neither are the people who love you and are cheering you on. So if you tell somebody that you’re working on something and you want their support for accountability, use their phone number right. Don’t tell yourself that you’re an inconvenience. Use their phone number right, don’t tell yourself that you’re an inconvenience.
05:48
The other thing that sometimes comes up too is folks will assume and this would happen to me when my sister was. My nieces were younger at the beginning of my struggle and I never wanted to tell my sister that I was having a hard time. Right In my mind I was making up the story that she was too busy with her daughters to worry about me and in a right In my mind I was making up the story that she was too busy with her daughters to worry about me. You know, and in a sense, like my sister and I have a big age gap and I kind of feel like I was really her first experimental child. You know, my, my sister was definitely a mother figure for me and she did that with no problem while I was growing up. So why would she suddenly not want to be there for me now that I’m a woman, right? But in my mind I told myself that she had moved on from caring for me and now had to put her energy into my nieces. And here’s the thing I’m sure she was busy plenty of times. She is a super involved mom, and especially when my nieces were still at home, of course she was like going to any of their activities, et cetera. But you know what, what I didn’t stop to think about was the fact that my sister was also a grown woman who could have told me hey Jess, I can’t talk to you right now. Can I give you a call back later? Or hey, jess, can we make sure to talk tomorrow? Right now my hands are full, you know, et cetera.
06:58
I never gave her that chance. I never gave her the chance to speak up for herself, right Um she? I know how much it hurt her. Now that I’m sober and we’ve talked about it, I know how much it hurt her that I never went to her for help. It really devastated her, especially because I let my problems escalate to the point, as you all know, that I was in and out of rehabs, right Um? Hospitalizations, car accidents, et cetera. So for her to have seen her little sister escalate to that point without having been given an opportunity to even step in and help.
07:33
That was really hard for her and that was really unfair of me to do that to her, because I assumed I told myself the story. I convinced myself that she was too busy being a mom. Well, you know, women aren’t only mothers. Women are also sisters and daughters and friends, right, like we are many things. We’re not just a mom and I just I didn’t give that opportunity to practice being like the big sister that she loves doing, right? And so the next time that you tell yourself that your loved one is too busy with something to take your call, without you even trying to call or ask by text, like, hey, do you have a second? You know, stop and reframe it Right, and like, tell yourself that your you know, friends, sister, loved one, they’re grown and they can tell you if they can’t talk to you. Don’t, don’t make that assumption for them, Don’t speak for them.
08:26
And you know, like, the last example that I was thinking about, too, is is when I would go to meetings, right, and I would get all these numbers, and this was specifically like I would say like in 2020, when I was like really struggling and going to. At that time, I would go to 12-step programs and you know, people were always giving me their phone numbers, a lot of people I was not into. I was definitely not going to call them. But there were a few people who genuinely felt warm and fuzzy and like safe people. They definitely didn’t activate like my creep factor, so I could have called them Right, but I would start to tell myself like, oh no, I’m bothering them, I’m not going to call them. Mind you, they sat there in a meeting with a huge smile on their face, giving me their phone number and literally saying hey, call me anytime, anytime you need anything, call me Right. Like they’re literally giving me the blueprint for how to connect with them and I’m like, no, they don’t know what they’re talking about, they don’t want to talk to me, I’m not going to bother them.
09:26
Right, and these stories that we tell ourselves, they’re so powerful because they feel so true, they feel so rational in our bodies. But of course, it’s like our brain is always going to want to connect the dots in a way that makes sense to us, to also keep us in our comfort zone, right? So if continuing to drink is in your comfort zone, your brain is going to do every single thing possible to make you not call the people who are going to hold you accountable and support you in sobriety. To hold you accountable and support you in sobriety, it’s just, it’s the way that we are. It’s basically, I feel like it’s like the mental law of inertia, right, the body in motion stays in motion while the person drinking stays drinking. That’s what they’re going to want to continue to do, and we have to do something to break that inertia of alcohol, right?
10:11
And so again, the next time someone in a meeting space or in a community space of any kind gives you their phone number and they’re like hey, please call me, please text me, I would love to connect with you, go ahead and do so, right? Like? Ask yourself the question am I a mind reader? How do I like? What evidence do I have that I’m bothering the person who asked me to call them? Right, you’ll realize that you have no evidence. There is no proof because you’re just making it up in your head, but it sounds and feels real because it’s coming from your brain. So you know like you’re, you’re not suddenly a telepath, and I think that that’s so important to remember. And so if you didn’t get anything out of this. I just hope that you walk away from listening to this podcast episode and processing the fact that, one, you are not an inconvenience and two, you are not a bother. Right, you will encounter difficult times. Welcome to reality.
11:10
Whether you’re sober or not sober, or in whatever other kind of path you are, life is going to get difficult sometimes. There’s no immunity from that. There’s no protection from that. Quitting drinking does not protect you from hard times, right? And the story that you tell yourself is absolutely going to dictate if you’re going to go through these tough times alone and miserable and struggling, or if you’re going to go through these challenges with the support of others. You may still be miserable, but at least you won’t have to be alone, and that’s the important thing to remember. So, again, loving reminder, you are not an inconvenience, you are not a bother. Thank you so much. I am looking forward to seeing you on the next episode. Hey, if you are enjoying what you are listening to, I invite you to subscribe and share the podcast, but also go to my website, bottomless, to sobercom, and find out other opportunities to work with me, from free workshops to writing classes, to one-to-one life coaching opportunities. You can schedule a free consultation. For that, everything is available at bottomless to sobercom. See you then.
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