Non drinking stigma

The stigma around not drinking is very real, most people do not understand it, and nor would they as they have obviously not had a drinking problem, but I do believe most people expect an "alcoholic" to be someone who does not work, who is possibly homeless, and has no real positive input into society. I know I did, I always thought an alcoholic was somebody who drank from the minute they woke up until going to sleep or passing out, I thought an alcoholic was someone who could not do anything without having a drink.

I guess this is part of the reason it took me and takes so many alcoholic's so long to admit to themselves that they do have a problem, their idea of what an alcoholic is very different to the situation they find themselves in.

I first started entertaining the idea of having a problem about 3 years ago, I realised I had an unhealthy relationship with alcohol and started to notice that in most general life situations I wanted alcohol to be a part of it, I didn’t think I could have any fun without alcohol and lots of it! I was in two minds though, i knew that I was perhaps drinking too much but I also felt it was some what normal, most of my friends were drinking similar amounts and going out and getting on the piss for whatever the occasion was the accepted norm.

I guess this is the problem, the culture around alcohol is so normal and so accepted that if you are a non-drinking you are looked at differently almost weirdly and people can’t understand the reasons for you not wanting to drink, I know I couldn’t, I'd look at the non-drinkers at whatever the event I was attending and think wow how boring I wouldn’t want to be that guy,m he can't be having any fun!

I would basically just not attend a even if I had to drive to get there, it was easier just to stay home and drink, looking back it's amazing to see how wrong my priorities were!

That is the beauty of where I am now, I am not bothered by what people think, I know why I made the choice to not drink and I know it was the right choice, I am proud of my situation and I am proud of what I have achieved so far, I understand the culture around alcohol and I believe generally it is an acceptable way of life, however there are people out there, myself being included, that have trouble drinking the recommended amounts and not knowing when to stop, for people like us the accepted culture of alcohol is a hard pill to swallow as abuse is all too easy.

If you think you may be drinking too much an easy first step is to just start monitoring it a bit more closely. Keep a tab at how much and how often you are drinking.



Success Built from Failure,

The Alcoholic Entrepreneur

Sports Box

I got invited to a box to watch my AFL (Australian Football League) team play at Domain Stadium over the weekend, it was in a box, which, of course, means plenty of free alcohol. I put my hand up to drive, which is just another small trick to keep the mind on the job and give me another reason to keep my mind from even contemplating having a drink.

But as is starting to become the normal that thought never came, we arrived about 30 minutes before the game started and the waitress was quick to offer everyone a drink, everyone that I was with ordered an alcoholic beverage and from what I could tell I was the only one in the box that was not drinking alcohol.

This didn't bother me at all and I enjoyed the atmosphere and conversation, I spent a bit of time watching the teams warm up and then before I knew it the game was starting, I've always been into the footy and have always enjoyed going to live games, but a live game for me generally meant multiple trips to the bar and multiple trips to the toilet, so the game was not the priority, alcohol was as usual. It was nice to just enjoy the game for what it was and not have to worry about my next drink or emptying my bladder every 20 minutes.

The box was mainly standing area in a kind of bar set up, with bar stools and barrels as tables being the main styling, it also had a row of seating just down in front which was shared with other members who obviously owned those seats, we spent most of our time sitting down there as the view was better and you didn't have to stand. One of the rows of seats just to the right of us was a bunch of guys who were there enjoying the night in the way I would have 12 months ago, they were going through drinks at a rapid rate and were gradually getting more rowdy as the night went on.

I have no problems with this and these guys caused no trouble at all and all seemed to be having a great night, but it did make me realise how much I have grown in the past 6 months as there was nothing about what they were doing that appealed to me, I was really enjoying my night, and i am really enjoying my sobriety and my life!



Success built from failure,

The Alcoholic Entrepreneur

Weekend Progress

It's 8pm Sunday night and the kids have just been put to bed, I'm feeling relaxed and content with the weekend that has just past.

Alcohol played no part in my weekend nor was it craved or missed. After 4 months of not drinking I do not crave or even really give alcohol a second thought come the weekend, this obviously was vastly different 6 months ago. But that alone is an amazing feeling and allows me a lot more free time on the weekends.

The main reason for this post is to update where I am with my goals. My last post I explained how I was going to be saving part of the money saved and committing part of the time saved to my future entrepreneurial goals. 

What I didn't share was I had already started some small steps, a few months ago I registered the domain name http://www.thealcoholicentrepreneur.com/ and roughly a month ago I begin sourcing a web developer to get a basic site made, so I have a home base I guess you could call it for my future goals blogs & any other crazy idea's that may pop in my very sober very clear mind!  

So the website has been built albeit a working in progress and being hosted by Bluehost and running live as I type and you read.. there is plenty of work to do but the foundation is down and I am happy with what I have in such little time. I will be doing a full blog of the steps I went through to get the site to where it is in a the very near future. 

But for now this post is about this weekend, So what did i achieve this weekend? Up to this point in time I have clocked 8 hours, 4 of those were spent on Friday night, where I was editing the website in small ways, I added a second banner on the front page, and tweaked the sign up form slightly, i am slowly converting all the post's I have written in blogger across so I also transferred one of the older post's, within a few weeks I should be caught up and be running in sync with blogger. 

I also set up google analytics, this required me to set up a google analytics account, then link to the site via code which I needed to enter into the back end of the site. 

the other 4 hours were put in on Saturday afternoon/Night, during this time, I was playing with social media, I had created a facebook page a few weeks ago, but not a twitter account, so my partner set up a twitter account and a email address so we have a contact point alcoholicentrepreneur@gmail.com for anyone who may be interested. While she was doing that I tweaked the logo to fit the facebook page. I also connected the social media links on the web page to both the twitter & facebook page. Once the twitter page had been completed, I went ahead and tweaked the logos to fit that. 

That basically brings us up to the now, so here I am writing this blog, I am also flicking between facebook & twitter and following other pages/people that are related to what we are doing here and what I am trying to achieve, I am finding the time hard to monitor as I am having so much fun I get lost in doing it, it does not feel like work and the enjoyment and excitement just wrap me up, it really is an amazing feeling and I recommend anyone who is thinking about it to get in contact with me and start your own new journey!

Would love to hear some feedback and anyone wanting to keep up to date, on the website there is a sign up form where I will eventually be linking to the blog and have monthly updates etc.

Success built from failure,
The Alcoholic Entrepreneur

www.thealcoholicentrepreneur.com

The Next Stage

One thing I have learnt so far in my sobriety is that you need a plan, ever since i started this blog and named myself "The Alcoholic Entrepreneur" I have had a plan in mind and over the months of sobriety that plan has slowly started to solidify itself and take shape, I have set the wheels in motion on a few small projects and am now ready to take the next step and explain what my plan is and how I am going to go about it.

As you may have read in previous post's not drinking free's up a lot of your time and a lot of money, two very important things in life, I'm sure you all agree!

Additional time & money is fantastic and something no one in the world would take for granted or deny them selfs, so it is one of the greatest rewards for stopping drinking and I truly believe it is not spoken about enough.

I have decided to put this new found time and money to even more use, I am not just going to allow my lifestyle to absorb these new changes, it would be all to easy to eat up all this new time on general life things, and not really gaining anything from it, and the same goes for the money. I am looking at it the same way I look at getting a pay rise. Every financial post I have ever read in myself, says when you get a pay rise, don't allow it to just increase your lifestyle, put it straight into savings and start investing those additional funds to help grow your wealth.

So that brings me to my plan, my addition to my already very real commitment to not drinking. So if you haven't already put it together basically what I am going to start doing from the 1st of July 2015 is to keep a record of the average saving's i make per week from not drinking, I averaged these savings to be $120 per week & roughly 30 hours per week.

For the sake of making sure I keep my beautiful supportive partner happy & to make sure I don't just turn one addiction into another, I obviously cannot take this money and time and use it all for this project, however I can take a responsible and manageable amount of both and work with that.

So I have decided to commit $80 & 12 hours per week to this project, the $80 is firm and will not change however the 12 hours is a minimum and could change from week to week.

To keep a record and hold myself accountable I will be keeping and posting two monthly reports, one that will basically be a time sheet and show what I have been working on and for how long, and another showing the money saved, what the money has been spent on and eventually how much additional money is coming in.

Help hold me accountable and reach these goals, join in along the way and let me know how you are doing!


Success built from failure,
The Alcoholic Entrepreneur

www.thealcoholicentrepreneur.com