Alcohol is SH!T: How to Ditch the Booze, Re-ignite Your Life, and Recover the Person you Were Always Meant to be.

by Paul Churchill

If you let it, the body will do most of the healing and work during this journey. It will tell you exactly what to do. It already has—you’re reading this book. This may sound strange, but you can’t think yourself out of this predicament, because you’re relying on the same brain that thought yourself into this dilemma.

While reading this book, do me a favor and don’t attach yourself to an emotion, label, identity or outcome. I’m not lying when I say an incredible life awaits you, but at this moment, I want you to be present here and now.

According to Eckhart Tolle, “Every addiction arises from an unconscious refusal to face and move through your own pain. Every addiction starts and ends in pain. You’re using someone or something to cover up the pain.” Pema Chodron says that addiction arises when the edge of life is too sharp.

The problem isn’t the last drink, it’s the first.

Usually lightbulb moments allow us a glimpse over a mountain top only to see more mountains, but it’s all part of the journey and it’s important to cherish each step.

So, what is this thinking/unconscious mind? Who is the unconscious mind? Is it me? Is this who I am? I’ve got wonderful news for you. No, it’s not who you are. Not at all. You are the one that experiences the thinking mind. You are not the voice inside your head, but the one who hears it.

Spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle refers to the ego as a dysfunctional relationship with the present moment. Albert Einstein referred to the ego as an optical illusion of consciousness.

Depression is a bitch, anxiety is the worst, and stress can wreak havoc on quality of life. However, as the Sufi mystic Rumi said, “These pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them.”

You’ll know you’ve entered the waters of trust when you begin to recognize that the mind-created self, the protective personality, the ego, was all a fabrication of the mind, and that you, or the construct the mind created, doesn’t exist. Once this begins, a magical thing starts to happen. You’ll begin to stop thinking and start being.

Stop the incessant mind chatter and start enjoying this beautiful thing called life. All of it.

Everything that’s needed to be joyous in life, we already have. The mind will be eager to disagree with this statement, but the heart knows it’s true.

As you begin to deepen with trust, you’ll realize that little to nothing in your external environment needs to change, that everything is fine just the way it is. If and when change does occur in your external world, it will mirror the growth and shedding of old skins in your internal environment.

Now start being.