Sober Not Somber Hour

Hello. Hello. Welcome. Welcome to Sober Not Somber Hour. It is already four on a Tuesday. Do you ever feel like the weeks, you know, you should have so much time early in the beginning of the week and then the tasks just keep loading up that you are trying to check off but just keep getting moved off on your calendar. That's been one of those days today. How is everyone? Come on in. Jen Varales, Sober Not Somber Hour. I have a really great drink that I am excited to share with you today. Eileen, I think is it.

Welcome. M em Johnson, Welcome. This is a beverage and I always highlight an alcoholic beverage that I dive into the actual content of what I want to share. But this beverage is three spirit and this particular one, they have three varietals in the adaptogen kind of category. I would say this one is to energize and it's juicy and fiery, they say and it certainly is. So their branding is all about choosing your mood and, and none of this is THC CBD substance related. But this particular beverage has a little bit of natural green tea for the energy.

So I'm just going to make this and then we're going to get into the topic today which if you've been paying attention on the Cadre sphere, I'm just going to do like maybe 2 ounces of the Leipner. The topic this month is Harvest. And and then what I do is add this Fever Tree pink grapefruit soda to it which is also described as juicy and zesty. And then I do about 3 ounces of that. So that is my NA beverage. Look how lovely. You guys have probably seen this glass several times if you've logged in.

Yeah, so. So last week as I shared, I was getting ready to go to this gala. It's called the Imagine Gala and it is put on by the retreat, which is a recovery community, I think about 80 years in existence out in the Wayzata area. A lovely gala. The theme was we are not a Glum lot, which I thought was hilarious. Hi. Speak Wonder. Yeah. Fever Tree is so good. I wish you could cheers with me. Yeah, I just thought that was such a fun choice for a title of a gala for sober people. And the phrase comes from the Big Book of AA which proclaims we are not a glam ot, which means we should celebrate our sobriety and live happily.

Happily ever after. Oh my gosh, that is so good that my. That's like my favorite beverage right now right at this minute. Oh yes. Cheers. Across the miles. So couple things, Harvest. I am choosing to share with you a little bit about the concept of trust when it comes to harvesting. And might seem like a little bit of stretch, but stick with me. So trust is really this feeling usually we think about in relationships with others. Do you trust this person? Right. You're thinking a lot externally about where we in relationships either trust people or find it hard to trust people.

But what I want to prompt us all today to think about is how much do we trust ourselves? How much can we rely on ourselves to show up? So trust in its definition is this feeling of reliance on the character, ability, or truth of someone or something. And it comes from a consistent positive interaction or a series of those and a biological component of social bonding. Social. So when you think about trust with others in relationships, you need sort of social experiences and some consistency over time to build trust.

Trust doesn't typically just happen in an instant, although it can. You can have a intuitive feeling that you trust this person, but real solid trust, the kind that you can rely on others to show up a certain way or be there for you. Take some time to cultivate or harvest within a relationship. And once you kind of realize what that trust is in a relationship, you can either lean on it or decide there's not enough trust in this relationship to feel safe. For me, we're going back to the conversations around safety in September.

But, yeah, I think that is something that we all can understand kind of from an external perspective. And so what I wanted to share with you today is just flipping the switch a little bit on that to think about how we trust ourselves and how we develop our harvest, that sense of trust within us and what that can do in our lives. It's super powerful. So many of you know, I'm Sober, I have 11 years of sobriety, and in active addiction. I couldn't trust myself. I couldn't trust myself. And maybe others can relate to that.

But literally, like, I would tell myself, I'm not drinking tonight. And I would say that all day long. Nope, not gonna have a drink tonight. I swear, you know, I'm gonna do something different. I don't need it. And then I would break that promise to myself. And ultimately that after 20 decades of behaving in that way, I'm not gonna drink this weekend. And then immediately breaking that 5 o' clock on a Friday really eroded my sense of trust in myself. And it was really specifically in the area of alcohol misuse.

Other areas of my life, I could somewhat trust myself. If I'm going to show up to work, I'm Going to be there at 8. Yes, I can trust myself, even if I'm hungover. If I'm going to show up, sign up for a workout class, I'm going to show up. I could trust myself. And these are like little trust contracts within ourself. No one else knows about these. And so I was thinking, you know, that muscle flexing, like trust now in sobriety and how much that has just built in a beautiful way over years of taking a deep breath when things seem overwhelming and just being like, I've got this.

And that's a popular phrase everyone you know says these days. And you hear it a lot. I've got this, you've got this. Right? But to really, truly believe that, because you can tell yourself that and also keep scrambling, you know, throughout the day to get through your overwhelming to do list or you can really settle into. No matter what happens, I'm going to do my best. I'm going to show up in every possible way I can be present and I trust that, that I'll figure it out. That's a hard one. That's a hard one.

Especially when you layer like alcohol misuse and anxiety together. Like never knowing if I could truly trust myself. Speak wonder. Best description of alcohol addiction is in Matthew Perry's memoir, Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing. I have not read it. I will have to. I love when people put. Can put words to this addiction that are meaningful for them, but they really, it really carries weight for others and perhaps a new perspective of looking at addiction. And yeah, I mean, I think there's loneliness as an impact.

There's loss of trust, complete loss of trust in yourself to do the right thing. It's. It slowly kind of strips you away of all of these really rich things that anyone should have in their lives. So when I think of harvesting trust and building that muscle, that's what I want to leave you with today. Like, how are you actively building that for yourself? Are there areas in your life where you completely trust yourself? You know, like, I'm going to go to bed on time, I'm going to put the phone away and stop scrolling.

Can you trust yourself to do that? And, and you know, what are some tips and ways that you can sort of tap into creating that for yourself? So, for example, I think my biggest thing is career and work. And I definitely have worked through anxiety in my entrepreneurial career and overcome that by showing up again and again and trusting that if I show up as my authentic self, that's a big part of it. That's A big part of establishing trust for yourself is if you show up willing and as your best self, you have to trust that everything's going to follow from that.

There's not much else you can control or do. So I feel like that, that little muscle of harvesting can sometimes feel like. Like it's really digging deep. And that's, you know, that's the word harvest. You know, the last share I did last week was really about, you know, a little bit of personal growth and values, like tapping into your values to really show how you want to be in the world. And this, this is similar. Like, how can you trust yourself and develop that trust and really harvest that for yourself so that.

That you can show up as you want to in the world? I love it. It's a beautiful thing having another sip here. So, yeah, I exercise that, like I said, a lot. And I think the other biggest piece to just wrap this on is reflecting on what trust has looked like over your life. And that could be, you know, whether, you know, your relationship with adults in your life. How did that define trust for you? And then how does that translate to how you trust yourself today? How can we build that? How can we build that together?

Keep showing up, right? Thank you all for chiming in. Tuesday, October, what is the day? 21st. One more month of. Of harvesting and it's. It's. October has been a definite season of change and transition. So I am learning to trust and taking the next right step, even when I don't know what that is. Anybody. You can relate to that. Lots of change. Happy Tuesday. Happy sober, not somber hour. Get this beverage free spirit. If you need a little company for your 4pm happy hours daily. See you all next week.

Have a good one.