Hey guys! It’s Marcus here with today’s special sobriety tip number 3.

Today we’re going to talk to you about what to do with all that spare time and how to deal with those racing thoughts and out-of-control feelings and everything like that.

One of the things that I found early on in sobriety to help myself calm down and learn new things and put new thoughts inside my head that weren’t my own thoughts, was to read and consume good stuff.

Ever since I got sober, I dedicated a certain amount of time each day to read and every night when I go to sleep I listen to a good talk whether it’s a sobriety top of talk or philosophy talk or whatever it is and get something that puts a new thought in my head. This is because what you’re gonna notice is your thought cycle and they start to be the same over and over and over again, especially when we’re drinking and using. 

The best way to change them is by putting new ideas and new thoughts in our mind. 

You can do this! A lot of people find it helpful to read the A.A. Big Book. A lot of good stuff in here; if you want to learn what people do to stay sober, learn how people have gotten sober, learn what it takes and things like that. That’s one of the powers of the AAA program is going through and you know following a program that gets you out of yourself, getting out of your own way. Very good stuff there. Another thing I like to read is Alan Watts.

I’ll put a list of this stuff at Talksober.com/lists.  We’ll put some good audios and books and things that you can read a lot of them are free!  Some of them you might have to go to the book store or something that this one was only like five bucks but you can get like stuff by Alan Watts. Lots of good talks there. You can read about addiction, different things like that. Changing your life with addiction and stuff like that as well. I also find it helpful to read philosophy and spiritual stuff and spiritual not necessarily religious but like this is the Tao Te Ching or the Dao De Jing, I think they say it by Lao Tzu and really good stuff.

It really does change your thoughts because oftentimes as alcoholics and drug addicts, what happens is we start to think in loops and our thoughts cycle and cycle and they go down that hole depression. If you put new stuff in, it’s gonna give you more options. While you might go and on a normal day think, “oh wow I’m depressed, I wouldn’t want to go drink,” you might think, “I’m depressed. That’s normal. That’s what happens. Maybe I’ll read something or consume something different.”

What will happen is you’ll start to get new thoughts and your thought life will start to change and you’ll start to feel better which is GONNA MAKE YOU LESS LIKELY TO GO OUT AND DRINK.

So if you feel like picking up a drink or you feel like you need help, get a book or watch a YouTube video.

Make sure that you subscribe to my YouTube channel here.

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If you want to get the list of stuff that’s helped me over the last three years stay sober even in the face of adversity and tough times, go to talksober.com/list.

So tip number three, get out of your head and into a book or into a good audio that’s going to help you learn about yourself, learn about something else or

get your mind out of your head!

Thanks again for watching. Go to Talksober.com/list.

Subscribe to my channel and I’ll see you tomorrow for day number four sobriety tip!