10.81 kilometres! Or 6.71 miles! Not a bad walk for a fat drunk who hasn't had a drink for a month!
Walking is a great exercise during this first month of sobriety as I am learning patience one step at a time, literally. Even though I feel like I could run and go faster and get the exercise over with, I have to walk and just take it one step at a time. More importantly, as I walk further and for longer periods, emotions and thoughts bubble to the surface and I can confront them instead of denying them or avoiding them. Here is the subtitle to this blog post, which one do you prefer?
Walking brings up old resentments and regrets which is an opportunity to re-process the event so I no longer hold on to the event as a negative, instead as an experience, without a positive or negative bias.
-or-
Walking Clears My Head
Whilst I am walking, it is amazing how frustrations and old regrets come to my conscious mind. (Like how I am a fat drunk and 36 next month and how I haven't really got a career or a trade and had a wife and two kids to support.)
Here's today's trigger... I was about twenty minutes into the walk and was going past the entrance to an independent coffee roaster, a place where artsy types and students lounge in the sun but also business types meet for the good coffee. And there was my next door neighbour (A we'll call him) from when I was about nine years old, standing there shaking hands with obviously a business associate. A was wearing a chambray shirt and trousers with his surname embroidered on it, for example Johnsons Building and he was fit and healthy looking.
And that was all it took for me to go into a negative self-talk spiral, looking at my reflection in the shopfront windows and saying things to myself like "look at A, he was never a smart kid or that good at school, and now he has his own building company and he isn't a fat miserable drunk" or "yeah but his father would have helped him out getting started and my Dad has never shown any interest," and stuff like this as I trudged along the pavement.
But then, a funny thing happened and I caught myself in the act of doing this, and I made a conscious effort to stop it. I just said to myself.enough - no more. And kept walking, looking up and around and trying to find a positive thing to think about.
And the positive thing I thought of was A appears to be doing well, and good for him. For me, I have been living with an illness called alcoholism and it has influenced me to make some poor choices, which I am living with now. Where you are today is the result of all the choices and actions that you have made in your life It is just the way it is. I am a fat drunk who goes on long walks for exercise, and I know and accept this, and I am working towards being better and improving. And that's all I can do right now, right here, in this moment.
Have an appointment with the doctor this afternoon so will be a bit anxious to see if I can get a new prescription for antabuse. I am hoping I can as it is invaluable during these first few months.
Walking is a great exercise during this first month of sobriety as I am learning patience one step at a time, literally. Even though I feel like I could run and go faster and get the exercise over with, I have to walk and just take it one step at a time. More importantly, as I walk further and for longer periods, emotions and thoughts bubble to the surface and I can confront them instead of denying them or avoiding them. Here is the subtitle to this blog post, which one do you prefer?
Walking brings up old resentments and regrets which is an opportunity to re-process the event so I no longer hold on to the event as a negative, instead as an experience, without a positive or negative bias.
-or-
Walking Clears My Head
Whilst I am walking, it is amazing how frustrations and old regrets come to my conscious mind. (Like how I am a fat drunk and 36 next month and how I haven't really got a career or a trade and had a wife and two kids to support.)
Here's today's trigger... I was about twenty minutes into the walk and was going past the entrance to an independent coffee roaster, a place where artsy types and students lounge in the sun but also business types meet for the good coffee. And there was my next door neighbour (A we'll call him) from when I was about nine years old, standing there shaking hands with obviously a business associate. A was wearing a chambray shirt and trousers with his surname embroidered on it, for example Johnsons Building and he was fit and healthy looking.
And that was all it took for me to go into a negative self-talk spiral, looking at my reflection in the shopfront windows and saying things to myself like "look at A, he was never a smart kid or that good at school, and now he has his own building company and he isn't a fat miserable drunk" or "yeah but his father would have helped him out getting started and my Dad has never shown any interest," and stuff like this as I trudged along the pavement.
But then, a funny thing happened and I caught myself in the act of doing this, and I made a conscious effort to stop it. I just said to myself.enough - no more. And kept walking, looking up and around and trying to find a positive thing to think about.
And the positive thing I thought of was A appears to be doing well, and good for him. For me, I have been living with an illness called alcoholism and it has influenced me to make some poor choices, which I am living with now. Where you are today is the result of all the choices and actions that you have made in your life It is just the way it is. I am a fat drunk who goes on long walks for exercise, and I know and accept this, and I am working towards being better and improving. And that's all I can do right now, right here, in this moment.
Have an appointment with the doctor this afternoon so will be a bit anxious to see if I can get a new prescription for antabuse. I am hoping I can as it is invaluable during these first few months.
You are awesome! Love that post.
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