 Zach 6-5 from Palm Beach County, South Florida is 117. I was giving you an extra month there, 117 days after all three. Joe, how are you mate? Great to have you here. I'm great. I'm sober and great. Yeah so tell us just tell us again how many days after all three you are and you know what your experience of the whole fleet of life is now. Yeah I'm 117 days and I gave for my for my 65th year for my birthday I said I think I'm going to give myself the gift of sobriety and so I started back up with the 30 day no alcohol challenge and I did that before and so I had spent almost a whole year of going without drinking but then I went back and I started practicing moderation and it turned out that that was not something that was going to be successful for me. So then I decided that for my 65th year I'm going to decide to give it up completely and and and spend the remaining years of my life more present just let you know less distracted and and not having to deal with all the effects of alcohol it's contributed to my life. Yeah nice one so just tell us a little bit about what you do and how your drinking was affecting what you do. Well I work for a large international consulting firm and so I do a lot of traveling and I have clients you know all over the world and so as part of that engagements with clients and things it's very it's very common to have evening dinners gatherings deals are made over dinners and you know social activities and all of that and then I also have a pretty active social life here in South Florida and so there's lots to do pool parties every weekend yachts to you know to spend the weekends on and things like that and all of these activities seem to have a very large component of alcohol consumption and then it was just a kind of like the natural thing to do. And what was your drink of choice? What type of alcohol you drinking? I did well years ago I used to drink martinis and and I gave those up because they were just way too strong and so then I switched to vodka tonics which was my kind of go-to cocktail hour drink and one or two of those would be the what I would have at cocktail hour you know for that but my true love is red wine and that was the thing I worried about most about becoming alcohol-free is how am I going to eat how am I going to eat you know if they're how am I going to cook because even I mean there's an old expression that said whenever I cook I always have red wine I always use red wine and sometimes I even add it to the food you know so it was one of those things where red wine was my my real drink of choice. So you joined our 90-day program in a bid to cut out alcohol so what was there a moment where you chose where you decided enough I really want to dip this in the butt again or forever or like was there a moment was it was it a build-up over time like what was the motivating force for you to say I'm going to come up a whole compound? Yeah there was a there was a moment and I and I guess it wasn't really that significant but it was I got up one Monday morning after a pool party at the condo complex where Sunday was a was a great cookout and drinking started around three o'clock in the afternoon and so cocktails and were and drinking happened through to like nine ten o'clock at night and so I woke up that Monday morning and I felt really poorly really bad and I said why am I doing this to myself and I said this this is absolutely insane and then and I said and I said that was the turning point that I said I don't want to do this anymore I don't want to feel like this anymore I don't deserve to feel like this anymore and I have full control over that so I thought and then I said uh no more I'm going to and I'm going to go back to not drinking and and so good and so you reached out again and you joined our 90 day program what happened just walk us through what happened well I really I really had some success with the 30 day no alcohol challenge and the support group and all of that so I immediately went back on to that and and and then I and then I saw either a clip that you had on the website or something came I was I was somehow I stumbled across what your program 90 for the 90 day focused intensive group and I that's when I said geez I think I think that if I'm going to do this and like I do with just about everything that I do is that when I when I commit to it and I always look for coaches and ways in which to accelerate my ability to kind of and engage in that new that new venture and and and then also kind of assure my success in that so I joined the 90 day group as well and bought your book and bought your book because I don't think the book was finished when I was on the program many about maybe three or four years ago and so what happened when you were in the program in terms of why were they beneficial who did you meet like what was what really was valuable for you what was valuable is a couple of things there there's these the program consists of what they call some accelerator modules or accelerator exercises and there were and they and there was a weekly call that we had through zoom so I actually got to interact with and listen to other people's challenges and what was working for them and kind of supporting each other so the support of that focused group was really was really really good but one of the things that really that worked really well for me is one of the accelerators of parts of that is called the the daily 20 gratitudes and so when I had first heard about this I said wow and I've always journaled and I always had some you know gratitudes and gratifications and things to be thankful for me but then I said I had to make a list of 20 of them every day I said I don't know if I'm going to be able to do that and that turned out to be the easiest thing ever and the thing that actually I enjoyed doing every morning and it and it kind of grounded me and set me up for a successful alcohol free day because it put me in such a good mood positive attitude feeling confident and and happy and joyful and and one of the things about not drinking is that I was much more focused and tranquil in the morning and so this was a part that I found was was something that was really impactful which I was surprised by actually and something that I definitely continue to do every day now so I'll watch you there for a second so Joe what's happened to your sleep oh my sleep is excellent I it's very important so I take my sleep seriously and my sleep wasn't actually too bad before but I think because of the effects of alcohol falling asleep was never really a problem for me even when I was drinking but I think the quality of my sleep from the alcohol was pretty disruptive and I actually track my sleep I have some biosensors that I wear that actually tracks my sleep and so it's it's it's it's phenomenal the other thing is is that I also are using the blue blockers that I got from swanee swanee's blue blockers and I haven't I just started wearing those for a couple of weeks and so I'm trying to track to see if in fact historically if this is also going to be contributing to my sleep improvement but my sleep is very very good did you notice any shift in your productivity as a result of being alcohol free oh you're just tremendous as it was just tremendous I mean I was always kind of a type A personality and and pushing and forcing things to be done and and so I was pretty productive even when I was drinking but it's way easier now to get all that done it's like it's less struggle it's much it's easy and in fact it's and in fact there's there's like no stress or pressure about it it just happens now and so I'm not quite sure how to describe that but it's but it's maybe it's focus and maybe it's just being more calm and then not being bothered by even even when things don't go correctly or something gets really screwed up and all that stuff it is that I have a whole different way in perspective of handling that which I attribute to my sobriety and what have you noticed about relationships or with friends family or you know colleagues clients what have you noticed about your way of being and the relationships you have with the benefit of being alcohol free so the I think which is I guess it's good it's like I haven't really lost any friendships or relationships regarding my change in who I'm being around alcohol and so they've been and and I think it's because also the friendships that I have that you know a lot of them go back 40 years and so it's it's one of those things where they're they're based on more than just casual acquaintances for going out and hanging out with drinking and and I think that's part of that I really like to spend my time with my value of my time as as as more precious than money and so therefore if I spend it with people there have to be people that I really really like and they are and and I guess maybe I have high standards of the people that I hang around with hence I'm hanging around with you James a lot because I like that I have a high standard of people but it's one of those things where I haven't really had a any any bad experiences since I since I've changed about that it's all been consistent or better and I'm a much better I think listener and my sister said it best though I think because when I asked her I did a feedback when I was about 60 in 60 days of alcohol free I did a survey I asked several friends to give me some feedback as to what they're have they noticed anything about me and and that I to be honest and to and to tell me the truth and my sister said that I was way more calm and much better to talk to and way less of an asshole than so you know that's all a good thing because I think I think the alcohol would make me kind of curt and and intolerant and way more opinionated and less accepting and tolerant and open-minded and engaging with people and what's your plan now Joe for the future in relation to you drinking well it's just every day I just go day by day I don't I have very maybe maybe once week I might have an urge for something and this is going to be my first holiday season in a long time without drinking so with Thanksgiving and Christmas coming up but I don't have any concerns about it I do I mean I'll have my mocktails I actually found some some de-alcoholized red wine that I use every now and then when I want to have when I have dinner guests and so I'm going to have a glass of that with with our dinner and and so I kind of so those kind of hacks take kind of tricks my brain into thinking that you know the the the experience is there but I'm not I'm not including the the poison along with the experience so so I have that as my backup but other than that I just like I don't miss it I don't miss it and it's and I don't have that I never I for some reason I never had that issue where if alcohol is in the house it's too tempting because that's that's not the reason I drank because of it's there it's I never really drank from for being bored I guess so so I have alcohol in the house I have you know wine for for guests and stuff like that but I just I have it's it's it's not tempting to me what would you say to someone who's watching this who's thinking about taking a 90 day and be on the break from alcohol possibly coming in doing it without assistance and help oh I would I would say that if you're truly committed to experiencing your life alcohol free then then you really should be you really should seriously consider doing this program because the program will give you a very high opportunity for success in doing that and it also gives you the a method in process to to kind of transition from where you are today to a better version of yourself alcohol free and I think once you get you know through that experience then there's there's like no turning back and then so it's it's totally life changing and from a cost perspective it's like it'll be the best money you've ever spent and you spend in fact you spend if you probably added up you're probably spending way more money on alcohol than you would for the ability to become alcohol free and have a richer more joyful more pleasurable more exciting life without it thank you so much Joe do you feel happy I do but I wasn't never really unhappy but you know I think the it's like it's like it's it's like one of those things where you maybe had you know I don't know you like chocolate but then like all of a sudden you get some like really really good chocolate it's like you always had chocolate but now it's like even better I love it well Joe thank you so much and thanks for sharing your experience and thank you for playing full out and being such a wonderful cause of energy in it on our group pool so I really appreciate that you're inspiring other people who come behind you yeah I'm sorry I haven't really been on the group calls I've been pretty busy with work but I am I would like to rejoin those anyway because I do like to participate in that and again I'm still on the journey because I don't think the journey ever ends and so I don't be surprised if you see me showing up there great Joe well thank you so much so I appreciate you and congratulations again yeah you have a good morning thanks for listening to the alcohol free lifestyle podcast I want to load you up with some free stuff right now so if you want to go to jamessonic.com slash guide I will send you my quit alcohol guide which has helped six figure entrepreneurs and top professionals produce or quit drinking you can also text the word quit guide to the number 44222 if you're in the US of course it doesn't really work anywhere outside of the US but if you're in the US on your mobile phone and you'd like that guide text the word quit guide to the number 44222 or you can go to jamessonic.com slash guide if you'd like to schedule a free 15 minute call with 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