Hone Your Curiosity for Sober Freedom
Curiosity
Cu·ri·os·i·ty noun 1. a strong desire to know or learn something. "filled with curiosity, she peered through the window" 2. a strange or unusual object or fact. "he showed them some of the curiosities of the house"
Curiosity is one of the unique abilities I honed while getting sober. 
That is a very telling sentence. Getting sober. See, right there, my curiosity is piqued, and I can’t turn away.
If you’ve spent any time trying to get sober, you know in the recovery world, the only real measure of success whether you are sober is if you abstain. So, while I was getting sober, I was abstaining, so why would I or anyone use that term getting sober. Let’s explore.
RETURN TO SELF
In digging a little deeper, I found this content Wikipedia which fascinates me.
Sobriety is the condition of not having any measurable levels or effects from alcohol or drugs.[1]
Sobriety is also considered to be the natural state of a human being at birth. A person in a state of sobriety is considered sober. Organizations of the temperance movement have encouraged sobriety as being normative in society.[2]
This quote resonates with me, how I live sober and offer women sober freedom to explore their life as a whole without assuming an identity or needing to manage a disease/disorder through lifelong recovery. It’s a more modern context yet really just refers to the origin of the word that I explore in the Sober Revolution Ebook, “Sober is making your days count, NOT counting the days you don’t drink.” You can download it for free through this link.
RECOVERY MOVEMENT
Now, if you read further, “getting sober” is explained in the more common use of the word.
In a treatment setting, sobriety is the achieved goal of independence from consuming alcohol. As such, sustained abstinence is a prerequisite for sobriety. Early in abstinence, residual effects of alcohol consumption can preclude sobriety. These effects are labeled “PAWS,” or “post acute withdrawal syndrome.”
Someone who abstains, but has a latent desire to resume use, is termed a “Dry drunk” and not considered truly sober. An abstainer may be subconsciously motivated to resume alcohol consumption, but for a variety of reasons, abstains (e.g. a medical or legal concern precluding use).[3]
Sobriety has more specific meanings within specific contexts, such as the culture of many substance use recovery programs, law enforcement, and some schools of psychology. In some cases, sobriety implies the achievement of “life balance.”[4]
PULL THE THREAD
See where curiosity took me. I pulled the thread by asking a question I was curious about the answer.
When I wrote Sober Revolution a couple of years ago, mainly to sort my thoughts out on the true meaning of sober vs. the recovery meaning, this content was not here. I noticed this wiki page was recently updated, June 2021, as happens often.
It’s my hope more people view sobriety as an opportunity to learn, grow, and develop into the highest expression of their greatest desires without needing to make alcohol the enemy, measure their sober success by abstinence, and make drinking or not drinking the focus of their life.
With that said, not all people can enjoy sober freedom. There are many that need the structure and constraints of traditional recovery.
CURIOSITY LEADS TO SOBER FREEDOM
Freedom from labels, never, always, assuming an identity, thinking about drinking or not drinking, because you are living forward driven by information pulled from your subconscious. Possibly the working orders you were assigned at birth. Remember that sentence we discovered from Wiki “Sobriety is also considered to be the natural state of a human being at birth.”
Curiosity is considering other possibilities, whether they seem plausible or not. I invite you to ask questions with childlike wonder.
Who do I want to be?
What could I do?
Where could I go?
What makes my heart sing?
What am I afraid to speak out loud?
What’s hiding in my soul?
IMPOSSIBLE
Nothing is impossible. NOTHING.
Many of us are afraid of what could go wrong if we go poking around. I’ve touched on this in other articles. Sure, life isn’t great, but I can handle this. If nothing changes, it ain’t so bad. The bad news is something is going to change, whether that is your intention or not. That’s life. Change is the one thing you can bet on.
You have nothing to lose and everything to gain by exercising your curiosity muscle and explore the possibilities.
So you might as well take the bull by the horns and be on purpose.
CLEAR MY MIND OF ALL THE “TRUTHS”
One last thing I will say about curiosity in this article is an excerpt from my first book, Wholly Sober, Chapter 13, titled, Curiosity, “I had to shut down all the other voices. Clear my mind of all the “truths” I had been told. Get still. Be patient. And be willing to find my truth in my journey.” It’s can be hard enough to enter a state of curiosity to explore possibilities without a head full of programming.
WANT COMPANY?
Need some help getting curious? I would be overjoyed and honored to accompany you on that journey.
Reach out and schedule a time for us to chat. I am very much looking forward to hearing from you, my friend.
Much love,
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