Alcohol-Free Advantage Podcast with Andy Ramage

2 years ago I commissioned a picture or infographic of my 2020 goals.Yesterday another one of them came true.And now it all makes sense I know exactly how the law of attraction works:Let me quickly explain: Your brain would explode if it had to take in all the information that bombards you all the time. So it filters information based on your values. Or put another way - what you value you see.When you set a goal you are making a statement to your conscious and subconscious mind that this goal is important to you. So you set up an internal filter for this goal. Then as if by magic you start to notice the people, places, things, books, courses, wise guides you need to reach your goal.This is the law of attraction. 

Today I have a deep appreciation for my body. For too long, I abused it with alcohol, lack of exercise and poor nutrition.An injury ended my professional football career in my early twenties.I’ve carried these injuries ever since.More recently, I’ve been told to stop running, moving, deadlifting…But my body just took me on an 88.5 mile (145 km) adventure over four days. And I feel incredible.Most anything is possible if you treat your body well.

“The true self is what you have built from your nature, not just what your nature started out with”: David Brooks The Road To Character Your true or authentic self is not a static persona that sleeps beneath your actions. You chisel your authentic self from the raw material of your nature. You are the sculptor of your being. You don’t have to allow life to force you into a shape of its choosing, you can carve our the person you want to be.Life will knock you into shape if you allow it, but life is a second-rate sculptor. You are the master.

Days Left On Earth: 17492“Never be that drunk guy at the end of the bar who says I coulda made it if it weren’t for the…” My dad.Have you heard someone say, or have you said, something similar?“I coulda shoulda woulda if it were not for the drink, the problem, the luck, the other person…”We have all heard the tales of woe, after a few drinks.

Days Left On Earth: 17493“I shall be telling this with a sighSomewhere ages and ages hence:Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—I took the one less traveled by,And that has made all the difference.” Robert FrostAre you willing to take the road less travelled by?Let me know in the comments

Days Left On Earth: 17494A few years ago I was given this advice by someone I admired greatly, "Don't try to be someone you're not'. This well-intended advice was both totally WRONG and RIGHT.The person who offered the words of wisdom had assumed I was the persona that alcohol created and I should therefore stick to being this person. But I was trying to NOT be this persona, I desperately wanted to be me.Have you found that people confuse your authentic self with the persona alcohol creates?

Days Left On Earth: 17495In the classic Robin Williams film, Dead Poets Society, where he plays the unorthodox teacher John Keating, he tells the boys to look at pictures of long past pupils and says,“Did they wait until it was too late to make from their lives even one iota of what they were capable? Because you see, gentleman, these boys are not fertilising daffodils. But if you listen real close, you can hear them whisper their legacy to you... Carpe diem. Seize the day, boys, make your life extraordinary.”Seize every day like it’s your last. 

Days Left On Earth: 17496“You are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else, you were born into bondage, into a prison that you cannot taste, see or touch - a prison for your mind.” Morpheus then offers Neo (Keano Reeves) a choice, take the blue pill and go back to your “normal” life or take the red pill and see the truth.Morpheus offers one final warning, take the red pill and “See how deep the rabbit hole goes.”If continuing to drink is the blue pill, then going alcohol-free is the red pill.I took the red pill.Once free of alcohol,  the fog lifted and I could see my truth.Life was a thousand times better without it.So what’s it to be, the blue or red pill?

Days Left On Earth: 17497Bede, known as the father of history, wrote:“The sparrow, I say, flying in at one door and immediately out the another, whilst he is within, is safe from the wintry storm; but after a short space of fair weather, he immediately vanishes out of your sight, into the dark winter from which he had emerged. So this life of man appears for a short space, but of what went before, or what is to follow we are utterly ignorant.”Maybe life is like the sparrow. We get a fleeting moment in the warmth to spread our wings. So let’s seize the day and never waste it on a hangover.

Days Left On Earth: 17498Almost all our instincts favour the short term. The short term is easy. It's easy to eat the cake, it's hard to resist it. It's easy to drink, it's hard not to.It’s easy to be negative; it's hard to be positiveIt’s easy to skip the exercise class today and hard to show up consistently for the next 50 years.Stop the rot It is bullshit to think that I will do it perfectly tomorrow. Tomorrow never comes, we only ever have today.So what will you do today?