Sobriety Quotes

Words of Wisdom to Encourage Recovery

You never know what words will push someone to seek sobriety. I suffered from alcohol addiction for nearly twenty years. I was given a lot of advice on how to quit and seek treatment. Most of the things people said never stuck. It wasn’t until I was given some words of wisdom from a recovering alcoholic that I sought treatment at Icarus Behavioral Health in New Mexico.

I spent most of my life angry at the world. I punished others for my perceived shortcomings. I thought everything that happened to me was someone else’s fault. My anger controlled my life. It controlled every aspect of my thought process. I tried Alcoholics Anonymous once or twice but always left angry. These people didn’t know me or what I was going through.

There is no manual to fix your addiction, no matter what kind of addiction you might have. The right words might help, but action is also required to make the leap into living a sober life. In this journal, I will lay out some of the quotes that have helped me, and perhaps they might help you.

Keep reading to find out more information, and if you are struggling, reach out to Icarus in New Mexico today for support and resources to assist you in achieving a successful, lasting recovery!

Acknowledging a Drug and Alcohol Addiction

After years of alcohol abuse, I finally sought addiction treatment. I’ve heard a lot of sobriety quotes over the years, but none that actually stuck in my head. When I started to learn about justified anger, I finally began to listen. Justified anger is one of the things they often cover as an AA meeting topic, and it’s one of the things that helps a lot of people stay sober and not give in to their anger.

Justified anger basically talks about how it’s better to let the anger go, even if you feel you are justified in being angry. All that anger will do is continue to make you miserable. That really clicked with me. I started going to AA regularly, as well as a support group for anger addiction. All the suffering I went through for all those years started to slip away. I gave in to addiction treatment and have been sober for four years now.

The really crucial takeaway I have found is that inspiration is important in supporting addiction recovery and that a few words that really resonate for you can become a mantra that gets you through even the darkest days.

Building A Solid Foundation

For many recovering addicts, there is a life change that is required to maintain sobriety. Building a solid foundation is key to making sobriety work for you. You can’t get sober and then live the same way you used to. Building this foundation begins with becoming comfortable in your own skin.

If you don’t love yourself and you aren’t comfortable in your own skin, you aren’t going to go very far. It will be very easy to fall into self-loathing and negative thinking, and then turn back to substance abuse and socially isolating yourself. If you are comfortable with yourself, you will want to treat yourself better. If you have issues with yourself, it can be easier to do unhealthy things and put yourself in a bad situation. We can all be our own worst enemies.

A lot of addicts turn to recreational activities or artistic endeavors in order to create this foundation. Exercise became a solid foundation for me once I first became sober. There needs to be something there to fill the void that is left behind by drugs and alcohol. There are many healthy pursuits you can engage in to make this happen.

Inspirational Quotes From The Recovery Community

In a lot of situations when you are abusing drugs or alcohol, you don’t want to hear anybody’s inspirational quotes about alcohol and relationships, or about anything at all, really. It’s easy to say words. The term ‘easier said than done’ is very true. However, once you do take a shot at recovery, these sobriety quotes hold a bit more weight than they do when you are suffering.

A lot of the sobriety quotes you hear may seem like obvious statements, but the words mean a bit more if you have a personal connection to addiction. One of the quotes that stick with me is:

“Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extraordinary destiny.” This is a quote from the writer C.S. Lewis (he wrote the Narnia stories among other books my family enjoys) that means a lot to me personally.

We all go through hardships in life. Living a sober life doesn’t excuse you from experiencing pain and frustration in life. We all experience loss and difficulties in our relationships or careers. How we respond is what is important. If you have a good head on your shoulders, you are better equipped to handle the curveballs life throws at you. The curveballs are going to come no matter how lucky you are or think you might be.

The Path To A Better Life Can Be Found

When I quit drinking, I had to rebuild my life from the bottom up. You spend so much intimate time with yourself when you don’t have drugs or alcohol to mask your problems. Soul searching is a big part of the recovery process. When you are going through an early recovery, you have to take a look at your life, and oftentimes you don’t like what you see.

A big part of addiction recovery is facing yourself and whatever problems you have been running from. This can be very scary. I loved to hear motivational quotes on a regular basis when I was beginning to go to support groups. I would replay these quotes in my head, and many of them would relate to whatever I was dealing with. It doesn’t seem like much, but when you hear something that relates to your situation, you feel less alone.

And although it’s a long quote, this one by Alexandra Katehakis rings true for me:

“To sober up seems to many like making life “so serious,” as if seriousness precluded joy, warmth, spontaneity, and fun. But there can be a delusional, blind quality to non-sober festivities. To have our eyes open soberly with all our senses and memory intact allows some of the most rewarding, soul-nourishing, and long-lasting pleasures possible.”

Success Achieved In Addiction Recovery

It’s important to celebrate milestones during recovery. Long-term recovery is achieved by achieving success and hitting certain milestones. This reminds you of all the work you have put in to get where you have gotten. If you’re hitting these milestones and other people are acknowledging your success, you are going in the right direction.

Along with the other folks in my support group, we celebrate National Recovery Month every year. This is a great way to not only acknowledge our own success but to show others that we see their progress. It means the world to me when someone tells me they are proud of my success in recovery.

Whenever I hear this, I try to let someone else know how proud I am of them. This creates a great cycle of support and encouragement. While certainly not professional medical advice, the right quote can be just the place to get support… and you can carry them with you wherever you go!

Quotes For Those Who Are Newly Sober

When you are newly sober or coming right out of inpatient treatment, you are in a vulnerable position. It can be very difficult during the first few weeks. Things don’t just all fall into place once you end your drug addiction. Staying sober can be a battle, but the right words can make it a bit easier.

When I was newly sober, one of the sobriety quotes I fell back on was from a blogger I like named Brian Weiner:

“One day you will tell your story of how you overcame what you went through and it will become someone else’s survival guide.”

This quote continuously reminded me that I could be a beacon for someone else’s recovery.

Being able to influence someone else in a positive way was enticing. For so many years, I had influenced people only in a negative way. I was eager to try and provide a spark for someone else working towards recovery. Inspiring hope to a fellow drug addict is an intoxicating feeling. Much more rewarding than the intoxicating feeling of drugs or alcohol.

How Rock Bottom Becomes The Solid Foundation

A great quote from J.K. Rowling is the following, straight to the point ‘bullet of wisdom:’

“Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.”

For me, this is particularly inspiring because it tells us that we can be at our absolute bottom and use it to our advantage. Everything in life is an opportunity to do something positive, despite how negative it may seem at the time.

When you are at rock bottom, it can be hard to imagine a life where you are actually inspiring people to reach lasting recovery. All you see yourself doing is either dying or continuing your substance abuse. The reason a lot of people seek recovery when they hit rock bottom is they have nothing more to lose. When you have tried everything your way, it’s easy to finally admit that your way doesn’t work, and maybe it’s time to reach out for help.

Sobriety Quotes: Inspire Ambition with the Right Words

Ambition is one of the most important mindsets you can have if you are going to remain sober and do great things in life. We all have a certain amount of ambition, yet cultivating that ambition and using it for good can be tricky sometimes. When I was drinking, the only ambition I had was to get more alcohol into my body.

During these days, the AA tried and true slogans served as short sobriety quotes that became like a mantra to me, repeated over and over each day I found things rough (which was most of them!)

“Easy Does It”

“One Day at a Time”

and the everpresent “Keep Coming Back”

Once I was sober for a few weeks, I found myself being more ambitious to try new things. Anything that would keep my mind occupied and not on drinking was a win-win for me. I started exercising often, and the more I did it, the more ambition I had to push myself. I would run half a mile, and then try to outdo myself the next time. Pretty soon, I was up to running three miles. Ambition-inspired activities played a vital role in my continuing recovery.

The Only Person That Can Change You… Is You!

Recovery is a personal process. We all need support along the way, but it’s up to you how far you are going to take it. The only person that can reach all of the success that sobriety has to offer is you. You can’t have someone holding your hand the entire way. As an adult, you are responsible for yourself and no one else.

It’s frustrating sometimes to see people lose their sobriety and not regain it. This is tough, and I’ve seen it happen plenty of times. I’ve known people who seemed like they were doing amazingly well in their recovery and then slipped back to where they were previously. Although relapse happens to many of us, having a solid relapse prevention plan (and maybe an inspiring quote or two!) at hand can help limit the possibility and safeguard you against the dreaded ‘slip.’

If I see someone else is considering relapse, there isn’t anything I can do about that other than offer a helping hand and provide them with the sobriety quotes that I use to keep myself in check. If they take the advice, then that’s great. If not, it’s not up to me to lock them in a room and force them to be sober. Only you can fix yourself.

Sobriety Quotes to Nourish the Soul

The reason people become drug addicts is that they are looking for a quick fix to an often complex problem. Getting high or drunk may feel good, but that feeling is short-lived. There is nothing soul-nourishing about being black-out drunk. Living your best life and pushing yourself to reach your full potential is what truly feeds the soul.

Making life fulfilling requires positive energy and a good head on your shoulders. If you are waiting around for life to hand you something you didn’t earn, you will be disappointed. If you stop waiting and grab life by the horns, you can feel the soul nourishment that many people in recovery have also felt. It’s a hard feeling to describe when you feel at peace with the world and yourself.

The Struggle Is Natural

Everyone struggles sometimes during recovery. I’ve never met one person who got sober and then never had a bad day again after that. We are all human beings. Being a human being means you are going to be challenged. No one is completely happy and content twenty-four hours a day. The secret is to embrace the struggle. Everyone feels the struggle during sobriety.

We all feel irrational emotions occasionally. The trick is to not let your thinking become wholly irrational. When you begin to think irrationally, this thinking feeds itself and gets worse and worse. Sometimes it’s hard to recognize when you fall into this thinking. That’s why it’s good to have people around you who can point it out sometimes.

From Completely Powerless To The Greatest Glory

Another great sobriety quote that I like to go back to is this one by another writing great, Ralph Waldo Emerson:

“Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail.”

We all fail in life, and our failures don’t have to define the future. Whenever I fail, I use it as a learning opportunity. When I was completely powerless in my addiction, I would always let it get the best of me.

My anger problems always made my negative thinking control my life. No wonder I was always failing. I soon learned that a lot of these failures were a result of me doing the same thing and expecting different results. This is another great quote that can go a long way in sobriety. You need to try new things sometimes in order to get the result you are looking for.

Overcoming Addiction Once and For All

When you overcome addiction, it’s a surreal feeling. When I see other drunk people, it gives me a weird feeling in the pit of my stomach. I see people having fun, but I know that that fun only goes so far. The more you drink, the less fun you are going to have. It’s easy for your mood to switch. It’s easy for your hang-ups to come to the surface. It’s even easier to fall into irrational thinking.

Now that I have been sober as long as I have, I am a much more improved person. I am more present for my loved ones and anybody else who might need me. My number one priority in life is to stay sober and to help others achieve this gift through facilities like Icarus Behavioral Health. I try not to preach too much to people who do drink. The best thing I can do is be an example. Everything I have in life is because I am sober.