Oliver Anthony Reveals Secret Thoughts in- "I've Got To Get Sober"

Oliver Anthony's song I've Got to Get Sober really is powerful. It's so powerful, these words that he has written and that he sings. And I feel like it really speaks to the heart of what it's like to be trapped in your own addictions, in your own patterns that you're trying to get out of, no matter what those addictions might be. So I thought we would take a look at the song and react to it, analyze it from the perspective of the psychology of what goes on inside your head when you're really struggling and you're stuck in these patterns that you want to disrupt, and the agony and the shame and the secrets, and most of all, the ambivalence and mixed feelings about how and why you're stuck in these places and how and why you will eventually get out of them. So let's take a look at this song. I would like to say thank you to our viewer who recommended this to me. He let me know. He said, hey, there's this song people are reacting to. Maybe you should take a look at it and react to it. And I listened to it, and immediately I was like, oh, absolutely. I love this. Not only I've never even heard of Oliver Anthony until this morning, but you immediately fall in love with him. He is, like, blowing up all over the place right now. The song that's really blowing up is another song. It's not this one. This is a popular one, but it's another song. I think it's called something like Rich man from Richmond. It's also another really good one. And I think the reason he's blowing up so big is because he really speaks to those painful, uncertain, insecure thoughts that we have inside. So let's take a listen to it, and I'd love to know what you guys think about it. And if you haven't heard of this guy, you definitely want to check him out.

Well, the life we've been given and the way we've been living, just a song that we write till we die.

So even with those. Just those first couple of lines that you hear, and he's talking about, basically he's saying, we write about our lives. And so to me, it make. It makes me. It makes me connect to the idea that he understands this struggle, this ambivalence, and you're about to hear more about it, but of what it's like to have all these mixed feelings because he's saying, hey, we write about. We write about our lives.

Now, some people write songs on living just right, but I write mine on just getting by I'll go on the whim start writing the hymn that sounds so sweet but the troubles and the sand of the world that we're in Knock me back off my feet.

You know, can't we all relate to that? Just the. The struggles and the stress of life and how it feels like, you know, you get two steps ahead and it just throws you backwards.

I gotta get sober Got this hard and living right I don't know how it's gonna go but it ain't gonna happen tonight so pour them down strong.

So that chorus line there about, I've gotta get sober, I've gotta start living right but it's not gonna happen tonight that speaks volumes to this ambivalence that we have. And what I hear when I hear this song. If this was someone who was sitting on the therapy couch talking to me, I'd be like, this guy's real close to getting sober. Like, this guy's so close because, number one, he's. The way he's saying, I've got to get sober. I've got to start living right. But not tonight. If you. I know a lot of people who watch these videos are watching from the family member perspective. And all you're going to see when you have a loved one who's going through this, you're just going to see that they're going to get drunk tonight. And you think that they're not thinking about it all, but usually they are. And I think this is where the. The secret thought is revealed. This is what I call change talk. And when you see this, like I said, from the family man perspective, you think, oh, this guy's never going to get it. But if you could see what goes on inside the head of someone who's struggling with something, no matter what it is, this is what you would see is, okay, I'm going to do it. I'm going to do it. And the fact that he's saying I've got to do it, and he's saying I'm going to do it so says that in his mind, he already knows he's going to make that change, and he's just sort of procrastinating on it, but the fact that he already sees that it's going to happen tells me that this is a person who's going to make the change.

And if I wake up tomorrow when my son comes back like a hound, I'll be wishing I was sober.

When. When I hear that line, if I wake up tomorrow when the sun Comes back around, I'll be wishing I was sober. It says, he knows already I'm going to regret this. How does he know that? He knows that because he's done it 10,000 times before that he's made this mistake. And every single time that happens, it sort of reinforces for a person. I don't like this. This doesn't really work for me. It's always full of regret. And one of those times when you wake up and the sun's come back around and you have that, it's it. You're going to be done. It's the last time. And you're going to think to yourself, this is it. It's the last time. And when I hear someone saying these kinds of words, I'm telling you, it means they're pretty close. Probably within weeks or months, I would say, of making the real change.

Well, the liquor and the bowl They've been saving my soul from the pain that the world's put on me Lord, I know that upstairs there's an old man who cares and one day he'll set me free.

Okay, so there's a. There's a lot of, like, powerful psychology and messaging there. You know, there's this. Here we go back to this other side of the liquor and the bowl, or saving my soul, basically, like, it's helping me. It's the thing that's getting me by. Yet you have in the verse before, which is like, I know I'm going to regret it. I know I wish I was sober. This is the articulation of the ambivalence that goes on in someone's head before they're able to get to the other side. And it. And honestly, it doesn't have to be about an addiction. It doesn't even have to be about drugs and alcohol. Any of us who have a pattern in our life that we're trying to change, you can relate to how this feels. You know what this feels like? It's like, you know, you can think in your head, this mistake, mistake, because I've made it a hundred times. I've got to stop doing this. And you go through that process time and time again until eventually it clicks. And then once that happens, you're done. Now, the other part of this. So he's saying, the liquor in the bowl saves myself. So it's like doing something for me. But the other part of this, it says. He's saying, I know that there's an old man upstairs who really cares. This, to me, is sort of speaks to a step two, if you're from like a 12 step program, it speaks to. I know there's a solution, and I know there's someone or something out there that can help me. And so to me, that's another reason why I would think if I hear these words from someone, this is someone who's about to change. Because they. They already get that I have to change. I keep trying this. It. It doesn't work for me anymore. And I know there's a solution out there, and I know there's someone out there who cares. You see this? This is language of change.

I'll go on whim start hiding the hymn that sounds so swee. But the troubles and the sin of the world that we're in Knock me back off my feet I gotta get.

Sober.

I gotta start living right I don't know how it's gonna go but it ain't gonna happen tonight Surprise Pour them down strong Till I drown and if I wake up tomorrow when that sun comes back around I'll be wishing I was so.

Can you guys hear the. The pain in that? It's like you Pour them down Until I drowned if I wake up tomorrow there's this thing that happens in late stage addiction where you get to the point that you. I call it passively suicidal. So, I mean, sometimes people get so bad into it, they're actively suicidal. Means they like literally want to kill themselves. They have a plan for it. But in most other cases, maybe someone doesn't have a plan, but they're just so miserable and they're in so much pain that they just don't care if they wake up the next day. So they start to live very recklessly because there's this part of them that says, you know what? It'd be better if I didn't wake up. And that's the depth of the pain that you get to when you have an addiction issue. And so you can see him so clearly, like, articulate all of these secret little inside thoughts, which, whether or not if you have struggled with an addiction, then you know this is true. And I would love to hear from you in the comments about that because I think it helps so many people to hear it. It helps other people are going through it to feel like, oh my gosh, like, I get that, that, you know, I had that same thing. And it also helps the family members who are watching this understand that there is this ambivalence going on inside that they're probably not going to say it to you. If. Imagine if this guy is your Husband. If this guy's your son, right. You don't hear these thoughts. What you see is the behavior, the stuck behavior. But before that behavior change, these thoughts come. And so what I want you to know is what you see on the outside isn't always what's going on on the inside. It looks a lot more like what this song is.

Well, the life we've been given and the way we've been living. Just a song that we write till we die.

I don't know if that. I don't know if that song speaks to you guys as much as it speaks to me, but I kind of have the feeling that it. That it will and that it does. Is there a song out there that you relate to when it comes to addiction recovery or anything in between? If so, I'd love to know what that is from you. You know, what song speaks to your heart that really sort of expresses. If you could express it, you know, like a songwriter would. Expresses how you feel on the inside. Love to hear that from you guys. And maybe those are other songs that we can kind of look at and explore and look at the psychology behind. I know there's a lot of people out there reacting to this song. Musically. I don't have the in depth knowledge about music to do that other than to say, it's fabulous. I love it. And you can totally tell why this guy's blowing up. Like, even if he wasn't singing about this, that soulful sound, I would like it no matter what he was saying. But the fact that he's speaking about this, which is so close to my heart and to your heart, just makes it even that much more compelling and powerful and deep. I would like to say take just a minute to say hello. For those of you who joined me on this impromptu live that I literally decided to do just this morning when it got recommended to me. Thank you guys so much for showing up. And if you are new here, welcome to our channel. We don't normally do music reviews, but we do almost always talk about addiction recovery. We don't believe you're powerless. You absolutely can change, and you don't have to hit bottom and lose everything before you do it. If you have a loved one who's struggling with an addiction, there are many, many, many things you can do to help them. And that's what this channel is about. So if you relate to that issue, come back and visit the channel another time and turn on the little bell notification so you can get notified when I do one of these crazy impromptu Lives. Let's say hello to the people who are here, want to hear your thoughts and say thank you for showing up on a Sunday afternoon randomly. Hey, Christy. Hey, Irma. Let's see. Irma's got something. Hey, Amber. Just want to thank you because your videos. Because of your videos and you have the time in your busy schedule. And I want to say thank you taught me how to talk to my son about addiction. Thank you for the positive feedback and thanks for showing up on this live that we just decided to do last minute. Hey, righteous monkey. I have to ask the addiction, the addiction to leave my son's body with the grace of God every day in prayer. I could honestly say that I'm not afraid anymore. I know my son will make it out and find the love. I'm so glad to hear you saying this, because sometimes when it's your. When it's someone you love, you get so scared that your own thoughts are. They're never going to make it. And you get so consumed with these horrible outcomes, and not only are you thinking it, but sometimes, you know, we get scared, we get desperate, we say impulsive things, and then we say that you're, you know, you're ruining your life. You're never gonna get out of this. And the more you say that and the more you think that and you feel that, you're just more deeply ingraining that as a reality and sort of subconsciously sending those messages out there for you and for your loved one. So when you say, I know. Going to figure this out. It's going to be okay, that's a good message. Just like this guy's song, even as full of pain as it was, he says, I've got to get sober. I'm going to start living right. You can hear, even though I haven't done it yet, you can hear like, that this person can see the other side and it's coming. Doesn't know exactly when, but it's just around the corner. Tara, smiling, says, I'm in recovery and have a friend who's been in and out of recovery lately. I have a feeling he's out again and want to know how I can best support him. Do I reach out or wait for him to come to me? I think it's. I think it's perfectly fine, Tara. To reach out when someone is out there again, what you want to do is you just sort of want to reach out in a. In a way. Just says, you know, hey, what's up? How's it going? Or hope you're doing well. I'm just thinking about you or something like that. You don't want to reach too deeply and say anything like, you know, I know you're back out there. Do you want to talk about it? Or something like that. When you just reach out and send us like a little text message is what I'm talking about, or something like that, it says, hey, the door's open. Not mad at you. Maybe. Maybe this person is sort of quit coming around or quit calling or, you know, they know that, you know, and then there's this awkwardness there. So if you just say, hey, everything's cool. We're still good. Even if you just send funny memes or send little inside jokes or something like you normally would. When you talk to this person, what it's saying is, I'm still here without hitting that shame button on the inside. I think it's. I think that's the helpful way to do it. If you, if you come at it too hard and heavy, it hits that shame guilt button so badly that they either just. Usually they just sort of like, avoid you, or if they talk to you, it'll just be on this superficial level. So you don't want to exactly talk about it unless they want to talk about it. All you want to do is say, hey, dude, I'm thinking about you. I hope you're doing good, or, hey, did you see that crazy movie that came out? Or whatever it is you would normally talk about. So you want to keep it casual. Casual. But say, I'm still here. I hope that helps. Krista says, I think you're talking to. I'm here. No one, no one even imagined me getting help. I finally had enough. It's been almost three years. I haven't looked back. Best thing I've ever done. Thank you for sharing that, Christy. And that's such a great example of people are closer to change than you think. And, and the reason they don't bring it up is because they're not sure. And they know if they say it out loud, it makes it real. And then there's that level of accountability, but there's these contemplative thoughts going on for a long time. And so even when the person is showing you the opposite of it, there's usually some level of this, sometimes even a lot of this, and then that that changes. Just around the corner. Righteous Monkey says, I can relate to this. Let's see here. Taurus Mama 4 says, hi, Amber. God love me to you for a reason. My husband is a twice a Year binge drinker. And I'm those moments. And in those moments he causes destruction. You give me good tools to calm my heart. I know that when I hear stories like what you're saying, Taurus, which is like, you know, it doesn't happen every day, it doesn't happen often, but you know, twice a year it just goes off the rails. The fact that it only happens twice a year, then it tells me that this person knows that they do have problem and they try to contain it. And it gets sort of, you know, probably a couple times a year it's either the person decides like these are almost like if you're on a diet, these are my cheat days. And then it goes badly again. And then they're like, oh yeah, this is why I don't do that. And they pull it back together or they convince themselves, oh, it'll be different this time, you know, I won't let it get out of hand. And then gets out of hand and then they're like, yep, still the same, still doesn't work. And then they pull it back together. And it's hard when you see that because you think are they ever going to get out of this cycle? But if you think about it, they're, they're actually, they're out of the cycle almost all the whole year. I'm not making excuses for those little blips, but I'm just saying don't see those as signs that it's never going to just be gone. Because what happens is every time that happens and it ends badly for that person, it's reinforcing like no, this doesn't work. Like why do I keep doing this? And eventually the temptation there just goes away because you stop seeing it as something that you're missing. Ruth says any Alice in chainsaw is what she likes. This is a really good question here. Do you know if you need to be religious for a 12 step program? Because I'm not. Haha. This is actually a question that comes up all the time, this 12 step religion question. And I do have some videos on my channel about how to work the 12 steps if you're not religious. And sometimes people say it's not religious, it is religious. Like I'm just going to tell you it is a religious program. But what I would say about it is I would call it like a non denominational religious. So it's not some hard concrete set of rules. The keys here that you have to get to work a 12 step program to actually work the steps is you have to Believe that there's some power that can heal you. Now that power can be. Now when you go to toss it me, sometimes I'll say things like, your higher power can be the doorknob. That's just done. Your higher power cannot be the doorknob. That, that doesn't make any sense. The reason is, is because you need to have some kind of ability to, to take direction from your higher power. But the higher power can be a group, like your trust up group, your support group, but it needs to have some kind of like guidance in your life other. Because this is basically what you're saying is you're like, I'm going to do it their way. That's what you're saying when you, when you hand it over to your higher power, which is what the 12 steps going to ask you to do. So whether that's your therapist, whether that's a group of people who have gotten sober before you, basically you're saying, I'm gonna stop trying to do this my way because I've tried to do it my way a thousand times. Just don't work. So I'm gonna try another way. That's it. If you can do that, you can work the 12 steps. And I tell people, you know, try not to get hung up on the language. These steps were written a long time ago. And some of the language is kind of like, it's difficult. And to me it reminds me of when you read Shakespeare, like in senior English, and you're like, I know this is English, but is it really English? So don't get hung up on the jargon. And like I said, I do have some books. I'm not. Some books, some videos. You want to take a look at those. And then there's also another good book written by Russell Brand, the comedian, where he talks about 12 steps. And he sort of like translates the 12 steps into very simple, more modern, very irreverent language. And that, that might work for you. So yeah, I'm a fan of the 12 steps, but there is a religious capacity there. But you can kind of substitute your own language in there. You don't have to go exactly that way. And they don't, they don't care. They're. They just want you to get better. Says I also had to let my son know with kind words. You are preparing me every day to lose you, and I'm not willing to lose you. How hard can that be? Can you imagine for me one second of your addiction? I. I hear what you're trying to do Irma as you're trying to like get the person to see the seriousness of it, but that rarely works. I have to be honest with you, when you come at someone so heavy, it's so scary, it hits so many buttons inside of them that you get the slam door effect is what I call it now. It depends on his personality. He may just slam the door on you and you know it. And he just says to you, you know, like, shut up, you don't get it, or, you know, you don't know what you're talking about or something like that. But even if he doesn't, like verbally communicate that to you inside their head, they usually, they can only tolerate so much of that shame because they already have it. It's not, it's not quite the best way to, to bust through that shell. You have to. You have to. You can't bust through it. You have to get them to open the door. And so there are ways to get them to open the door to you. And that's what we talk about on this channel. But I hear you and I definitely, when you say that to me, I have to prepare myself for losing you. And can you imagine? I get that. And there's a lot of family people on here that 100,000% relate to that and get that. I like this one. Btw, I love that song from that red bearded guy. He has a nice voice. I know that red bearded guy, right? That beard is like something else. That's like a branding genius right there. Like he'll never be able to not have that beard, I'm guessing because it's like the first thing you see and remember about this guy for sure. Thank you guys so much, those of you who joined us live. And thank you for watching on the replay. If you're new to the channel, if you come back and visit us again, if this kind of stuff speaks to you, we are live every Thursday at 1 and we release a new video on Tuesday mornings as well. I'll see you guys next time. Bye, everybody.