Amber Hollingsworth walks through five types of obstacles that block people from getting sober: people, money, logistics, emotional fears, and physical dependence. She helps you name your own barriers and find resources to tackle them.
Chapters
You're back for more. Seriously? Wow, I'm really impressed. You have definitely shown willingness to do work, honesty and all these like really hard self reflection things that you've been having to do. Humility and commitment. If you've made it this far, then you've put in some hard work. You've had to ask yourself some hard questions and you ought to be a little bit proud of yourself for that because it's really easy to just think, I'll do that later or forget it or who cares? Or maybe you start it and you're all in the zone, but then the next day you're not. If you're still working and you're on this lesson, you really are committed. Okay, okay, okay. I guess we need to move past the mushy goosey positive validation stuff. Let's get into our work for this lesson. This one is a lesson. I'm going to call it. Yeah. But this is where we're going to take a look at any roadblocks that might be standing in your way. So let's say you, you know, you've completed your really in depth pros and cons matrix list thing and it's got you to thinking about making some changes. But you probably have some hesitation still. There are probably obstacles in your way. Some of them are like real logistical problems and some of them might just be more emotional or psychological. You know, fears, anxieties, worries or that sort of. Nonetheless, there's still roadblocks. And the best way to get over a roadblock is to acknowledge what it is, size it up. Because after that you can figure out how to get over it, around it, under it, through it, whatever, blow it up with a laser beam. Once you've identified what those roadblocks are, then you can figure out what to do about them. So let's take a minute to do some thinking about what might be things that would stand in your way of being able to get sober. Now, I'm going to give you some examples of some really common ones, but everybody's really different and your situation is completely unique and you're going to have some that I didn't even think of. But these are just some examples to sort of get your mind to start thinking in that direction. Roadblocks and problems that you might have, you might have some people problems, right? You may have some negative influences in your life that you really need to disconnect from. Some. Some of those may be harder than others. Now, by negative influence, I really can mean a couple of things. It could mean There are some people you really need to distance yourself from, at least for right now, maybe not forever, but for now, in order to stay sober. Because being around them triggers you, or there's a certain group of friends or people around that are always doing that, and you need some distance to not have that trigger. Another way people can be kind of like a negative influence that you need to deal with is maybe they're just really negative. They're in your ear. They're telling you negative things that keep you down or keep you feeling like you can't do it, or feeling terrible about life or hating other people or hating yourself or whatever. You don't need that negative energy. So maybe they're not, like, high risk because they're using or something, but they're just not helpful to have around. Those are the kind of things that. I mean, they're people roadblocks. They're people problems. Another kind of roadblock that you could be having might be a financial roadblock. Maybe you've decided you want to make a change, but it's a really big change, and your addiction is progressed, and you feel like you're going to need quite a bit of help. But it's really expensive to get counseling, coaching, intensive outpatient treatment, you know, inpatient treatment. Don't worry about what all of those are. We'll explain those in a. In a later lesson. But. But you're worried about money. Can I afford to get access to the resources that I need? Is that a roadblock that you have? Maybe you have some logistical roadblocks that you're facing. Like, maybe you're taking this and Covid is still a thing, and you would totally love to go see a counselor or go to some meetings or, you know, join a new church group or something like that, but there aren't any. Or there are, but you can't go. Or there are, but they're all zoom and you hate zoom or whatever. Is that a roadblock for you? Or maybe you live in a town where there just aren't many resources to access. Do you have any logistical issues as far as that's concerned? Are you worried about childcare being an issue? Maybe you really want to go see this certain, like, recovery coach that you know about, and you really feel like it would help you to go have lunch with them, you know, once a week, but you don't have anybody to help you with childcare. Or you'd love to go to meetings, but who's going to watch your kid child care? That can be a roadblock. Or obstacle. Maybe you're still having some of those fears that we talked about. Remember those? At the very beginning, we made that big list of worries that you have about the thought of getting sober. If you're still having. Some of those are obstacles because they keep coming back in your head and they're making you hesitant and they're slowing you down. So make sure and include those. I'm still worried about, I feel anxious about. I don't know if this is going to work. I'm nervous, those kind of things. Maybe a roadblock is you really, really want to change, but you're physically dependent and you can't because if you just stopped using today, you'd get really sick and it might not even be safe to do so. So that means, like, I need medical detox or some medical help, but I can't afford to take the time off work, or if I take the time off work, I'm going to lose my job. These are all the kind of things that, I mean, they're like practical things, some of them, some of them emotional things, but they're standing in your way and they're for sure obstacles that you're going to have to figure out how to, like I said, get over them, under them, around them, through them, laser beam them down, whatever. Call in your mama and have her move them, whatever. There are obstacles that's got to be addressed. Hey, what's the saying? Say that saying. I really like this one. It says, I didn't say it was going to be easy, but I am saying it's going to be worth it. In your next lesson, the part where you got to put some pen to paper or some hands to the keyboard or whatever. Then I'm going to ask you to identify what possible roadblocks that you have, and I'm going to ask you to identify whether or not there are some resources or solutions or something that might could help you with that. Maybe you don't have it all there to totally overcome it. But, you know, you can do this part or that part, or this person could help you with that, or you could call up this person and they know who else you could get in contact with. So you're going to identify what the roadblocks are, and we're going to take a look at and dig deep. Are there any resources, solutions that you know or you can get access to that might help you with that particular roadblock?
