The Alcohol-Free Camino

Just in front of me, there's a battalion.

No doubt of the Spanish army also on the road with us into Santiago de Compostela, St. James, Field of Stars translated loosely.

This has been a spiritual walk for over 1200 years.

Can you believe that? 1200 years.

Millions and millions of people have walked this very walk in search of... spiritual connection enlightenment forgiveness gratitude adventure and everything in between and this is my second time to walk this path now I did the entirety a year and a half ago and I've decided to bring a group back this time of alcohol-free adventurers so it's myself and seven others including my lovely Tara and we've been on this adventure together for the last Five days, our fifth day of walking covering 119 kilometers.

We're about five kilometers from the finish line in Santiago.

And it's been joyous, right? This is the thing that I want to talk about for this episode.

One of the hidden wins of alcohol-free that gets overlooked and underappreciated is this sense of courage and and confidence that starts to appear that I think gets lost in many ways in our charge for the conventional hedonic treadmill that many of us get stuck on that involves escaping to feel a little bit better through a few drinks.

And those few drinks, unbeknownst to us, subtly and slowly chip away at our confidence in a way that we never appreciate because it's so slow.

But alcohol appears to be the thing that gives us that little bit of oomph back, that little bit of spark, that little bit of confidence, that little bit of fun.

And then we turn to it more and more and more.

And then over time, it actually steals, without us knowing, our confidence, our spark, our fun.

And then we fall into that trap of thinking, well, the only way to get those things back is to have a couple of drinks, but it's been the very thing that's been stealing it.

from you all this time.

And it's not until you come on an adventure like this or you go alcohol free initially and you start to realize that that confidence has been buried under years of drinking.

That spark, that get up and go has just ebbed away without you even realizing.

And then all of a sudden, You go alcohol free.

And there it is.

It's waiting for you because going alcohol free is one of the biggest confidence challenges in our life.

And here's the thing about confidence.

Confidence is a skill.

Confidence is a skill.

I'll repeat that.

You need to use it to grow it.

and get it stronger, the same as you would to strengthen your muscles.