Start with level 1, work your way up! They all will help establish another layer of accountability for you. There are different levels of burning the ships. It doesn’t have to be a public blast on social media like I did. Have you burned your ships? Or do you always give yourself a way out? Burning the ships gave me the courage, strength, and the push, to step into a new life. Even though I really wanted to get sober and live a life without alcohol, I was too scared to leave the comfortable and familiar. And once it’s out there…once that ship has been burned…it can’t be unburned! But that’s the point, right? I knew I had no other choice, I had to take action. Putting yourself out there like this, being vulnerable like this, is scary. What quickly came to mind was how scared I was. Using my story and my voice helps keep me in check, and it helps others know that they are not alone.įast forward to today… I n the few days before sitting down to get these words out I was doing a lot of thinking about my 100 day post, trying to remember the way I was feeling, what emotions I was experiencing. This single scary ‘ burn the ships ’ post 100 days in busted down the door and has made it easy for me to continue to share my journey. I was overwhelmed and speechless by all the positive, encouraging, supportive and ‘I can relate’ messages that I got. As I started getting the notifications from comments and likes I was afraid to go read them. This public post on Facebook was my ‘drastic’. I knew that in order for me to move forward in life, to break the cycle I had been on, that I would have to do something drastic. I often felt damaged, defective, less than. The word ‘alcoholic’ brings up images of a person living under a bridge, drinking from a brown paper bag. There is this stigma associated with addiction, and too often it keeps people from admitting they have a problem or from seeking help. My anxiety was still at an all time high, almost paralyzing at times. I was embarrassed, filled with shame and guilt. Even admitting to the people that knew, from personal experience, of my drinking problem was hard. When it came time to press “Post” I was a mess of sweaty, shakey, nerves.

I’m not going to go into anymore of my story right now, if you’re curious you can listen to my interview – Recovery Elevator Episode 255. It’s not just a coincidence that my 100th day fell 100 days after my (last🙏) rock bottom moment. And I secretly made plans to publicly share my milestone of 100 days sober on social media. So I bought that plane ticket to Nashville.

I needed more accountability and I was going to have to get uncomfortable. Knowing myself, and finally being honest with myself, I knew that I would have to do something more than count days and read quit lit if I was going to make it another 100 days. There were days, even weeks, in the beginning, when counting those days was all I could focus on. People scared me.Īt that point in my sobriety, counting days was very important to me.

It was scary, I was so nervous I almost canceled the trip. But I was also terrified! Flying across the country, alone, to go meet members from my online recovery community, that I only knew from Facebook…was stepping way outside of my comfort zone. I can remember how excited I was when I did the math and realized I would be there on that day. On February 15th, 2019, while attending my very first Recovery Elevator event, Nashville LIVE…I hit 100 days sober. Retreat is easy when you let yourself have the option. The story about Hernán Cort és, in its simplest form, is really just about commitment. But there is a life lesson in this story that I do want to talk about.

HIs ‘ burn the ships ’ strategy worked! Although, guys! His men didn’t even really burn the ships, they sunk them! 😱🤯 And that fun fact, my friends, wraps up our history lesson. Two years later, in 1521, Hernán Cort é s conquered the Aztec empire. It was to send a message to his men, a loud and clear message… …there is no turning back…his men would have to conquer, or die. 🔥⛵️ His logic behind this wasn’t to go down in the history books as the conquistador loco that ordered his men to destroy his ships. In the year 1519, Hernán Cort és, a Spanish conquistador, arrived in the New World with six hundred men and, upon arrival, ordered his men to, ‘ burn the ships’.

Burn the ships