Welcome to The Crucible, Conversations for the Curious.
I am Hamish, your host.
This podcast is for anyone going through awakenings, trying to make sense of life.
Whether dark nights are the soul, needing to make life -changing decisions, struggling with addiction or critical illness, or simply realizing that their life as they know it is
not aligned to values and purpose.
You are not alone.
You can get through this, promise you.
Life is far more beautiful on the other side.
Hi everybody and welcome to another episode of the Crucible conversations for the curious.
Today I'm chatting with Ned.
He's all the way from Australia and he is the drinkless coach.
So Ned thank you so much for turning up this evening your time this morning mine.
Hey, Hamish.
Thanks for inviting me.
It's great.
Can you please tell us a little bit about your journey to becoming this Drinkless Coach?
Why you've ended up doing this kind of coaching people.
Well, it started probably when I was 19.
I'm 52.
And 19 is when I first bought my book called Mind Power by John Kehoe, an Australian guy that specialized in body language and NLP and all that.
And I had a real...
I don't know, I had a real interest about how the mind works because having been brought up in a very staunch Croatian community in Australia, there was a lot of emotional sort of
blackmail going on.
And yeah, emotions play a big part, but basically...
Passporting forward to my 20s and my 30s, there was a lot of drinking going on, a lot of partying going on.
And it's all innocent when you first start, right?
It's all innocent, it's fun, it's hangovers and doing silly things and all that.
But then it just continued in the 40s, you know?
And you're not as young as what you used to be in your 40s, you're feeling a little bit more, hangovers last a bit longer.
The conversations are a bit more deep and meaningful.
And I got married at 53, but basically after about 10 years of marriage with the drinking and all that, it wasn't something that I was doing every day.
It was just something that I was doing as now I see it as a coping mechanism.
And the...
I was trying to cope with different types of emotions from my partner and also within myself.
And it all stemmed from my childhood, which I hadn't really processed as an adult.
And so everything was sort of transpiring through the course of my adulthood.
And I just thought, this is the stuff that adults go through and she'll be right, the old Aussie way.
But...
But anyway, when it got to COVID, right?
You know, it was like 12 years married, two little young girls, children.
And yeah, the marriage just started falling apart more and more and more.
And my partner wanted to go on her own journey.
And she didn't leave because of the drinking.
She left because she wanted to follow her own pursuits.
And
when she did leave and take the children, we thought, you know, give us the space and do a trial.
That's when I hit the red wine hard and I hit it hard for two years.
knowing what I know about the mind and doing hypnotherapy and everything, I just decided that I didn't want to know anything.
I just wanted to hide away and I was just drinking and constantly just being a functional sort of alcoholic, to tell you the truth.
lot of shame, a lot of guilt.
And you know, when kids are involved, you just can't decide to just have your own life and not take responsibility.
Because those little eyes are always watching you and wondering what you're doing and how you're doing it.
you know, you're influencing your children.
So I have to start asking some really deep questions.
You know, is this what I want?
my lot to be like, is this how want life to be?
Yes, I've gone through a divorce.
Yes, I'm the black sheep of the Croatian family.
No one else has gotten divorced in my community.
I'm the first one, whatever.
So it was quite debilitating, right?
But the thing is, so many people get divorced and so many people go through trauma and hardship and they've come out the other end and they've been okay.
And I thought, well, you know, maybe I can do that as well.
So I just started looking inside, man.
I started looking at, you know, what have I got?
You know, I've got somewhere, I've got a space in my home where I can start, you know, thinking about.
escaping from this routine of drinking every day.
You know, I knew about the mind, I knew about the subconscious programming, I knew about conditioning from the past, I knew about releasing trauma and everything like that.
So I just got really accountable on the 31st of January 2023, which is not that long ago.
But that was the last time I had my ceremonial red wine.
and I didn't have one and I haven't had one since, right?
But basically, it was just a decision to go for 30 days.
And in Latin, decision means to cut away from.
And I just decided to cut away from my past identity and just try life again.
and be really highly accountable with like a lot of people in a group that I decided to be in, pay for the accountability.
When you pay, you pay attention.
And because I paid a few thousand, I really paid attention because it hurts to pay, especially when you're paying for alcohol and then you stop and it's like, I can do this.
No, I can't.
I tried so many times, Hamish, to give up on my own.
And I failed.
So I just went in, got coached, got accountability.
And after 30 days, I hadn't had a drink.
was like, wow, this is so amazing.
And I had people in the group saying, man, you you're doing really well.
Like your advice is pretty good.
Like, you know, what you're talking about the mind and stuff.
And it just got me thinking about, you know, maybe the obstacle is the way, you know.
and just maybe I know that I have to serve on this planet and serve people, but what vehicle would I use?
And through my trials and tribulations.
After 30 days, I just repeated it, Hamish.
I just did exactly the same thing for 30 days.
I did it for another 30 days.
So I paid, I got accountability and told everyone.
And then I did it for another 30 days.
So I did it for 90 days.
And I said, shit man, if I can do it for 90 days, I can do it for another 90 days.
And now it's 600 days later.
And I've turned it into a business helping other people trying to either drink less, reduce, take a break or quit altogether.
because moderation's really hard.
So yeah, but that's where I am at this moment.
Fantastic.
Well, well done you.
mean, making that decision and sticking to it, getting that accountability, that makes a difference, doesn't it?
Getting people to support you and yeah.
No, brilliant.
I was giving up on myself every single day But in the accountability pod that I was in other people were suffering I noticed that I wouldn't give up on them because they were
counting on me and I was counting on them and I was giving up on myself But I wouldn't give up on them and that's what sort of helped me to start believing in myself because I
started believing in other people and and where we come from
You know, we come from tribes, you know, we're not, we were nomads, but we were in tribes and in villages and everything.
And yeah, connecting is so important.
So, so important.
No, absolutely.
That's interesting because I watched a clip the other day, I can't remember who it was, but he was saying, there is no way you can give up for anybody else.
You've got to give up alcohol for yourself.
And I didn't.
I started doing it for other people.
And you have just said you were doing it to support other people.
I don't think it is something you can do by yourself, as in
It's very difficult to say, I'm going to give it up for me, especially when you've hit that rock bottom, because you don't like yourself.
But when, as you said, when you've got people you are collaborating with in a community with, you're supporting each other and suddenly that dynamic changes.
And that makes it easier, doesn't it?
Well, exactly.
and not every day is going to be not every day is going to be sunshine and roses, right?
You're to have like, really crappy days where you get triggered.
And like you're opening up the fridge and all you can see the soda water and lime.
So you got no choice but to drink that right, but you get triggered and then someone else is having a better day and you hear about that.
And then you have a better day, you know, and then they have a worse day and then
if you're just feeding off each other and just helping each other, but for sure, man, it's, you know, it's, it's, it's a most of this deal with alcohol.
It's an invisible game.
Like it's all about emotions and the mental side.
I truly believe yes, you got the physical addiction and you get the shapes, which I never had.
But more so it's, it's all that invisible in emotional.
side which we're not really taught.
You know, like they don't teach this stuff at schools and then as adults we're supposed to learn how to handle our emotions.
No wonder my children say dad I never want to grow up because I see what adults are like and my god they don't even got their shit together.
You know what I mean?
And they're adults Dad.
They went to school.
You've brought up so much stuff there.
want to go back to just the habitual drinking.
Why were you...
You said you weren't every day, but why were you drinking?
What was the reason for it?
What was it doing for you and against you?
It was the advantages of drinking was I could forget about, you know, the day and the stresses, right?
Because I was doing a job that I wasn't 100 % happy with.
And also, I've been looking at it now, and this is really hard to say, and I've never said it before.
But I really wasn't connected to my wife.
It takes two to tango when you separate with someone.
And I take just as much as responsibility for the separation as she does.
And I think that the drinking was just masking the debt connection that both of us yearned for, but didn't know how to really.
get to that place.
Like we've done a lot of inner work, but the connection wasn't there after the second child.
It really wasn't there.
She was going through a lot of emotional, she went through a midlife crisis at 35, right?
So, and I couldn't help it because I didn't know how to help her.
wasn't, I wasn't, wasn't there for her.
But I think I was using it to, and it was so normal, Hamish, in Australia, I mean,
You know, we've got amazing weather, especially where I am in Queensland.
It's optimal weather in the world, right?
Where 90, you know, like probably about 70 % of the time it's beautiful weather, right?
And so it's outside, it's barbecues, it's drinking, it's, you know, we're at the beach and it's just normal.
yeah, it was masking the emotional defects that I felt about myself because of my upbringing.
in Sydney and the emotional sort of blackmail that was going on.
And my dad being very staunch Croatian and there wasn't a much emotional outlet.
So everything had to be stayed inside and you were to be seen and not heard and the self -esteem wasn't there.
So I think it was that that stemmed into all aspects of my life, including my marriage.
but also, yeah, just wanting to numb out, man, numb out and not forget about the day.
And my wife and I would catch up maybe once or twice a week and have our red wines and party and all that.
But yeah, it was used as a lever to sort of just to zone out.
It works, but it really...
just makes your world smaller.
It stops you being so attentive, doesn't it?
It stops you being, as you said, so connected.
And you start to miss out on stuff.
You miss out on relationships and work and all sorts of things.
Yeah, I mean, your inhibitions, I was just gonna say your inhibitions drop.
As soon as you consume alcohol, your inhibitions drop and then you feel like you can open up and really express yourself.
But the thing is, why do you need alcohol to express yourself to someone that supposedly is the love of your life?
I mean, there's a, you so you're always wiser in hindsight, but that's what was happening.
So anyway.
Yeah.
And you mentioned a really interesting point as well.
You weren't happy in your job.
How does that affect one's self -esteem and, I guess, propensity to drink just to sort of, yeah.
Like, I don't know what it's like in England, right?
I've lived there, but I only visited half of the pubs in London.
There's only about 7 ,000, right?
Back in 30 years ago.
But in Australia, most people don't like what they do for a living.
They don't.
Like I don't, speak to a lot of people and they don't, they don't know what they do.
They can't wait for Wednesday, hump day.
And then Friday, it's like, yes, the weekend's coming.
And then Monday comes and they're moaning, you know, and most people are like that.
I guess, you know, with the not liking the job.
you just put up with it and you tolerate it.
And what drinking does is it helps you tolerate a life of mediocrity.
And for a long time, if you can have drinks and just dull down the senses, right?
The government loves that, but everywhere, it just numbs everything out.
Then you can put up with most things.
because you're not feeling life.
You're not, you're not being able to express yourself either.
But I wasn't on purpose.
Like, I think, especially men need to be directional in their life.
And they need to say, right, this is what I'm going for.
And that's what I'm doing.
And I really love to go for that.
And it's going to be a challenge and I'm going to go for it.
I'm in the Savannah.
I can see the gazelle.
I'm going to go hunt for that gazelle and bring it home.
And I didn't have that.
I was just
wandering and drifting.
Yep, I understand that.
it's, I see that and I see that regularly.
It's when we don't have that purpose, when we're not aligned to a purpose, as you said, mediocrity, it's the worst way of word out there, isn't it?
It is just bland and numbing.
yeah, so just wrap my head around this.
The job is boring, unpurposeful.
The drinking comes in and it just, as you said, it just settles everything down, makes the world smaller.
Looking forward to the weekend, not performing, mediocre, all that kind of, just from that drink, it makes it even worse.
Yeah.
And then, tell me about...
Sorry, carry on.
There's a bit of a delay, so I keep on talking over you.
No, I was gonna...
Okay.
I want to tap into shame because you've mentioned that and know shame is a huge thing when it comes to any alcohol when people are aware that it's not serving a purpose.
They're using it or it's using them.
shame and guilt were huge for me.
end
It was like, shame is such an inward emotion.
Like it's not projected out to other people.
It's hidden and it's more casting in on yourself.
And that's what it feels like.
And you know when you're shameful when you start hiding your drinking.
You know when it's shameful when you start thinking, God, I've gone to that bottle of shot.
twice in a row and then I'm going to that bottle shop and then there's that bottle shop.
I better do the rounds and go back to this bottle shop because he's seen me three days in a row and there's a bit of shame there and you know and then the guilt and the shame with
you know not being the dad that you thought that you should be and that people think that you are but you're actually not because you're not present with your children but
Shame is like, like I speak to a lot of people about their emotions.
And the reason they don't want to talk to me is because of the shame, because they're so shameful that and they think that they're the only ones that are going through that
emotion.
And most people that I know that drink have got some form of shame around their drinking, because it does start to escalate over time, especially if you're doing it for
you know, for emotional coping reasons, you know.
But the way I got out of shame was to bring it into the light.
And the way that I did that was I called it out, Hamish, I called it out.
And as soon as I called it out, and I told people that I was shameful about what I did, it went, it melted away.
It was hard to put it on social media, but I knew that I had to do it and let my friends know and let everyone know because...
I needed to clear it.
And it's so funny, you think as soon as you start talking to people about shame, you think you're going to get it from them, right?
But the opposite happened.
I just got love.
I just got support.
Because the connection about the shame, other people were feeling it too.
And they were connecting to the shame that I was talking about.
And it was beautiful, man.
daring to share it, daring to be vulnerable is so powerful, isn't it?
And as you said, other people can connect and even if they don't have that shame, they, they go, Hey, Ned, you've, yeah, you were acting like a pratt, but you've realized it and
you are very remorseful and you're sharing it.
And yeah, it is.
It is incredibly empowering, isn't it?
And that feeling of, you know, it's not going to kill me.
The shame is not going to kill me.
Yeah.
That's the thing.
Like it's just a thought.
Like the thoughts, the commentary in going through your mind, they're just coming and going.
They're like a cloud in the sky.
They're just going in and leaving, right?
And you think these thoughts are going to kill you, but they're not.
You think the shame.
I don't know if anyone's ever been diagnosed with shame, gone to the surgery and the doctor said, miss, sorry, he died from shame.
I've never heard of that, right?
But it's like it is like that.
Like, you know, but the thing is that once you do it and you call it out, it doesn't have any power over you.
And yeah, you got to feel a little bit of pain, but you got to feel that pain because it's like the butterfly leaving the cocoon and going into that metamorphosis from, you know,
from that grub, you know, and I was a grub to a beautiful butterfly, but he's got to go through that pain of going through the cocoon and it's going to be painful.
but that's what makes the wings puff up and blossom into a big span so you can, you know, you can fly, no?
And that's how I felt straight after it.
Like I felt like, wow, yeah, it was tough, but now it's good, man, it's good.
You've got to go through it.
Yeah.
And how do you support people to go through it?
Because obviously this is part of your process with working with people because as you said, they don't want to talk about it because they think it's going to eat them.
So how do you encourage people or encourage them to see the futility of shame?
The reason they have shame is because they have a polarized perception of what's going on.
And what I mean by that is that they have a view of life that is one sided and shame is just one sided.
So for example, Hamish, if they can think of a person that and they think shame and they think, my God, I'm so shameful for what I did to that person or what I said to that person
when I was under influence.
You've got to look at both sides and say, well, yeah, you were shameful, right?
and you feel shameful around that situation and what occurred.
But like, what are the benefits of that?
What are the benefits of you feeling the shame at that point?
And you're like, what do you mean benefits?
It's shame.
There's no benefits.
Look again, what are the benefits?
What do you mean?
I was really shameful to that person and everything like that.
I'll go look again, what are the benefits?
And they go, well, it sort of woke me up a little bit.
And
It sort of made me realize that, shit, maybe I'm not as smart as what I thought I was.
And then what happens, Hamish, is I start to realize that...
the shame was giving him a blessing in disguise.
And then they start to balance the equation on the shame.
And it's not just all negative.
There's some other stuff over here that they start to come to fruition.
It starts to really give them a light bulb moment.
And once they balance that shame, that's when they can start to let it go.
And that's how I do it.
I do it through a process, through timeline therapy.
which is all about disassociating the subject or the client from the event so they can get the positive lessons that the negative lessons have been holding them back in their
nervous system.
I'm jumping ahead a bit here, but it's all about balancing the perception of what's going on with that emotion.
And once we balance shame, guess what happens?
They start laughing at me.
They start going, holy Toledo, this was holding me back?
I'm getting goosebumps man.
Just talking about it.
it?
Like so many things, more and more I'm realizing that the simplest things in life are the hardest.
And yet the lessons you can get from it, from that awareness, from, as you said, realizing that you were being horrible to somebody, you shame yourself for it, and then you go,
well, I've learned not to do it again.
Yeah, and 100 % Yeah, it's just, and the thing is that like, you can guide a person to do it, but at the end of the day, they're talking themselves into it.
Because we're programming ourselves all the time.
When we're drinking, we're basically conditioning ourselves where it's self hypnosis when you're drinking, because you're thinking about certain things and you're drinking, and
you're under the influence.
And then you just like just having these thoughts.
60 ,000 a day, right?
And if they're all the same, that's the sort of programming we're giving us.
So when you go the other way and you say, what are the benefits?
And they start looking at that and they start telling themselves these things about the benefits.
And they have these aha moments.
just, they...
programming, the programming themselves, you know, and they hypnotizing themselves to see the other side, because everything has two sides, you know, sunrises, sunsets, ups and
downs and ins and outs.
And, you know, everything a tree grows up, but it also grows down, you don't get any part of life, it has two sides.
So it's just showing them that there's another side to this.
Have a look.
What's going on?
and then they figure it out for themselves and it's beautiful because they're doing it you know you're just being the Sherpa on the mountain climbing with them you know and it's
beautiful and that's what I had to do for myself so yeah
That is the magic, isn't it?
You've worked out a way that worked for you and just like, hey, let's try this.
I love the Sherpa on the mountain.
I'd say you've got a torch and just shining it by their feet and say, that rock, mind that rock.
Just the same thing, guiding them along and not coaching.
You're empowering.
You're not saying, thou shalt not drink.
You're allowing them to reprogram.
yeah, my coaching program, like, goes for 10 weeks.
But 99 % of it, we don't even talk about the alcohol.
They go, is this an alcohol program?
I go, yeah.
And I go, you know that it's ethanol, you know, that it breaks the blood brain barrier, you know, that it uses blood as the carrier and enters your brain, you know, that it, you
know, diminishes the receptors.
and degrades them.
You know all that.
Why do I have to talk to them about that?
Let's empower them.
Just let's open the door and let them walk through it.
And that's where the real work is.
We can talk about the top of the iceberg, which is all the conscious work.
But when you start getting into the deep stuff, the subconscious work and you know, with the programs, you slide in the habits and everything and start empowering them, then they
start to believe in themselves.
So rather than giving them a fish, we're teaching them like,
How to fish, you know?
You're allowing them to unshame themselves.
You're not doing anything for them, just holding that light.
Yeah.
I think that is so incredibly important because I think that's about 80 % of the battle.
When you've understood that shame, realize you were doing the best that you could, realizing that it was just a pattern you were following and now you don't have to do it.
You're not going out and saying, all right, how much shame am I going to be tonight?
Let's see it.
Let's be really shameful tonight.
You're not intentionally going out and wanting to be shameful, right?
There's no intention there, but it happens.
It happens.
And it happens for a reason.
We just got to find the other reason, you know?
And once you can be, show people the other reasons for it, it's like, you know, most people are good people, you know?
and alcohol just gets in the way and you know, people don't grow up when they're 12 and I see my daughters playing and one of them wants to be an artist, the other one wants to be
an actress.
You know, they're not, they're going, I really want to be an alcoholic when I grow up or I really want to be good at shame when I grow up or I really want to have a lot of guilt
when I grow up.
No, it just, they don't.
No one grows up wanting to be like that.
but it happens when, because alcohol gets such a grip on you and because the emotional intelligence of most people isn't high, because no credence is placed on it in schools,
they find it hard, you know, so it's just unlocking that for them, if you can, you know, so, yeah.
Yeah, I think so.
I want to go forward.
So you, you were drinking for all those reasons just to isolate, get rid of, hide.
How did you start to make sense of leaving that behind?
But why were you unable to get any further than so far and then you went back?
So whether before moderating, was just you were in that place of I want to, but
Tell me about that state when it's trying to get out of it and not getting anywhere.
Yeah, like I was just sort of pretending that everything was okay.
And if you were to look at my life from the moon, you could see that I was basically going from work to home, work to home, work to home, work to home, not socializing, not doing
anything, right?
Via the bottle shop, of course.
right backwards and forwards backwards and forwards and you you sell yourself and the idea that you know this is okay I'm going through some stuff everyone goes through some stuff
and you know you tell yourself you know it's okay and then in the morning you wake up and you go well I'm not gonna have a drink today because you know I had like a bottle of red
and that's that's a lot and I don't want to do that
every single night and then know five o 'clock comes around and you you you know you're doing it again and it was getting really to the point where it was getting really
frustrating and and you just you start to i started knocking myself around like with the soft talk that was coming in it was being very you know it was very disheartening of the
way that i was talking to myself and
Yeah, and it's just, I just feel for people because I was stopping and starting and really trying not to continue drinking, but I just couldn't, I couldn't break away from the
clutches because I didn't have a big enough reason to do it.
I hadn't figured out my big why of why I really wanted to do it.
I knew, I just knew that I needed to do it, but I couldn't figure out what the reason was.
And because I didn't have a big purpose or a big why or a big direction of where my life was going.
And I was just in a holding pattern, setting goals, but never nothing was coming to fruition.
I was just, I was just stuck and I was really was, I was stuck for a couple of years, like really bad.
And I think when it happens, it's like water torture.
You can only take so much, but
But the reason, I think the reason I was stuck Hamish was because of, just didn't, I was trying it to, I was doing it in secret, trying to do it on my own and I kept failing, you
know?
And that was that period of that time.
That was really hard.
It's a horrible place to be in, isn't it?
Because it's self -defeating.
You're doing it by yourself, beating yourself up, damn it, shame, not gonna drink, fucked up again, I've drunk again, and round and round and round it goes.
And as you said, it's very difficult to do it by yourself.
You need that support.
You need to be heard.
And I think absolutely you need to have a reason for it, a really, really good reason.
that is more important than the shame, more important than the fears.
Because all those demons aren't going to kill you either.
No one's been killed by the demon of alcohol.
Yeah, I mean, the advantages of me leaving that identity life of that drinker, that secret drinker.
I had more advantages of staying where I was than advantages of leaving that and going alcohol free.
And I hadn't figured that out.
There was a gap there.
But the minute I figured that out of
the advantages of leaving and going alcohol free and stacking those reasons why.
And when that stack started to get higher than the stack of the advantages of staying, that's when the pivot occurred for me.
But I didn't have enough of the stacking.
But when I did...
because I kept asking because I'm a big journal, right?
I like to write things down all the time.
I'm always writing stuff down because when you write stuff down, you're getting it out of your head.
You can look at what you're writing at different angles and say, what about this and what about that?
And for anyone that does doesn't journal, like if you really want to store what's going on with your life, start writing stuff down because that helped immensely.
And that helped me stack the reasons why going alcohol free just for 30 days
What were the advantages?
You know, I had 300 advantages to 30 advantages to staying where I was.
So that was starting to sell me on the idea to escape.
See, that's, that I think is one of the remarkable things, because people can give up smoking like that when they do that kind of thing.
You can do that with the drinking.
The problem with the drinking and the cigarettes is it's a habit.
And obviously your brain craves that dopamine and all those chemicals from the drinking.
And of course we remember that on the crappy times, alcohol works.
It just numbs.
So it's...
You can get the brain there, the physiology, physiological effects take a bit longer, don't they?
And the habit breaking takes a bit longer.
Yeah, I mean, I just read a book, talk called No Willpower Required and in that there's a study, they're saying it takes now 66 days to break your habit, you know what I mean?
And to establish it.
know, Maltz in the 50s, he was a plastic surgeon.
And he was saying that when the plastic surgeon with surgery was done,
people would take a new identity from their plastic surgery and it took them about 21 days to form that new identity from the plastic surgery that was done.
And that's where this 21 day business came from.
yeah, physiology, physically for me, you know, because I was processing red wine at three o 'clock in the morning every single day and I was waking up and going to the toilet every
single day.
But after like 20 days,
I started to sleep all the way through and I started to, and sleep is a major thing, right, for drinkers because the liver doesn't get a chance to rest, unfortunately.
So you're always processing the poison.
But yeah, after 20 days, yeah, physically that was all sort of like the skin was getting better.
Like I took a photo of myself after 30 days, like before when I started and then after and holy Toledo, Hamish, the inflammation was so much further down.
just that picture in itself, taking pictures of myself progressively was a real big catalyst for me transforming as well, because you could see.
the change, you know, and that was incredible, for sure.
So yeah, but yeah, it does, it does take time.
But, you know, 10, 15 days, man, that's not long for having the inflammation to go down.
And if you can do 10, 15 days and start getting really good sleep, it's setting you up for success, you know.
Isn't it?
Yeah.
I like that thinking about the photograph.
remember I was in rehab for six weeks.
So, you know, obviously no access to alcohol.
When I left, I just kept away from it.
But I remember being in the new place I was staying and I felt my I don't remember looking at my skin and seeing it, but I remember I felt raw, but beautifully soft, like I'd taken
every mask off every single scab and stuff had been peeled off.
thinking back of
pictures.
I had one a couple of weeks before I went into rehab, he said puffy, red, dead eyes.
And then a few weeks later, you know, there's, there's some light in there.
And you can spot it.
I like that you can spot it in the photographs.
And that's a really effective way of reminding yourself you're on that right path, isn't it?
Yeah, 100%.
Like it's like, like the other thing is that other people start to spot it.
You know what I mean?
And and one of the coaches was saying to me goes, guess what, Ned, like, you know, the one of the one of the one of the side effects of not drinking is that you might actually
become better looking.
You know what I mean?
That's what he was saying.
It's like you might actually, you know, start to chisel out a little bit.
you know, lose weight and, and lose the inflammation and not eat so much crappy food and, you know, and so many benefits, you know, and you start to stack all these benefits and
people starting to notice and, the other thing is that you're telling yourself that you're going to do something and you're following through.
your mental state's starting to sort of benefit from that as well, you know, but yeah, it's just.
People just try, you just gotta trust yourself and just give yourself so many reasons why it's important to do it and just go for it and don't hold back because life is short.
So Ned, I want to go back to identity because you've said identity without alcohol and identity with alcohol.
What
What makes that difference to you?
What do you see as the two different identities?
And how did you reframe that second identity as the alcohol -free?
well, identity is tied to, like identity is one of the most powerful forces in the universe.
And identity is tied to your beliefs.
And the word belief has another word inside of it, which is spelled L I E and every belief is a lie until you see for what it is.
and see the truth.
And most beliefs that we've been giving when we were young are not even our own.
And so we're living this life of beliefs, which is our identity, which has been passed down from our lineage and from past generations.
And it's a beautiful thing if it's passed down by someone that had all this stuff going on and they were all good and all kosher and all happening, right?
But most people didn't have people that were 100%, you know, having those lives.
Most people were growing up and they were being grown up with parents and you know, with their schooling system or you know, with their, you know, if they're in Catholic schools,
their nuns and priests and all that.
And everyone had stuff going on and you were just given all these belief systems.
and that ended up shaping your identity of who you are, i .e.
money doesn't grow on trees or money's the root of all evil and you're identifying a rich person as someone that is a crook and why would I want to be like them and all these
identities that you gained, which were belief systems from the past.
And I had that identity like...
You know, my father was a drinker since he was sticks in Croatia when Tito flattened Yugoslavia.
That's all they had to drink.
And so that's all he knew.
And so he's having me when I'm 12 crushing grapes in the bathtub to make wine.
And it was all this identity around alcohol and everything like that and hard men drink and hard men party and hard men, you know, you know.
if they don't drink, then they're wusses.
And this identity was passed on to me, All these beliefs.
So I had to break through all of that and the journaling and everything wrote that I was writing.
I had to question all my beliefs.
So the way that I did it is you write down all your beliefs of what you believe, right?
You write them all down.
And when you start looking at these beliefs, you go, where did this belief come from about money?
I love money, but money's hard to get.
Why?
Because I didn't give it much respect, right?
So you start, when you start to question things and not just big, big spoons bed, then you start to question these beliefs.
Then you can start to break down these beliefs and start forming the beliefs that you feel to be true.
And you know they're true when they give you a tingle on your arm, where you can feel it at a visceral level within your body.
Yeah, this is true.
This is true.
And so that's how the identity shift happened for me was disbanding on the belief system that was spoon fed to me and me deciding what was really, you know, what was really true.
And that's how the transition occurred.
And it is, it's like they're all lies until you, until, I'm not saying that, everything's been given to us alive.
But as soon as you start looking at it and questioning it, because we don't question stuff, right?
When we're drinking, we just drink.
Yeah, yeah, right.
You start questioning your life and questioning things, you know?
then that's when it starts to calm and you're Holy Toledo.
That's not true.
So anyway, yeah.
Yeah.
And some of them are a lot of those ones your parents passed down are be be kind be this be that but not the work hard for money money is the sin money money.
Religion this that and the other it's just pick what what resonates as you said what it feels like when it feels like that feels good.
Yeah, own it.
That's the thing Hamish, I'm sure you're like this right, but how much better do you know yourself now?
completely, completely, 100 % better.
Yeah.
What's important?
What matters?
What I don't stand for?
Boundaries.
All these things have come up from looking at those beliefs and going, yep, no, no, no, definitely no.
Yep.
And then querying them now, you know, some of the new ones I've got still I change as better stuff turns up.
Yeah.
Yeah, cool,
Yep.
So true.
Okay.
So what happens when you are two weeks, three weeks, four weeks, six weeks, 20 years in, and then, you know, the shit really hits the pan.
Something drastic happens.
You know, the, that memory of how it works.
How do you cope with not falling back into that relapse or complacency?
Because they're easy places to go if you're not.
being a little bit vigilant.
How do you have to live with that?
Because you have to live differently, don't you, when you're sober?
Yeah, I think like when you are drinking, you're conditioning yourself to respond a certain way.
And when you're not drinking, you're doing the same.
You're conditioning yourself to respond.
And it's not what happens to you.
It's your perception of what happens to you.
And what happens is that our beer goggles or wine goggles get removed and our perception changes to another reality.
And so when anything happens in your life,
that is heavy or adverse, right?
I always remember like how I used to feel when I used to drink and I know now at a visceral level how I feel all the time and it's completely 180 degrees different and that
feeling that I've got and I think most people chase a feeling in life, right?
That's irrespectible, regardless of all the external circumstances that happened in my life.
But I just anchor myself to my core essence, to my true self of who I am.
And when you're drinking, you don't know who you are.
And I didn't know who I was, Hamish.
But now being clean and being clear and having clarity, I know who I am.
And if something happens in my life,
I don't need to go to some substance to make it all better.
I make it better myself by being myself and feeling that sadness.
If it's some incident like today, my grandmother died, right?
And it's hard, right?
But she would want me to talk to people and spread my message.
because that's what she taught me.
And she was 95.
So it's like, I didn't think, I'll have a drink for her and everything like that tonight.
I was just saying, no, I'm gonna catch up.
I'm gonna chat to Hamish and we're gonna talk about something that's really important and spread this message around the globe because people need to hear it.
And...
That's where I come from with all of this now.
I just go back to my values and my purpose.
If I know what's really valuable to me and my top three or four values, which I know what they are, and everyone should know what their values are, if I'm running in my life with
my values and my hierarchy is all set and it's all good, right?
Then whatever happens is fine.
I just go back to my values of what's important, you know, and I know.
Like I said, the feeling and how I feel is very important to me, my clarity, me grounding myself and knowing that, you know, there's people reliant on me.
And so I need to, you know, you know, make sure that I'm there for them and all that.
And alcohol is just, you know, it's not even in the equation anymore.
You know, because...
If you're going through a really bad situation, you want to be making really good decisions.
After all, stuff going to be doing any favors in that.
Absolutely.
I think that is so true.
And I'm sorry about your grandmother.
So thank you for turning up to do this as well.
And I think you've nailed several things there.
Was your previous job, when you were working, was that really lined with purpose and value and what was important to you?
I did mechanical engineering.
And I was like an architect, was an engineering draftsman, right?
And I did it because the family like really wanted me to do something like that, because that's sort of where they wanted me to go, you know, and I just did it.
because they didn't know what I wanted.
I didn't really have a mentor and everything like that.
But yeah, it wasn't like, and I'm more of a people person.
And when I say values, it's like, you know, like, I like to, you know, have, I like to communicate and connect with people rather than just, you know, working on, you know, a
drawing in detail.
and just working in isolation, like to have people around me and working with people and connecting with people.
I'm a very funny guy.
This is a heavy subject, but I'm a very humorous, funny guy.
And so I use a lot of humor in my therapy sessions and stuff like that.
And I like to be a bit...
out there and a bit charismatic at times and everything to get things across, get people moving and shifting in the right direction.
So yeah, but the job that I had, which I did for 25 years, you know, it was great.
got me, you know, it got me, you know, to have beautiful experiences, but it wasn't really my calling, if you know what I mean.
And that's the thing that alcohol did give me.
It gave me a calling.
I went through that.
came out the other side and it gave me a calling.
So, beautiful.
I've, I've met that time and time again, it is it's, we do stuff for a while we work, we play with whatever and then that level of dissatisfaction comes in.
It's not necessarily authenticity, a lack of authenticity.
It's just not aligned.
It's no longer your purpose, your drive.
Yeah,
if you can figure out what does life demonstrate to you right now?
What do you love having close to your home?
What do you think about?
What do you listen to?
What do you like to
you know, talk to your friends about, you know, and everything.
If you can figure all that out, it's gonna, life's gonna demonstrate to you that there are certain things that really make your heart sing.
If you've got your heart singing because you're in love with, you know, you're in line with your values, you don't have to drink to fill any void because the values is filling
that up naturally.
And that's what I really realized, you know, as well, you know, that you've got to do something that really makes your heart sing.
And that's it's so important for everyone everyone, you know, whether it be a hobby or their vocation or whatever it is or taking care of children or whatever it is You just
want to do it and do it as much as possible, know, and and the alcohol is secondary It doesn't even mean anything
Yep.
Absolutely.
think that's key, isn't it?
Find your bliss, find your joy, find what is important.
That doesn't mean you can't have a busy hectic job.
It's getting that in harmony, but it's just being authentic, being what's really and accountable.
And I guess ultimately you're taking responsibility for your life, aren't you, rather than giving it away to other people or other things like the alcohol.
Yeah, I mean, 100%, 100%.
Like we got this one life, this one beautiful life.
And, you know, like I talked to so many people and about this subject and, you know, people think they're going to be around forever the way that they talk to me, you know,
and, it's like, it's not like that.
And it's a, it can be a simply soap.
So get on with it.
Let's get on with it and let's have experiences and
feel all the emotions that we've been given.
Feel the anger, feel the sadness, feel the hurt, feel the guilt, feel the shame, but also feel the joy and the gratitude and the love and everything else, you know?
And you can only do that if you're not numbed out.
You know, so definitely.
But I think values for me, like that was the stacking was huge, know, deciding I'm gonna help people with this because this...
this, I reckon I can do this.
I can help people.
And when they're talking to me about experiences and they've gone through it, or they're going through it, and I've been through it, it's like, yeah, okay, let's just let's see if
we can work something out for you.
So and everyone's got a talent, everyone's got, you know, something that they can offer to the world.
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, I think this has been fabulous.
Tell me, how can people find out more about what you do?
You've explained why you do it, but how can they find out, find Ned, understand what you do and connect with you because anyone who is struggling with alcohol needs to be heard.
And, you know, this is what you do.
You help people make sense of it.
So how can we find out more about you?
Like Ned Miro, N -E -D M-I -R -O, you can find me on TikTok and also on Instagram.
You can find me in a group that I have called the Drinkless Revolution Hub, which is a Facebook group.
And they're all my socials.
And...
Yeah, so they can find me there primarily.
And that's where I do most of my videoing and posting about the subject and letting people know about it.
Yeah, and I do work all over the world.
And a 10 week program that I put people through is basically removing those negative emotions and limiting beliefs.
I truly believe, Haymish, that
Most people that drink have got some significant emotional events that have occurred in their life.
And if the trauma isn't removed from their nervous system and not processed correctly, then it's gonna be really hard for them to, you know, to remove alcohol, you know?
It can be done, but it makes it so much easier if they can clear their limiting beliefs and negative emotions.
And that's the work that I do.
And then once the onion is peeled, we pack it.
with what really rings true for them with their values and goal activation and their roadmap and everything like that.
But yeah, Ned Mero, if you just look that up on socials or just Google it, you'll find some stuff.
A few hundred videos.
Brilliant.
Well, we'll put that all in the show notes.
And I think what you do is, it is remarkable.
is aligned with how I like to think, how I do things as well, because it is about interrupting, being curious, getting rid of that shame.
And as you said, looking at what went wrong, what was taken on board as a child, as a young adult, whenever.
And realizing, you know, it's in the past.
It doesn't have to affect you.
100%, like so true, Yeah, but I'll just finished writing a book called Kick the Drinking Habit.
And I'll put that in there as well.
I'll give it to your guys, your listeners as well as a gift as well.
And that talks a lot about what we discussed tonight and the things that I feel need to be incorporated when
attempting to change your identity to a non -drinker.
So I'll include that in there as well, Hamish.
But yeah, 100%, you know, we just gotta deal with our stuff and bring it to light so you can shine.
So yeah.
Cool, Ned, well, thank you so much for everything.
I want to ask you one last question.
What is the superpower that you've got from giving up drinking?
just wanna.
I just want to be an example of you being able to just to be yourself and just living your life the way you want to live it and just making sure that you're living a good life with
heaps of experiences, with loved ones.
doing good work, whatever that work is.
But I guess my superpower is just being me, being my authentic self, you know, the blood, sweat and the tears and just, I don't, my superpower is I don't really care what people
think anymore.
just, I just give, give love and give of myself and empty myself out every day.
And then when I sleep at night, I sleep like a baby.
So it's just.
Just that, being authentic and just being real, you know, because it's, you know, I was fake for so long.
So yeah, being real, man.
Yep, I think that is super important when you're being real.
Yeah, you are a shining example to everybody.
That is spectacular.
Yeah, and it doesn't take long.
Like, you know, you know yourself, Hamish, can only, it can turn in a blink and maybe your life takes a while to change, but the direction of you facing from one direction to the
other direction, that can happen in an instant.
And that's all it takes.
Yeah.
Brilliant.
Ned, thank you so much for stories and wisdom and that lovely piece about identity.
think that was really super.
Really appreciate your time today.
Thank you.
That's cool man.
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