SUMMARY KEYWORDS

drinking, alcohol, purpose, sobriety, not this, pivot, career, find, meaning, quitting drinking, quit drinking, beliefs, dreams, mindset, alignment, values, security, convenience, generosity, abundantly, give, emotions, household, wife, husband, spouse, kids, marriage, married, sober, sober curious, AA, alcoholic, Dry January, take a break from alcohol, sober coaching, life coaching, break the cycle, conversations, personality, character, morality, health, navigate, align, shifting, focus, accountability, financial freedom, freedom, time, money, energy, happier, loving yourself, self-love, taking care of yourself, deep sleep, joy, grateful, enjoy, pride, removing alcohol, alcohol-free, journey

SPEAKERS: Casey McGuire Davidson + Karolina Rzadkowolska

00:02

Welcome to the Hello Someday Podcast, the podcast for busy women who are ready to drink less and live more. I’m Casey McGuire Davidson, ex-red wine girl turned life coach helping women create lives they love without alcohol. But it wasn’t that long ago that I was anxious, overwhelmed, and drinking a bottle of wine and night to unwind. I thought that wine was the glue, holding my life together, helping me cope with my kids, my stressful job and my busy life. I didn’t realize that my love affair with drinking was making me more anxious and less able to manage my responsibilities.

In this podcast, my goal is to teach you the tried and true secrets of creating and living a life you don’t want to escape from.

Each week, I’ll bring you tools, lessons and conversations to help you drink less and live more. I’ll teach you how to navigate our drinking obsessed culture without a bus, how to sit with your emotions, when you’re lonely or angry, frustrated or overwhelmed, how to self soothe without a drink, and how to turn the decision to stop drinking from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life.

I am so glad you’re here. Now let’s get started.

Hey friends, it’s Casey and I am so excited to share today’s conversation with you because it’s a little bit different than usual. Instead of me interviewing a guest, this episode is a true collaboration.

I sat down with my friend, Karolina, an Alcohol-Free Empowerment Coach, bestselling author of Euphoric: Ditch The Alcohol and Gain A Happier, More Confident You and the host of the Euphoric AF podcast.

 

[00:02:00]

If her name sounds familiar, you might remember Karolina from episode 267 where we talked about 10 sobriety myths that are flat out lies and what’s actually true. If you want to listen to that one, just go to hellosomedaycoaching.com/267. The episode was such a hit. I knew I had to have her back on for another conversation this time on a topic.

 

Both of us love how sobriety cracks you open and helps you find your purpose, pivot your career, and go after long lost dreams. Because here’s the truth, quitting drinking is just the beginning. It’s the foundation that gives you clarity and confidence and courage, and once alcohol is out of the way, you can start to hear that inner voice.

 

Maybe it’s about your job or your routines, or even parts of your life that looked fine on the outside, but didn’t feel good on the inside. In this episode, Karolina and I swapped stories about our own moments, the pivots we made after quitting drinking like me leaving corporate America and starting my coaching and this podcast and her building a business and writing a book.

 

[00:03:00]

So, if you’ve ever thought, okay, I quit drinking. Now what this conversation is for you, I’m hoping you’re going to walk away with inspiration and practical ideas for building a life that feels aligned, meaningful, and so much bigger than what you imagined when alcohol was still in the picture. Let’s jump in.

 

Casey, I’m so excited to have this conversation with you today. How are you?

I’m good, I’m good. I’m excited to have this one too. I know it’s something we both love talking about.

Well, I know it’s like a shared episode we’re going to be sharing with both of our audiences. So, would you mind introducing yourself real quick , and then I’ll go next.

[00:04:00]

Oh, perfect. Yeah, absolutely. My name’s Casey McGuire Davidson. I quit drinking almost 10 years ago. I’m a Life and Sobriety Coach. I primarily work with high achieving working women. A lot of them are moms who are basically, you know, doing all the things and then coming home and sort of drinking a bottle of wine to forget about all the things. And I help women change that through a habit change approach and work with them on building from day one to day 100 to six months and beyond. I also host a podcast, the Hello Someday podcast for Sober Curious Women.

Amazing. I love it. Well, and I’m Karolina Rzadkowolska. For anyone who might not know me, I’m an Alcohol-Free Empowerment Coach as well. I’ve been in this business 7 years and almost 8 years alcohol-free, and as I have been helping so many women go alcohol-free as well.

I’ve just recognized how much that missing piece often is that we search for a drink, is that sense of fulfillment and purpose. And so, as my Business has evolved, we’ve really started looking at how to help people transition and change their careers and really find more sense of meaning and launch businesses that are more meaningful to them.

 

[00:05:00]

And so, I call it, you know, the powerful place where women ditch drinking and unleash their entrepreneurial fire. And so, that’s kind of how my brand has morphed over the years as well. And it’s so cool to watch and see like that next chapter that evolves as people go alcohol free because it really is the alcohol-free part.

 

It’s like the beginning to the most fulfilling life you could possibly imagine. I’m curious, Casey, if you wanted to start kind of sharing your story of like how that opened up for you, the process of like reevaluating things in your life, how you knew you wanted to start something maybe new or you know, like I would love to just go back in time.

Yeah, I mean, I love this question ’cause I see this happen with so many women I coach as well. When I was drinking, I had a big corporate job at a Fortune 500 company. I had 2 little kids, they were 8 and 2 years old. I was married so I was barely getting through the day. I was super busy running out of work at 6:00 PM sometimes wondering if I had, quote unquote, like, “enough wine” at home because I kept trying to stop and then going four days and then being like, screw it.

[00:06:00]

Today, it was tough. I need to pick up a bottle. Can I do it before daycare pickup? Coming home, opening the bottle, doing like bedtime, homework, bathtime, all the things, and then sitting down on my couch and either opening up email. With my glass of wine next to me or trying to check out with TV or whatever it is.

Same thing. So, that was the groundhog day that I was moving through. A lot of times I had those 3:00 AM wake up every morning I would wake up and kind of gauge how I felt, to know how bad the day ahead of me was going to be, how difficult it was going to be, and then start it all over again.

Get the kids ready, get them to daycare, go to my meetings and do it all again. So at some point, and we can talk about this, like I decided that I just could not do that to myself. I was anxious, I was exhausted. I sort of felt doomed.

[00:07:00]

I kept failing and I was wondering like, if I can do all these things in my life, why can I not stop drinking?

 

So, I ended up hiring a Sober Coach. I joined online groups and I built up those like 30 days, 60 days, 100 days, alcohol-free that were so difficult. And what I found is. As I got more sober time under my belt, I had the same job. I had the same boss, I had the same kids and husband, and yet I felt so much more confident and clear and happy, and I had so much more space in my life.

 

And what I see with a lot of women is once they get the alcohol piece out of their life, suddenly they look around and they’re like. Do I want this anymore? Because as part of stopping drinking, you have to set up better boundaries. You have to prioritize yourself, and you have to take better care of yourself.

 

[00:08:00]

And what I find is so many of us realize that when we are drinking, we are settling for so little. We are tolerating things we don’t need to tolerate anymore. I personally didn’t love my job. I’ve been in corporate for 20 years, and the pace of it, the daily targets, the how can we increase revenue but decrease, you know, expenses and increase our profits and the business travel.

I just didn’t love it and I was anxious about it. And it was only once I stopped drinking that I was able to feel less trapped and also be like, what is it I want to do? What is aligned with me? So, a couple years in, I ended up going back to coaching school on nights and weekends, which was hysterical because I could barely get through the day when I was drinking. And yet I had the same job, the same husband, the same kids.

 

[00:09:00]

Could take on starting this entirely new career while working full-time and did that and suddenly, you know, then created my website, created my brand, started working with clients, and 2 years later, left my corporate job and started my own business.

 

Yeah. Oh my gosh. It’s so cool. That origin story. I love it. Yeah, it was a process and it, when you look back, it’s, it’s amazing how trapped you feel. So I was sad and anxious when I was drinking, despite everything looking really good on the outside. And I find that for so many women that is the case.

Once you get rid of the alcohol, you realize that you were moving, like trying to run a marathon with a ball and chain tied to your ankle. And once you get rid of. You can do anything because if you can hold down a big job and have a family and do all that stuff while being hung over every day and losing hours every night, it’s incredible what you can achieve once you get rid of that.

[00:10:00]

Yeah. Yeah. Mine was similar, but I would describe it in this way where I drink a lot when I was in my college days, also Grad School, so up until like 24, I’m like no responsibility, just drinking way too much. But as I got older, about my mid-twenties, later twenties, like I settled down. I got the, you know, marriage, I got the career, I got the house, all those kinds of things.

 

And part of me was trying to evolve past this like party girl that I used to be. And so, my quest was always to say, how can I make drinking more adult? How can I be more sophisticated about it? And so it was this always this illusion to me of like, how can I turn this into a sex in the city episode instead of like, you know, a real world episode and stuff like that.

And so, what happened is that Monday through Thursday, I would live a really healthier lifestyle. I would drink green juices, I’d go to yoga classes. You know, I have to wake up early for work. So I didn’t really like to drink as much during the week. But then every weekend I overdrink. Every single weekend and those Monday mornings are the same thing that you just talked about.

[00:11:00]

Like I felt horrible. I was so unenthusiastic about the week, the Sunday Blues, the Monday drama, you know what I mean? And it’s so funny ’cause like half the week I’m like, Ugh, I don’t want to drink again. Like, you know, I just need to. Sleep a little bit more. I just need to like rest from this. And by Thursday and Friday, I totally forgot about that feeling and I just wanted to reward myself for getting through the week and start the whole cycle all over again.

And I lived this kind of like detox to retox lifestyle for so many years. Being consciously aware that I didn’t like it. You know, I think there’s a phase in our drinking where we don’t really, we, we shove it so much under a rug that we don’t even consciously realize that there’s a love hate part of it to it.

We just think it’s love. But I probably spent about 7 years being very conscious about that, about the hate part, which was very interesting. So, I would call that my sober curious phase, but I think like the labels. The, you know, idea that what are you supposed to do, go to AA and be an alcoholic for the rest of your life.

 

Just not having a path forward was so confusing to me.

[00:12:00]

And I just had this rule in my mind that all adults drink that that’s what made you normal. That’s what made you fit in all those kinds of things. And it wasn’t until I heard about Dry January that I just kind of got that light bulb moment of like, oh, I could just take a break from alcohol.

 

I never even considered that before and really got the permission, I think, from society to be able to do it.

And you know, my first month in, it wasn’t easy necessarily, but like waking up with pride, waking up, loving yourself, waking up with absolutely no regret from the night before feels freaking amazing.

And so, I slowly started to fall in love with all facets of it – the deep sleep, the pride, even like the joy and wonder. I started noticing as I was alcohol-free, you know, like. I was, I was enjoying even things like clouds and treats, more like things who had more wonder and more appreciation in the world.

 

And then ,February comes around, I don’t even think I’m allowed to keep going. Like it’s just this rule, you know, like a normal adult has to drink, so you have to go back to it. Karolina and I drink a few times in February and it was.

[00:13:00]

Such a let-down, like even just one or two drinks. I noticed my mood would crash and tank and I’d get frustrated and impatient and I was like, wait a minute.

I thought I was drinking ’cause it made things fun. I thought I was making things happier, like this is not what I thought it was. And around that time I decided to take another break. But this time do what you did as well as really go into the mindset, really go into my subconscious and be like, why? Do I value drinking in the first place? Why do I associate all these benefits with it?

And I also did programs and online groups and completely changed my thinking about it. But that’s when the brilliance, I think, came out. I got so much more confident on my alcohol-free journey. Like even, you know, 3 weeks without alcohol, 6 months without alcohol.

 

Like you’re just stacking and stacking and being like, who is this person? She’s like, superwoman, I’ve never met anyone like this before. You know, you just get so proud of yourself. And I think that confidence started stacking and the courage started stacking too, because going alcohol-free in a world that necessitates.

That you drink takes a lot of courage in the first place. Even ordering a mocktail at a bar takes courage, you know?

[00:14:00]

And I think from that courage and confidence, I started really mining about what I really wanted to do next. And I always had these dreams about being an Entrepreneur and working for myself, but I always shut them down before as a drinker.

I wasn’t smart enough. I wasn’t capable. That was for other people. You know, I was working in the university sector and so, in my, like job, the type of people who were Entrepreneurs were men from the Silicon Valley that had all the charisma in the world to schmooze like capital ventures. You know, I never thought of myself as an Entrepreneur.

That going alcohol-free unlocks something for me because I never thought I could do that. And so, once I did that, I was like, wait, why not me? Right. And I think I started like really reflecting on this more existential question in my life because alcohol had really been this reward to an unfulfilling week.

And really looking at it like that made me come to terms that, yeah, sure. My career was fine on paper. I had great colleagues. Some projects were fun, some weren’t, you know, whatever. It was just a mixed thing, but it was not my soul came here to this planet to do.

[00:15:00]

And I think being honest with ourselves, we’re like, we’re not just settling anymore and we’re really rising out of whether that’s settling or mediocrity or just even that belief that we don’t deserve more.

We don’t deserve exactly what we really want. Something snapped in me and I did the same thing you did. I started my business, I started a website, I got certified. I was doing it on the weekends and the mornings, and same thing. Two years later, I went full-time and I’ve never looked back. This has been the most fulfilling career choice of my life, and it’s one of the most fulfilling choices I’ve ever made.

 

In fact, Casey, I say the 3 best choices I’ve ever made in my whole life is marrying my husband, going alcohol-free and becoming a Coach.

 

Yeah. Yeah. That’s awesome. I know for me, basically quitting drinking was my absolute worst case scenario. I spent many, many years sort of trying to moderate and get a handle on my drinking so that I would never have to stop because I loved it so much.

[00:16:00]

That was my thinking around it, and also nobody I knew didn’t drink. Like, I went through that period of time where I was like, well, if they don’t drink, they’re pregnant. They have a problem with alcohol or what the hell? They’re super lame. Like, that’s how indoctrinated I was in the alcohol culture and it took that mindset work, but also getting some distance from alcohol, figuring out how much better I felt without it, like actually removing it versus just trying to limit it to show me how much it was impacting not only me physically, but emotionally and mentally. And it really is incredible when you, when you’re able to get away from it, when you see.

Yeah. Well, I almost think of it this way, like, when you go alcohol-free or you go through an extended period without alcohol, however you like to phrase it, I feel like you’re blessed with these gifts. And you know, the obvious ones are like energy and maybe more self-love because you’re taking care of yourself in a better way.

 

[00:17:00]

And then, the less obvious stuff comes up too, like the confidence that you get out of it, the courage that you get out of it.

The creativity. Like, I was so blocked creatively when I was a drinker. I had wanted to write ever since I was a little girl. I dreamed of writing books and you know, being an author one day and I wrote a lot when I was a child, like little short stories and poems and stuff like that. And right when I became a drinker, it totally dried up. Like, I stopped writing, I even stopped journaling, which I think is really sad and says a lot, right? But the desire to write never went away. So, as I got older, I would have these New Year’s resolutions. Like this is the year I write a novel. I’m going to set aside a week, you know, every week to write, like for an hour or something.

And I would do it the first week in January and then never again. Like, it just didn’t happen. I didn’t have the discipline. And you know, I say it now, but it’s so much easier to open a bottle of wine than write the next Great American novel. I just couldn’t do it. It just something inside of me like could not pass that chasm.

[00:18:00]

And as I went alcohol-free, all of a sudden my journaling comes back like with a flourish. You know, like I’m so excited writing through these new reflections and the new insights I’m having. I think you learn so much about yourself when you remove alcohol that this, relationship with yourself starts really building and you’re really starting to understand yourself.

 

And I just started writing so much of it down. And then one day I was at a beach in Hawaii and it was my first alcohol free trip without obviously alcohol. And I was watching a sunset and I was mesmerized. Like I had never enjoyed a sunset so fully in that moment. And I was at a popular beach. So, there were a lot of people who were actually waiting in line to get a drink to watch the sunset.

Right. And all I could think was like, you’re missing it. You’re missing it.

Yeah. This is the splendor of the world and you’re missing it ’cause you think you need a drink to make it better. And in that second, this word euphoric came to me and it was like, Karolina, you are euphoric. This is what euphoric feels like.

And then about a week later, I got home from that trip and I got an entire book downloaded to my brain.

[00:19:00]

Every single chapter, every subchapter that like became my book, Euphoric: Ditch Alcohol And Gain A Happier, More Confident You and I started writing with the Flourish, and a few years later, my book was published.

I achieved one of the biggest goals and dreams I ever had since I was a little girl. Never would’ve happened if I didn’t go alcohol-free. Now, obviously the book is about the subject matter on alcohol, so I did need to get that experience. But even just the writing process, the creative process, I didn’t have that creativity and I didn’t have that relationship with my intuition when I was drinking.

And it was really sad. ’cause it’s really hard to be, I think, in a place where you don’t have a relationship with your intuition. You don’t know what to do next. You don’t know if you should go left or right. You’re just going with the inertia, with the flow, and it’s like you don’t have any guidance system.

I’m curious if you felt like anything like that, too.

Yeah, I mean I definitely do, but I think for me it was a slower process. So, when I stopped drinking, I wanted to just enjoy my life. I had spent so long trying to get through it and then basically like how I imagined it was knocking myself unconscious every night with alcohol to do it again.

 

[00:20:00]

And once I stopped drinking, and I knew this when I was drinking as well, I was like, what is wrong with me? I have a really good life. Like I have friends, I have husband, I have two kids. I love my community. You know, why am I unhappy? Why am I anxious? Why, you know, do I feel the need to knock myself unconscious every night?

 

And so, once I got away from that, I just was like. I want to be happy. I want to enjoy my life. So, I started doing this like joy practice and just trying to enjoy every moment and gratitude practice and all that stuff. And honestly, for a few years, I didn’t want not drinking to be. A huge thing about me. I just wanted it to be a part of me.

 

[00:21:00]

Like, so before, I was like, yeah, I work at L’Oreal. I’m a wife, I’m a mom, I do x, I live in Seattle. I’m a red wine girl. So, once I stopped drinking, I wanted it to be like, I work at L’Oreal. I’m a wife, I’m mom. I quit drinking. I, you know, live in Seattle, whatever. So, I didn’t want it to define me. And it wasn’t until I became a Coach and I wanted to be a Coach for basically every 40 woman, 40-year-old woman I knew at work, which was like, we did all the things.

 

You did everything right. You got all of the gold stars, and you’re like, why am I not happy? Is this what success is supposed to look like? Am I supposed to just put my head down and grip my teeth for another decade till my kid graduates college that.

I was went through that process of Coaching them and then I realized as women came to me who were that profile, but also struggled with alcohol, that it was so much easier and more fulfilling to work with women who struggled with alcohol and wanted to get rid of it.

 

[00:22:00]

Because in that process, it breaks you completely open. In that process, you have to get honest about everything about your marriage and how you feel about parenting and your schedule, and your parents and your boss, and your job, and your insecurities.

Every bit of your life, you have to get honest with it because they’re all triggers. And the great news is then you get to get rid of a lot of those resentments and irritations and build something new for yourself.

[00:23:00]

And as part of that process, It, it’s incredible with women, I mean, when I coach them and, and we, I’m sure do things a little bit differently, but my first, you’ve mentioned that sobriety is like the first step, the foundation.

So, when I work with women, the first step is Sober Coaching. Let’s get you through day 2 and day 5and day 30 and day 60 and like, get all the pieces you need to move away from alcohol and sort of cite, you know, step through all those hurdles. But the second step is Life Coaching. And what I like is for every single woman that’s different, right?

 

They define what is the next thing that they want out of their life. And for some women it’s, I don’t like my job. I want to do something else. I want to do more personal development. For other women, it’s, I need to figure out what’s going on with my marriage. For other women, they have kids on the spectrum that they want to figure out how to interact with more.

For some, they want to travel. What I love about that is for every single woman, it is something different. And that’s exciting to me. My husband laughed at me ’cause he was like, do you advise all your client clients to like, rage quit their jobs? And I’m like, no, that’s just happened to 5 of them.

[00:24:00]

You know, I think Elizabeth Gilbert said, not this, right?

I kind of don’t know what’s next, but I know it’s not this and some women that happens with them about drinking. It’s that point of clarity. And then once you get rid of that, it’s not this about a lot of other things in your life. And I think that’s what you’re talking about in terms of the world opening up and what they want to move forward with.

 

I mean, I think it’s really interesting. Yeah. For me it was joy. First.

 

Yeah. Yeah. And I think too, like what you’re saying, it’s, it’s fascinating ’cause it’s almost a phenomenon where, you know, you go alcohol free, you start to reevaluate everything else. All these emotions that were being numbed for so long are really talking to you now.

And it’s either you make changes out of this. A sense of this high that you’re riding like, wow, everything about my life can change. I have more courage now. I have more confidence now I feel better every day. Or it’s like a real honesty that things need to change. Like, look, I’m really not happy with this.

[00:25:00]

Like, what else could I do? But I think either way, going out coffee free teaches you that you can change your identity no matter what it is. And it’s fascinating you mentioned, you know, people quitting their jobs because I think that’s a big phenomenon. I’ve seen so many people, and maybe not like go putting your notice like the next day, but I just mean I’ve noticed so many women who start to open the door for another option.

When it comes to their work. So, it doesn’t mean they’re quitting their jobs tomorrow, but it’s just like, Hey, maybe this Accounting thing isn’t my thing. Maybe the thing that, you know, I’ve been socialized, I think it’s really similar to alcohol because we’ve been so socialized into drinking. That’s how you’re a normal adult.

 

That’s where all the glamor and belonging sophistication lie. And I think sometimes in our careers, we get conditioned into those too. Like, this is what’s safe, this is what’s good. Looks on paper, this is what makes your parents proud. This is what looks good on college. You know, whatever. It’s like, when was the last time have we asked ourself, is this making me happy though, right?

Mm-hmm. And a lot of times we have that sunk opportunity cost or you know, where you spent so long on something that you don’t want to stop it. But I think that reevaluation is so just honest and open to be like, you know, I can do anything for the rest of my life.

[00:26:00]

And, and just because I’ve done something before doesn’t mean I have to continue.

And it takes a lot of courage and it definitely takes a lot of, you know, bravery to question and be a beginner again, right? Like, when you start something new and you don’t know what you’re doing, but it’s so exhilarating as well because that’s like what learning looks like. That’s what passion comes from.

That’s what purpose feels like too. And I think for me. At the end of the day, the two things that were missing in my previous career that I just didn’t feel strongly enough were growth and contribution. So, I didn’t find myself growing as much as I wanted to. I not sure there was some opportunities for growth, but not like in the way I really, you know, find the, the alcohol-free trajectory has led me on.

 

And then, also contribution. Like I always wanted to make an impact. I even thought of, you know, I worked in an education setting, I was even thinking of launching my own nonprofits or social enterprises, and I just wanted to feel that my work gave back and wasn’t just like, you know, a slogan on a corporate website that, you know, we were into social responsibility, but truly that I personally make an impact.

[00:27:00]

And that’s what I never felt with my previous career. And when I started coaching as well, it was just this eye-opening experience of like. Wow. Like this woman’s life, the trajectory of her life was forever going to be different because of the work we did together. And it doesn’t mean that as a coach you’re like responsible for changing someone’s life or else or anything like that, but you’re playing such a meaningful role and just I think speaking up about your story, whether it’s through a podcast or, you know, through informal conversations too, right? Like, so it doesn’t have to be formalized into anything, but when we start to kind of share and give back, it gives so much meaning to what we’ve been through as well. And I think that really changes and I’m so excited when. The women I’ve worked with have written books because that’s like, that’s such a crowning achievement.

 

I know so many people in this world. I think it’s around 84% of all Americans want to write a book, you know? So, it’s just one of those things that I didn’t know that so many people have. Yeah. I remember one of my first clients. She just published her book this year. It’s a huge process, obviously, so it took many, many years.

[00:28:00]

But I was just like, Wow. We really started something back then together to really unearth this dream that you have. Or you know, like you mentioned, like traveling to new countries and it doesn’t always have to be a launching a business either. It could be maybe a career change. Or a position change, a boss change, a team change.

But it’s just getting honest about like, Hey, I spend a lot of time doing this work. Am I finding purpose with it? Am I finding a sense of fulfillment? And I think it’s finally getting that empowerment to saying, I actually can’t change this. Instead of feeling like life just happens to you, which I think was just the predominant mood I had when I was a drinker.

 

It was just this apathy that like, well. This is what like life gives me. So, this is what I have to do, you know? Yeah. And sense of that real true autonomy of I can design this any way I want. It’s going to take a lot of hard work, it’s going to take a lot of intentionality. I am going to spend many hours at this, but at the end of the day, it’s so, so worth it.

If you’re listening to this episode and have been trying to take a break from drinking, but keep starting and stopping and starting again, I want to invite you to take a look at my on demand coaching course, The Sobriety Starter Kit®. The Sobriety Starter Kit® is an online self study, sober coaching course that will help you quit drinking and build a life you love without alcohol without white knuckling it or hating the process. The course includes the exact step-by-step coaching framework I work through with my private coaching clients, but at a much more affordable price than one-on-one coaching. And The Sobriety Starter Kit® is ready, waiting and available to support you anytime you need it, when it fits into your schedule.  You don’t need to work your life around group meetings or classes at a specific day or time. This course is not a 30 day challenge, or a one day at a time approach. Instead, it’s a step-by-step formula for changing your relationship with alcohol. The course will help you turn the decision to stop drinking from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life. You will sleep better and have more energy, you’ll look better and feel better, you’ll have more patience and less anxiety. And with my approach you won’t feel deprived or isolated in the process. So if you’re interested in learning more about all the details, please go to www.sobrietystarterkit.com. You can start at any time and I would love to see you in the course.

 

 

[00:29:00]

And I think that sense of purpose is one of the most missing things for all people. In fact, I recently read a study by Gallup that 85% of the population finds their work meaningless. Mm-hmm. And I just think that that’s actually sometimes the source of our overdrinking as a society in the first place.

You know, like, yeah, we, we find that meaningless. There’s so much stress and pressure there, or boredom, right? I felt both stress and boredom with my previous job, which is like, how can you feel both, but you can and that just, that longing, it’s like this existential crisis of like, what did my soul come here to do?

And I think you and I aren’t saying any specific answer for anyone that’s going to be so unique to each person, but I think that that’s what the alcohol free experiment. Leads you to, it’s like, how do I answer that question? You know, it’s a big question. Yeah. I mean, I think one of the things that I did, I did in coaching school and then and it was really powerful for me when I was still in corporate and then now I do it with my clients, is the core values work.

[00:30:00]

And one of the things I realized, and I see this for a lot of women, is that what we think our core values are not actually ours. There’s what our parents have told us we should value, or what society has told us we should value. And so we internalized that. So, when I was working in corporate and going to, before I went to coaching school and people would ask me, What are your values? And I was like, okay, I integrity and responsibility and you can rely on me. I’ll never let you down, or whatever it was, right? And I went and did my core values and I realized, yes, it was integrity, but it was also beauty and pleasure, and connection and joy, all these things, and that my parents had taught me that I should really always be responsible and never let anyone down.

 

[00:31:00]

And so, it’s the idea that. You’re following someone else’s path. And once I figured out that I didn’t need someone else’s pat on the head or promotion to do a really good job, that gave me sort of the permission to follow my own path, even if it wasn’t what my boss or my parents or even my husband thought was what I should do.

And one of the cool things about that is we all have different values. We all have different core values, we all have different dreams. I’m not here, Karolina isn’t here. Any coach shouldn’t be here to tell you what those should be, but it is really powerful to figure out, you know, at the end of your life.

 

What do you want people to say about you? Because I sort of looked at that and I was like, if people say, wow, she was a great VP of marketing and never let anyone down, and was always there for every, you know, deadline, I would be like, damn, I fucked up man.

[00:32:00]

I did something wrong, you know, because I wanted to see the world and have adventures and be there for my kids and have them come home from college and want to talk with me.

And that was just out of alignment with me being on the road for a week of every month, or not being able to stand at the bus stop in the mornings, you know? And I just think it’s really interesting because someone else could choose a different priority and that’s okay. But I think when we’re drinking, we’re so out of alignment with what we care about.

We can end up really far off course.

Yeah, one of my top values I discovered was freedom, too. And so, I never liked having a bus. I didn’t like having to ask for time-off. I didn’t like to. I remember for so many years I commuted to work and then I had a puppy at home, so I had to go home to go walk the puppy and then I would go drive back and traffic to get back to work.

 

And it was like oftentimes I didn’t have a meeting in the afternoon and I was like, why am I even going back to work? Why can’t I just work from home?

[00:33:00]

Seemed so asinine for me, but it was just this sense of confinement that I had. I didn’t like that sense of like lack of autonomy over my schedule and my time and I didn’t like not being able to travel whenever I wanted to.

My husband for the longest time had to request the time-off before we could even book a plane ticket. I was like, what are we 5 years old? You know? And thank God, I was able to retire him from my Coaching business, too. We work together now, so we don’t have that problem. Oh, that’s amazing. I wanted to travel the world too.

I wanted to like have experiences. I wanted to have magical moments. I wanted to just feel like I’m making an impact while I’m living, like truly a dream lifestyle. And it’s obviously, not every day that we’re in Europe and you know, on a beautiful beach or something, but I just, I love how that’s now my autonomy to create the life that I desire.

And I just, I think at the, at the end of the, the day. Just, I didn’t have the belief before that that was even possible, that I could even design something like this. And I had one of those attitudes too, of like, oh, that must be nice for other people.

[00:34:00]

Like, you must just be lucky or you just must have, you know, stumbled into something like this.

I just didn’t even understand that, like, we had the capacity to change our lives like that. I’m really curious, Casey, for you. When you decided to become a coach and launch your own business, was it like a hundred percent declaration to your mind, like, this is what I’m going to do, I’m going to go all into this, or were you kind of like just dipping your toe, like, well, I’ll try this.

This seems kind of fun. Like how realistic did you think it was back then?

You know, what’s interesting for me, I’m a very practical person. I call myself like a practical dreamer, and I was the primary breadwinner in my family, and I had, you know, like a lot of us, I was 40 when I stopped drinking. I was a little older.

I had 2 kids. I had the mortgage, I had the health insurance, all the things. So, I had a lot of fear around sort of my responsibilities. To the family, what I had signed up for, what I needed to contribute.

[00:35:00]

And balancing that with the fact that, you know, very clearly I worked in e-commerce. So, after Black Friday, Cyber Monday, one year where I had worked all through the Thanksgiving weekend, I turned to my husband and I was like, I don’t want to do this 5 years from now.

I don’t want to do this a year from now. I don’t want to fucking do this tomorrow. Like, I don’t care. And he was like, okay, but that’s a loaded conversation, right when your finances are tied together. So, I was listening to all these different personal development stuff. I’m a huge fan of Jen Sincero’s, You Are A Badass.

And I came to him probably a month or two later and said, Hey, I want to go to this Coaching Program. It was 9 months. It was a significant investment and I was still couching it. I was like, Best case scenario. I love it. I’m good at it. And this is my next 20 year career.

[00:36:00]

Worst case scenario, I meet some really cool people. I get some great personal development, and I can apply Coaching to my Corporate career. Right. And so, turns out, it was option A. I loved it. But then, I had to go through the process of, alright, let me build up a business before I leave my corporate job and let me see how I am with clients and let me see if I can generate interest.

And, you know, turns out, I loved it and I was good at it and I could build a business that, that I could afford doing it, but there was still a leap of faith. And one thing that was funny is my, this was, I don’t know anyone, anyone here who has a job and goes into those like performance reviews. So, I was in my, you know, performance review with my GM, the head of Division and we had a lot of turnover in our company and so, she was actually really wanting to retain us and I was sober.

[00:37:00]

I’d actually already been to Coaching school, but she really wanted to keep me and she thought how she was going to keep me was giving me a bigger job and a promotion.

So, she was sitting there and was like, what do you want, Casey? Do you want more scope? Do you want more responsibility? Do you want more people? Do you want x? And I felt like I was a deer in the headlights. And somehow I sat there and I looked at her and I was like, I want to be a Life Coach. And it was just she was, I have never seen a woman who is so powerful be speechless, but she just looked at me with her open mouth and we ended the meeting somehow.

And I went back to my desk and was with, you know, everybody’s like, how’d it go, blah, blah. And I was like, here’s what I did. And they were like laughing hysterically. I was like, I feel like I’m that wolf who had their, you know, their paw caught in the trap and just decided to no off, because there was no way for me to come back to that and come back from that.

[00:38:00]

And I just felt like it was a moment where I couldn’t hold it in anymore and I couldn’t trap myself further. And I just had to be honest. But I was such a, it took me so much to get there. I actually had vision boards with all these sort of quotes where that was like, I am beginning to love the sound of my feet, walking away from things not meant for me, or there was always enough, you know – time, money and energy for what is important to you.

Just all these things to get my own personal mindset ready to cut that cord. So, that was a long answer to your question, but no, it was not a, I’m going to do this and I have all the confidence in the world. It was incremental steps to getting myself ready to do that brave thing. What about you? I just want to comment real quick, like I think so many people put Life Coaching into like a fluffy or kind of silly pursuit, especially maybe from the corporate world and like, well, look what you’ve done.

[00:39:00]

You have a Sober Coaching Empire, you have one of the top podcasts in the world. Like it’s just for anyone, you know, who was in that conversation with you many years ago. You know, laughing like, okay, I tell you one thing because that, when you said that, one of my biggest fears was, is Life Coaching even a job?

 

Like, is this going to be a joke? Like what are people going to think of me? Because I had a lot of ego and sort of like, I, it was very much tied to who I thought I was as a person and my measure of success, my job, my title, whatever. And my husband’s best friend, and I’m still friends with this guy a decade later, and but said to my husband.

She’s going to be a Life Coach. I thought that was for people who couldn’t make it in the corporate world. And that was like a dagger to my heart because that was my worst fear, was that that was what people would think.

[00:40:00]

And I had to do a lot of mindset work to jump over that and to be like, no. It is more secure and smarter to build a business for myself than to work in an industry where we have annual layoffs and reorganizations and shifts and all that kind of stuff. To build something for myself rather than paying and working to increase the profits of someone else’s organization. But it is funny because now that that guy, my husband’s best friend, is like my biggest supporter, and you know, when I was in the New York Times, he sent it around to everyone he knew and you know, all the things.

 

He’s always been like, so how many downloads are you up to on your podcast? But seriously, he was like. I thought Life Coaching was for people who couldn’t make it, you know? So yes. That was you when you said that, I was like, yes. That was a huge thing I had to overcome. Yeah. And I love too, like it’s like proving people wrong.

[00:41:00]

Like, you can build an empire, you can become a thought leader, you can become a best-selling author, a top ranked podcast, like the sky’s the limit and you get to do it while helping people, you know, and truly making that difference and feeling fulfilled. Like I feel so fulfilled.

And I mentioned earlier, that boredom was a huge part of the reason why I think, you know, drinking was even alluring for me each weekend. And I’ll be honest with you, like yeah, I can have a Sunday afternoon where I feel a little bored, you know, maybe, but like the existential boredom that I used to feel, I don’t feel that anymore. I actually truly feel fulfilled almost every single night I put my head on the pillow of what I do.

Not only do I love the Coaching aspect and helping people and the relationships you build over time and all that beautiful stuff, but it’s also so challenging being an entrepreneur in the best way possible because you’re building something for you, like, this is your baby. And like, you said before, like you know, a company can lay you off or you might not agree with a certain project direction or even a certain milestone and stuff like that. Everything here, you, you become obsessed with because if you don’t love it, you switch it or you pivot it, you know?

 

[00:42:00]

And I think for me, I’ve changed actually my business. I don’t work with as many women who are just starting their sober journey. We do have like some in-house programs for that, but for me, it’s now helping women who are at this phase who are like, okay, I’m a few months alcohol-free now, maybe a year or so, whatever, and now I want this new direction, this new chapter, and I want to feel this sense of purpose and I want to go after something of my own.

 

And, you know, as an entrepreneur for so many years, I feel like now it’s my next active service to share that journey as well. First, it was the alcohol-free journey. Now, it’s this journey because, you know, that’s what we’re here for. We go through things and challenges and evolutions. I’ve, I believe, to help the person behind us, you know, and lots of people want to get, you know, into Coaching or into the Sober niche or into wellness coaching and all that kind of stuff.

 

And I’d love to just be as transparent as possible, like feel free to DM me if you’re listening to the show, if you have a question, because you know, a lot of people think of it as a pipe dream. Like, only very few people can be successful at it. And there’s just so many different ways to do it. You know, you can be the type of person who has a lot of one-on-one clients and does a lot of referrals and kind of plays a local game in that sense.

[00:43:00]

Or you could be a top podcaster and you know, have a huge audience or something like that. So, I think it’s really interesting, all the different options. But I think for me, Casey, I like dipped my toe into it. At first, I, I knew my soul was guiding me to it, but my ego was like, is this going to work? So, each little step I did was just kind of like a, we’ll just try that, you know?

So I was like, I’ll just try putting up an Instagram page and then I’ll just like file an LLC. ’cause you know, why not? And then, I remember having a meeting with a business advisor. It’s actually ironic. I, in my old career, helped set up a small business development center at our university and like helped hire everyone and all this kind of stuff.

And so, I was actually meeting that with them now as a client and the business advisor I just remember was really patronizing and he is like, oh, this, you think people are really going to want to stop drinking? Like ,when I told them the business idea, I was like, yes. Like, this isn’t like a little fluffy, you know, thing.

Like this is going to be an empire even though I was like still unsure and, and you know, had no idea what it would really become.

[00:44:00]

But I started to like, get defensive and just be like, no, I’m, I’m really building something that’s going to be big and last. And I think that that perseverance and also that deeper why of like, why you’re doing what you’re doing.

It just holds you to the next level and to the next level and to the next level. You know, you and I have now been around in this industry for quite a long time and it’s just so cool to see other communities grow and the initiatives grow and just how much opportunity there is with that.

But I’m so glad I did it and I think, you know, whoever listening to this show, whether it’s like coaching or another entrepreneurial venture or another decision that like is coming out of the alcohol-free journey, I don’t think you’re going to regret it if your intuition is really guiding you there.

 

What if you thought of it this way that maybe the universe is even tapping you on the shoulder to remove alcohol because you have such a big purpose? Like. how special does that feel instead of, oh, you have a big problem, or you really messed this up, or you somehow really got into drinking. It’s like, no, no, no. Everyone drinks too much.

[00:45:00]

That’s, that’s common, but what if you are actually listening to this because you have such a big purpose? That’s why the universe is getting you to re-evaluate alcohol. It’s like preparing you for this huge life and this huge contribution or this huge joy and pleasure and adventure that you’re meant to go on.

 

I just, once I really started adopting that belief, like we really truly get to see, it’s cosmic almost that the journey that we’ve been on, you know, it’s really special.

Yeah. I mean, I think what, you know, I love this quote and I used to have it up in my office. It’s, it’s about

“Maybe the journey is not about becoming anything. Maybe the journey is about unbecoming everything that was never really you, so you can be who you were meant to be in the first place.”

 

And I think a lot of times we drink because we’re trying to fit ourselves. Like a square peg in a round hole. We’re trying to be who we think we are supposed to be or who’s what someone else told us we were supposed to be and drinking because that makes it easier.

[00:46:00]

That’s what you know. I always ask the question when people are in the early days, what do you not have to think about? When you drink, right? Mm-hmm. And for some people, it’s their job. For some people, it’s their marriage. For some people, it’s, I want something and I’m not doing it, whatever it is. But I always come back to this story that that cracked me up again.

It was like the Life Coach thing. So, I was in college and I decided I wanted to be a Sociology major, an American History and Sociology. And the reason that I wanted that was because I loved the idea of really understanding how society is shaped and how, you know, people are made to believe a specific thing. How group of people come together to create a movement, all that kind of stuff. It’s, you know, Psychology, but at a mass scale and understanding the history around it.

[00:47:00]

And I went home in college for Christmas and told my dad. Who I adore, who is a diplomat in the American Foreign Service. I told him I wanted to be a Sociology major and he looked at me and said, no offense Casey, which means he’s about to offend me.

I have never known anyone who ever amounted to anything who majored in Sociology. And then, he took the extra step. Thank you Dad of said, at least I don’t have to tell my friends. You’re a Women’s studies major. Mm. And that was like a dagger to my heart. And guess what I did? I went into Business Consulting.

I spent 20 years working for Rich White Men. Building businesses for them to get the right title. So, that in some ways my father would, you know, think I was doing a fantastic job. And what’s interesting is that when I, I mean, what do I do?

[00:48:00]

I’m a freaking Life and Sobriety Coach for women like combined Sociology and women’s studies, and that’s kind of what you get, right? Like, how can we shift the behavior of lots of people tapping into Psychology and movement and what they want and empowerment. And so, it’s kind of come full circle and that’s why I think maybe the journey is unbecoming what you were told you were meant to be. To be what you were meant to be in the first place.

So, it’s just interesting and I love the idea of sobriety, allowing you to take a look at what’s working for you, what’s not working for you, and how you can shift that. Not blowing up your life, but small incremental shifts that are steps towards a happier future.

 

Yeah. Oh my. That’s so profound. And isn’t it so interesting, like the clues that you had from that younger age? I remember I wanted to be between like an author, a Psychologist, and a teacher, and none of those three exactly fit right. Like, the way that it was presented to me back as I was growing. You know, that’s amazing.

[00:49:00]

Exactly. And like, we couldn’t have even imagined, like this industry, maybe coaching has existed at fur. Longer, but online coaching, online business, like what’s available to us today, we couldn’t do when we graduated college. You know what I mean? Yeah. And I think it’s really profound to recognize that the eras has also changed.

That you really can do anything with the power of the internet these days. And even if it was a, you know, crazy pipe dream when you’re a 5 years old to write your, like a movie and get it developed and something like that. It’s not as crazy today. Like there’s actually so much more means. Today, an opportunity to, you know, harness the power of the, how we’re connected and, you know, there’s a how to tutorial about literally anything.

There’s not like a lack of information anymore on this world. So, I think it’s like recognizing that we’re not these like, shaped people and thinking just that alcohol came in right at that same time, you know? Right. As our brains aren’t even fully developed yet. And it’s just another way we’re conditioned to just do what everyone else is doing.

[00:50:00]

Follow the way, you know? And I think it’s fascinating how rebellious it is to go alcohol-free, but then also to take it a step further and be like, who you were really meant to be as you as you talked about earlier. And having the courage to do that and knowing it’s not like an overnight process, you know.

 

It’s going to be a multi-year thing, but what else are you going to do with your time? Right? The time’s going to pass, and I just read an incredible book called, The Experiential Billionaire, and it’s all about how our experiences and our memories and quality time and doing the things we really want to do is what we are going to really remember, or the things that we’re going to regret the most when we die.

And it was just so special to think of that, you know, like that top regret of the dying is not being who I really wanted to be on this planet. You know? And what greater permission slip than going alcohol-free to finally do that? Like, you got the courage, you got the confidence. Let’s go.

So, I’m so curious, Casey, you have the of the energy, all of, I mean, it’s incredible.

[00:51:00]

Yeah. If we want to, you know, start to wrap up, I think we could talk forever. Like, where can my audience find more about you and learn more about your programs?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the easiest place to find me is at hellosomedaycoaching.com, and you can find everything there. I’ve got a free guide for your first month alcohol-free.

I’ve got my Sobriety Starter KitÒ coaching program, and you can also find out all about. My podcast, which is the Hello Someday podcast for Sober Curious Women.

What about you? Amazing. Well, all my things are found at euphoricaf.com and I do run a 5 x certification program. So, what that looks like is that you would get trained not only as an Alcohol-Free Coach, which so many people who go alcohol-free or so interested in giving that back and helping other people with that, but also trained as a mindset coach, a success coach, which is all about helping people find that deeper sense of purpose and fulfillment.

Now that alcohol’s out of the way. And an NLP practitioner and hypnosis practitioner. Now, since I’ve been around in the entrepreneurship space for a long time, I also know that without the business building skills, like the coaching business doesn’t take off and it’s so important to have those both.

 

[00:52:00]

So, we actually include those 5 certifications and business building in the format of a business mastermind and our program.

And an inclusive in-person retreat as well. So, it’s kind of a, one of a kind program. With that, we have the most incredible people graduating every single year. So, if that’s something you’re interested in, do check it out at my page, euphoricaf.com. I also help other alcohol-free entrepreneurs keep growing their businesses ’cause I just, you know, the voice and the impact that we have as a society is just so big.

And like you said earlier, you could work for, you know, some rich white guy and keep on, you know, with the status quo or we could change the world. And I think women who speak up and really have these movements to share, like they can seriously change culture. And so, being able to do that with the online world and the marketing and all that kind of stuff, it’s not easy, but it’s like there are roadmaps to follow. There’s a lot of mentors obviously out there who can help you with that. So, I’ve kind of shifted a little too into the business, into the certification.

[00:53:00]

Yeah. But it’s just such a joy because it’s, it’s truly taking question, that existential question of what’s next to that next level? And obviously, not everyone’s going to become a coach or be in the alcohol-free space, but it’s, curious how many people get so passionate about it once they go alcohol-free.

 

And whether you do it formally as a coach or even just informally, like, people ask you questions, people want to know how you did it. People want to know you know how these changes happened, and just start looking up to you and stuff like that. So, the ripple effect is huge, whether you know you’re doing it formally or informally, which I think is really special.

And then, check me out on Instagram. I’m pretty active there as well @euphoric.af.

That’s awesome. And we were talking before we jumped on that, you know, I went to a huge sort of international coaching school that, you know, taught coaches for a lot of corporate, corporate work as well. And one of the things that I thought was really missing from most coaching programs is that business development meant and marketing piece of it and branding and finding your niche and how to build a business.

[00:54:00]

And I think that I got really lucky that I had 20 years experience doing that on my own. But a lot of coaches don’t have that, and it is incredibly helpful because in order to have this build be a business to help a lot of people, you really do have to get your message out there and make it sustainable.

Yeah, well, totally agreed. And it’s such an honor to be able to offer that part because I did all those programs that didn’t have it either, and I had to learn the hard way, you know? And so, now, it’s like, this is the foundations, this is how you get your ideal clients. This is how you market. This is how you launch an amazing podcast.

All those things like, you know, I wish I just had them in one place when I was starting.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, great. Thank you for doing this. Hopefully a lot of people listening to this will start opening their eyes and hearts and just imaginations to think about what’s next.

Yeah. I have such a pleasure. I love talking to you, Casey.