Welcome to the Stop Drinking Podcast , where we help you make stopping drinking a simple , logical and easy decision . We help you with tips , tools and strategies to start living your best life when alcohol-free . If you want to learn more about stop drinking coaching , then head over to wwwsoberclearcom .
Let's imagine for a second you'd stopped drinking alcohol for six months , and this would be pretty awesome , right ? But imagine I came up to you and I said congratulations , it's been six months and as a reward , you've got two options you can either have an espresso martini or you can have $100,000 . What are you going to pick ?
Well , seven or eight years ago , however long it was I didn't choose the money . I chose to drink , and I'll explain what this means in a minute . But I relapsed on a New Year's Eve and it cost me 100 grand , maybe even more .
So if you want some motivation and you want some inspiration to stick on this path , to stay sober and make yourself a few hundred grand in the process , definitely watch this video , because I want to warn you what can happen when you drink alcohol , when you relapse . So a quick introduction . My name is Leon Sylvester .
I'm the founder of SoberClearedcom , which is a coaching company that works with business owners and professionals . We help them get control of their drinking within as little as 48 hours . Our success rate is between 92% and 97% , and I have the most viewed YouTube channel in the world when it comes to stop drinking content .
We've got over 20 million views Now , despite not drinking for six years . Life didn't used to be this way . I've been up and down with alcohol for as long as I can remember and I've done it all . I've drank every single day . I've binge-drinked , I've quit drinking with Alcoholics Anonymous with Willpower , with begging God to help me . I've done it all .
But the worst relapse of my life happened on a New Year's Eve seven or eight years ago , I can't remember . I'd basically quit drinking with willpower for six , seven , eight months and my life during that six to eight months was just amazing . I was in the best shape I'd ever been .
I had a six pack , I had a girlfriend , I had a Mercedes , I had a personal training business whilst I was a full-time student , and it was making just under 100,000 US dollars per year as a full-time student . When I'm not drinking , I'm not drinking . I'm a different beast compared to when I'm drinking .
Right , when I'm drinking , it's nothing like that , but because I had consistently not drank for such a long period of time , I was just taking over . I was just killing it and listen . That might come across as arrogant , but if you knew what I was like when I drank , you'd think the same You'd be like . This guy is a different person .
Anyway , I went out on a New Year's Eve party . It was me , my friend , my friend had invited some girls and we went to this club called the Hospital Club . It's a famous private members club in London and I'm a guy from a small town in England that's never been in a private members club before .
I might have been to this place once or twice with my friend before the party , but to me this was like a very special place , like when I was growing up I didn't even know these places existed . So on the night it was fancy right . It was a great Gatsby themed party .
You know , everybody's wearing suits and hats and it was really , really cool and people in this place were super successful . You know , I met a guy that night who I'm still in touch with to this day and I'm like he's like , what do you do ? I'm like , oh , I do personal training . I've got a personal training business .
He's drinking champagne , right , he offers me a champagne . I have my own fund and we do sustainable investing in places like Africa and stuff like that , and I'm like that's cool . So I've seen this successful man drinking and then I look around and everybody's drinking , right , everybody , and everybody is having a great time .
People are talking like crazy , you know , super loud . And whilst I went into that occasion thinking I wasn't going to drink , there was a switch in my head . What started happening is I started having a positive association with alcohol . I forgot about the pain that it caused me for 10 years and in that moment I just thought , oh yeah , drinking .
There was just this switch . I thought about the guy drinking his champagne . I thought about , you know , all of these people laughing and joking and I didn't see just the occasion as the good time . I just started seeing alcohol as the one thing that everybody had in common . So this little voice in my head came up and it's like Leon , just have one drink .
That thought is a demon . I had one espresso martini and within five minutes of finishing it , I'm drinking another one . Then I'm on the beers and then , before you know it , I'm smashed .
Now I was already having a great time before I drank , but as soon as I got that feeling of missing out , a feeling like everybody was doing something and I'm the odd one out that's not actually , you know , enjoying themselves properly as soon as that switch happened in my mind , it was game over .
And one of the biggest problems is the next day when I was waking up with a hangover . I had really good memories of that night . I didn't think , oh , alcohol sucks , it's the worst thing ever . The worst thing that happened is I had a positive association with that evening and drinking alcohol and that just prolonged into a relapse that destroyed my entire life .
I lost my business , sold my car , moved to London , failed in a career in recruitment , failed as a personal trainer , kept drinking , had to move back to Oxford where I was at university , had to go and work in a restaurant . My life just crumbled apart because of that one decision to drink that espresso martini .
That cost me almost a six-figure personal training business and in fact it probably cost me a lot more because of the opportunity cost , because that probably would have grown even higher . And here's what I should have done instead , instead of associating positivity and that night and alcohol all as one thing . I should have just gone home and played it out .
I should have sat with myself and said right , listen , leon , that was a mistake and get real with yourself , because if you don't fix it right now , leon , what's going to happen ? Because I knew in my heart what would have happened . I knew it would have just started snowballing and everything would have crumbled .
I didn't say that to myself , I didn't play it out , I just thought everything's going to be fine , right , and it was almost denial . I was lying to myself and if I could go back in time , I would have just sat down , had a conversation , got real with myself and then I would have asked for help .
I would have stopped telling myself that it's okay that I'm going to figure it out , whatever . I would have found support . That's what I should have done , but I didn't , and it cost me so much . Thanks for checking out the Stop Drinking Podcast by Sober Clear .
If you want to learn more about how we work with people to help them stop drinking effortlessly , then make sure to visit wwwsoberclearcom .